Welcome to my weekly Raw column known as The Raw Deal. What I do here is go over the matches and segments, praise or criticize when need be and wrap it all up in the final section where you’ll see the three stars of the show, my final thoughts and a rating out of ten. To open every edition of The Raw Deal, I’m going to write a paragraph or two about something that’s on my mind for the week called “The Deal On…” that hopefully catches on.
The Deal On…Extreme Rules
I have yet to see the show, but it was definitely a newsworthy show with CM Punk leaving the event as the new World Champion. I mentioned in my preview of the PPV that I thought it would make sense to do that because all signs pointed to Jeff Hardy winning the belt, which he did. However, due to his contract status it made sense to move the belt off of him until he decides to stay long term or not. It appears as though he’ll probably take a few months off before coming back later in the year although with a guy like him you never really know. The rumor is that they’re going to try CM Punk out as a heel even though, to me, that seems like a poor decision because Smackdown needs babyfaces especially with great heels like Edge and Jericho already there. I guess we’ll see what happens with Punk as champion.
I was surprised Batista won the belt, although after seeing Raw it made more sense. I’ll touch on that more later. Loved reading about the finish of the Jericho/Mysterio match. Jericho pulls off the mask, Mysterio covers himself up and that costs him the title. Very creative finish there. I’m glad I was wrong about the ECW title match because I think guys like Tommy Dreamer need to be in the business to help the younger guys learn about what it’s like to really love to be a performer. Dreamer’s emotions always seem genuine to me, which is what makes me like a guy like him. Good to see him win the belt. Can Christian get moved to Smackdown now? Guess not. Nothing else was too surprising from the show.
I’m surprised Umaga got released. I thought he was generally well liked by management while being a potential future opponent of The Undertaker. Guess not. I wonder if his release was due to a possible disciplinary issue or maybe a failed drug test. Could be simply running out of ideas for the guy although I get the feeling there’s more to this story.
From Lafayette, Louisiana here’s the Raw Deal…
Batista promo leading to injury
This was great. Batista came out all happy and confident about his title win. Orton was like, no, I don’t think so. Then they absolutely destroyed him. It was beautiful to see them systematically go after the left arm the way they did. The chair, the slow bending of the arm and then the sudden break was cheesy, yet so different from the things that we see that it worked. Batista was legit hurt, they put the belt on him in order to generate interest in Raw and then they quickly got rid of him, leaving the title picture wide open. I don’t mind it. Also cool to find out that they took out his left arm here even though his legit injury was his right arm. Good to know they’re protecting the injury by doing it that way.
Regarding Batista, I thought he did a great job selling the severity of the injury. I guess he’s used to it. Just read at F4W that it’s a torn biceps that will take six months to recover from. It’s a tough break for a good guy who unfortunately has had way too many injuries in the last five years. He just came back from being on the shelf, wrestled for two months and then got hurt again. Feel bad for the guy. I guess that’s the risk you take when you’re nearly 40 years old like he is with a body like he has. Muscles are going to tear easier on somebody like that. I was really looking forward to an impending heel turn too, so it sucks that we won’t get that until later in the year if it even happens.
Kofi Kingston d. William Regal to retain the US Title (1/2*)
They got what, two minutes here? Way to establish the new champ. I’d prefer to see Regal retire sooner rather than later and become the GM because he’s great in a role like that.
Fine promo by Orton with the Legacy boys basically saying he’ll be champ by the end of the night. Good job of keeping viewers watching to see what went down later.
Maryse d. Kelly Kelly to retain the Divas Title (1/2*)
Remember last week when I bitched about how they don’t let the divas talk or show any personality aside from the smiles or sneers in the ring? This week they had Mickie James come out wearing some piece of fabric that I guess was a dress in order to say Maryse fears her. See, it’s not a huge angle, but it’s something at least. These three women are freaking beautiful, for the record. They almost make me forget about how much I loved Trish. Almost.
Hey fans, here’s a clip of the Hogpen match because it was terrible and we want you to suffer through it even if you didn’t see the PPV. Thanks Vince.
Goldust, Festus and Marella (w/Horny) d. Noble, Chavo and Kendrick (DUD)
The comedy faces against the heels that think they’re good even though they’re basically losers. I think they put that team together to show how easy it is to book a cruiserweight that thinks they’re the best. Anyway, I’m sure the kids loved this one. Next.
