WWE Fastlane 2019 review: Highlights, takeaways and projections
By Luke Norris
Highlights, takeaways and what’s next for the Superstars of WWE following Sunday night’s Fastlane pay-per-view event.
The road to WrestleMania is all clear.
The final pit stop on the way to the biggest show of the year took place on Sunday night at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland in the form of WWE Fastlane, and the night was interesting to say the least.
The Kickoff Show had plenty of entertaining moments with appearances from Beth Phoenix (more on her in a bit), Christian, The IIconics and AJ Styles. One of the Kickoff matches, Andrade vs. Rey Mysterio, was cancelled in favor of placing the two into a Fatal 4-Way Match for the United States Championship. There was Kofi Kingston getting called into Vince McMahon’s office (more on that soon as well) just before his New Day teammates pulled off a win over Shinsuke Nakamura and Rusev in the one Kickoff Show match that did actually happen, a pretty solid bout.
There’s plenty more to get to on the main card so let’s just jump right in to the curtain-jerking match at WWE Fastlane.
SmackDown Tag Team Championship Match
The Usos (c) vs. The Miz & Shane McMahon
Even assuming the outcome ahead of time, with The Usos retaining the SmackDown Tag Team Championship, this was still a good match. It was better than the bout at Elimination Chamber as the two teams just seemed to have a bit more chemistry this time around. There were a few fun spots thrown in here, spots that could have gone insanely wrong if not timed properly, and the ending was done quite well with The Miz taking a chance he normally wouldn’t take, heading to the top turnbuckle for a high-risk maneuver. It obviously backfired and he once again cost his team the match, which led to the inevitable split that we all knew was coming. This was a fun start to the show though, especially with the hometown angle thrown in there and The Miz’s dad sitting at ringside.
What’s next: It’s obviously quite odd to see The Miz in the babyface role as he’s usually the one turning on someone but as per usual, he’s doing a great job. McMahon hasn’t been a heel since returning three years ago and will be to be fun watching him embrace that role once again. Just as we knew when this team got together, we’re looking at The Miz vs. McMahon at WrestleMania.