How to Ruin Shinsuke Nakamura vs. AJ Styles at WrestleMania

We didn’t think it would ever happen, but it is. AJ Styles defends his WWE Championship against Shinsuke Nakamura at Wrestlemania 34. While many worry that it may not live up to their previous encounter in the Tokyo Dome, hopes are still high. After all, it is a Dream Match™. It’s easy to think of ways to improve this match (such as not doing anything to it), but we’re going in an opposite direction.

How can we ruin this instant classic?

Make it a tables match

Few things are less exciting than a Tables match. People can crap on Chairs matches all they want, but at least a Chairs match involves people hitting each other with chairs, and that’s always fun to watch. In a tables match, the only real tension is centered around putting someone through a piece of plywood. People want to see other people go through multiple tables (also preferably while they’re on fire and stacked on top of more flaming tables). There are so many ways to fix this match, but that’s a story for another time.

Imagine if the match a year in the making between AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura was based on putting someone through a table. No story about being a better wrestler or whatever. No exciting near-falls. Heck, how can they do their finishers?

How can Nakamura Kinsasha Styles through a table? I guess Styles can do his Phenomenal Forearm through a table, but it’d look super lame. And I guess he could do a middle-rope Styles Clash through a table. And Nakamura can do his reverse suplex thing. It’d suck, though.

7 minute finisher spam

Imagine this: the bell rings, and then boom! Kinsasha! Nakamura goes for the pin, but AJ Styles kicks out. Nakamura attempts to lift him up for another move, but then AJ reverses into the Calf Crusher. Shinsuke reaches for the ropes and forces a break, Styles then attempts a Phenomenal Forearm but then it’s countered into a triangle choke. Rope break again. Nakamura attempts a Kinsasha again, but Styles counters with a Styles Clash. Kick out.

AJ Styles then attempts to do another move, but then Shinsuke counters wit his reverse powerslam, He attempts another Kinsasha, but then Styles dodges and lifts him up for the Ushigoroshi, but then Shinsuke escapes and then does another Kinsasha. 1, 2, 3. Shinsuke wins in seven minutes.

While that would be an awesome finishing sequence, without the proper build-up, it’ll fall flat. It’s like watching an action movie and it starts with the awesome gunfight where the hero shoots three hundred bad guys and then it ends. Sure, it would be cool, but if everyone was telling you it was the greatest action movie ever and it was really just lots of bullets with no buildup or development, it’d feel a tad flat.

add the winner of the andre the giant memorial battle royal

What if, WWE, in their efforts to make winning the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal (or as it’s known by many people, the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal), announces that the winner of the bout will be placed in a World title match of their choosing that night?

At the end of it all, Goldust outlasts a billion other superstars and wins the bout by throwing a returning Jack Swagger out of the ring. The Bizarre One, not foolish enough to insert himself into Reigns v. Lesnar 2: Electric Boogaloo, instead opts to join AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura.

Goldust then does surprisingly well for himself, surviving the initial onslaughts of both Styles and Nakamura. He delivers powerslam after powerslam, bulldog after bulldog. He then retrieves a golden trash can from under the ring and gets conked on the head with the lid before eating a Kinsasha and getting pinned.

Styles and Nakamura get their official one on one match at the next Smackdown.

sheamus v. daniel bryan at wrestlemania 28

A match one year in the making ends in 18 seconds.