5 Botches, slip ups, and outrageous moments from WWE Survivor Series 2016

WWE Survivor Series 2016 is in the books and what an outrageous night it was. For starters, who would’ve ever guessed that Brock Lesnar would be manhandled by Bill Goldberg like it’s 1997? The entire main event was shocking and will likely be talked about for a long time to come, but we’ll give it a fair chance to run it’s course. It’s hard to imagine that anything risking Brock Lesnar losing even a tiny bit of his monster status being a good thing, but you never know. Maybe there’s some big picture that hasn’t been revealed to us yet as to why Lesnar would lose clean for the first time in years to an aged part-timer.

Despite being a head-scratcher of the main event, Bill Goldberg won his match without incident and it was according to the story. The Toronto crowd even game him the loving reception that WWE hoped he would get. Looking at the rest of the show, not everything else worked out so smoothly. David Otunga demonstrated why he’s not very good at his job, Baron Corbin showed up healthy on a Pay-Per-View that he was written out of due to injury, and Shane McMahon took a spear just a tad too snug. All of this strangeness follows, so continue on to see what cringe-worthy moments follow.

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5. A meeting of the minds

Considering this was a 4-hour event (longer considering the pre-show), there was a surprising absence of botches. That’s a good thing because there’s tons of talent on both the Raw and SmackDown rosters and it’s always nice to see everyone perform well. However, there was one move that didn’t go quite as planned.

During the 5-on-5 men’s traditional Survivor Series match, Shane McMahon got eliminated when he went for a Coast to Coast dropkick against The Big Dog. Roman had the move scouted, so he went for a spear to put away the boss’ son. When he went for a subsequent pinfall, something was obviously wrong with Shane. Reigns may have misjudged the distance and shot for the speat too soon.

It appeared that the two bonked heads together upon impact, effectively knocking Shane out cold. It was a scary situation. Thankfully, he was walking himself out with only a little bit of assistance just a few moments afterwards. Hopefully, this injury doesn’t turn out to be too serious.

4. “Battle of the Bulge”

David Otunga is a terrible announcer, but you already knew that. Discussing Shane McMahon’s involvement in his team’s Survivor Series match, he started to compare him to a certain famous U.S. General...

“Look how well he’s doing, he’s like General Patton at Battle of the Bulge...”

If Otunga ended right there, then that would have been a perfectly acceptable analogy...but no! David couldn’t help himself and saw an opportunity for what he thought was a sick burn or a hilarious joke or whatever it is that goes on inside his head.

“...and I”m not talking about Kevin Owen’s stomach here.”

He went for a fat joke on the current WWE Universal Champion. Sigh, be a star, David. I don’t know if Vince McMahon or another producer was laughing hysterically at that line, but I simply rolled my eyes at it. Since Otunga stayed off camera for most of the night, the image above was the moment when the two best friends embraced in a bromantical hug because Owens might need some comfort after David’s bullying.

3. Still booing The Big Dog

It’s hard not to feel bad for Roman Reigns because when he was the last man standing on his Raw team against both Bray Wyatt and Randy Orton on the SmackDown side of things, Toronto immediately let him have it. It became the same old story of Roman becoming the conquering hero and whether he has the talent or not, it’s a role that he cannot be accepted in. The fans definitively reject Roman in that role and Toronto was determined to not be an exception to this.

Thankfully, WWE creative at least booked Reigns to not overcome the odds that were stacked against him. Roman doesn’t always have to be Superman and that’s okay. He’ll need more and more opportunities to not decimate everything in sight for fans to maybe one day gain sympathy for him again, and even then it’s hard to imagine him becoming a fan favourite without a ton of work.

2. Way too many chin puns

James Ellsworth doesn’t have a chin, do you get it?

Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson spent the first part of their post-A.J. Styles WWE run dabbling a little too much in a bad comedy. Thankfully, they’ve cut out the funny over the past month or so and just started beating people up. It’s a far better fit for them and also much needed for the Raw tag division to have a couple of tough guys ready to crack some skulls when that kind of thing is necessary.

The duo, formerly known as The Club, sadly regressed during a backstage segment with James Ellsworth during Survivor Series, giving him more chin jokes than your dad can handle. They mockingly encouraged James to keep his chin up and promised Mick Foley that they’d save their “chin-tensity” for the ring.

These were mediocre jokes at best. Can Gallows & Anderson just stick to beating people up? They’re really good at that.

1. Baron’s not injured?

Remember when Baron Corbin was part of the original lineup for the SmackDown 5-on-5 men’s team for Survivor Series? Also remember that he slipped on the apron during a match against Kalisto, causing him to be too injured to compete for this event> Yeah, that would’ve been nice if the story kept some continuity.

The Lone Wolf looked completely fine and not injured whatsoever when he decided to interfere in the Cruiserweight Championship. Even though Kalisto is the one he’s really got issues with, he made sure to strike Brian Kendrick first to ruin any chances of the cruiserweight division moving to SmackDown. Looks like they get to stick around on Raw, even though the Monday show really has no idea what to do with the sub-205 guys.

The Baron Corbin interference is ultimately a creative slip up because if he’s perfectly fine and in the building for Survivor Series, shouldn’t he be on the SmackDown team? Shane McMahon was actually the alternate, only selected because their original choice doesn’t know how to come down off the apron.