Another pay per view this weekend, and there’s a bit of filler going on here.  Injuries and suspensions have led to a bit of reshuffling of this card, and there’s also a main event match that looks sure to under deliver.

No Way Out is a name that hasn’t been used since 2009, but it’s basically just one of the generic B-list pay per views that has no particular gimmick.  There was some talk at one point that this was going to be a cage match show, which would have fitted with the name.  But it turns out there’s just one cage match.  In practice, it’s simply a generic PPV.  (In Germany, by the way, it’s called No Escape.  That’s because they already used the name No Way Out in February when the Germans flatly refused to promote a show called Elimination Chamber.)

So… the card.

1.  Steel Cage Match: John Cena v. The Big Show.  This is the latest step in the ongoing John Laurinaitis storyline, which is now being overwritten to the point of horror.

John Laurinaitis, you will recall, became general manager of both Raw and Smackdown (the difference between the two shows having been largely eroded to the point of meaningless) at Wrestlemania.  He’s now the erratic heel manager on both shows.  The anonymous board of directors are notionally meant to be faces, but this being wrestling, they seem incapable of simply firing the guy when they could make a needlessly complex match with his job at stake.  So last month we had John Cena v John Laurinaitis with Cena having to do nothing more than pin a retired wrestler to end the storyline.  But he dragged it out for ages until the Big Show showed up to help Laurinaitis win.  (This was such obviously stupid behaviour that they felt obliged to try – and fail – to explain it on Raw.  If the WWE’s current obsession with Twitter has any upside, it’s that they’re continually being reminded of the gaping plot holes.)

Vince McMahon showed up again last week back in his old figurehead role (with no explanation, despite his being removed from power ages ago), and so the stipulation for this match is: if Cena wins, McMahon will apparently fire Laurinaitis.  If Big Show wins, Laurinaitis keeps his job and will fire Cena.

Except McMahon was knocked out Big Show at the end of Raw, so he may or may not be there on Monday to actually fire Laurinaitis.

Truly this is a show which would be improved by the writing skills of Jeph Loeb.

There are all manner of problems with the stipulations attached to this match.  Fundamentally, I don’t think most people believe either stipulation is going to be honoured.  They “fired” Cena last year and he didn’t miss a single show.  Laurinaitis could conceivably go, but it’s unlikely they would resolve that storyline on a B-show.  These sort of stipulations only work if the audience accepts that something’s actually at stake.  Otherwise, you’re just reminding the audience that nothing is.

The match will be competent enough but we’ve seen it before and I expect it to be basically a backdrop for a fundamentally flawed story.  It’s not something that really interests me.  My guess would be that Cena wins but some sort of screwjob involving Vince’s absence leads to Laurinaitis staying in place anyway – to general irritation.

2.  World Heavyweight Title: Sheamus v Dolph Ziggler.  The original idea here was for Sheamus to defend against Alberto Del Rio, but he’s out with a concussion.  So Ziggler was parachuted into the slot on Monday.  He was meant to be wrestling Randy Orton on the undercard, but Orton’s just been suspended for a drug test failure.  So that worked out well.  Kind of.

Ziggler is widely regarded as one of the most underrated wrestlers in the company, and someone who ought to be promoted to the main event.  He and Sheamus are likely to have a good match.  But it’s one we’ve seen before, on free TV, quite recently.  And Ziggler’s been booked as a mid card guy for a while.  So it’s rather difficult to position him as a serious threat to the title, unfortunately, and it’s not what you’d call an obvious pay-per-view draw.  Still, it’s an opportunity for Ziggler to have a high quality main-event match, and that’s something.  With the company’s depth problems, they really ought to be doing more with him.  After all, as this match shows, they need him in this role.

A win for Ziggler would be a major shock, but there are arguments for doing it – essentially, that it would give him his much-needed promotion and that it would get a bit of attention.  I’d still put my money on Sheamus.

3.  WWE Title: CM Punk v Daniel Bryan v Kane.  Another match that would probably have benefitted from dialling back the storyline a bit, though at least this one still makes some degree of sense.  Punk remains the defending champion – and he’s now had the belt since 20 November 2011, an extremely long run by current standards.  (In fact, if he survives this match, he’ll surpass Triple H’s 210-day reign from 2008.  After that, his next target is John Cena’s 2006-7 reign which lasted over a year.)

Punk and Bryan had a well received match on the last show, but for some reason the company has decided that the rematch would be improved by throwing veteran brawler Kane into the mix.  Personally, I’d rather have just seen them continue the two-man programme.  Even so, it’s not a catastrophic decision; the match is still a reasonably decent one.

In the background of this storyline is AJ Lee, who was Bryan’s girl-next-door girlfriend for some months until he turned heel and eventually dumped her after blaming her for his 18-second loss at Wrestlemania.  In a rare example of character development that makes passable sense, even if it’s a bit of a cliche, AJ has migrated over a period of months from “girl next door” to “loyal girlfriend” to “long-suffering girlfriend” to “jilted and desperate to get her man back” to “quite possibly stark raving mad.”  She now hovers on the fringes of this storyline apparently aligning herself with CM Punk – she wears a version of his outfit – but also acting rather erratically and being regarded by all three wrestlers as essentially a loose cannon who might do anything.  The story, in part, is about whether she’s faking it, and (in any event) who she will actually side with, and (assuming anyone’s actually thought about it) why.

