August 2004 | PPV | Summerslam
The Rock and Cactus Jack came in with an excellent strategy. Isolate the already weakened Faarooq. They never let JBL tag into the matchup and effectively made this a two on one handicap match between themselves and one half of the APA. At one point Cactus Jack was the legal man and he tossed Faarooq outside of the ring. The Rock capitalized, hitting Faarooq on the outside with a Rock Bottom before rolling him back in. Cactus Jack clotheslined JBL off the apron then went back to Faarooq and hit him with a Butterfly Piledriver to pin him for three and make the Rock 'n' Sock Connection your new World Tag Team Champions.
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Villain vs. superhero. Boogeyman vs. Hurricane. Tonight the battle between good and evil would finally be settled with United States Championship gold on the line. The Hurricane looked intent on vanquishing the bad guy as he started off on an absolute tear, whipping Boogeyman all over the ring and arena. Momentum shifted though when he went for the Eye of the Hurricane and was countered. Boogeyman then hit Hurricane with some stiff shots to regain control of the match. He then went for his signature move The Boogeyslam but it was countered and Hurricane dropkicked him to the mat. He went to the apron and launched himself back in hitting Boogeyman with the Slingshot Lariat, which looked like it would end things but Boogeyman was just close enough to the ropes to get a hand on them to save himself. Hurricane started lining up Boogeyman for the Superman Punch but the monster dodged it and when Hurricane turned around he ran right into a devastating Boogeybomb. Unlike Boogeyman, Hurricane didn't have the luxury of being near the ropes and simply didn't have enough in him to kick out as Boogeyman became the new United States Champion. Who can stop this monster?
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Shelton Benjamin came out to this match with a new manager, Montel Vontavious Porter, also known as MVP. He was dressed sharply in a suit and looked very intent on running interference in this matchup. Steiner looked dominant as he has done for the entirety of his reign as champ, and showed no signs of slowing down despite his loss to HHH on RAW. Shelton was no slouch either and kept pace with the champ throughout. Steiner started to gain the advantage and was going to go for a Frankensteiner but Shelton Benjamin "accidentally" knocked out the referee with his feet as he was being lifted in the air. MVP took advantage of the downed referee and tossed a chair into the ring for Benjamin to use. He went to use the chair, but Steiner was too quick and moved out of the way and knocked the chair to the mat. He then picked up Shelton and hit the Frankensteiner directly on the chair as the referee came to, to retain his title. A pissed off Shelton Benjamin got into an argument with MVP after the match saying, "You ain't good enough for me, you don't live up to the GOLD STANDARD, you're fired!"
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Goldberg eliminated Rey Mysterio almost immediately, hurling the smallest competitor in the matchup out of the ring. There weren't any eliminations after that for a while as the superstars competed in the ring, but eventually Goldberg got a second elimination of the match sending another luchador, Eddie Guerrero, out over the top rope. He flexed and celebrated which was a mistake because Bret Hart took advantage to lift him up and over as well. It came down to Bret, Kurt and HBK. HBK and Bret seemed to want to have a faceoff between themselves to renew their old rivalry so they worked together to eliminate Kurt Angle. This was a mistake from Bret though because as soon as they tossed Angle over, HBK caught him with a Superkick out of nowhere and then picked his corpse up and tossed him over to win the battle royal.
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Rob Van Dam was going into this match as a heavy underdog especially after being attacked by Brock Lesnar on Monday. And he looked like one early on as Brock simply ragdolled him with suplexes and powerful moves for most of the matchup. Brock was getting cocky though and not going for pinfalls early giving RVD some chance of staying in the matchup. Eventually though Brock Lesnar did hit an F-5, but RVD somehow kicked out of it to stay in the matchup. RVD then started to turn the tables from there because Brock gave him too much time to recover hitting a Rolling Thunder and following that up with the Five Star Frog Splash but only getting a two count. RVD seemed to have a second hit of energy though as he repeated the exact same two moves again, but this time Brock rolled out of the way of the Five Star Frog Splash. When Van Dam got to his feet, Brock lifted him up for the F-5, but RVD countered it into a tornado DDT. He climbed the top turnbuckle for a third time and hit the Five Star Frog Splash connecting this time, seemingly about to win the matchup. But then from the speakers John Cena's music started playing. He was on the ramp with his money in the bank briefcase and declaring that he was cashing in RIGHT NOW, turning this match into a triple threat. Lesnar and RVD were both spent and John Cena took full advantage, first drop kicking RVD and throwing him out of the ring before picking up Lesnar and hitting him with the F-U to pin him to the mat for three and win his first ever WWE Undisputed Championship.
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