John Cena vs. Alberto Del Rio – Miracle on 34th Street Fight- WWE Raw, December 24th, 2012

On that Christmas Eve, a suspiciously familiar Santa Claus made his way into the arena. He seemed comfortable there and the fans responded accordingly. Make no mistake, Santa is over. He walked to the near corners of the crowd to hand out some Mattel WWE figures, the finest wrestling figures ever made. The Jolly One would not roam the aisles long before the devious Alberto Del Rio’s music hit. The arrogant superstar would make his way to the ramp by car, as he typically did in those days. This was no typical entrance. Mexico’s greatest export would accidentally run down St. Nick, causing unknown, and likely career threatening, internal injury to the magical man. Del Rio emerged from the car petrified, it was never his intention to take out the icon. His announcer, Ricardo Rodriguez was inconsolable as the fans called for Del Rio’s head and for CPR to be performed on his victim. Rodriguez began to heave, with all of their dastardly deeds, this stood above the rest. Though Del Rio was sorry for what he’d done, the WWE is a violent world with violent consequences. That consequence came in the form of John Cena.

So, the whole premise of this match is ridiculous, even for Raw, but that’s what makes it work so well. Everyone involved is super into it and its actually a nice example of both Cena and Del Rio’s acting chops. Booker T, Matt Striker and Teddy Long all provide some fun little moments too. Comedy is too often overlooked in Professional Wrestling commentary, it brings balance to the violence and relieves the audience from having to suspend disbelief at all. A match like this allows the performers to create a fun holiday moment without interrupting the grittier storylines that they were surely involved with. The match itself is also a lot of fun. You literally have two of the all-time greats going at it and, regardless of it’s fantastic premise, it is a true main event. There are a couple of spots that are fairly amazing, one with a bowling ball comes to mind. The match is capped by interruption from a very special competitor.

Ho Ho Ho, Have a nice day.

This match, along with the essential promos, is available both on the WWE Ring in the Holiday DVD and on the WWE Network.