Money In The Bank 2018: 5 reasons to watch WWE’s June PPV

Last year’s Money in the Bank event gave us the first-ever women’s Money in the Bank ladder match. It also gave us James Ellsworth — not a woman — pulling the briefcase down for Carmella, meaning the lasting image of the first-ever women’s Money in the Bank ladder match was of a dude. That was a brilliant play for year two, but they already used it for year one, and now I’m annoyed about that all over again.

Aaaaaaaaaaanyway, woo, Money of the Bank! For years I’ve been saying this should be treated as the fifth big pay-per-view on the calendar, the one that makes the long-standing Big Four into the Big Five, and it’s happening. Money in the Bank is going to be longer, going from 7 p.m. onward instead of 8. It, like every other pay-per-view on the schedule now, is co-branded with both RAW and SmackDown superstars appearing.

Let’s get right to those reasons to watch, which are plentiful.

Ladder matches are good. This isn’t a hot take or anything, it’s just fact. One-on-one ladder matches are great, personal affairs with high stakes, and are a beautiful thing. There’s also a beauty in what we’ll see at Money in the Bank: huge, impersonal, chaotic messes with bodies flying everywhere, a half-dead wrestling climbing their way to the top of the ladder by sheer willpower along while a bunch of even-deader wrestlers litter the floor below them.

What are they climbing the ladder to acquire? A briefcase containing a contract for, depending on the match, a shot at a men’s or women’s top championship that can be cashed in at any time. Sometimes, the execution in cashing in the briefcase is awful — see Corbin, Baron, 2017 — but other times, it’s a wondrous moment in crowd excitement and energy and a reminder of why the fight for the case itself is so important — thanks for reminding us of this by attacking a downed Charlotte earlier this year, Carmella.

Speaking of Charlotte, she’s joined in the women’s ladder match by a slew of other former WWE women’s champs — Alexa Bliss, Natalya, Naomi, Becky Lynch, and Sasha Banks — as well as former NXT Women’s Champion Ember Moon, and... Lana. Sorry, Lana, you were a manager in NXT and the same in WWE until recently, so you didn’t have time to build those credentials, but hey: you tricked Billie Kay and Peyton Royce long enough to win your way into the ladder match, and for that, you and your pals Rusev and Aiden English deserve some respect.

Charlotte lost the SmackDown Women’s Championship through cash-in shenanigans with Carmella. Becky Lynch was the first-ever SmackDown Women’s champ. Natalya won it from Naomi in 2017, before Charlotte took it from Natalya. Alexa Bliss won the SmackDown Women’s title from Becky Lynch back in the day, and then moved on to become the RAW Women’s Champion, before losing that to current champ Nia Jax. Sasha Banks won the RAW Women’s title a whole bunch of times while all of this was going on, but failed to successfully defend it even once.

So, you’ve got a bunch of wrestlers who have tasted the title before and want to prove they’ve still got what it takes to get it back, plus Ember Moon, who hasn’t won gold on the main roster yet, just at NXT, and Lana, who is here to prove she belongs at all. There isn’t a James Ellsworth to be seen, either — Rusev and English are good guys, or at least closer to good guys than Ellsworth was, so they aren’t about to show up and start hitting the women with ladders to open up a path for Rusev’s wife, Lana. And given how many former champs are in the mix here, we are in for a treat.

On the men’s side, we’ve got Rusev, Miz, Finn Balor, Bobby Roode, Kevin Owens, Samoa Joe, Braun Strowman, and whichever member of New Day — Big E, Kofi Kingston, or Xavier Woods — is selected to join the match. New Day won their way into the match like everyone else had to, but only one of them can participate. Well, legally, anyway: there’s nothing stopping the other two members of New Day from joining the fight or climbing up the ladder to secure whoever is actually in the match the briefcase. The only rules are no rules! (And also that the match only ends when someone has possession of the briefcase, which is a rule, now that I think about it).

