WWE Holiday Tour show results
December 26, 2014
New York City at Madison Square Garden
Report by Mike Omansky, PWTorch correspondent

Estimated crowd: 17,000+, just a hair short of a sell-out. (Some random upper level seats were the only ones not sold in the building.)

The announced return date is Friday, February 27 featuring the MSG return of Hulk Hogan. The pre-sale code after the show: MSGPRE.

Overall, a solid show. Nothing "exception," but a very strong main event.

(1) IC champion Dolph Ziggler pinned Luke Harper with the Zig-Zag to retain the Intercontinental Title. Good match, about 15 minutes. Harper dominated early; good back and forth; then a series of false finishes. (**)

After the match, J&J Security ran in and attacked Ziggler. Seth Rollins then came in to Curb Stomp Ziggler. He then did a promo; in essence, this was nothing compared to what would happen in the main event against John Cena.

(2) Ryback pinned Curtis Axel with Shell-shock. Axel didn’t initially understand why they were fighting (Rybaxel call-back); he just wanted to shake hands and go back to the dressing room. Then, he slapped Ryback twice, and it was pretty much Ryback for the match. (*1/2)

(3) NXT champion Sami Zayn beat Adrian Neville to retain the NXT Title. Zayn won with a running knee for the pin. Most of the crowd didn’t know who they were at the start of the match, but both did their moves throughout and got a good response. (**)

(4) Jack Swagger vs. Fandango (w/Rosa Mendes). A dance-off allegedly won by fan vote 55/45 percent. Fandango danced first. Then, Swagger danced and was pretty funny. Fandango attacked him, but Swagger recovered and put on the anklelock. Fandango “tapped out," but it wasn’t a match.

(5) WWE tag champions The Miz & Damien Sandow beat The Usos to retain the WWE Tag Titles. Miz won with a Skullcrushing Finale with help from Mizdow. The fans were completely into Sandow, cheering him from the beginning and throughout. Miz only tagged him in twice, but tagged again each time before Mizdow could actually do anything. Usos were the victims. (**)

(6) Randy Orton beat Kane in his return match. Orton scored the pin with an RKO after escaping a chokeslam. About five minutes; shortest match of the night. Decent match, but nothing special beyond the return of Orton. (*1/2)

(7) Alicia Fox & Emma beat The Bellas (Divas champion Nikki Bella & Brie Bella) with Paige as special referee. Fox pinned Brie after a fast-count by Paige. Typical Divas outing. Fast-paced enough, though. (*)

(8) Big Show pinned Erick Rowan with a pretty weak Knockout Punch. Not much at all. Lumbering match; worst on the show.(1/2*)

(9) John Cena beat Seth Rollins (w/J&J Security) in a wild Street Fight. Cena won with an AA off the top rope through a table for the pin. The main event went about 25 minutes. There were segments with chairs and tables, three segments where J&J jumped in the ring to beat down Cena, and the third time resulted in a double AA for their troubles. Three-fourths of the way through, Kane ran in to chokeslam Cena, but Orton ran in to toss out Kane and do RKOs on J&J. Big Show then came in and punched Cena, but Rollins only got a two count; Big Show was waiting to do it again, but Dolph Ziggler ran in to eliminate Big Show. Several times during the match Rollins grabbed the microphone to get heel heat (such as “tonight will be remembered as the night that Seth Rollins sold out Madison Square Garden, and eliminated John Cena from the WWE." how terrible N.Y. fans are, etc.). There were ref bumps amidst all of the chaos - at one point, J&J pulled the ref out of the ring, Rollins hit Cena with a chair, and there was no one to count the pin, i.e. lots of action/the kitchen sink. (***1/2 for Best Match of the night.)

[Torch art credit Grant Gould (c) PWTorch.com]

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