It was not a great match. Period. It was an average match. The charcters themselves is what was entertaining, but the match was pretty sloppy at times, with a couple badly blow spots. Punk needs to get off this "Best wrestler in the world" crap B/C people in mass dont tune in for 5 star wrestlings matches. In fact, the greatest matches of all time have been horrible wrestling preformances. The crowd may respect very technical matches, which Bryan nor Punk are great at, but it's the emotion surrounding the match that will sell it.
For every 1 fan that would buy or watch a show for a "technical wrestling" match, 10 more would buy if they felt they would whitness somethng like Hell in a Cell with Taker and Foley in '98, or the emmotion surrounding Hogan vs Rock in '02.
Chad's right. It's really about the emotions surrounding the match itself. The story has to be good, the build up really has to matter. Both sides have to have something worth fighting for, something that the fans want to see happen. It's outcomes that an individual really wants to happen, so bad that it turns thousands of stomachs into knots as the match is taking place.
It's a beautiful thing being a wrestling fan sometimes, when you witness something magical that millions of people connect with you on it. It's like watching your home team, the team you stuck by and rooted for years... even suffering year and year of disapointment. A magical season, with a playoff run and your team is in the World Series. At the end of the series, your favorite player hits a Home Run in the bottom of the ninth inning, down by 1 to tie Game 7 of the World Series. Stuff like that really sets off a spark within a person, emotions that you can only get by investing so much interest in something.
A technical battle between Daniel Bryan and CM Punk on RAW this past week shouldn't get rave reviews. Punk crammed shit into the allotted time he was given, just like he always does on TV. Anyone else ever notice that? It's like Punk constantly has to prove to everyone how good he is, so he tries way too hard and winds up botching a simple move that he's done a thousand times before. It didn't take me out of reality while watching it, like a really good match does. It was... nothing special in my book. But that's just me.