No Way Out 2000: Triple H and Cactus Jack Put the Whole Show Over the Top

Kurt Angle and Chris Jericho open the show with exactly the kind of brisk championship match a crowded card needs. They move through counters, suplexes and submission attempts without wasting the first five minutes pretending not to know each other. Jericho's offense has snap, while Angle already looks absurdly comfortable working from underneath and cheating when the opportunity appears.

The finish fits Angle's character better than it serves Jericho. After the outside collision with Chyna distracts the referee, Angle uses the Intercontinental title belt to stop the Lionsault and steal the championship. It is a cheap ending, but it is a purposeful cheap ending that turns Angle into a double champion and gives him material for the rest of the night.

The match never reaches the level these two are capable of later, but it does not need to. Ten minutes of sharp wrestling, a meaningful title change and an immediate continuation of Angle's rise make it a strong opener. The B- reflects a very good piece of card construction rather than a hidden classic.

The tag-title change is more important than the match used to deliver it. Billy Gunn enters with a damaged shoulder, Road Dogg absorbs most of the punishment, and the Dudley Boyz work a short, direct match that is essentially designed to get the belts off the Outlaws without pretending the champions are at full strength. Five minutes later, the division has new rulers.

There are useful details inside the brevity. Bubba Ray attacking Gunn's bad shoulder with a pipe gives the injury a reason to matter, and the 3D on Road Dogg provides a clean visual finish. What never arrives is the back-and-forth tension expected from a pay-per-view title match.

As an angle, it works. As a match, it is thin and rushed, closer to a decisive television title change than a memorable pay-per-view defense. The Dudleys winning is the right historical result, but the bell-to-bell material earns only a D+.

Mark Henry and Viscera get less than four minutes, and the mercy is appreciated. The match is a slow heavyweight exchange built around power spots that never develop rhythm, while the crowd lets everyone know it has more interesting plans for the evening. There is no hidden technical gem waiting under the surface.

The Mae Young involvement makes the segment worse with hindsight. Viscera threatens her, Henry makes the save, and the entire presentation leans on an angle that was intentionally outrageous in 2000 and mostly uncomfortable now. The wrestling is secondary to material that does neither wrestler many favors.

Henry winning is harmless and the match ends before it can become exhausting. That is about as much praise as the bout earns. It is a D because it is short and functional enough to avoid total failure, not because anyone should seek it out.

Edge, Christian, Matt Hardy and Jeff Hardy are already operating at a different speed from much of the card. The match has recognizable tag structure, but every transition is sharper and every comeback carries the possibility of turning into something spectacular. They are not yet doing the giant stunt matches that define the rivalry, which actually lets the teamwork breathe.

The closing stretch is the best undercard wrestling of the night. Edge spears Jeff out of the air, the Hardys keep finding layered double-team attacks, and Christian survives long enough for Terri to shove Jeff from the top rope. Her turn creates the opening for Christian to finish Matt and gives the match storyline consequences beyond the number-one contendership.

The finish keeps it from feeling completely clean, but the work before it is too good to dismiss. This is four young wrestlers showing why the tag division is about to become one of WWF's defining strengths. A B+ feels right: excellent undercard wrestling with an angle stapled onto the final seconds.

Tazz and Big Boss Man wrestle for forty-seven seconds before Prince Albert interferes, which means the match is less a contest than a sentence with a referee in it. Tazz applies the Tazzmission, the interference arrives, and the bell rings before the audience has any reason to invest. The post-match attack lasts longer in memory than the official bout.

The idea is to show that Tazz can absorb a beating and keep fighting, but the execution continues the strange early WWF handling of a wrestler who debuted by beating Kurt Angle at the Royal Rumble. Instead of feeling dangerous, he is immediately dragged into a midcard numbers game. The disqualification protects everyone on paper and excites nobody in practice.

There is too little wrestling to rescue and too little story payoff to justify the space. This is the easiest skip on the card and an F without much debate. At least it is over before the popcorn has a chance to cool.

Kane and X-Pac bring enough history to make seven-plus minutes feel more important than the wrestling itself. They brawl around the entrance, use the surroundings and keep the pace brisk, which is the correct approach for a feud that has already spent months circling the same betrayal. Kane's power spots remain the match's most convincing material.

The finish is inventive but unsatisfying. Kane tombstones Tori and appears ready to end X-Pac, only for X-Pac to dropkick the steel steps into Kane's face and steal the pin. It gives the heel another escape, but it also extends a rivalry that feels ready for a conclusion.

Nothing here is disastrous, and the stipulation gives them enough freedom to avoid a dull standard match. Still, the work is merely adequate and the result is more frustrating than compelling. A C- captures a match that is watchable in the moment and unnecessary the second it ends.

This six-man tag is a wonderful snapshot of how absurdly deep WWF suddenly became in early 2000. Chris Benoit, Dean Malenko and Perry Saturn bring crisp, aggressive work to a match built around the crowd's enormous affection for Rikishi and Too Cool. The styles should clash; instead they give each other exactly what is needed.

The Radicalz control stretches are especially good because they treat the comedy-heavy babyfaces like serious opponents. They attack Rikishi's leg, cut off Scotty 2 Hotty and use quick tags before the crowd gets the release it wants from the hot comeback. The finishing sequence becomes crowded, but the pace and execution keep the chaos readable.

Rikishi pinning Malenko after the Rikishi Driver and Banzai Drop is a crowd-pleasing ending even if it abandons some of the leg work. The match is not a masterpiece, but it is energetic, technically strong and more substantial than its place on the card suggests. It earns a B+ as one of the night's most rewatchable undercard pieces.

The Rock and Big Show have enormous storyline stakes and only an average match to carry them. The brawling is basic, Show's power offense does its job, and Rock supplies enough urgency to keep the crowd engaged even when the in-ring exchanges are ordinary. The audience cares far more about who is going to WrestleMania than how beautifully anyone gets there.

Then the referees start multiplying. Earl Hebner gets knocked out, Tim White arrives, the officials argue, Shane McMahon makes his surprise return and eventually drills Rock with a chair so Big Show can take the pin. It is gloriously overbooked Attitude Era theater and a much better angle than wrestling match.

The finish successfully creates chaos for the WrestleMania title picture, but the bout itself never rises above competent. Big Show's win is memorable because of Shane, not because of anything between the bells. That makes it a C-: useful television attached to middling pay-per-view wrestling.

Triple H and Cactus Jack enter the Cell with a problem created by their own Royal Rumble classic: how do you follow a Street Fight that already felt like the feud's ultimate violence? Their answer is not to sprint immediately toward the roof. They fight inside the structure, use the steps and chairs, draw blood and make Cactus's attempts to escape feel like a man searching for one last route to save his career.

The escalation is superb. Cactus breaks the Cell wall with the steps, piledrives Triple H on the announce table, chases him to the roof, falls through the Spanish announce table, returns with a flaming barbed-wire two-by-four and finally gets backdropped through the roof and through the ring. The famous bumps are enormous, but they work because each one arrives after the match has earned another level of desperation.

Then Foley gets up. That moment is the emotional peak: Triple H looks stunned, Cactus drags himself from the crater, and one Pedigree ends the title challenge and supposedly the career. The later WrestleMania return cheapens the retirement promise, but not enough to undo an outstanding Hell in a Cell match that strengthens Triple H and gives Foley a near-perfect full-time farewell.