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WWE featured six total matches on the main card of Backlash 2020 (Sun., June 14).
The main card of this pay-per-view (PPV) lasted 3 hours, 5 minutes, and 3 seconds (3h 05m 03s). Here is a sorted list of the bell-to-bell times for the six matches that took place during this event:
- 44m 46s: Edge vs. Randy Orton
- 16m 47s: Jeff Hardy vs. Sheamus
- 13m 17s: Drew McIntyre vs. Bobby Lashley
- 8m 50s: Banks & Bayley vs. Bliss & Cross vs. The IIconics
- 8m 25s: Asuka vs. Nia Jax
- 7m 21s: Braun Strowman vs. The Miz & John Morrison
These times add up to 1h 39m 26s, which is roughly 53.7% of the show. For comparison’s sake, the overall match time percentage for all WWE PPVs since the start of 2013 is 54.1%.
The segment featuring the Street Profits, Viking Raiders, and Motorcycle Ninjas lasted about 14m 20s, but I didn’t include it in the above list of matches. It wasn’t clear that the segment that aired was supposed to be a match. There was no finish to it, if it was supposed to be a match. Tom Phillips clarified the situation afterwards when he said the following: “Due to the events surrounding the Street Profits and the Viking Raiders, the Raw tag team championship match will, in fact, not be happening here tonight.”
The above list of match times shows that the four championship matches at Backlash were the four shortest matches on the card. For some reason Hardy and Sheamus got more time than even the WWE championship match. Hell, the non-title skirmish featuring Motorcycle Ninjas was also longer than all four championship matches at Backlash.
On the one hand, it’s good to have a pay-per-view not run much longer than three hours. On the other hand, that so many of the title matches didn’t even go 10 minutes (including the pre-show United States championship match between Apollo Crews and Andrade, which was less than eight minutes) indicates that WWE booked several lackluster championship matches on this card.
Are you surprised by any of these results, Cagesiders? Which of these matches received less (or more) time than you hoped for?