• 7 months ago
10 Best WWE Backlash Matches Of All Time | partsFUNknown
It is Backlash season once again! As we prepare for WWE's most heavily branded afterparty, Adam has provided his list of the ten best Backlash matches ever. Is your favourite Backlash match among them? Let us know in the comments below!

00:00 - Start
01:05 - Honorary Mention
01:37 - 10
02:30 - 9
03:14 - 8
04:06 - 7
04:52 - 6
05:37 - 5
06:18 - 4
07:05 - 3
07:49 - 2
08:44 - 1

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Transcript
00:00 'Tis the season for WWE trademark, WrestleMania trademark, Backlash trademark, colon, WWE
00:07 WrestleMania Backlash trademark, WWE having a perfectly normal branding one as they always
00:11 do.
00:12 Yes Vince, you do improve the SEO of all your shows by throwing the word WrestleMania in
00:15 there.
00:16 Stupendous.
00:17 Who cares if it makes all your content look like it was designed by the tiny robot who
00:20 lives inside the WWE network.
00:22 Anyway, my gripes about how WWE isn't a product designed by people for people, Backlash is
00:26 a real Marmite show, one that tends to either fix the problems of that year's WrestleMania
00:30 or double down on them.
00:31 It's also one of the longest running B-Paper-U format in company history, so there's a lot
00:35 of very good and very bad to pick from.
00:37 With this year's show just around the corner, let's have a look at the good ones, treat
00:41 ourselves.
00:42 Quick point of order, the greatest wrestling match ever is not on this list, cannot be
00:46 doing with the piped in crowd noise pandemic matches.
00:49 No crowds, no thanks.
00:50 I'm Adam Hailing from Parts of Unknown and here are 10 Best WWE Backlash Matches of All
00:55 Time.
00:56 And if you don't want to receive a backlash from us, you better subscribe, because if
01:00 you don't, Oli will know, and it will make him sad.
01:05 Honorable mention, Scottie 2 Hotty vs Dean Malenko 2000.
01:09 Hot take, this match is a little overhyped.
01:11 Yes, yes, I'll be sure to read your imminent comment and log it with the rest of my failings.
01:15 Don't get me wrong, this match is a lovely surprise.
01:17 A 15 minute technically sound cruiserweight match on PPV, which is bonkers for the WWE,
01:22 especially in the Attitude Era, and a Dean Malenko match at that.
01:25 A man thoroughly wasted by the Fed, but it's mostly subdued until the admittedly very wonderful
01:29 closing sequence.
01:30 Top rope DDT, goodness me.
01:32 Wanted to mention it to try and stem the internet hate, but it doesn't quite crack the top 10,
01:36 you bloody hipsters.
01:37 Number 10.
01:38 Edge vs John Cena 2009.
01:40 WWE would very much like you to think that John Cena's greatest rival is Randy Orton.
01:44 I think they're destined to do this forever, says WWE nudging you in the ribs.
01:49 Do you get the reference?
01:50 They'll say, it's from that movie.
01:52 Face off.
01:53 But their actual best rival is Edge.
01:55 The two really brought out the best in each other, be it their SummerSlam match, their
01:58 amazing TLC match at Unforgiven, or this, a Last Man Standing match featuring John Cena
02:02 where, checks notes, he actually f***ing loses.
02:06 How do you do?
02:07 Honestly, it's a modern era Last Man Standing match, which means the match stops every few
02:11 minutes for some tedious referee dinner theatre, but the spots in between are joyous.
02:15 Cena yeeting the steel steps at Edge, Edge getting A8'd into the crowd, and a closing
02:20 spot of Cena getting yeeted into a spotlight like he was a bunch of steel steps.
02:24 Last Man Standing matches, as we'll soon see, live and die on their spots, and this
02:28 one had some good'uns.
02:30 Number 9.
02:31 Shane McMahon vs The Big Show 2001.
02:33 A better Last Man Standing match?
02:35 You f***ing heard me.
02:36 A Last Man Standing match between pre-constantly crying Big Show and pre-thumb Shane McMahon
02:40 was better than Cena and Edge, and I don't want to hear any of your nonsense.
02:44 It's the kind of pure story, plunder-heavy match that was Shane's speciality in the
02:48 2000s, but the crowd are apeshit for the whole thing.
02:51 Even Vince's angry little run into Felder Giant Shane pulls a bunch of magic tricks
02:55 out of his arse, including a really funny chloroform bit, an all-time great big boot
02:59 from Test, bang, and closing with one of the all-time great stunts in wrestling history,
03:04 a sensational dive from a man who majored in sensational dives from a divey league university.
