How to Change a Mind in Three Segments

Sandow's night started off well, but I argue it may have ended well too
Photo Credit: WWE.com

My worst fear going into Damien Sandow's cash-in of his Money in the Bank briefcase on John Cena this past Monday was the same one I had with CM Punk, The Miz, Daniel Bryan, and Dolph Ziggler. I promised the world I would vomit if he didn't escape the opening segment of RAW with the World Heavyweight Championship. To be fair, Cena came out and did his usual, tired "SOME OF Y'ALL LIKE ME, SOME OF Y'ALL DON'T, BUT I RESPECT THE HELL OUTTA ALL A' YA ANYWAY. I'MMA KEEP FIGHTIN' CUZ I'M THE CHAMP!" shtick, only perversely like he was still in his Thuganomics rapper character. My hater juices were flowing.

All during the match, I was slowly but surely broken down to the idea of what had become the inevitable. Was Stockholm Syndrome taking hold, or was something about Sandow's arc over the last three-plus months making some kind of warped, twisted, Wyatt Family-style sense to me? I started to break things down. Firstly, and most importantly, Sandow looked exactly how I pictured he should be as a main event heel during the three segments where he was opposing Cena. From launching him into the barricade while derangedly shouting "RISE ABOVE THIS," to savvily countering the Five Knuckle Shuffle into an arm yank on the bad limb, Sandow showed me that his non-speaking skills were on par with his sublime microphone work. Even if he wasn't getting the hardware to show for his efforts, he was given a platform, a test run, if you will, to show what he could do with the hyperintensive spotlight.

But what was shown with that spotlight? What kind of character was on display when illuminated? His stated makeup is that he is the intellectual savior of the masses, and with that description in mind, WWE apparently failed him. If his superior intellect couldn't save him in a match against a weakened Cena, then what currency do brains hold in WWE? Is his character a failure? Well, I remembered two things. One, in WWE, heels never tell the truth. The Shield started out saying they fought for justice, but they've proven time and time again that they're mercenaries. The money Paul Heyman paid them was just as good as the scrilla obtained in exchange for paramilitary support from Triple H.

(Aside, how awesome was the teased dissension between Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns during their backstage promo? I want to bottle that moment up and keep it to put on my cheeseburgers.)

Secondly, to believe that Sandow's words defined his character and not his actions would be bad analysis. Sandow may have talked a big game about his smarts, and yes, to some degree, his character has refined mental capacity. However, his character has always been about talking a big game and getting into situations where he may not be able to back up his words. WWE showed it when he interrupted Degeneration X at RAW 1000, when he made his life's mission taunting Cody Rhodes about stealing the briefcase from under his nose, and during so many other segments when Sandow's only function was to come out, get the crowd hot and bothered with his arrogance, and eat some kind of instant comeuppance.

In this situation, what was coming to him wasn't something readily apparent. While claimed the briefcase, Rhodes was the one who ultimately won out in the match, like the Universe intended him to. He's entangled in a hot story, and he will almost certainly get a run with one of the big belts before the end of 2014. Meanwhile, since Sandow's victory was cosmically empty, he had to fail in his cash-in attempt, didn't he? Obviously, while I set the question up as rhetorical, clearly, the answer is as muddled as the mint in a good mojito.

Monday's lasting impact will be very much dependent on how WWE follows up on Sandow in the next year. If this moment is the spark for Sandow to "snap" like a certain other cerebral technician with a propensity to use big words did in the early-to-mid '90s, then tonight will serve as a truer launch point than winning a briefcase ever could. I've seen a classic meanstreak, one that can get a wrestling heel easily to a WrestleMania main event, in Sandow ever since I first saw him wrestle Richie Steamboat in FCW. However, given WWE's track record with "building" heels, Sandow could very well be getting gored in the ass by El Torito by the time TLC rolls around. I won't ask anyone to get as irrationally excited as I am, because I fully admit that I may have WWE Stockholm Syndrome.

However, for all the doom and gloom that surrounds a typical Super Cena victory over an up-and-coming heel, I still can't bring myself to produce any vitriol over this one failed cash-in. Sandow's hubris, the arrogance embedded in the DNA of his persona, dictated that if anyone who wasn't Cena, Randy Orton, or otherwise established in the WWE firmament could take losing on his cash-in attempt, that person would be him. I've shown my work; I've changed my mind on the base decision of the opening of this weeks RAW. While the future may prove this failed cash-in as WWE business as usual, I can't say that the decision was a bad thing in and of itself.

Written By TH of The Wrestling Blog