The Boss Reigns Supreme at SummerSlam: Banks Captures the Title

Sasha Banks and Alexa Bliss brought the crowd in Brooklyn back to their feet during the second hour of the show.

After a tremendous kickoff show match and an always intense John Cena match, the crowd had lost quite a bit of interest in the show as it wore on. Particularly after the Big Cass vs. Big Show bout and Randy Orton taking out Rusev in mere seconds.

Then came the Banks vs. Bliss bout, which has been hyped heavily for the supposed real-life heat between the two women. They certainly played off that aspect throughout the match, and both women were phenomenal in their performance at SummerSlam.

The story was Bliss working over Banks’ shoulder, which she hurt when thrown to the outside (similar to Bayley a couple of weeks ago). Bliss worked over the injured left shoulder like a seasoned veteran for several minutes.

Similarly, though each woman took turns getting in offense, there was a story where Bliss just couldn’t beat Banks and threw a tantrum every time there was a close near fall. Banks even kicked out of the Twisted Bliss.

Eventually, Banks fought back and locked in the Banks Statement, but Bliss was able to escape a couple times. Once she got to the ropes, another time she broke the hold by grabbing Banks’ hurt arm and shoulder. The third time was the charm, though, and Banks was able to hang on and win by submission.

It will be interesting to see the direction WWE takes with this story tomorrow night on RAW. Alexa will obviously continue to be a focal point of the women’s division moving forward. They debuted a No Mercy PPV advertisement earlier in the show, which featured Bliss.

I’m sure Bliss will come out tomorrow night on RAW and want her rematch clause invoked immediately. Whether that will happen on TV or at No Mercy remains to be seen, but keeping Alexa in the title picture in the long term would be in the company’s best interest.

It should also be noted that Bayley was shown backstage before the bout wishing Sasha Banks goodluck, and Bayley was boo’ed pretty loudly by the crowd when she was shown.