Battleground (2013)

Battleground (2013)
Promotional poster featuring Ryback
Promotion	WWE
Date	October 6, 2013
City	Buffalo, New York
Venue	First Niagara Center
Attendance	11,700
Tagline(s)	Unlimited Energy
Pay-per-view chronology
← Previous Night of Champions (2013) Next → Hell in a Cell (2013)
Battleground chronology
← Previous First Next → Battleground (2014)

Battleground (2013) was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by WWE. It took place on October 6, 2013 at the First Niagara Center in Buffalo, New York. This pay-per-view was announced on the April 8, 2013 Raw as the new October WWE pay-per-view, a week after Over the Limit. This was the first annual Battleground event. The event received 114,000 buys worldwide, making it the second lowest number (to the ECW December to Dismember) in the last 17 years. The buy rate was down from the last Over the Limit event of 167,000.

Background

After defeating Randy Orton at Night of Champions for the WWE Championship, Daniel Bryan was stripped of the title after referee Scott Armstrong admitted to a fast 3-count. However, Triple H did not give Orton the title back since he and his wife Stephanie McMahon believed that Orton's performance at Night of Champions was not what they wanted the face of the WWE to be, stating that they wanted the more ruthless Orton that they feuded with previously. It was then announced that Bryan and Orton would face off once more for the vacant championship.

At Night of Champions Rob Van Dam faced the champion Alberto Del Rio for the World Heavyweight Championship in which Van Dam won by disqualification. On the September 20 episode of SmackDown, Triple H gave Van Dam a rematch with Del Rio at Battleground for the World Heavyweight Championship. Immediately afterwards, Del Rio would proceed to viciously assault Van Dam backstage. The next week, the match was made as a Hardcore match. On the October 4 episode of SmackDown, Van Dam defeated Fandango via disqualification, but after the match, Van Dam placed a trash can at Fandango's face, and hit him with a Van Terminator. Later that night, Van Dam sent the broken trash can to Del Rio as a "gift" for him.

CM Punk began feuding with Paul Heyman in July after Heyman cost him the Money in the Bank ladder match for a WWE Championship contract at Money in the Bank (due to Punk earlier telling Heyman he didn't want him to be his manager). This resulted in Punk fighting and losing to Brock Lesnar at SummerSlam. Punk continued to feud with Heyman and his other client, Curtis Axel resulting in a handicap elimination match at Night of Champions. After Axel was eliminated, Punk handcuffed and beat down Heyman much like Heyman had done to him a couple of weeks prior on Raw. However, Ryback made the save, putting Punk through a table and costing him the match. On the September 23 episode of Raw, it was announced that Punk would face Ryback at Battleground.

Also on September 23, Brie Bella pinned AJ Lee during a 10-diva tag team match, leading to Brie receiving a match for AJ's Divas Championship at the pay-per-view.

On the September 30 episode of Raw, Cody Rhodes (who had weeks earlier been fired from WWE in part due to perceived insubordination by Triple H) and Goldust (who was lobbying to get his younger brother's job back) were given a non-title tag team match against WWE Tag Team Champions of The Shield (Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns) by Triple H and Stephanie McMahon; if the Rhodes brothers had won, they would got their jobs back. If the Shield had won, Goldust and Cody's father Dusty Rhodes would have been fired from his position as an NXT trainer, and the Rhodes Family would be banned from WWE.

The same night, R-Truth defeated Intercontinental Champion Curtis Axel in a non-title match. Two nights later on Main Event, it was announced that Truth would get a title match against Axel at Battleground.

On the September 30 Raw and the October 4 SmackDown, Bray Wyatt delivered cryptic messages to Kofi Kingston after Kingston's matches, leading to a match between them at the pay-per-view.

Another scheduled match featured Santino Marella teaming with The Great Khali to take on The Real Americans (Antonio Cesaro and Jack Swagger) in a tag team match.

Event

Pre-show

The pre-show included the Kickoff panel of Josh Mathews, Tensai, The Miz and Titus O’Neil previewing the matches. Also on the Kickoff show, Dolph Ziggler defeated Damien Sandow by pinfall following a Zig-Zag.

Miscellaneous

The English commentators were Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler and John "Bradshaw" Layfield while there were also Spanish and German commentators ringside. Lilian Garcia and Justin Roberts were ring announcers.

Preliminary matches

The first match of the night saw Alberto Del Rio defending the World Heavyweight Championship against Rob Van Dam in a Hardcore match. Del Rio retained the title by applying the cross armbreaker to Van Dam, whose arm was wrapped in a chair.

The second match of the night was a Tag team match between the team of The Great Khali and Santino Marella and The Real Americans (Antonio Cesaro and Jack Swagger). The Real Americans won by pinfall after a Cesaro Swing to Khali.

The third match was Curtis Axel defending the WWE Intercontinental Championship against R-Truth. Axel won by hitting a hangman's facebuster, thus retaining his title.

The fourth match was AJ Lee defending the WWE Divas Championship against Brie Bella. AJ retained her title via Schoolboy pin.

The fifth match was a Tag team match between the team of Cody Rhodes and Goldust vs. The Shield, with Rhodes family's jobs on the line. Rhodes and Goldust won via pinfall after Rhodes hit the Cross Rhodes on Seth Rollins.

