12 Biggest Takeaways from WWE Roadblock

The WWE Network Special Roadblock took place on Saturday and was the culmination of a two-week build-up following the Fastlane PPV. The matches advertised were The New Day vs. The League of Nations, Brock Lesnar vs. Bray Wyatt, The Revival vs. Enzo and Cass for the NXT Tag Team Championships, and the main event of Dean Ambrose vs. Triple H for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. Overall, the network special was received as a decent show, but one with many flaws such as the botch in The New Day match, the random returns of Stardust and Jack Swagger, and many more things that made the event problematic. Some fans were predicting that this show had the potential to surpass WrestleMania, but those predictions definitely did not come to fruition.

After watching the special and reviewing what happened on the show, I have come up with the 12 Biggest Takeaways from WWE Roadblock. This list covers every single match that was aired and discussed their biggest problems and the overall reason why the show could be viewed as a waste of time.

Let’s take a look.

1. New Day Rocks…New Day Rocks

The match between The New Day and The League of Nations was a nice way to kick off the show. Although the buildup coming out of Fastlane occurred mostly on social media, similarly to the build up to the match between Brock Lesnar and Kofi Kingston, the match itself was good. The tag team tandem with The New Day has only gotten better and better since the group started to rise in popularity. Big E was especially on the top of his game and performed well in this match, but as usual, it’s the culmination of the group that makes them a success. This all but confirms that The New Day will be defending the tag team championships heading into WrestleMania. What that means for The League of Nations is unclear as of now.

2. Suplex City is a Little Too Repetitive

After Brock Lesnar ended The Streak, the Beast Incarnate would gain a reputation as the new age suplex machine after he suplexed John Cena 16 times to gain the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. Since that time, Lesnar has heavily relied on that style of offense and we’ve seen little deviation in his move set since. At first, this was an interesting change because of how devastating Lesnar would make them look. And while they’re still devastating looking, their starting to get a bit old at this point. If he is going to maintain his moniker as the enforcer of Suplex City, then he’ll need to do more than just German Suplexes. Imagine if Lesnar was doing all the suplexes that Taz used to do, he’d be an even bigger badass than he is presently.

3. Bray Wyatt Didn’t Fight As Advertised

The feud that started between The Wyatt Family and Brock Lesnar was seemingly canned heading into Fastlane and was moved to this network special after the WWE announced Dean Ambrose as Lesnar’s WrestleMania opponent. With that in mind, fans were ready to see the Eater of Worlds, Bray Wyatt, take on the Beast Incarnate. What the fans got instead was a handicap match that ultimately morphed into a one-on-one match between Luke Harper and Lesnar. The match itself wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t what the WWE advertised. Also, if anyone saw the footage of Lesnar at another house show in Canada that week, then you ultimately saw the same match twice. On one hand, this means that a genuine Wyatt-Lesnar feud can be saved for the future and be built up properly, but at the end of the day the WWE didn’t deliver on what they promised with The Wyatt Family. Just like at last year’s Survivor Series.

4. Jack Swagger vs. Chris Jericho Made No Sense

In the second match of the show and the first unadvertised match of the night, Chris Jericho came out and disparaged his Canadian fan base and discussed how he was angry that the fans chose AJ Styles over him. He then went on to discuss men like Jack Swagger and other up-and-coming wrestlers who defeated Jericho at one point or another. After continuing to badmouth Canada, Jericho was interrupted by the All-American American Jack Swagger. While it did fit the idea of what Jericho was talking about in regards to younger stars defeating him, most fans felt it should’ve been a Canadian wrestler who came out to defend the country. And considering how WWE had Sami Zayn on the show anyway, it would’ve only made sense for the two to have a match.

5. CM Punk

In one of the more bizarre moments of the night, the Canadian WWE Universe fans started chanting CM Punk’s name for little to no reason. The first time it occurred was during the Jack Swagger and Chris Jericho match where the match was rushed, had no build-up, and didn’t really make sense. Although it is somewhat disrespectful to chant another wrestlers name during a match, it was understandable as to why the fans weren’t satisfied. However, this reasoning would be crushed when the main event title match between Triple H and Dean Ambrose took place and the chants still persisted. Considering the internet’s hype and desire for Ambrose to win this match, you would think that the fans would be on the edge of their seat as their last chance to see Ambrose main event WrestleMania is slipping by. Instead, it seemed like it was more important to chant for Punk. For what reason, I have no clue.

