McNEILL’s Live Blog of WWE Hell In A Cell 2016!

The Kickoff show is on. We may have a match later. The New Day will visit with Tom Phillips. And Melvin Gordon is trying to cost me a fantasy football game. We’ll return after a few hundred video packages.

So, is there any chance I can skip Raw tomorrow and watch “The Kevin Owens Show” instead? It looks more interesting.

Kendrick wants to know if TJ Perkins is going to let him win tonight. But first, he wants to take Perkins on a trip. A guilt trip.

Booker’s reaction is that TJ Perkins seems soft for not beating up Kendrick. And that about sums up WWE in 2016.

Rich Swann is in the Lita seat on the panel. Renee Young wants Swann to teach her how to dance. I’d watch that on WWE Network.

Alexander/Dorado/Sin Cara vs. Tony Nese/Drew Gulak/Arya Daivari. If someone knows why Nese is dressed as Hawkman, drop me a line.

Sin Cara catches Daivari (and himself) with a quebrada.

Things are looking good as we throw to an ad for Col. Ziggler’s Louisville Fried Chicken.

SHILL: Guess who’s coming to PWTorchLivecast.com? It’s me and Greg Parks, following tonight’s Hell In A Cell show. Be there LIVE.

Let’s all hit some big moves. Then Cedric pins Gulak with the Lumbar Check. Good stuff.

Tom Phillips is here to ask The New Day questions from Twitter users. The New Day is here to mock Tom Phillips.

We cut back to the panel. Three out of four panelists surveyed enjoyed watching the champs bully Tom Phillips.

Mick Foley tells us that in 2016, a woman can get herself killed going off the top of the Cell, just like a man.

Time to lower the cell. Which means it’s time for Roman vs. Rusev. See you on the other side of the intro.

“Evil has awoken in Boston”. Come on, leave Bill Belichick out of this.

“Kevin Owens is just a cog in the machine”. I like how Rollins raised the stakes for this match with that promo.

I hate to nitpick, but Lana’s Titantron should be done in Cyrillic.

Joining us tonight at ringside, please welcome our Klingon announce team of Bob K’Ehleyr and Lieutenant Worf.

Remember, you can discuss this show on social media by using the hashtag #WWELockdown.

Cole reminds us that the first Hell In A Cell was Undertaker vs. Michaels in October 1997. If there’s a better match than that on tonight’s show, I’ll eat my Logitech headset.

You see how Rusev sold that first bump into the cage? If all six main event wrestlers can sell like that for the next three hours, we’ll be in good shape.

The crowd is chanting “U-S-A!” Yes, for Roman Reigns, you smartasses.

Graves says the impact from Reigns and Rusev could damage the Cell. That’s okay, as long as they leave the LED ringposts intact.

“We know what Rusev’s capable of with those stairs”. Climbing? Oh, hitting Reigns with them. That makes more sense.

Rusev puts the ring steps on the turnbuckle. That takes real strength because those steps are 200-250 pounds.

The crowd chants for tables and Rusev goes under the ring. Don’t be silly, there aren’t any tables…Well, I’ll be damned.

Reigns takes a yuge beating and comes back. This should be the formula for all Roman’s matches. Oh, it is already? Never mind.

Reigns takes stairs to the face and Rusev locks in the Accolade. Reigns starts making his way to the ropes, defeating the laws of physics.

Hey, who left a chain under the ring? Were they using it to chain the tables together? So many questions.

Just one of these times, I’d love to see a heel take all the stuff under the ring and create a giant Wile E. Coyote roadrunner trap.

Reigns samoan drops Rusev on the steps and hits a spear off the steps for the win. Really good opener, but I’m not eating my headset yet.

Backstage, the shreds of Tom Phillips’ dignity are interviewing WWE Universal Champion Kevin Owens. Owens doesn’t bully Tom. Tom’s been through enough.

Bayley vs. Dana Brooke. Speaking of bullies, Dana does a fine job. Bayley was once part of the Four Horsewomen of NXT. Dana’s one of the women who dated Dolph Ziggler, a slightly less exclusive group.

Dana works the arm. Bayley fights from underneath. Belly to Bayley. That’ll do. Fine match.

Commercial break while Colonel Dolph takes on Pupper Clucker.

Backstage, Mick Foley & Stephanie McMahon congratulate themselves on getting through the first two matches.

#Raw Talk is on after the pay-per-view. If you really think you can afford to miss the PWTorch Livecast, that is.

Time for Enzo & Cass against the Bullet Gang. Enzo & Cass think “The Big Gal” is a poor nickname for Luke Gallows.

After an extended rant from Enzo & Cass, we introduce their opponents, Bald Guys With Matching Jackets.

The thread on commentary is how disappointing Gallows and Anderson have been since their arrival in WWE. That’ll get this match over.

Cass does well against Da Baldies. Enzo does not. Magic Bullet finishes the match. To be continued, tomorrow night.

Sasha Banks puts over a breast cancer survivor. It would be nice if they tied this in to Survivor Series. But they can’t. Wrong month.

Can’t wait to see Goldberg vs. Lesnar at WWE 2K17.

They lower the cell again for Owens vs. Rollins. So, because Smackdown had its main event early at No Mercy, Raw has to do it too?

Universal Title match. I’d complain about Owens entering the Cell first. But if I was in this match, I’d want to be the one entering first, so I think we’re good.

