WWE: The 5 best Elimination Chamber Matches of all time
3. Elimination Chamber 2017
John Cena (c) vs. AJ Styles vs. Bray Wyatt vs. Baron Corbin vs. Dean Ambrose vs. The Miz for the WWE Championship
Ahh yes, 2017. Good times.
SmackDown really was on a roll in 2016-17. The WWE title was elevated to new heights by AJ Styles’s first reign as champion, and Cena won it from Styles to tie Ric Flair’s record of 16 World titles in what happened to be one of the best matches of either man’s career. Clearly, the WWE title was on a high and whoever walked out with the title out of this match was going to be a made man.
Oh, wait, *checks history*, *sighs*.
Anyway, this match was probably the first Chamber match of the Modern Era that was truly exceptional. Great Chamber matches always have a few different narratives going on, there are rivalries coming into the match that influence it heavily, and it also creates rivalries in the aftermath. This match had both.
Cena and Styles started the match, and if you’ve watched literally any one of their matches, you know they have excellent chemistry and they killed it again in the first few minutes.
The next entrant was the Intercontinental Champion at the time, Dean Ambrose, and just for context, he was over as hell. He came in and mixed it up with Cena and Styles, taking fans’ minds back to their triple threat at No Mercy 2016.
Bray Wyatt was next, and he destroyed everybody, or ate them, because he’s the Eater of Worlds. Get it?
Everybody climbed the chains for some reason and AJ bumped around like he was made of rubber. Up next was Baron Corbin, and he went on a path of destruction as Miz looked on from his pod terrified, but this only lasted a few minutes as Ambrose rolled Corbin up for the surprise pin.
What I like about this match is that everything that went down enhanced the characters and stories that were progressing. We didn’t need Corbin to be in the match for long, and he wasn’t. Then, he threw a tantrum and absolutely decimated Ambrose, and Miz, in a moment that was perfect for his character, sneakily pinned Ambrose as Corbin left. This would lead to Corbin vs. Ambrose at Mania.
Miz couldn’t celebrate for long though, as he was eliminated by Cena to set up their Mania clash. At this point, nobody wanted Cena to win, and that resulted in some great near falls, as Big Match John dominated Styles and Wyatt, but to everyone’s pleasant surprise, Wyatt eliminated Cena clean. Now, it was down to Wyatt and Styles, with a new champ guaranteed. The crowd was electric.
A few minutes of great wrestlers doing great things later, Wyatt reversed a Phenomenal Forearm into Sister Abigail and got the win and his first-ever WWE title, and we’re going to ignore everything that happened after.
“You deserve it” *clap* *clap* *clapclapclap*