Protect Ya Neck

Chairs match

Randy Orton vs. Rey Mysterio

It all started with Randy Orton being a colossal jerk.

The Road to TLC

Hate talking about it...but Crown Jewel was a thing. And if we’re going to take a look at this feud from the very beginning, we have to start there.

At Crown Jewel, Orton wrestled Rey Mysterio in the semifinals of the World Cup tournament and controlled the match from the get go. He countered a 619 attempt and had all the momentum...only for Mysterio to roll Orton up for a pin fall and send him to the Saudi showers early.

Mysterio used his victory to secure a spot on SmackDown Live’s Survivor Series team, but that success only angered Orton even more. Orton stalked Mysterio in the lead up to Survivor Series, lurking in the background. The two men were given a match to sort out their differences on Nov. 20, but uh... it wasn’t exactly a friendly match.

Orton secured the victory with an incredible RKO to the floor and another in the ring, but he was particularly vicious throughout the match, ripping at Mysterio’s mask and tearing it off entirely after crushing Mysterio’s throat with a chair.

Orton’s explanation for his attack? The goal was to embarrass Rey Mysterio. The attack was meant to remove Mysterio from of the pedestal that his name and reputation have built. To Orton, Mysterio is simply another of his victims.

Yikes.

Mysterio tried to get revenge three weeks ago, but suffered another nasty chair shot to the throat. Nevertheless, Mysterio agreed to a Chairs Match at TLC, a decision that irked Orton to no end. He spent his time on this past week’s show talking trash, and it provided Mysterio an opening at last to get some retribution.

What’s at stake?

Respect. Reputation. Legacy. You know, that sort of thing.

Orton’s violent brutality and promos have been a direct challenge to Mysterio’s place on SmackDown. Randy Orton’s been a nasty, vicious wrestler this year and has taken great pleasure in ruining the image of his opponents. He had that ugly ear incident with Jeff Hardy earlier this year, he snapped Tye Dillinger’s fingers, and now he’s messing with Mysterio’s mask.

Orton’s also implied that Mysterio isn’t who he used to be. He’s not as good. He doesn’t deserve the reverence he gets. The stakes here are simply proving who’s right.

This feels like an angle that could have run on SmackDown in the early 2000s when I was a kid, and yet I’m not sure how much the fans care. Still, I think it’s a solid little story – one told over a few PPVs, no less! - and while the match probably won’t be a long one, I have no doubt these two could pull out some neat stunts.