Cena vs. Miz…sorta…
I liked Miz’ pre-match promo because he’s in a good zone with his character. He believes in the stuff that he’s saying, which means the crowd is going to boo him even more for the actions he does. As soon as Cena came out I knew Show was coming out too because they seem intent on keeping Cena out of the title picture even though he’s beat Show twice. I’m tired of Cena vs. Show. I’m tired of wondering if Cena can beat the big guy because has he ever really lost to the guy? I don’t remember. Let it end already. I guess the direction now is to involve Miz into the feud more, probably leading to a three way match at the next PPV possibly with Miz getting a fluke win to elevate him a bit. I’m not sure exactly how it’s going to happen, but that at least makes sense to me.
MVP d. Matt Hardy (*)
Pretty basic TV match with Hardy losing again. It’s the right move because they need MVP to be getting wins like this. Please get this man a storyline that the fans can sink their teeth into because he really needs it just like the company needs him to be a big star.
Excuse Me…There Goes Vickie
This was pretty cruel, huh? It seems like it’s a tradition in WWE because when Eric Bischoff got fired he did so while getting tossed into a garbage truck by Vince McMahon. This might have been worse. Edge ran her down for being disgusting, admitting that he only married her for her power (obviously) and people thought she was his mother? He’s in his mid-30s and she’s 41, yet she looks like his mother? Um, sure. I understand those that think this was pretty cruel to her, but I think she was probably understanding about it because she’s been such a great heel that has drawn a lot of heat to her. She really performed better in her role than I’m sure most of us ever would have ever imagined. Kudos to her for the job she did.
I liked Cena’s backstage promo. He’s so much better on the microphone when he’s serious rather than when he’s reciting whatever bad joke the writers have for him that week.
Ted Dibiase and Cody Rhodes d. Carlito & Primo in a non-title match (*1/4)
This was a predictable outcome, yet it was also the right one. The tag belts aren’t very valuable right now, which is a shame because I think fans in general enjoy good tag team wrestling. I think the Legacy boys should be holding the belts and should have been holding them for at least two or three months now. They will benefit from having them more than the Colon brothers will. I’m sure it’s only a matter of time now until they do the switch.
The Randy Savage DVD should be sweet. It would be even better if it had a proper documentary talking about his importance to the company as well as the business as a whole. Oh well, get the DVD anyway. Savage rules. Most of you would probably expect me to write a blurb about how it’s a shame that he’s not in the WWE Hall of Fame, but this year they put a marginal wrestler like Koko B Ware in, so really, what’s so great about such an “honor” anyway? He doesn’t need it.
Main event time. I wasn’t surprised by what was about to happen. Were you?
HHH returns to beat up Orton
Good execution, crowd ate it up and it was fun to see the heel get what he deserved. With that said, it’s still the same feud we’ve seen too much of. The fans didn’t go nuts for any of their previous matches this year both on PPV and TV, so why is it going to be different now? I understand why they are doing it. That doesn’t make it good. Now there’s a question of what’s next for the vacant WWE title? I’d imagine some kind of mini-tournament or they’ll just do a HHH vs. Orton match at the next PPV or maybe even next week.
Three Stars of the Show
1. Randy Orton – He wins again even though his title run was terribly booked.
2. Batista – I feel bad for the guy. He gets a spot here for a great job of putting over how much the belt means to him as well as selling the pain of his injury.
3. Vickie Guerrero – Goodbye. You should be proud of your work as GM even if the sendoff wasn’t all that great.
Final Thoughts
There was a total of about 20 minutes of wrestling on this show, so if you’re looking for a pure wrestling show don’t watch this one. Watch Smackdown. Still, I didn’t mind this episode too much. It did a good job of building up to next week’s three hour show because nobody knows who the new champion will be, or how they will be crowned. I’m curious about it. And who will the new GM be? More questions with answers hopefully to come in one week’s time. I just hope Vinny Mac and the writing team have some of those answers ready by the time Raw comes on next week.
And if it all sucks then hey, at least least Smackdown’s good, right?
Rating: 5 (out of 10)
Last week: 7
I appreciate any feedback you guys can give so please send me your thoughts at [email protected] about anything related to WWE past or present. In the future I may do a column full of mailbag questions because I get some good ones on a regular basis that I’d love to share. Please, keep sending them in. I will start posting them in the column next week. Just didn’t have time for it this week.
I’m hoping to have the review of WWF Badd Blood ’97 posted by the end of this week. It will likely be on Friday, so be on the lookout for that one.
Smell ya later,
John Canton – [email protected] (You can add me on facebook here if you want)
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