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WrestleMania 25: Previewing Edge vs. Cena vs. Show for the World title

Sunday April 5, 2009 BY iFight365.com

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We’re previewing the full card for WWE’s WrestleMania 25 PPV which takes place tonight.

iFight365.com will have live coverage this evening from around 5pm EST/10pm UK time.

Edge defends his World title in Houston against John Cena and Big Show in a triple threat match. Has the build been good? Is a triple threat match the right way for WWE to have gone about it?

Mark Bright: John Cena’s positioning here is definitely the weakest spot on a WrestleMania card ever for the guy who is the biggest star in the company. . And he did a clean job on TV to Show on the go-home RAW. When people talk about Cena not getting a 100% positive reaction, I think booking him so poorly like that is part of the reason why. The WWE has always been its most successful when the top babyface is a charismatic and unbeatable superman.

Steve Austin became the biggest draw of all time because he was your hero who would kick ass and always win, even when faced with other top level stars like Undertaker and Rock, it was clear who the top guy was because Austin always beat them. Hulk Hogan, in his first run in WWE lasting 8 years he lost twice on screw job endings and once clean, other than that he was the big hero who was on top and always won. John Cena loses all the time and people are somehow surprised he isn’t as over as Hogan and Austin were. Clean jobs on the go-home TV show? Fucking boneheaded.

Part of it is that if they booked Austin or Michaels, or Bret or HHH this badly they’d either walk out, or politic and get things changed, which Cena really should’ve done on Monday. Having Show about to win (but not after a chokeslam so you’re at least left with some doubt in terms of “Cena was down but he might come back into it”) and having Edge come out to attack him just as he did after the RAW match, would’ve been fine. With that out of the way, the biggest star in the company is stuck as the spare man in a 3-way love triangle deal with Big Show, Edge and Vickie Guerrero. And while that is something they’ve hinted at for months, adding Cena actually takes away from that issue so it cheapens all four personalities.

Things would have been far better if Cena had got a dream match with an Austin or Hogan to headline the show, and doing Edge v. Show with Vickie in the middle for the World Title. But this is what we’re left with, and despite the lacklustre build, I have enough faith in all three of these guys to bring their working boots with them. Edge and Cena are at a stage where they’ve wrestled each other so much they could have a good match together in their sleep, and if Big Show can step it up at WrestleMania and have a great match with a non-wrestler as he did last year, they can definitely put something cool together for a WrestleMania World Title match.

As for a winner, the “winner gets Vickie” stipulation suggests to me that Cena wins, since he’s the only one that doesn’t want her, and it’ll lend itself to some bad comedy to further book their top star in situations where he looks like a complete geek.

Phil Lowe: It’s a title match which I have very little interest in. Although Cena vs. Edge has been done before, I’d much rather have seen that match than the triple threat match we’ll see on Sunday night. It’s not a slur on Big Show though, as I quite like watching the guy in the right match and with the right opponent – I’m just not a huge fan of triple threat matches when there’s a title on the line. Would it be unfair to say WWE decided against another Cena vs. Edge match because some people in the company thought it would be a better match than Triple H vs. Randy Orton?

The build to this match has been pretty poor, although the match itself at Mania should still be at the very least, solid. If Show has his working boots on (and look at his performance at WrestleMania last year to see how capable he can be), it could be very good. But the whole love triangle stuff has been poor and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see Cena win the belt here just for the “comedy” that will follow on TV over the next couple of weeks between him and Vickie Guerrero. Ultimately though, the story here has been the piss-poor way in which WWE has booked John Cena heading into the match. Cena may well still be over with many fans, but he’s looked like a total chump over the past few weeks and in no way should he have been doing jobs.

James Mustoe: I’d have Cena go over as Edge shouldn’t be winning at WrestleMania right now and I just can’t see Big Show going over. All three men have had some good exchanges/matches with each other in the last few weeks which bode well for the in-ring quality of this match. However the overexposure issue is still there, and again I am just not that interested in seeing these three wrestle again (and pay for it).

Michael Campbell: These guys will have to work hard to overcome audience apathy. Their feud has been built upon soap-opera guff, and although at times that’s been amusing, I think most fans don’t see it as WrestleMania title match-worthy. I would agree. Additionally, we’ve seen matches between Cena and Show, and Edge and Cena countless times before. With Big Show, this past week on Raw, they attempted to build him as the favourite, by having him cleanly beat Cena, but this approach doesn’t work, because they’ve done NOTHING else to make him look like a badass, and he’s been defeated in countless matches before. Cena’s even defeated him at a previous WrestleMania! There’s nothing different about him than two months ago, and that’s why as far as he’s concerned, this match is no buys.

If this match somehow goes on last (I strongly doubt it), you can guarantee Cena will win the title. However, I think they have the sense to go with Orton/Trips as the finale, and that throws the result of this wide open. I’m going to go with Edge to retain, because I’m getting the feeling this will be a way to balance the other results, and I can’t see them putting the title on Big Show. At least I hope not, argh. Winner: Edge.

Dan Short: The idea of John Cena vs. Edge at WrestleMania would have been just fine by itself. Granted they have long since overdone the spark to their epic feud years ago, it’s still great fun to see the two hit it off. Then they had to foul the whole thing up with two additions that made absolutely no sense including in the first place: The Big Show and Vickie Guerrero.

The Big Show being involved in a WrestleMania championship match at this point is always bad news. He is well past his prime and, given the kind of matches he had generally be involved in the past number of WrestleMania’s, it just didn’t seem logical to add him into the mix. Vince is obviously keen on big men, but to put Big Show in a championship match at WrestleMania just doesn’t draw the way he feels it should.

And then you have the whole Vickie Guerrero mess. The way the match was being built the last few weeks with her thrown into the mix really killed off any form of excitement for the match. It’s a waste of time and effort. Not to mention her angle really has not part in the mix for a championship match at WrestleMania. Elizabeth worked for the Ric Flair vs. Randy Savage match at WrestleMania VIII because everyone involved played their roles with such believability and dedication that it was a magnificent showcase. It doesn’t work here because none of it is believable and the dedication just isn’t there.

Okay, enough nit-picking on my end. I see either Cena winning the belt or Edge somehow retaining. I don’t see Big Show getting any closer to the belt then he is now.

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