WWE Stomping Grounds 2019 review: Highlights, takeaways and projections

United States Championship Match

Samoa Joe (c) vs. Ricochet

Wow, this was a bit of a surprise. It was shocking enough to see Ricochet earn this shot at the United States Championship by winning the fatal five-way a couple of weeks ago and Sunday night, things went even further.

This was one of the few matches that I was looking forward to going into Stomping Grounds and while the pace was a bit slower than I imagined it would be at points, it still delivered nicely. While the high-flying focus is always going to be on Ricochet when he’s in the ring, it never fails to impress watching Samoa Joe’s athleticism, especially when we all know how brutal his beatings can be — and we certainly got plenty of that as well.

Joe was on the offensive for the majority of the match as Ricochet took some big bumps in this bout. But as he does, he was able to (literally) bounce back as he was up and down and all over the place (and doing a backflip off of a human being’s chest) and just doing the amazing things that he can do. It did legitimately shock when he got the 1-2-3 as I thought he might just turn into one of those guys from NXT that can do great things but never gets the real chance to shine on the main roster. This is a big win for his career, and kudos to Joe for letting the young talent go over here. Good match.

What’s next: While it’s likely that Samoa Joe won’t just go away after losing the title, it looks as if AJ Styles will be getting the first crack at Ricochet’s United States Championship. Styles, Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson interrupted a photo shoot as The One and Only posed with his newly-won title and AJ announced that he’d be seeing Ricochet on Monday night.

So are we in for a one-off match with AJ Styles and Ricochet or are we setting up an entire feud that may involve Samoa Joe as well? You know what, I don’t even care. Just give me Styles and Ricochet in the ring together and I’m good.