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11:19 - Wow, I'm shocked that the Rock birthday celebration didn't turn into something a little more substantial. Rock is a special talent and I'm sure the "WWE organization" is thrilled and grateful to have him back, so I have no doubt that tonight was a genuine "thank you" to him. But, as a viewer, it felt a bit wasteful and dare I say self indulgent. And it lacked a really shocking moment. I may be wrong, but most fans probably don't care about Pitbull, Maya, Regis & Kelly, Jimmy Kimmel, Craig Ferguson, and so on and so forth. If TNA had no problem with Mick Foley appearing, WWE should have just swallowed their pride and allowed him to appear (even if only in a video birthday wish segment).
It was a nice, well deserved moment. But I don't think it really made me feel like I have to watch next week.
11:15 - Geez, between Edge's retirement and Rock's happy birthday "thank you," I'm not sure how many more of these tribute videos I can watch! They're so well produced and emotional.
11:09 - Well we knew somebody big would interrupt.
10:59 - Oh, it's okay if we lose CM Punk. We've got a Mason Ryan push to look forward to!!!
10:57 - I'm confused. They already had the Rock/Cena confrontation.....so what closes out the show? Certainly not this match.
10:55 - Dear WWE: Do whatever in the world it takes to keep CM Punk on your roster. Sincerely, Everybody that has taste
10:50 - Wait, wait, wait. Why did they pick the tag champ that isn't on Raw to do this match? I know the tag champs can appear on both shows, so this isn't technically wrong, but it would be an easy switch that wouldn't immediately dilute the impact of the draft.
10:39 - Well, I'm glad Del Rio and Mysterio were drafted to Raw just to feud with each other.
10:16 - Reversing the decision was a bit much since the ref never actually saw Miz do anything wrong, and even so the circumstantial evidence was pretty weak. If anything, the match should have been continued. Of course, this was just done to extend the feud, but it didn't make Cena look particularly good.
By the way, Cena gets a lot of gruff, but man, the guy has GREAT ring chemistry with virtually everybody. He's able to have really good to great matches with guys who don't consistently have really good to great matches. While people refer to him as "Super Cena" in a derogatory manner, as if to say he doesn't make his opponents look good, I actually think up and comers are FAR better off against Cena as they would be against other top faces like Triple H, Orton, Undertaker, and the like.
10:06 - Come to think of it, how did Alex Riley get drafted? It was pretty well established that Miz hired him, not Raw. In fact, weren't his few Raw matches authorized by Miz?
10:03 - I'm curious if this match means that they're blowing off Miz's rematch clause.
9:52 - Just one week after making a big deal about the Draft, we've got both rosters at Rock's birthday party.
9:51 - What's the over/under on them surprising us with a Mick Foley Happy Birthday wish?
9:45 - Love Kharma's theme music. The booking is intriguing, though. Notice that over the past two nights, she's attacked heels, and not faces. And Kharma definitely needs to be a heel.
9:41 - Methinks we're going to see some Kharma.
9:36 - By the way, I forgive the fact that they're light on wrestling tonight. The Superstars are probably pretty banged up from the night before. Then again, why not use a night such as this to showcase your lesser-used talents?
9:33 - Why don't they just do what they did during the early years of Raw? One announce team for the first hour, and another announce team for the second hour? It just seems awkward how they continue to come up with these scenarios where Cole is removed from the announce table and replaced by JR (or vice versa). Why not do Cole and Matthews (or Regal or Striker or whoever) for hour one, and then JR and King for hour two?
9:28 - I found The Rock's opening promo pretty inoffensive until the Pitbull nonsense. Then it just felt like they wasted a half hour.
9:10 - I enjoyed the patriotic opening, and I wasn't bothered by the fact that they tooted their own horn, but I did find it curious that they didn't mention the conclusion of the story. Namely, that Osama Bin Laden had been found and killed. Sure, that may be a little graphic for a PG rated show, but they could have used delicate wording to work around that.
And is it me, or has the Rock's theme music gotten much, much longer? We're near Undertaker level at this point.
How incredibly awesome was it seeing Christian win the World Heavyweight Championship?? I didn't catch the show, but I was anxiously following the results. It was well deserved and I loved it.
I had no problem with Cena winning the WWE Championship. I think they could really build some tension over the next year regarding whether Cena can continue holding the championship going into WrestleMania. They've given Cena a year long reign before, so why not now? It could be interesting.
The booking overall, though, was rather curious. At the end of the night, two babyfaces walked out as champion. Yet all of the heels looked like crap. Punk jobbed. Rhodes jobbed. All four members of The Corre looked like a joke. Sheamus jobbed. Miz jobbed. Del Rio jobbed. I look at both rosters and I wonder who could possibly be the next challenger, especially on Smackdown.
I'd give Christian a one month reign as a face, and then I'd turn him heel. Unite him with Brodus Clay, of all people (filling the Tyson Tomko role) and have him feud with Orton.
12 comments:
Why is Rock doing the Diamond Cutter sign anyway? What's the significance?
Apparently a lot of his hand signals and such were significant to the Miami area. Not sure how the diamond cutter fits in.