AJ has unexpectedly turned out to be rather good in this role, and so it’s working better than you would expect, even though it’s a case of loading up a match with story content it doesn’t necessarily need.  If it’s well handled, this could still be good.  As for who wins… Punk has held that title for an awfully long time, and Daniel Bryan’s had a recent surge of popularity, and it’s easier for AJ to play a part in the finish if he wins.  On the other hand, they only just took the Smackdown title off Bryan, so it’d be a slightly odd move.  I could easily see Punk retaining the title and everything being dragged out a little longer, to be paid off at a higher-profile show.  As for Kane, he’s there as a complicating factor; he wasn’t a big success the last time they gave him the title, and I’d be very surprised if they went back there.

4.  WWE Intercontinental Title: Christian v Cody Rhodes.  Christian returned unexpectedly at the last PPV and beat Rhodes for the title.  This is the obligatory rematch.  The problem with Christian’s return is that they’ve decided to make him a babyface even though he was last seen as a heel, and nothing has really been done to explain the turn.  I assume they were betting on the common babyface reaction that popular wrestlers get after being away for a while, but even so, you’ve got to do something to motivate the character.

Still, it’s a very good match on paper.  Christian ought to win; he needs to hold on to the title to rebuild momentum, and Rhodes would be treading water if he won the title back yet again.

5.  WWE Divas Title: Layla El v Beth Phoenix.  The WWE hasn’t done a great deal with Layla after bringing her back and giving her the title (which they did mainly because they thought it would be a surprise).  She’s been dutifully defending the thing at those shows, but there’s not been much in the way of storyline for her.  This could really go either way – they might just be treading water, in which case Layla ought to retain on the logic that title changes ought to mean something, or they might be cycling the title back round to Beth Phoenix in order to start a storyline with her.  By the generally uninspiring standards of the WWE women’s division, which has never had its recruiting priorities straight, this should be relatively good.

6.  Tuxedo match: Santino Marella v Ricardo Rodriguez.  Ricardo Rodriguez is the long-suffering “personal ring announcer” of Alberto Del Rio, and with his boss out with a concussion, they’ve got to find something for him to do.  This is apparently their solution – program him against fellow comedy wrestler Santino Marella.  At least it gets him on the show.

A tuxedo match is an old comedy gimmick traditionally used for fights between managers.  The aim is to tear off the opponent’s tuxedo.  No, really.

WWE comedy tends to be somewhere between tedious and excruciating, but with the right material these guys can be funny, so you never know.  And while you wouldn’t know it to look at him (and the WWE generally goes out of its way to portray him as a hapless non-combatant), Rodriguez is actually a proper wrestler – he spent years on the California indie circuit.  So if they want him to do a real match, he can actually do it.

On paper, Santino ought to win, since he’s the US champion and he’s fighting a ring announcer.  It’s way too early to do any sort of storyline to split Ricardo off from Alberto Del Rio, though it’s got to come at some point; you have to question whether Del Rio, as a main event heel, really benefits from a comedy sidekick.

7.  Brodus Clay v David Otunga.  This is the pre-show match which will be streaming on YouTube.  Clay used to be a generic thug but has recently been repackaged in the 2012 version of the “dancing fat man who’s fun-loving yet physically dominant” gimmick.  While it’s plainly a novelty gimmick, it’s not the worst role to have.  After all, he gets two dancers to accompany him to the ring, which makes him look like a big deal.  And something broadly similar worked wonders for Rikishi’s career back in the day.

David Otunga is John Laurinaitis’ sidekick, with a weird “wrestling lawyer” gimmick that is only slightly less weird for being legitimate.  (All the stuff about him being a Harvard-qualified lawyer is, quite bizarrely, true.)  There is in theory a storyline here – Otunga injured Clay’s knee on this week’s television – but let’s be realistic.  Clay never loses.  Otunga never wins.  It’s a bit of a foregone conclusion.  And while there’s a case to be made for giving Otunga a bit more credibility so that he can function a little more effectively as Laurinaitis’ henchman, there’s no way that Clay’s months-long winning streak is ending against David Otunga on YouTube.

Also on this show… Triple H will be appearing to talk about the Brock Lesnar storyline that’s been parked for weeks.  This is apparently scheduled as the first step of the build towards Triple H v Lesnar at Summerslam in two shows time.  Are you interested in buying a PPV to see an interview?  No, me neither.  There’s some interest here in terms of where they’re actually going with Lesnar, whose relationship with the company seems to run hot and cold, but you don’t need to buy the show just for that.  I’d stick this on Raw on Monday rather than waste PPV time on it.

Worth getting?  Well, there are a couple of good matches on paper, but I don’t see it as a very inspiring card.  You can see plenty of matches of this standard on regular TV.