That’s right, it’s that time of year again. As a forever fan of reading and creating rankings lists I love when I’m able to reach back into the bag in January and do all of my end of the year rankings. Let me just preface this before the Internet wrestling fans tear me apart that no, I’m no corporate mark or AEW hater, I think there’s plenty of awesome talent over there that’s doing the damn thing and putting on some great matches. I just keep up with and cover WWE on a much more consistent level on this blog and in my weekly life and have been a WWE fan since a child, so loyalty runs a bit deep in that aspect. Seeing how I keep up with WWE much, much more consistently and have seen *nearly* every piece of WWE’s weekly main roster content throughout the entire year, I feel a lot more comfortable giving my personal picks for favorite matches for them. Again, nothing against AEW and their fans, everyone should like and watch what they want. Now, without more unnecessary explanation, let’s get into this thing!
#10: Lyra Valkyria vs Becky Lynch: Women’s Intercontinental Championship match (Backlash)
These 2 had a series of really good matches this year for the, at the time, brand new women’s IC strap and helped solidify that belt somewhat and bring some real attention to it. Eventually Bayley got involved in the title picture as well and all 3 of them put on a great match together at Evolution, but this is still easily my favorite of that series of matches. Maybe I’m partially biased because I was live in attendance for this match and got to cheer and boo in person and be a part of that environment around me, but this really was an awesome, very technical affair between 2 women with great mat presence and overall ring awareness. Lyra and Becky just work so well together and really complimented each other well on this night and basically every time they’ve ever met in the ring. Their later matches got a tad bit convoluted by adding stipulations and eventually Bayley into the fold, but on this night, when the 2 just got a chance to get in there and go, and with adequate time to work with as well, boy did they deliver. This was also the match that Lyra beat Becky in a bit of a shock, so it helped her further establish her name and character within the women’s roster.
#9: Cody Rhodes vs Seth Rollins: Champion vs Champion match (Crown Jewel)
This was a match I was kind of chomping at the bit to see again. As a big Rollins fan, it’s always felt like a shame that he never got a win over Cody in their long and storied rivalry just a few years back. Don’t get me wrong, I understand it helped establish current Cody Rhodes within the modern landscape and did a lot for the man we see carrying the company today, so he needed those wins, but Rollins is a huge name within the company too and he NEEDED this win too. They did a really good job conveying that message in the build to this as well, Rollins was driving himself crazy with self-doubt if he could actually beat him and what it would do for him and his relationship with ‘The Vision’ if he couldn’t. They put on a really good match, which is to be expected. These 2 have great chemistry as well, but Rollins hurt his shoulder probably 60-70% of the way through the bout and essentially worked the rest of the match with 1 arm. In a way it kind of limited Rollins ability in the ring, but it was also pretty metal to see how much of a warrior he was to keep the show going and continue to work through their spots and pick up the win while injured. Especially considering the shoulder injury was a pretty serious one and has once again, put him on the shelf for months.
#8: John Cena vs Randy Orton: Undisputed WWE Championship match (Backlash)
Again, sure, maybe my bias comes partially into play since I was in attendance at this show. I don’t really think so though. I truly think this was the best and most compelling match in Cena’s heel run this year. It just made so much sense to do. Cena and Orton are storied rivals with many chapters in their book, but basically every encounter before this one Cena played the role of the face and Orton the heel. This match flipped that normal script on its head. In their older, grizzled years and on the retirement tour of the one and only John Cena, he played the cynical heel that wanted to leave with the belt and ruin wrestling, while Randy Orton was the gunslinger willing to stand up to his old rival to try and save the thing he loved, and to top it all off they had the final showdown in front of Orton’s home crowd in St. Louis. Chef’s kiss levels of nostalgia. Just the environment in the arena that night and how much the crowd played their role, cheering on the hometown boy Orton and booing the big bad Cena (which I couldn’t bring myself to do since this was the last time I was going to see him wrestle live) really helped add to the big fight feel of this match and seeing them lock up again brought back so many fond memories from younger years watching with friends.
