WWE SummerSlam 2026 - Night 2: 3 Things We Hated And 3 We Loved

The second night of SummerSlam has come and gone. WWE saw an Interim Women's Champion crowned, a new Intercontinental Champion, and Roman Reigns defended the World Heavyweight Championship, while dealing with some issues from his past. You can read all about Roman's therapy session on the WWE SummerSlam – 8/2/2026 Results Page.

Now, all that's left is for the Wrestling Inc. Staff to vent their frustrations and sing their praises of the Sunday night that was SummerSlam Night 2. There were immaculate highs, like Chad Gable finally winning the Intercontinental Title, and there were woeful lows, like the bloated main event. As always, the comment section will be open to any and all.

Here, without further ado, is the best and the worst of SummerSlam Night 2 in Minneapolis.

Baron Corbin was released from the company at the end of 2024, so he hasn't even been gone for two years, but tonight, it certainly didn't feel like many WWE fans remembered him. Or, if they do, they didn't miss him, as the fans in Minneapolis didn't sound too stoked about him winning the United States Championship from Trick Williams.

I can see how WWE may be attempting to make Williams more babyface off his title loss, especially since Corbin worked heelish, hitting Williams with the belt behind the referee's back, but it was still a low point of the show. The match overall wasn't very good or memorable when it came to the in-ring work, and coming off a super-hot opener featuring the return of Kevin Owens, "cool down match" isn't even a strong enough word to describe it. The crowd was pretty thoroughly dead after Williams' entrance.

While it's nice that Corbin is back in WWE, if that's where he wants to be, putting him in the United States title picture immediately, especially against a usually super-hot Williams, was a choice. So many fans wanted to see Carmelo Hayes on the SummerSlam card, and putting him in another match against former best friend Williams would have made perfect sense, and would have been a good match. There was plenty of time (time that 'Melo hasn't been on WWE TV, mind you) that WWE could have built to their hypothetical SummerSlam match to be a big feud-ender. It would have been much more exciting match than Corbin vs. Williams, even in this death spot on the card.

This felt like a "WWE SmackDown" match, until Corbin's win, at least. The star won off a title shot to Williams' head from behind the referee's back, after a table spot involving Lil' Yachty, then the End of Days, which admittedly looked pretty good. I just don't know if this was the right spot or time to take the title off Williams, and I'm even more unsure if Corbin was the right person to do so. The crowd reaction to his win wasn't great, and it will be interesting to see how the fans at Friday's episode of "SmackDown" react, during what I'm sure will be a promo segment that gets interrupted by Williams and Yachty.

This was quite possibly the worst two-night series WWE has run since the concept's inception at WrestleMania 36. There were a few matches across the weekend that helped strengthen that thought, and Corbin's win against Williams was one of them. Maybe it will seem worth it if Williams goes full-babyface, but for now, it just kind of stunk.

Written by Daisy Ruth

Less than 24 hours after being reinstated as General Manager, Nick Aldis emerged to play spoiler for Sami Zayn and Finn Balor at the beginning of Sunday's show, first announcing that Gunther would be the third participant of their number one contendership match. That appeared to be a device to further Zayn's sentiment that he is being continually screwed out of the WWE Championship he held for five days. But it also appeared to be a burying of a hatchet between Aldis and Gunther following their match on Saturday.

Then Aldis announced that there would be a fourth participant: Kevin Owens. There are few things in wrestling that manage to yield an audible pop from this writer, but his return produced one and just a few goosebumps to boot. There had been an acceptance that he may not wrestle again, with the overarching desire to see him happy and healthy. But to see him back in the ring and having not missed a step was heartwarming.

His last match came against Sami Zayn in an Unsanctioned bout, and he was returning to the ring in a move that would exacerbate the ill-feelings of the "Last Real Good Guy" if he were to win. They hugged it out before getting into their fight, an earnest welcome back to the ring from best friend to best friend. And when all was said and done, Owens did win, and he did so by pinning Zayn.

He will now challenge the WWE Champion, currently CM Punk, and that is a feud interesting for many a different reason. Owens and Punk rather famously clashed while sharing a Ring of Honor locker room, and that legitimate tension often adds a dimension to a rivalry in the ring. Punk once remarked on Owens' physique and the fact he wrestles in a T-shirt, and was supposed to have lambasted him in front of their colleagues at the time. So it would feel cathartic for Owens to finally become WWE Champion at the expense of Punk.

They're both great veterans in this game and have yet to wrestle one another, so it is genuinely one of those dream matches. Owens' return ignited a match that likely would have been good, but carried almost no excitement. It ignites a title picture that had been saturated by Punk-Rhodes friendship talk and a deliberate undermining of Zayn at every turn, and it creates an interesting hook for the coming TV shows.

Owens' interactions with Zayn, Punk, and Rhodes all offer something interesting for different reasons. He really does feel like the catalyst to an exciting main event picture on Friday nights.

Written by Max Everett

There's no doubt that professional wrestling has its fair share of bad matches. Sometimes, there are matches that are so bad that they belong in a league of their own and become an automatic contender for Worst Match of the Year no matter what point of the year it is. The Human Monies on a Pole Match between Danhausen and Dominik Mysterio definitely qualifies as an example of the latter category of bad professional wrestling matches.