03:10 Is it a good technical match?
03:12 No.
03:13 Is it highly sports entertaining?
03:14 Yes.
03:15 Number 8.
03:16 Angle vs Chris Benoit, 2001.
03:18 From the same card, is it highly sports entertaining?
03:21 Not as much.
03:22 Is it a good technical match?
03:24 Oh, you betcha.
03:25 You really don't hear this match get talked up enough, although to be honest there's probably
03:28 very good reason for that.
03:29 But it's one of the better Iron Man matches in WWE history, a match format that the big
03:33 dub usually excels at as well, so that's high praise.
03:36 Off the back of their hastily thrown together match at Mania X-Seven, Backlash saw Angle
03:39 and Benoit continue their stellar rivalry with yet another contest, this time to find
03:43 out who can make their opponent tap the most in 30 minutes.
03:46 Honestly, these guys had something like half a dozen pay-per-view single matches all together,
03:50 and there's not a dud between them.
03:51 This is a more methodically paced affair, but it builds and builds really satisfyingly
03:55 to a thunderous crescendo as Benoit comes from 3-1 down to win in overtime.
03:59 Smart, brutal, and a technically amazing achievement, this is a shining example of why WWE had the
04:03 best midcard around in the early 2000s.
04:06 Number 7.
04:07 John Cena vs Edge vs Triple H, 2006.
04:10 A weird match, main eventing a weird show in WWE's weirdest year.
04:14 Case in point, this is the show where Vince and Shane fight Shawn Michaels and God, God
04:17 who came down to the ring to the Funkasaurus theme, do never change Vince, unless you can,
04:21 in which case, change.
04:22 The main event saw WWE try to fix the WrestleMania 22 match between John Cena and Triple H, where
04:26 the Chicago crowd booed Cena and cheered Trips.
04:29 "I know," said WWE, "we'll put even more dastardly heel Edge into the mix, then
04:33 people will cheer Cena."
04:35 Arrested Development narrator, they did not.
04:37 However, the match is also really bloody good, with Triple H putting the emphasis on bloody.
04:41 Jesus, big lad.
04:42 The crowd reaction dynamics are all over the shop, but that actually makes for a really
04:45 fun and rowdy watch, and it's always impressive when Big Match John picks up two boys.
04:50 A blockbuster main event to a very strange show.
04:52 Number 6.
04:53 Seth Rollins vs The Miz, 2018.
04:55 2018 was the year of Seth Rollins.
04:57 From that crazy gauntlet match performance early in the year, to stealing the show at
05:00 Mania 34, to one of the best intercontinental title runs in recent memory, for most of the
05:05 year, Seth was all banger all the time, and this is no exception.
05:08 A quintessential example of what PPV openers and mid-card title matches should be.
05:13 Something with a well-told, sensical story that slowly heats up the crowd to a fever
05:18 pitch that has all of that in spades.
05:20 It starts off slow, builds some trademark Seth Rollins showpiece offense, plenty of
05:23 good dastardly twattery from Miz, before the match throws in a joyful little twist.
05:28 Rollins injures his knee, and Seth sells it beautifully, with the knee buckling during
05:31 multiple moves, leading to heart-stopping false finishes.
05:37 Number 5.
05:38 Chris Benoit vs Triple H vs Shawn Michaels, 2004.
05:41 A really good sequel that people don't talk enough about, and that probably has something
05:44 to do with the reason why people don't talk about the Ultimate Submission match quite
05:47 as much.
05:48 A rematch of the amazing main event triple threat from Mania 20, Benoit trips Michaels
05:52 2.
05:53 Wasn't quite as good as the original, but it's still fast aces, and buoyed immensely
05:57 by the fact that oh boy do Montreal still hate Shawn Michaels.
06:01 Seven years after the screwdrop, and they still haven't forgiven him.
06:03 Gives the match a different energy to Mania, especially with Canadian Benoit tapping HBK's
06:07 ass out with the sharpshooter of all things.
06:09 A bit slower, the crowd are a little less keyed up than at the Garden, the entertaining
06:13 HBK hate to one side, but it's still a trio of very accomplished wrestlers doing very
06:16 accomplished things.
06:18 Number 4.
06:19 Cena vs Orton vs Edge vs Shawn Michaels, 2007.
06:22 An underrated, underrepresented format, you really don't see enough Fatal 4-Way main
06:26 events.
06:27 Maybe it's because WWE's one-off pay-per-view Fatal 4-Way was a load of old jessup.
06:30 What wasn't, however, was the main event of Backlash '07.
06:32 A frankly ludicrous Chef Boyardee overstuffed Italian sausage ravioli of a match featuring
06:37 Cena, HBK and Rated RKO.
