WWE Crown Jewel 2018 review: What we learned, takeaways, future projections

Triple H & Shawn Michaels vs. The Undertaker & Kane

What we learned: Let’s just go ahead and get this out of the way early. I’m a huge Shawn Michaels fan and seeing him back in the ring for the first time in more than eight years was great, even if a bald HBK is still hard to get used to. But that’s petty nonsense.

The moment when Kane tagged in The Undertaker to get it on with Shawn Michaels was amazing. How many times over the past 25 years have we seen these two legends battle? Yeah, I know Triple H and Kane were there as well but come on, it’s freaking Shawn Michaels and The Undertaker. Sorry, had to mark out there for a minute.

This was never going to be the greatest match in the world. I mean, the combined age of these four guys is 206. But it was hard not to get sentimentally nostalgic and excited watching this one. And it really wasn’t terrible. Everybody looked to be in pretty good shape, and while things were a little slower than what we knew 10 or 15 or 20 years ago, I’ve seen worse … obviously much worse just on this show alone.

Michaels did the majority of the work on the DX side of things as he and The Undertaker spent a lot of time in the ring together in what was easily the longest match of the night. Things went back and forth in and out of the ring. Triple H got slammed through a table by Kane, which kept him down for quite a while. Speaking of Kane, how about that spot where Shawn actually knocked his mask off? Yep, that’s Mayor Jacobs. He was able to get it back on but not before HBK hit a top rope moonsault to the outside. Nice.

The finish was a little botched as Kane didn’t seem to be able to get up for the Pedigree after taking some Sweet Chin Music but it got the job done.

What’s next: If The Brothers of Destruction were going to lose, it’s not surprising that Kane took the pin as it’s pretty rare for The Undertaker to lose twice in a row. I don’t see this being a one-off for Shawn Michaels. ‘Taker can claim that he wasn’t the one to lose and I do see a final one-on-one encounter between the two. Kane is likely back to his mayoral duties and we definitely won’t see Triple H for a while as it’s been reported by WWE that he likely suffered a torn pectoral muscle during the match and will head back to the U.S. for surgery.

Well, that was … something. Things got off to a decent start but really fell off in the second half. The early stages of the World Cup were entertaining, even if the matches were fairly short. But that was kind of the theme of the night for the most part. AJ Styles and Samoa Joe ended earlier than it should have. Lesnar and Strowman was a joke, which was followed by a maybe even bigger joke with Shane and Ziggler. The main event was entertaining and sent the crowd home happy, so at least there was that to close things out. Overall, however, this was pretty disappointing, especially coming off the strongest pay-per-view of the year in Evolution. We’ll see how Survivor Series shakes out.

What are your thoughts on WWE Crown Jewel? What was your favorite match? Please feel free to join in the conversation in the comments section below.