#7: El Hijo del Vikingo vs Chad Gable: AAA Mega Championship match (Worlds Collide, June)
This first ‘Worlds Collide’ event that WWE put on with AAA shortly after the merger with them was the first introduction I had into the world of AAA. I love lucha wrestling though and used to occasionally watch Lucha Underground for a few years late on Saturday nights, so I dug a lot of the show and tuned into future AAA events later in the year (like Triplemania). I was very pleasantly surprised by the quality of this match though. Not that I didn’t expect it to be good, I know Gable is a good worker and really entertaining, but I didn’t know what to expect from Vikingo and he was doing some stuff in that ring on that night that was blowing me away. He isn’t the biggest guy, but he isn’t the smallest either and he was doing some flips and corkscrews in the air that would make you think he was made of paper. The AAA crowd turned on him and started heavily booing him because the company was apparently giving him the Roman Reigns 2015 treatment and trying to force him down everyone’s throat I guess, but that’s just a damn shame to me because every match I’ve seen him compete in has left me impressed and feeling excited about wrestling. This is still my favorite of the matches I’ve seen of his though, and probably my favorite Gable match too if I had to say. They have such contrasting styles but found a way to make it work so fluently.
#6: Gunther vs Goldberg: World Heavyweight Championship match (Saturday Night’s Main Event, July)
This match was a bit controversial, but I think it was mainly disliked by people that just dislike Goldberg anyways and didn’t really give it a chance to begin with. I’m the opposite. I’m a (semi) proud Goldberg fan so I was stoked to see him return this summer and even more stoked to see that he was going to face one of my modern favorites Gunther for the strap. Now obviously I knew he wasn’t going to pick up the belt, it was his retirement match as announced a few weeks before the show, but I was just nervously looking forward to seeing what these 2 could deliver together in the ring. They delivered more than I ever hoped for or imagined. Gunther pulled 15 minutes and change out of 58-year-old Goldberg and brought him to the best technical wrestling match that he’s had in literal years on his way out the door. I heard Goldberg had some disgruntlements after this match and wasn’t fully satisfied with it and that sucks because I think this was just excellent. Goldberg has never been known as a match guy anyways, his character isn’t known for delivering 30-minute classics in the ring ever, so the fact that he was able to pull this out of the bag 1 final time at 58 years old and leave it all in the ring with one of the hardest hitting competitors in WWE today says a lot to me and should mean a lot to him as well.
#5: John Cena vs Gunther (Saturday Night’s Main Event, December)
This one is still a bit of a sore spot. Hard to talk about if you will considering it’s still less than a month since this match went down. Initially, I hated this finish, I’m not going to lie to you. Maybe hate is a strong word, but I was very bummed that Cena tapped out because that was the 1 thing I didn’t want to happen coming into the match and it was something I was very worried was going to happen. My worst fears were realized because that damn Gunther did it again and he made John Cena tap out to a sleeper hold after a hard and very valiantly fought battle by the GOAT in his final match ever. This match is much more nuanced than what’s initially seen on the surface though and in that nuance is the true beauty of pro wrestling. John Cena had been the man, going as hard as 1 human can possibly go in his profession for decades at this point and he had already established coming into this year that it was THE final year, he was going to give everything he had for a year again, but this was it. This was his final match, everyone knew it coming into the night, and Cena fought his ass off and had Gunther nearly beat multiple times, but he just couldn’t put him away and Gunther was relentless with the sleeper hold and trying to put Cena down in that way. He knew his time was truly up and he didn’t know if he could beat Gunther, but he was satisfied with letting go and moving on at that point and that’s what he did. Because he had to. The little smirk as he tapped. It’s sadly beautiful, and it’s so John Cena.
#4: CM Punk vs Seth Rollins vs Roman Reigns (WrestleMania 41)
Boy, this match was a lot of fun. With nothing truly on the line, this triple threat still main evented Night 1 of Mania this year and that was strictly based on the name recognition of the competitors and WWE theatrics and storytelling that led this to be and feel so compelling. I’m not saying that in a bad way either, this truly was one of the best ‘WWE storytelling’ matches of the year and it all was based on their personal hatreds towards one another, and Punk & Roman’s friendship and commitment to Paul Heyman. Don’t get me wrong, this was still hard hitting as hell, Roman driving Seth and Punk through those new, reinforced announce tables looked vicious and personal, but they delivered a hard hitting and crazy bout that went all over the arena, while telling a compelling story throughout. That’s what made it so special and that’s what made it feel like WrestleMania. The ending led to one of the bigger swerves/shocks of the year in WWE as well (no matter if you saw it coming or not, it was still an intended swerve in the storyline), as Heyman turned on his friend and his Tribal Chief and sided with Rollins to allow him to pick up the victory and immediately become one of the biggest heels in the company. Like I’ve said before, I’m a Rollins guy so take that into some account, but this was a huge win in his career resume, and a big career moment for Punk as well as he got to be in a WrestleMania main event for the first time in his career.