06:39 The action is non-stop, the crowd love every moment, and there's dueling storylines running
06:44 through it.
06:45 Rated RKO reunite with the crowd wondering when the inevitable "heel gotta heel" betrayal
06:48 will come, and it's also the cap and the jaw-dropping Cena-Michaels trilogy of matches.
06:53 It's also got one of the best closing sequences in Fatal 4-Way history, with counter after
06:57 counter and finishing move after finishing move ending in a spot where everyone's down
07:00 to pimples.
07:01 A bunch of moves in a can, but all of the moves are fun.
07:05 3.
07:06 The Rock vs Steve Austin, 1999
07:08 Welcome to the first part of the "this is the match they should have had at WrestleMania"
07:12 trilogy that happens more often than you'd think, which isn't to say that the match between
07:14 Rock and Austin at Mania 15 is bad.
07:16 It's just hecka bland compared to this one.
07:18 All in all, considering the boiler room brawl between Mankind and Big Show almost made this
07:22 list, Backlash '99 was a better show than Mania 15.
07:25 Hard job, Mania 15 was wank with a capital WANK.
07:28 The main event of the show was a no-holds-barred rematch between Austin and The Rock, and it
07:31 was a lot of fun, featuring a super hot start, courtesy of Austin, off the back of one of
07:35 the silliest wrestling bills - seriously, it had fake funerals being crashed by monster
07:39 trucks - f*cking wrestling - and an all-time great stone-cold stunner to The Rock while
07:42 he's holding one of the production cameras.
07:44 Just a lot more personality to this match than the Mania match.
07:47 Hot damn, Austin The Rock had some chemistry.
07:49 2.
07:50 Randy Orton vs Cactus Jack, 2004
07:52 Welcome to part 2 of the "this is the match they should have had at WrestleMania" trilogy.
07:56 Like Empire, this one gets a little dark.
07:58 Foley and Orton had a blood feud going into WrestleMania 20.
08:01 Foley had had his legend killed by being kicked down some stairs.
08:04 In fact, he had his Hardcore Legend status kicked straight out of his head, leaving Raw
08:08 in cowardly shame.
08:09 Then he came back at the Rumble with a mission of trying to prove to himself that he was
08:12 the same Hardcore Legend.
08:14 But then turns out The Rock was free, so instead of doing a Hardcore match at Mania, that got
08:17 shunted to Backlash so the Rock and Sock connection could ride once again and lose.
08:21 Anywho, this Hardcore match is the dog's tit, and is another stellar example of Mick
08:25 Foley forging new legends for up-and-coming talent in Fire and Wire.
08:29 The spots escalate to a frankly horrendous degree, including one of the gnarliest thumbtack
08:33 spots of all time, the sheer amount that stick in the lad.
08:37 An annoying moment halfway through where Bishop interrupts the match to tell off Mick Foley
08:40 for trying to light a baseball bat on fire, but otherwise, this is Hardcore Heaven.
08:44 1.
08:45 Triple H vs The Rock, 2000
08:48 And of course, part three of the "this is the match they should have had at WrestleMania"
08:51 trilogy, an absolute shenanigan that they ran The McMahon in every corner four-way instead
08:55 of Rock vs Triple H. Hey ho, what you gonna do?
08:58 Not exactly complaining, cause hell, this is the epitome of everything I love about
09:01 wrestling.
09:02 Clear comic book style story, look at all the stooges in their matching shirts.
09:07 Maximum hubris, maximum reveal, maximum payoff.
09:10 The McMahon helms the regime, stack the deck against The Rock, it looks like Austin won't
09:13 show up to be in The Rock's corner.
09:15 Very stupid, very wonderful double rock bottom through a table, then Austin does show up
09:20 and to one of the loudest, most sustained pops of all time, he cleans house, Rock wins
09:24 the title, hell, even Linda gets a huge pop by pushing over Steph.
09:28 Just constant crashing waves of good feeling and catharsis after a very shitty WrestleMania.
09:34 It's a match that I've gone back and rewatched so many times just for this one moment when
09:38 the glass shatters, cause this moment is the pinnacle of why I like wrestling.
09:42 I also like wrestling when Shane jumps off really high things.
09:45 I'm Adam and thank you for enjoying my excellent opinions.
09:48 And that's our list.
09:49 What's your favourite Backlash match of all time?
09:50 Let us know in the comments, don't forget to like and share this video around if you
09:53 enjoyed it, make sure you subscribe to PartsFunknown for more silly wrestling content.
09:57 I'm Adam and Jam That Jam.
09:59 [Music]
10:06 you

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