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2016 RDTWorldofSport Wrestling Awards

RDTWorldofSport 2016 Wrestling Awards

I don’t have a real basis for this to be perfectly honest. It’s mostly my opinion with some searching around to see what some respected wrestling forums and writers think. Some categories get a Top 5 and some get a Top 3. Why? Because I said so. Also this will mostly be WWE, basically because that’s what I watched 99% of the time. But if something else catches my eye, it could make the awards. With that being said, here goes.

Moment of the Year

Winner: Shinsuke Nakamura Wins the NXT Championship

 

Nakamura was on fire in WWE this year and didn’t even need to be on the main roster to do so. Nakamura was pretty much a phenom the moment he set foot in NXT. Winning the NXT Championship showed that NXT could get past the Sami Zayn, Finn Balor era, which honestly wasn’t a guarantee. The entire spectacle of the match is fantastic. Nakamura’s entrance with Lee England Jr. was incredible. The crowd was incredible. And when Nakamura hit Samoa Joe with the Kinshasa and won the title, the crowd erupted.

Second Place: Goldberg beats Brock Lesnar in 84 seconds

Third Place: Shane McMahon returns to RAW

Fourth Place: A.J. Styles debuts in the Royal Rumble

Fifth Place: Finn Balor wins the new WWE Universal Championship

Debut of the Year

Winner: A.J. Styles in WWE

There aren’t many ways the Royal Rumble can surprise us anymore, and even those on the inside knew that A.J. showing up in the Rumble was a possibility (since he has just signed with WWE), but WWE surprised us for sure here. A.J. Styles is pretty much the last major star that WWE had never truly had and for him to show up in the Rumble while the current “face” of WWE, Roman Reigns, awaited him in the ring, was truly epic and it’ll be hard for WWE to top that moment in a Royal Rumble ever again.

Second Place: Shinsuke Nakamura in NXT

Third Place: Bobby Roode in NXT

Fourth Place: Bayley on RAW

Fifth Place: Baron Corbin at Wrestlemania

Return of the Year

Winner: Shane McMahon on RAW

With WWE in need of a marquee match at Wrestlemania, the return of Shane McMahon and a match between him and The Undertaker in Hell in a Cell delivered. The crowd erupted for Shane, who hadn’t been seen in WWE for seven years. To my surprise, Shane stuck around after Wrestlemania and is still working for WWE today (as I thought he was just going for the Mania program and leaving). Watch the crowd reaction, it’s insane.

Second Place: Goldberg returns to RAW

Third Place: Seth Rollins returns at Extreme Rules

Fourth Place: Bayley returns to NXT to challenge Asuka

Fifth Place: Randy Orton returns on the Highlight Reel at Battleground

Match of the Year

Winner: A.J. Styles vs. John Cena – WWE Summerslam 2016

It’s amazing to me that Styles vs. Cena somehow served as a midcard feud. This was theoretically a dream match, the face of TNA for the last decade against the face of WWE. Of course, Styles vs. Cena pretty much put the rest of the main roster to shame with several five star performances. Notably, the one at Summerslam, which was at the end of the first hour, absolutely stole the show and made Styles into a superstar. John Cena put Styles over clean in 23 minutes of amazing back and forth action with great false finishes.

Second Place: Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Sami Zayn – NXT Takeover: Dallas

Third Place: NXT World Tag Team Championship – Two out of Three Falls: The Revival © vs. DIY – NXT Takeover: Toronto

Fourth Place: NXT World Tag Team Championship: The Revival © vs. DIY – NXT Takeover: Brooklyn

Fifth Place: WWE Intercontinental Championship – Last Man Standing: Dean Ambrose © vs. Kevin Owens

Feud of the Year

Winner: Charlotte vs. Sasha Banks

 

This feud was red hot to me all year. Understandable some became sick of the feud as they wrestled about six or seven different times on different events and some had also turned on Charlotte as a performer. The only issue I had with the feud was that WWE seemed to be going out of their way to create an undefeated on PPV streak for Charlotte. But otherwise I liked all of their matches and thought Hell in a Cell and the Iron Woman Match were strong. Starting with their triple threat at Wrestlemania with Becky Lynch, it really did feel like Women’s wrestling was becoming an important part of the show. The matches delivered, Women’s wrestling was elevated, and best yet we have a big heel for Bayley to dethrone…then a story if Sasha Banks turns heel on her. And that all spawns from this feud.