It's not even that Dominik and Danhausen put on that bad of a wrestling match with one another or that there was interference galore from JD McDonagh, the Minihausens, or Joe Hendry throughout the entire duration of this; that was the worst part of all this. Those two things definitely didn't help matters at all and were contributing factors in making this a low point on the show for me, but this entire thing was far too goofy to even be taken a little bit seriously at all. I know the point of the storyline between Danhausen and Dominik is comedy, but this wasn't even funny to me in any way, shape, form, or fashion. WWE has also done very similar things between Judgment Day, Danhausen, the Minihausens, and Joe Hendry for weeks on end now, including the pyro out of the ring post spot that finished off this match, and it's become very played out to even be remotely entertaining at this point to arguably a large portion of the WWE fanbase. This is the kind of match that belonged far, far away from a SummerSlam card and was absolutely horrific booking from bell to bell.

Written by Olivia Quinlan

SummerSlam Sunday was a night of moments and moments alone, for better or worse. But one of those moments came in the form of Chelsea Green winning the Interim Women's Championship. It is beyond stupid that a company that has never used Interim titles is suddenly using one in Rhea Ripley's absence, but that should not take away from the fact that, at long last, Green is the Women's Champion.

There are plenty on WWE's roster that can wrestle a clinic, lift the heaviest of weights and soar the highest of heights. But Green breaks the mold as someone with the Midas touch. She has carved a niche out of being given material that might land one on the future endeavors pile, and still making it one of, if not the, most entertaining things on programming.

Yet she has always been looked at as beneath the level of the rest of her opponents in the ladder match; she wasn't born in the business like Charlotte Flair, nor is she athletically prominent like Lash Legend, Tiffany Stratton, or Jade Cargill. Michael Hayes even said during "WWE Unreal" — so there are grains of salt to be taken — that Green's role was to uplift the others into the upper echelon rather than enjoy that success herself.

So to have her finally recognized as more than just an entertaining enhancement talent was great. It was done in a really cool way too, Green having the moment within reach just for B-Fab and Michin to seemingly rain on that parade. She was left hanging on the ladder as the match continued around her, and when the field cleared she was the only one left to claim the title.

There was a clear moment that the crowd realized this, cheering for her to wake up and wake the climb, then cheering ever louder with each rung until she finally did claim the title to one of the largest pops of the night.

It's intriguing to see how this title reign fares, and one would hope it's a significant run. At the very least, it was just a good moment for itself.

Written by Max Everett

Love them or hate them, you're probably tired of hearing about The Shield after the SummerSlam build and match. Although the match was supposed to be about who was Number One between Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins, the feud was actually centered around The Shield and what happened in the 12 years since. The Shield lore was misrepresented throughout the build to this match and heavily focused on during the match itself. Michael Cole and Wade Barrett wouldn't let their foot off our collective necks about The Shield all night; it was relentless.

The match itself was fine, despite commentary calling it an instant classic. The early story of the match was that Rollins, whose gear was giving Doink the Clown, had an answer to everything Reigns attempted. Rollins made the mistake of allowing Reigns to punch him in the face after attempting a tope suicida, which led to Rollins getting dumped over the barricade, and a brawl into the crowd ensued. Each man went through the announce tables. There were quite a few Curb Stomps, spear attempts, and a ref bump. There was a reference to the departed Dean Ambrose, and his name was uttered on commentary. Realizing their mistake, he was quickly referred to as a former member of The Shield. Prior to the match starting, Cole took a shot at the former Ambrose by stating "neither man has left WWE" in the decade-plus since The Shield disbanded.

No Shield-inspired match would be complete without a steel chair. While the ref was down, Rollins immediately went in search of a chair. He hesitated too long and paid for it. Reigns considered using The Chair, but decided not to. Instead, he relied on three spears. The first two were missed by the still-down ref. The third one was enough to put Rollins away once and for all (until WWE needs to revisit this feud for some reason in a couple of years). After finally vanquishing his former friend all on his own, Reigns offered his fist to Rollins. Rollins eventually caved and The Shield fists came together, minus one. Hopefully, WWE can put their Shields down and let Rollins and Reigns focus on other stories for a few years.

Written by Samantha Schipman

He finally did it after years of attempts. Chad Gable is now WWE Intercontinental Champion, winning his first-ever singles gold in WWE with a victory over Penta tonight. On what I thought was a very lackluster SummerSlam across both nights, I expected this to be some of the most solid in-ring work across the weekend. Thankfully, I was right, even though these guys could have got a few more minutes to go in the ring. By my timing, the match went around 11 minutes, which is alright, I suppose, especially when it comes to WWE booking these days.

They battled back-and-forth in a strong match, trying to put one another away early. The counters throughout the match were really strong, with Penta at one point nearly knocking Gable's teeth down his throat with a kick to counter a moonsault. Gable threw Penta over his head at another point; I have no idea how to describe it otherwise, as Penta rushed him, and it looked great. Penta is excellent at Lucha things, and he's also very good at selling. He also audibly told Gable he was "sorry" before he nailed him in the jaw with a big kick, which I thought was a nice touch with the whole story of respect we got in the build.

I wasn't bored at any point of this match, which was really saying something this weekend. The men kept things going at an excellent pace, but not too fast with Penta's high-flying offense, or too slow with Gable's holds.

Gable countered multiple Mexican Destroyers, two into ankle ones, the final one that got him the victory. I don't think Gable usually drops down to cinch in the hold tighter, usually, so him doing so tonight, with the loud "crash" of him falling to the canvas right before Penta tapped out, was a nice touch.

The super emotional celebration Gable got with his family in his hometown following the match was really cute, too. His son in the matching singlet was possibly one of the most adorable things I've ever seen. It was really nice that he got his moment with them, and the celebration didn't overstay its welcome when it came to the show's overall pace, and probably helped further his babyface character in some ways. I'm really happy for Gable, and he's got plenty of challengers, in Rusev, Ethan Page, Je'Von Evans, Dragon Lee, and more, on the red brand, to have a great run with the gold in the weeks and possibly even months to come.

Written by Daisy Ruth