Braun Strowman seems like a lock to win in terms of the whole the only guy who has stopped Braun Strowman is Brock Lesnar and he’s not here thing, but if Rusev, Finn, Roode, Owens, Joe, and all of New Day attack him at once, they might slow him down just long enough to keep him from winning. Strowman isn’t a force to be reckoned with: he’s the force.

Why did I not mention Miz among those who would join forces to slow Strowman down? Because Miz is the wrestler smart enough to climb the ladder while everyone else is delaying the most dangerous man in the ring. Unlike with the women, where it’s unclear to me who will win, Miz seems like the perfect pick on the men’s side: a heel carrying around the briefcase for months and months, waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike, reminding you they can cash-in at any time... yeah, let’s get Miz this thing and, eventually, another shot at the WWE Championship because of it.

Ronda Rousey getting a title match so soon after her first match in WWE is a little off, but the title isn’t going to end up being the point here: Ronda’s second storyline arc is the key. Natalya is supposed to be Ronda’s friend, but she’s been real shady lately — forgetting which leg of hers is supposedly injured, for instance, and with that very uncomfortable oh I’m your friend trustworthy til the end! attitude in every interaction with Rousey — and it feels like it’s going to be Natalya and Nia putting one over on the new woman in town who got herself a championship match out of the gate.

The characters opposing Ronda in this fit the bill, too, since Natalya has been around for ages and had to scratch and claw for title opportunities, whereas Jax spent all of 2017 dominating and couldn’t get a championship shot until her best friend accidentally told the world that she hates Nia and uses her as muscle. They would absolutely — and most importantly, understandably — be upset about Ronda showing up and getting the rocket strapped to her back.

So the real focus here isn’t on the title shot, but the consequences of getting one, and I’m more excited than I thought I would be to see how this all plays out.

Carmella was able to defeat Charlotte by first attacking her after she had been beat down by the IIconics — not a typo, copy, there are two Iconic women, see? — and then again by playing Charlotte’s hubris against her in a more fair one-on-one match. Her prize for gloating about defeating the woman who defeated Asuka? Asuka intent on making Carmella bleed her own blood.

I don’t really buy Carmella defeating Charlotte in a one-on-one match, but I can talk myself into it a little bit. Asuka, though? Nothing short of the return of James Ellsworth sacrificing himself for his Princess to take down the Empress is going to cut it for me here.

That, or Asuka just murks Carmella, and we get Charlotte vs. Asuka II somewhere down the line. I’m fine with either of these results, because both paths will be a hell of a lot of fun to watch on Sunday.

“Seth Rollins is wrestling” is enough of a reason to watch at least one match on this show. “Seth Rollins is wrestling Elias in an Intercontinental Championship match” only ups the reasons. Rollins has consistently been the best thing about RAW for months now, ever since before WrestleMania 34, even, and Elias has been spreading joy in a much different, acoustic way. Seeing them build to this over the weeks has been a lot of fun, and now they get to hurt each other for our amusement. Wrestling!

Rollins, with the help of the Miz before him, has helped make the Intercontinental Championship the most important title in WWE. Part of that is because Brock Lesnar holds the Universal Championship and can’t be bothered to show up to one of the biggest pay-per-views of the year, and another reason is the WWE Championship has been stuck in shitty feuds since Randy Orton got his hands on it at WrestleMania 33, but the most significant reason is that Miz and Seth Rollins are good as hell, and that goodness has transferred over to a belt that lacked significance for far too long.

Elias is a big part of the show these days, and becoming more and more of an actual in-ring threat: having him go up against Rollins is good for both of them, as well as the title they’re vying for.

I’m honestly a little tired of Nakamura vs. Styles, but on the other hand, we will get to see how many dick punches it takes for one man to stay down for a 10 count on Sunday, and I’m perfectly happy to share with you that I’m all about WWE showing the work for that math problem with one last showdown between the two.