There are no rules to this match, so both wrestlers stand by patiently in the ring for their introductions.

The bell rings. Owens rolls to the outside, checks under the ring and yells “Who took my chain?” (Okay, not really.)

Owens attacks Seth’s back. Worse yet, he rips off Rollins’ Kinesio tape. “He’s got a mean streak in him, Corey”.

Owens gets a table and sets it up, then sets another table against the cell. It was getting interesting until Rollins suplexed him on the apron.

Kevin sprays the referee with a fire extinguisher, which would have made more sense if he’d set the official on fire first.

Cole references the Boston Massacre, which took place in the autumn of 1990 when Kansas City beat the Patriots 37-7.

So spraying the ref was the setup for Jericho entering the cage. Kevin Owens and Seth Rollins are having a classic steel cage bout. The crowd, of course, chants for Chris Jericho.

Rollins powerbombs Owens through both tables, without damaging Seth’s knee. Jericho saves Owens from being pinned.

Jericho hands Owens a chair. What could possibly go wrong? Oh. Seth could take the chair away.

Back comes Owens, who powerbombs Seth through double chairs. That’s the finish. It almost seems anticlimactic. If only Seth Rollins had, you know, friends. Jericho beats up Seth after the match, to underline the point.

Back to our Kickoff Panel. Lita liked that last match so much, she’s willing to ignore that Owens & Jericho beat up her favorite in a two-on-one finish.

Next up, our Cruiserweight Title match. It’s Super Gamer against The Man With The Plan. Kendrick’s plan is to rig the elec…I mean, the title match.

Cole thinks he should explain the back story between TJ and Kendrick. Well, what the (bleep) were those video packages for?

Kendrick grabs TJ’s athletic tape and tapes Perkins’ wrist to the bottom rope. You know, like they do in Bellator.

An audience member (obscenely) calls Kendrick a hippie and tells him to get a haircut. Dude, you know you’re in Boston, right?

Kendrick fakes a knee injury, suckers TJ Sting in, and beats him with a headbutt and the Captain’s Hook. New champion.

Time for the announcers to tell you what a dummy you are for ordering this show on pay-per-view. (Plus, you can’t see Nakamura vs. Samoa Joe.)

Up next is our tag team title match. I knew I forgot something.

Joining us tonight at ringside, please welcome our Rigellian announce team of Tom Kang and Troy Kodos.

The New Day vs. Sheamus & Cesaro. The Americans like each other. The Euros bicker amongst themselves. Xavier Woods is wrestling tonight. That feels like foreshadowing.

Sheamus accidentally kicks Cesaro, but that’s not the finish. Sheamus dives from the top rope onto the New Day on the floor. Cole dubs it the Air Lingus. I’ll give him that one.

Cesaro gets Woods into the sharpshooter, but Sheamus is mixing it up with Big E and Kofi on the floor. Kofi kicks Sheamus, and that’s an automatic disqualification. The New Day loses by DQ. Tune in tomorrow!

Video package for Goldberg vs. Lesnar in three weeks. Sorry, but “You’re Last” isn’t the catch phrase I’m looking for.

Cole pitches the main event as “Women…in a cage!” It’s novel. I mean, when have women ever fought inside a cage before?

Charlotte Flair gets the full Macho King Randy Savage entrance. I like it, but what do you do to top it? Oh. Sasha comes out in an Escalade, like a boss. Trailed by an entourage, like a boss. Eating protein bars and swearing, like a boss.

Cole points out that no woman has ever entered the Hell In a Cell. They still haven’t. (Lower the Cell already!)

Yes, Charlotte attacks and they fight out into the crowd before the Cell is even lowered. Now the cell is lowered.

Byron talks about Mick Foley’s “cryptic” promo on Raw. I don’t think that word means what Byron thinks it means.

Charlotte powerbombs Sasha through the Maltese announce table. On her bad back. Well, that should do it. Show’s over!

Nope. Sasha climbs off the stretcher to start the match. I get the feeling this might be going a bit past the 11PM window.

Sasha does a suicide dive onto Charlotte at ringside. Since she isn’t Seth Rollins, this is not a transition spot.

Charlotte gives Sasha a backbreaker onto a chair, and then bends Sasha’s back around the ringpost. You know what would have helped this match? If it wasn’t the third Cell bout on this show.

Sasha climbs the inside of the Cell and hits Double Knees To Chesty on Charlotte.

Tres Amigos and the Eddie frog splash by Sasha. Nope, not the finish. Sorry.

Sasha ties Charlotte to the, um, Tree of Wooo and hits a double stomp. Still not the finish.

Charlotte bounces Sasha off the stairs and gets the table. Yeah, dead silence. But this is the main event! So let’s get our stuff in.

Pro Tip: When a wrestler bounces off a table instead of breaking it, that ain’t good.

Charlotte goes for the figure-eight. Sasha counters by hitting Charlotte with a chair. Three backbreakers by Charlotte. Not the finish.

It’s bad when fans are looking at their watches. It’s worse when they start shaking their watches.

Charlotte throws Sasha onto the table, then hits Natural Selection to win the title. That’s it? That’s the finish? We went seventeen minutes long for that? Okay.

Join me & Greg Parks for the postgame show on PWTorchLivecast.com, now.