The sixth match was Bray Wyatt facing off against Kofi Kingston, which Wyatt won after hitting the Sister Abigail for the win.

The seventh match was CM Punk facing off against new Paul Heyman Guy, Ryback. Punk won after hitting the low blow with the referee distracted.

Main event

The main event was Syed Azhan facing off against Samama Bin Hasan Hassaanfor the vacant WWE Pakistan heavyweight championship. As the match started, Azhan hit his finisher move to hassaan, The AC Can, but pin was broken by samama. Then, Samama trapped Azhan in a bear hug. Then Samama perform his finishing move last two days two Azhan,Hassaan broke pin fall on two and then hit a DDT,to Samama but he could make a close two fall. Azhan then hit the Tomb AC to Hassaan then.Syed make Get in spin star elbow to leg then AC on Hassaan to win

Aftermath

The next night on Raw, Brad Maddox announced that Randy Orton would face Daniel Bryan once again at Hell in a Cell in a Hell in a Cell match with a special guest referee. The WWE Universe was allowed to choose amongst Booker T, Bob Backlund and Shawn Michaels. Michaels won the vote. Orton won the match and the title after Michaels superkicked Bryan.

Stephanie McMahon fired Big Show after knocking out Bryan and Orton. Later that night, he knocked out Triple H. On the October 18 episode of SmackDown, Show knocked out Raw General Manager, Brad Maddox. On the October 21 episode of Raw, he brought a truck to the arena to stop The Authority and Orton, and the following week, he knocked him out because of the bankruptcy of The Authority. Michael Cole interviewed Triple H that Big Show would be banned from WWE. On the November 4 episode of Raw, Show got his job back and would face Orton for the WWE Championship at Survivor Series, which Orton won.

With Rob Van Dam out of the title picture, Alberto Del Rio tried to coerce Vickie Guerrero to make him the "face of the WWE" due to the fact he was the only active major champion. Later that night, Del Rio went to compete in a match against Ricardo Rodriguez. Vickie would then announce that Del Rio must defend the World Heavyweight Championship against John Cena, who had been out of action since SummerSlam due to an elbow injury. He attacked Rodriguez with a steel chair after he won the match. Del Rio lost the title to Cena at Hell in a Cell.

CM Punk would continue his feud with Paul Heyman and Ryback once again after he defeated the latter due to a low blow, which the referee never saw because Heyman diverted the latter's attention by taking out a kendo stick from under the ring and attempt to strike Punk. On October 9, WWE.com announced that CM Punk would face Ryback again in a rematch at Hell in a Cell. On the October 14 episode of Raw, Heyman complained to General Manager Brad Maddox that Punk used a low blow to defeat Ryback while the referee's back was turned, so Maddox decided to have a Beat the Clock challenge in which Ryback would face R-Truth, then CM Punk would face Curtis Axel, where whoever won their match in the fastest time (assuming Ryback or Punk would win), could then pick the stipulation at Hell in a Cell. Ryback defeated Truth in 5:44, and Punk pinned Axel in 5:33, thus Punk was able to beat the clock and pick the stipulation. Punk chose to fight both Ryback and Heyman in a Hell in a Cell handicap match. Punk won the match and attacked Heyman on the top of the cell. This was Punk's last singles match on pay-per-view, as on January 26, 2014, after the Royal Rumble, he left WWE and later retired from professional wrestling.

Cody Rhodes and Goldust, who fought The Shield (Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns) to a winning effort at Battleground (and saving Dusty Rhodes job as a NXT trainer, including their own), challenged the duo again for the WWE Tag Team Championship in a no disqualification tag team match. Rhodes and Goldust would finally defeat The Shield due to Big Show knocking out Rollins and Reigns, and the Rhodes Brothers became the new WWE Tag Team Champions.

AJ Lee was legitimately sent home from the following night's Raw after she showed signs of a concussion stemming from when her head struck a ring post during her title defense at Battleground. On the October 18 episode of SmackDown, Brie Bella defeated Lee in a non-title singles match and three days later on Raw, she along with her sister Nikki defeated AJ and Tamina Snuka in a divas tag team match with Brie pinning AJ again, earning Brie a Divas Championship match at Hell in a Cell.

Reception

Battleground was heavily criticized by critics and fans alike. Mike Johnson, from PWInsider, said that "WWE failed that night" and "really owes their audience an apology". James Cadwell, from PWTorch, said that the Intercontinental Championship match and Punk-Ryback were "house show level". He continued: "WWE had to put the 'feel-good' Rhodes Family Victory on the PPV to throw viewers a bone, but ending a title match for the vacant WWE Title without a finish and putting the spotlight on Big Show isn't going to build a lot of goodwill with an audience that is checking out of Raw right now. Overall, the main event was a notch or two below last month's offering. They just never moved into second gear". The event was voted by the Wrestling Observer Newsletter as the worst major wrestling show of 2013.

Results

No.	Results	Stipulations
1	Dolph Ziggler defeated Damien Sandow	Singles match

See also

• List of WWE pay-per-view events

External links

• Battleground Website