Jey Uso vs CM Punk SNME match draws backlash from WWE fans

wwe star cm punk holds championship belt in ring

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Matthew Couden

By Matthew Couden

Contributing Writer

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WWE "Saturday Night's Main Event" featured plenty of big winners, including successful defenses and new champions crowned during the event. Cody Rhodes managed to hold onto his Undisputed WWE World Championship despite Drew McIntyre trying to cheat, get his opponent to cheat, or get him counted out.

In an early match, Jade Cargill became a first-time WWE Women's World Champion after defeating an injured Tiffany Stratton. Dominik Mysterio used sneaky tactics to defeat Penta and Rusev in a Triple Threat match, successfully keeping his WWE Intercontinental Championship.

In the main event, CM Punk captured the WWE World Heavyweight Championship by defeating Jey Uso, who had won a massive Raw battle royal several weeks ago. While many fans celebrated Punk's victory, since he'd held the championship for only a brief time at SummerSlam, others criticized the match.

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However, Jey received the brunt of the criticism for seemingly botching a very noticeable move during the match. With that, fans reacted to Jey's performance, with some brutal comments about the main event superstar.

wwe star cm punk holds championship belt in ring

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The spot in question involved Punk delivering a neckbreaker, and Jey seemed to struggle to sell the move in the video below.

After Punk hit the move, Jey knelt on one knee after taking the move rather than falling flat to the mat like most would from a neckbreaker. After that, Punk gets up and delivers a boot kick to his head.

"Jey Uso botches selling the Neckbreaker. How this man won the Royal Rumble and was world champion is beyond me," a fan account wrote with the video on X.

View this post on X

"Jey Uso needs to be sat down and talk to about how he botched this match in many ways. He couldn't land moves like he should and even had Punk redo the neckbreaker and was frustrated," another fan wrote on X.

"Lol Jey Uso is so f***ing bad. Seriously just botched selling a neck breaker. F***ing idiot," a commenter said.

"Punk is a master in building to a great finish. He pulled off a good match with Jey Uso I can’t believe it. Even when Jey botched a basic neckbreaker bump…," another fan commented.

Another wrestling fan account on X blasted Uso after the match with, "Jey Uso LOSES! Botch central Bad Matches ALL the time."

"Can we PLEASE get him out of the main event scene? JEY SNOOZE-O THE REASON WWE FLATLINES," the account demanded.

The match received some favorable or average grades, including Bleacher Report, which gave the main event a “B” grade, compared to “C” grades for the other three matches. A Sportsnaut report gave the match a "C+" grade, reiterating that it was good but not a "classic," while Wrestlezone gave the match a "C-" grade.

There wasn't any outside interference or cheap tactics involved in Punk's championship win, so it should be interesting to see who steps up to challenge him moving forward. Based on some fans' reactions to the SNME match, they'd prefer it not to be Jey Uso.