What a Difference a Year Makes

A pleasant surrpise
Photo Credit: WWE.com

I really didn't like Undertaker/Triple H last year. Really not at all. Well, that's a lie. I liked the finishing sequence. That told a really good part of a story, but the problem was that the first two-thirds of the match was just so boring and ploddingly paced that I might've fallen asleep had the circumstances been a little different. So, I really was dreading the Hell in a Cell variant of the match this year. I don't know what them change the way the match was laid out, but it certainly worked for me.

It certainly stands to reason that both guys actually looked healthier and more mobile this year than last year. I think that's the most obvious answer as to why the layabout spots were necessary from the first slightly big bump in the match, but both men actually looked like they could actually do more than just lay around after each move was hit. I think that it was for different reasons. Undertaker got the benefit of sitting out for a whole year between his matches, while Triple H, whose first match back to WWE in almost a year after being put on the shelf by Sheamus was last year's Streak match, had the benefit of getting more into ring shape through limited action. That might not make sense, but at the same time, different bodies need different conditioning.

I also think that the addition of Shawn Michaels as the guest referee helped things out on a few levels. One, it allowed them to do stalling spots that actually had something to grab the viewers' attention. I don't know how this played out live, but for me in my living room, I was much happier seeing Trips bark at Michaels to stop the match or else he was going to stop Undertaker for good rather than seeing Taker and Trips lay around the ring like they just got stampeded in the streets of Pamplona after a vertical suplex. Two, his presence added a great element to the story throughout the contest.

My only quibble with the match was that I don't think they really needed the cell. The smart-ass answer was that it was needed to protect the fans from random objects being thrown from the ring, but other than that, was it used as a weapon? Neither guy was really thrown into it. I saw a couple of people on Twitter proclaim that it was the best Hell in a Cell match ever, but even if it was a better match than Undertaker/Brock Lesnar or Triple H/Cactus Jack, it wasn't a better Cell match. The structure actually played a huge role in both matches, while in this one, it was basically only an impedance for Charles Robinson to enter after Michaels was choked out momentarily.

Be that as it may, I was pleasantly surprised by how good this year's match was. I hope that this closes the book on Trips as a challenger to Taker's streak, because the Dead Man's only got a couple of matches left. I'd rather see him take on a run of opponents (Cena, Lesnar, MIZ??) rather than keep retreading guys whom he's already beaten. That being said, it was certainly one of the better matches in Undertaker's Mania run, which is more than I can say for last year's match.