#3: Iyo Sky vs Rhea Ripley vs Bianca Belair: Women’s World Championship match (WrestleMania 41)
These 3 women opened Night 2 of Mania this year and absolutely blew the doors off the place. In a little under 15 minutes, they were able to deliver in my mind the best overall wrestling match of the entire weekend. This was like the true wrestling nerd’s kind of match because it was just so fast paced and had constant action. All 3 women in the match got plenty of moments to shine and showcase the best of their abilities on the Grandest Stage of Them All! Michael Cole says it all the time, but I really don’t think he’s wrong. Iyo Sky is arguably pound for pound the best pure wrestler on the planet. She’s just so fun to watch and brings out the best in most everyone she steps into the ring with. Her and Rhea have tremendous chemistry together whether they’re being friends or throwing down in the ring with their powerhouse and high-flying clash of styles, and Bianca is no slouch either. She brings her own unique style that always allows her to hang with the best of them, and she added a lot here as well. Speaking of Bianca, man I’ve missed her throughout the majority of 2025 and hope she’s back soon. You’ll be hard pressed to find a triple threat match that’s thoroughly wrestled and performed better than this one from start to finish though, this year or any other.
#2: John Cena vs Cody Rhodes: Street Fight for Undisputed WWE Championship (SummerSlam)
The buildup to this match and the random booking of John Cena’s turn back to face was sloppily done and handled, but the match itself delivered on the night and stole the entire SummerSlam weekend. It was also nice to see John Cena embrace himself and the crowd and return to form after a somewhat mishandled, but still fun at times heel run over the spring and summer. It was a breath of fresh air to see THE John Cena again, and somewhat a sigh of relief in a way to have this match go off as wonderfully as it did following the debacle that was their WrestleMania 41 main event. They truly redeemed themselves on this night in their eyes and in the eyes of most all the fans as well and delivered a hard-hitting banger to cap off a fun, first ever 2-night SummerSlam weekend. Cena was pulling some tricks out of the bag that we hadn’t seen since his 2015-16 run and wrestled like his old self again, but it just barely wasn’t enough as Cody gave everything he had to put him down for the 3. This was the end of Cena’s final World Title reign and a very well done and fitting end it was, passing the belt onto the current face after a hard-fought battle and raising his hand, figuratively giving him his flowers and passing the reigns over after the match as well. Wasn’t the biggest fan of the Lesnar stuff after the match and what all that led to, but that’s another story for another day.
#1: Iyo Sky vs Rhea Ripley: Women’s World Championship match w/Naomi cash-in (Evolution)
Ah, Iyo and Rhea. We meet on this list yet again. After their amazing triple threat with Bianca at Mania you’d be wild to think that these women could top what they did on that night at any point, but I’d argue that they maybe did actually on this night. Rhea Ripley has become one of the biggest names on the modern roster over the last couple of years (both men or women), but it felt like people FINALLY got on the Iyo Sky bandwagon this year and realized “wow, she’s a really good wrestler!” Thank goodness they did though because this started allowing her to have some of the best matches on a week-to-week basis with any and all female competitors. Her matches with Rhea from this year though are still probably my favorite ones, and this match at Evolution takes the cake. They were given all the time they needed seeing as they were the main event at ‘Evolution’ (the 2nd ever all-women’s PLE put on by WWE), and they used that time to perfection. Their big moves and constant action brought the crowd to life, and they cheered on both these women as they battled all over the arena during the course of 25 plus minutes. Iyo was treated in a way as Rhea’s kryptonite this year, no matter what Rhea did to Iyo she just couldn’t ever find a way to put her down for the pin and she would end up slipping up, getting caught by Iyo, and losing. A lot of people thought Rhea would likely finally get her win over Iyo on this night, but Naomi shockingly cashed in as both women were laid out, beaten and exhausted from their intense battle, and stole the win and the Women’s Championship in the end. Some people were mad at that, but I thought it just added a level of shock value to an already insanely good bout.
That’s all for this one folks! I always like to say at the end of these rankings lists that my picks aren’t the definitive right picks, they’re just my picks and what I personally really enjoyed and got the most out of this year. I’d love to hear some of your picks as well! Comment on the post or shoot me a message to share some of yours or talk about the year that was in WWE. I’m always down to talk and debate some wrestling. Make sure to like and follow the page as I’ll be rolling out rankings lists still for a couple weeks this month and am always uploading new content over pro wrestling, horror films, NFL football, and more! Till next time, be good to one another!