Second Place: A.J. Styles vs. John Cena

Third Place: Sami Zayn vs. Kevin Owens

Fourth Place: Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Samoa Joe

Fifth Place: Shane McMahon vs. Stephanie McMahon

Biggest Disappointment of the Year

Winner: Brock Lesnar’s 2016

 

Lesnar had dominated and was without a doubt the biggest name in WWE pretty much since he returned, and especially since he beat the Undertaker at Wrestlemania XXX. He had a huge 2014 after that, beating John Cena for the title in dominating fashion and despite barely being there still being the biggest star. In 2015 he was a part of two match of the year candidates (triple threat at the Rumble and vs. Reigns at Mania), a feud of the year candidate (vs. Undertaker) and again seemed like his dominate self. What the heck happened in 2016? He kicked off the year with a disappointing Royal Rumble appearance where a feud with the Wyatts seemed imminent. A feud with Ambrose spawned from a triple threat match at Fastlane and the Wyatt’s deal was quickly dropped after Lesnar beat Luke Harper at Roadblock. Match with Ambrose was one of those that hurt both guys instead of elevating or establishing anyone. Came back to fight and bloody Randy Orton in a match that really didn’t seem like a big deal and there wasn’t any follow up. Survivor Series was the last match for Lesnar where he lost to Goldberg in 84 seconds, although that was probably the most interesting thing he did all year. Nonetheless, the aura took a huge hit this year and I’m not sure the product would be any different if he wasn’t here, which is a vastly different statement than you could make in 2014 or 2015.

Second Place: Roman Reigns’ rise to the top

Third Place: Roman Reigns vs. Triple H – Wrestlemania 32

Fourth Place: Wrestlemania 32

Fifth Place: Bayley’s RAW booking

Best Show of the Year

Winner: NXT Takeover: Dallas

Nakamura’s debut vs. Zayn. Balor vs. Joe. Bayley dropping the title to Asuka. Revival vs. American Alpha. Really kinda hard to beat any way you look at it. This totally beat out the following night’s Wrestlemania, that’s for sure.

Second Place: NXT Takeover: Toronto

Third Place: WWE Royal Rumble

Fourth Place: WWE Money in the Bank

Fifth Place: NXT Takeover: Brooklyn

Non-Wrestler of the Year

Winner: Daniel Bryan, Smackdown GM

Bryan as Smackdown’s General Manager has been a fun role for him. He’s helped elevate the Miz back to a level we haven’t seen Miz since 2011. He’s charismatic and a genuine fun part of the show (unlike Mick Foley on RAW somehow, which is baffling considering how great Mick was in this role 16 years ago). Yes, it’s sad that we’ll never see Daniel Bryan wrestle again. But it’s great to see him as authoritative good guy on Smackdown and a big reason that it’s beating RAW out in the ratings.

Second Place: William Regal, NXT GM

Third Place: Paul Heyman, Manager

Fourth Place: Shane McMahon, Smackdown Commissioner

Fifth Place: Stephanie McMahon, RAW Comissioner

Best Surprisingly Good Angle

Winner: Heath Slater gets a Smackdown Contract

Somehow Smackdown put together Heath Slater and Rhyno…RHYNO?!…and that’s become one of the hottest acts in the company. Heath Slater has probably the most underrated guy in the company to be fair as he’s been entertaining in pretty much everything he’s done since getting beat up by the legends in 2013. The entire angle with Slater not getting drafted, to begging for a job on RAW and Smackdown (the Slater-Lesnar segment may have been Lesnar’s best all year, interestingly enough) to finding Rhyno as a partner and winning the Tag titles with him was nothing short of brilliant.

Second Place: Braun Strowman runs through RAW and Sami Zayn

Third Place: Jericho’s List

Fourth Place: Randy Orton joins the Wyatts

Fifth Place: James Ellsworth beats A.J. Styles three times

Woman of the Year

Winner: Sasha Banks (WWE)

Charlotte may be the woman WWE is looking to push as the face to establish the division, and that’s not a bad choice, but the fans have been 100% behind “the Boss” all year and each of her title wins have been met with HUGE reactions. If Sasha Banks can stay healthy, there’s no reason that her and Bayley can’t have a great feud in 2017 (like they did for NXT in 2015) and push the division to even greater heights. With all due respect to Charlotte, that’s where the money is.

Second Place: Charlotte (WWE)

Third Place: Bayley (NXT/WWE)

Fourth Place: Asuka (NXT)

Fifth Place: Alexa Bliss (NXT/WWE)

Tag Team of the Year

Winner: The New Day (WWE)

How could it not be them? While yes, it seems that their star is finally fading, the truth is the New Day is still one of the most over and entertaining acts in WWE. It’s amazing considering just how awful they seemed when they started out in early 2015. They beat Demolition’s title reign record and I hope they can somehow regain some freshness for 2017.