Agreed on Kharma. Kharma is the only reason I've been the least bit interested in the womens division since Trish left (even when someone I like, such as Beth Phoenix or Natalya have held the title, they've inevitably been stuck fighting random girl who blows every spot she tries and looks incredibly sloppy, save for one or two okay matches with a Melina type). But the money in her is definitely in her as a monster heel. Not sure why she's only been attacking the heels. Last night was fine, since Michelle was on her way out anyway, but why only Maryse tonight? Weird.
Good thing we just had that draft. Hi, Teddy Long, Great Khali, and Alex Riley!
I know they don't care about the brand split but you JUST did the draft last week, you can't keep it going from now until Bragging Rights at least?
I hate when they do stupid crap like this. The referee has no clue that Miz hit him with the belt. All he sees is that the belt is in the ring. Alex Riley could have grabbed it and brought it to the Miz. Considering that guys constantly cheat and it never gets overturned, it's insanely stupid that they overturn it here with even LESS evidence for the ref.
Kyle: Agreed. They would have been far better off if the ref saw Miz hiding the belt during the pin (even after the 3 count, though). Like you said, Riley easily could have grabbed the belt and ran it over to him during celebration.
Come to think of it, the scene was pretty contrived. In the history of wrestling, the title was never kept in the corner of the ring. It was always with the announcer and bell keeper.
Yeah, I can totally get behind "Ref counts to 3, then notices the belt and overturns or restarts the match". Waiting til AFTER, when Riley is already in the ring celebrating and could have brought the title to Miz himself, is a huge stretch.
In regards to your comments on Cena, the thing that frustrates people about Cena is that he never loses cleanly to anyone (except occasionally in gimmick matches ala getting beaten in the Elimination Chamber after multiple people hit their finisher on him). That's a booking issue, not a knock on him necessarily, it's not his fault he's booked that way. But he always wins and typically guys never come out of a Cena feud looking better than they did going in. It's almost always a decisive win with lots of Cena celebrating after the match to really make sure everyone knows he wasn't at all hurt during the match (again, not necessarily blaming him there, but would it hurt him to sell like he really took a beating from his opponent?).
Now I actually think Miz is the exception. Miz has looked good against Cena, even at Wrestlemania, Miz essentially legitimately "retained" the title by legit kicking out of the AA and pissing Cena off enough to cause a double countout. At no point did Cena "have him beat" but then cheating allowed Miz to get away. I also liked that Miz kicked out of the AA tonight.
I will say Cena automatically looks so much better because many of his major feuds with guys come right after those heels feud with Orton. And sorry, but Orton is way worse than Cena. Just look at Punk. Orton punts Punk, Punk waits two years to get revenge. His revenge is Orton kicks his ass despite him having all of Nexus to help him for 3-4 straight weeks, then Punk manages to get a lucky wrench shot in, and then Orton decisively beats him at Wrestlemania. Then Punk gets a rematch and Orton decisively beats him again. Then Orton takes Punk out again post match. Then Orton decisively beats Punk again at Extreme Rules. At no point in the entire feud did Punk look good and it was only through Punk's fantastic ability on the mic and through his facial expressions (and Orton did an okay job in the facial expression department too) that anyone cared even a little. Orton crushed Miz too, losing only through outside interference (and actually, I think he won, just by DQ). But first he made absolutely sure everyone knew Miz wasn't in his league and he could have easily defeated him.
I don't know how much of that is Orton and how much is the writers. But it's horrible. Much worse than Cena. At least Cena has good matches with people even if he doesn't really sell the fact that he was actually in a fight.
Kind of a pet peeve I have with a lot of guys now, really. It's not just Cena. Go back and look at, say, a Ric Flair match where he wins. You knew he was in a fight. He sells it, he looks like he was in a war. His opponent looks better for having fought him and nearly beaten him, and he looks better for having won it. Cena, Orton, and many others typically end their matches by celebrating exactly the same way they did when they came out at the start of the match, which implies they weren't effected by the match at all and their opponent didn't take them to the limit. It's a method of selling I don't think they're bothering with anymore and I find that to be extremely unfortunate. It's one thing I liked about HHH/Undertaker at WM...I absolutely bought that those guys just went through a war. When Orton wins a match he's right back to posing and looking like nothing happened. Cena typically grabs the title and jumps up celebrating too. Just sell a hit or something. Sell like you're hurting.
So is Rock going to get in trouble for acknowledging Vickie Guerrero lost weight? My understanding was the company line is Vickie is the fattest fatty fat fat that has ever existed. Even though she's really nothing more than perhaps very slightly overweight when compared to the world at large.
I don't disagree with your comments about Cena not losing cleanly, but I think that's just what goes along with being the top face. Cena doesn't lose cleanly any less than Hogan or Austin before him. Triple H, Shawn Michaels (during his main event title runs), or Undertaker, either. Probably the only top face that has lost relatively cleanly more than him is Rock -- and even then, he didn't really lose cleanly either.
Vickie Guerrero has skin as thick as a Buick. She has lost a tremendous amount of weight and gets verbally bashed on a weekly basis. Hell, Michael Cole is more overweight than her at this point.
Agreed on CM Punk.
And keep in mind, when the Rock closes out the show, he doesn't even come ON until 11:05!
First time ever -- Raw overrun to last until 11:45.
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