6. Stardust is Beyond Boring

Following the “handicap match” between Bray Wyatt and Luke Harper against Brock Lesnar, the WWE sent Sami Zayn and Stardust out to have a match and there are too many problems to name with this. The first problem with this match is how random and unannounced it was. Secondly, the match had absolutely no story to it as Stardust hasn’t been seen on the main roster in months and Sami Zayn hasn’t had any interactions with Stardust at all. Lastly, the match itself just wasn’t impressive. The newest addition to the main roster facing one of the biggest losers in the company equals an uninteresting match.

7. Enzo and Cass are Due for a Big Victory

Ever since the last NXT Takeover special, the fans have been craving for Enzo Amore and Colin Cassidy to have their next big moment. Whether that moment means debuting on the main roster and winning the tag team championships or finally defeating Scott Dawson and Dash Wilder, the fans were anticipating one of these things to become a reality. And after WWE Roadblock, it’s safe to assume that Enzo and Cass will be headed to the main roster without any wins under their belt. The match itself was okay, but the finish was definitely not what fans were looking for. If they don’t debut before WrestleMania, expect to see them the night after.

8. Natalya is Underutilized

Natalya is one of the better wrestlers on the roster and she definitely needs to be given more TV time in the near future. As a native of Canada and a relative of Bret “The Hitman” Hart, the third generation diva was received greatly by the Toronto, Canada crowd. And the match that Natalya and Charlotte had for the Diva’s Championship was one of the best matches of the night. Of course, it wasn’t expected that Natalya would win with the triple threat match between Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks looming at WrestleMania, but this was still a good edition to the card. Perhaps WWE could add her to the triple threat and make it into a fatal 4-way, but that may just be wishful thinking.

9. This was Great…for Monday Night Raw

Whether you loved WWE Roadblock or hated it, I think we can all agree that the show was more entertaining than the average Raw. Multiple title defenses and a Brock Lesnar match would make any card more interesting. The sad part about this show is the fact that it would’ve been superb if some of those matches took place on Monday Night Raw. Matches with part-timers who rarely, if ever, fight for free would’ve been very interesting. The show would need correcting and fixing to fit more into the WrestleMania buildup, but overall the fans would probably be more entertained because of those things. Now we’ll have to wait until Raw to find out if the WWE can top this show and actually start to build towards WrestleMania.

10. Roadblock was a Bad-timed Special

For the past few years, the WWE had a formula that ultimately built-up to Showcase of the Immortals which consisted of the Royal Rumble PPV, a transition PPV (whatever it may be), all TV in between, and the WrestleMania PPV itself. All these matches played key roles in laying the foundation for the next revealed storyline and match that would come to an end when WrestleMania was said and done. This year, the WWE already had the Royal Rumble and Fastlane now serves as the transition PPV. So with all that in mind, what was the point of Roadblock again? Nothing was changed, further developed, or hinted at so this WWE Network special was essentially a waste of time. Now had this special been scheduled between SummerSlam and Survivor Series and actually built to things to come, then this show as a whole would’ve been great. But as of now, Roadblock was a network special that was better than Fastlane in match quality, but worse than Fastlane in building up to the next big show.

11. Roman Reigns was an Afterthought

Never before have I seen a world champion contender off of television for so long without any explanation as to why he’s gone and no predetermined date as to when he will return. Roman Reigns is looking to headline his second WrestleMania in a match with Triple H for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship and the two have done nothing to build their feud up. It could’ve been as simple as making Reigns a special guest referee and that would’ve helped build a potential feud with Ambrose as well as increase the drama heading into his match against Triple H. Instead, Reigns was barely mentioned and is rumored not to be scheduled to be back until the end of March. What an awful way to build to WrestleMania.

12. The WrestleMania Buildup was Non-existent

Speaking of the WrestleMania buildup, this show seems even stranger when you consider the fact that nothing influenced WrestleMania or had a direct effect on the card whatsoever. The headlining match for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship is between Roman Reigns and Triple H, yet Dean Ambrose was fighting for the title. Charlotte is fighting Becky Lynch and Sasha Banks for the title, but they were nowhere to be found. Brock Lesnar is fighting Ambrose in a No Holds Barred Match but instead was booked to face Bray Wyatt only to ultimately face Brock Lesnar. Almost nothing of importance happened on this show to demonstrate what WrestleMania could be like. Everything that was rumored or announced ahead of time still stands and two weeks were wasted building up a show that built up nothing feuds in return. With only three weeks left to build up this PPV, the show has even less foundation than the buildup to WrestleMania 31. WWE better be prepared to pull out all the stops in these last three weeks if they want to boost the ratings and interest in WrestleMania. Otherwise, they’ll be giving the fans even more disappointment than usual.