Dead On Arrival
In some circles Ryback will get blamed for the flat Hell in a Cell match last night, but not here. He played his role. The flaws in the match were out of his control. Ryback & Paul Heyman vs. CM Punk was an unsatisfying culmination to what, at times, had been a captivating feud. Paul's entrance took too long, the match lacked heat and the denouement failed to generate the pop WWE hoped for. Perhaps all parties could have done something different to improve the ultimate result, but the bulk of the blame rests with two parties: CM Punk and WWE Creative. CM Punk deserves blame because every big star deserves blame when his angles go bad. In wrestling -- as in movies and TV and radio and you get the point -- stars have ultimate control. The promoter or the booker may get mad at the star or threaten the star, but ultimately it's the star's responsibility to make sure he is part of matches and angles that are good rather than bad. At this point wrestling people