March 11, 2008 – Rosemont, Illinois
John Morrison & The Miz def. Tommy Dreamer & Colin Delaney {WWE Tag Team Championship Extreme Rules Match}
Pandering (Chicago Cubs & Bears gear) and inconsistent rule issues (why do rope breaks matter in a match without disqualifications?) aside, this was fun as they were able to rely on the plunder to hide their glaring workrate issues. The babyfaces more or less dominated, which was a nice bit of relief, until the champs surprised Dreamer with a double spinebuster through a table. Actually, even the finish was a little hinky as Morrison had just been taken out on the floor, but whatever I’ll overlook it because this is the first time in I can’t even remember how many episodes that I wasn’t bored by a match. ***
The Great Khali def. Stevie Richards
This match existed to hype Khali being in a battle royal at WrestleMania to determine the challenger for the ECW Championship the same night. Khali won in ten seconds, which really pisses me off because I had to spend time watching Richards rehab matches only for him to be a jobber again so soon. After the match, Mike Knox attacks Richards, which I guess he did the previous week after Richards’ loss to Benjamin (that bit was only shown online). Why do this? Richards was completely devalued in two weeks, so who could possibly care about this issue between two losers? N/A
Kofi Kingston def. Deuce
This was more or less a squash. Kingston won in three minutes and Deuce got maybe one offensive maneuver in before that. N/A
Festus def. Elijah Burke
I’m not sure what the point of this was, the commentators never gave us one, but Festus kept the pace of his matches really entertaining so I had no problem with this. He won this short, competitive match with a flapjack. **¼
CM Punk def. Big Daddy V
Punk won by count out, and in doing so got a spot in the Money in the Bank ladder match. If this had a real finish it would have been V’s best match, but as it is it’s probably on par with his little decent matches against Chris Benoit and Chris Jericho. Punk beats up Matt Striker after the match. **½
By the standards of this show, this was a really solid episode.