How Did Nakamura Do?

Outside of all the drama with Jinder Mahal, the big story for Backlash was supposed to be Shinsuke Nakamura making his official in-ring debut on the main roster. He faced Dolph Ziggler. He won. That was to be expected. But there is more to it than that. How did he actually look?

Looking around, I see a lot of fans were disappointed by the performance. I am not going to say I watched the match. I didn't. But I can get the sense of what happened from what I see fans saying. They feel it was a lackluster performance from Nakamura. The issue isn't sloppiness or a huge botch ruining the match. The wrong story was just told in the ring. I often talk about the story in a match. Will it be a squash? Will a particular spot come up? Things like that. I didn't really do that for this match. I guess I expected WWE to handle it properly or smarks to not be too demanding with this.

Specifically, I see fans unhappy because they feel the match was too much about Dolph Ziggler or he looked too good. That's the story of a lot of matches. The person that will end up losing looks good, which is supposed to make the other guy look good for overcoming such a tough opponent. Over the years, however, I have seen fans talk like the person on the winning end sucks or doesn't deserve to win. They talk like the loser is the better wrestler. It is just how the match is booked. And this match made Nakamura look too human for some fans.

Should the WWE have made Nakamura look better? Probably. I would be the first person to say that Dolph Ziggler deserves better and the WWE screwed up with him in the last few months. But he's a jobber. That is what he is right now. And if that is what he is right now, he should not get in the way of someone like Nakamura that just debuted. At this point, who cares if Dolph Ziggler looks good or is made to look strong? If the situation calls for him to get squashed, so be it. Preferably, a more competitive match would have been enough. Ziggler can always get a better push somewhere down the road. That has been his entire career, up and down.

Nakamura is obviously not ruined. It took CM Punk time to break out on the main roster. Same with Daniel Bryan. Nakamura already has a strong smark following, but if he is going to break out like these other guys, the WWE will either have to let him do something huge, like CM Punk's pipebomb, or he will have to come up with something that really energizes the fans, like Daniel Bryan's "Yes!" and "No!" chants. Plenty of time for that.