Second Place: The Revival (NXT)

Third Place: DIY (NXT)

Fourth Place: American Alpha (NXT/WWE)

Fifth Place: Health Slater and Rhyno (WWE)

Wrestler of the Year

Winner: A.J. Styles (WWE)

 

How can it not be Styles? The Face that Runs the Place stepped into WWE and immediately became a top star…then eventually THE top star. He was so good WWE basically had no choice but to put the WWE World Championship on him nine months into his run. He had great matches with Roman Reigns, John Cena and Dean Ambrose on Pay-Per-View. No one is better than A.J. Styles right now.

Second Place: Shinsuke Nakamura (NXT)

Third Place: Samoa Joe (NXT)

Fourth Place: Kevin Owens (WWE)

Fifth Place: Broken Matt Hardy (TNA)

 

WWE Closed My Mind Towards Professional Wrestling

I didn’t truly realize this until a few days ago, but WWE over the years successfully had made me think that it was the true, elite brand of professional wrestling. Everything else was the minor leagues (other than WCW for a few years in the 90s). Extreme Championship Wrestling, Ring of Honor, New Japan Pro Wrestling, Xtreme Pro Wrestling, Combat Zone Wrestling, even TNA in its earlier years were all looked upon as inferior. So what if CM Punk was already a super hot heel in Ring of Honor, or that Bryan Danielson was potentially better than Kurt Angle. Did it matter that AJ Styles could probably work circles around anyone in WWE in 2003? What about Christopher Daniels? I never appreciated Tyler Black or Chris Hero. Japan was another story as no one went from there to WWE, and those who did were usually WWE castoffs to begin with. I had high hopes for Tensai after rave reviews of his Japanese run…and he proceeded to become a joke character within a year.

WWE did this to me early in my fandom. As a kid ECW was pretty much the coolest thing around. I wondered how Taz, Sabu, Rob Van Dam and all would fair in a WWF ring. Raven did okay for himself in WCW in 1998. Not great, but he wasn’t a joke or anything, so there was promise from my viewpoint. And the WWF killed that for me with Taz. When Taz showed up at the 2000 Royal Rumble I was all-in on him being a major star, fighting the likes of HHH, Rock and when he came back, Stone Cold. And he wasn’t even close. Two months later he’s fighting in the Hardcore Battle Royal at Wrestlemania. The MAN for ECW was just a lower-card guy in the WWF. Interestingly enough, The Dudley Boyz shook this and became one of the top teams in the WWF, but even then I attributed their success to them changing their attire and acting more “WWF like”, even if that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

At some point I decided that it’s obvious these guys didn’t have what it took to make it in the WWF. Even Raven had floundered in his WWF run. Tajiri, who I remembered fighting Taz for the ECW World Title at Heatwave ’99, became a comedy character who was a Cruiserweight mainstay. Only Rob Van Dam made a huge impact, but then again I always thought RVD was ahead of others in ECW. At some point I just said to myself that anyone outside WWE was probably inferior to anyone in WWE. There were exceptions…but even those exceptions didn’t have me thinking much. Yeah, AJ Styles was clearly great, but would he even go above the Cruiserweight Title in WWE? Same goes for Daniels. Samoa Joe seemed like a bad ass, but when there were rumors he was going to fight John Cena in WWE in the gimmick given to Umaga I just assumed Cena was going over him. And while CM Punk made his way to WWE, I didn’t think much of him or his character until 2009 and the Straight Edge Society. Even when he surprisingly won the World Title in 2008, he didn’t feel like a main eventer (didn’t help that WWE didn’t treat him like one either). There were other misfires along the way: Paul London, Brian Kendrick, Colt Cabana as Scotty Bowman. The indies were the indies and that was that.

CM Punk got the ball rolling for sure in 2011. But even then he was pretty much a WWE guy to me. Still, when he and Danielson ended up holding the World Titles at the same time in early 2012 I felt that perhaps someone like AJ Styles could have done this at one time (not like, five years later, no way). But when WWE rolled out NXT, I didn’t watch it. I’ve been burned too many times in the past. It didn’t help that Adrian Neville, who was also an Internet Wrestling Community darling at one time as Pac, hasn’t really gained much traction. Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens though has helped change the perception, and the Finn Balor push to the Universal title was also helping, but my perception ended up completely changed at Takeover: Brooklyn II.

Austin Aries was a former TNA World Champion and a stereotypical guy who I’d peg for not getting anywhere in WWE. He looked like a star. Bobby Roode I’ve never cared about once, and he GLORIOUSLY looked like a star. And then, the moment Shinsuke Nakamura made his entrance for his NXT Title match against the aforementioned Samoa Joe, I asked myself…

What the hell have I been missing all these years?