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Wrestling’s 4R’s Monday Edition 12.21.09: Impact, ROH and Smackdown

December 21, 2009 | Posted by Jeremy Thomas

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    In HD where available…


    By: Aaron Hubbard

    ROH on HDNet 12.14.09:

    QUICK RESULTS:
    – Pick 6 Contenders Match: Delirious defeated Kenny King [***1/4]
    – Erick Stevens defeated Remy Marcell [1/4*]
    – Pick 6 Contenders Match: Tyler Black defeated Sonjay Dutt [**1/2]

  • THE RIGHT:

    CORNETTE-ARIES TENSION: We got a brief altercation between Austin Aries and Jim Cornette where Aries tried to brown nose his way into Corny’s good graces. He even asked Corny to be his manager. Thankfully, Cornette declined, because if Aries was managed by Cornette the world would explode from the sheer concentrated awesome. This really didn’t accomplish much besides keeping the tension between the two in our minds, which is a good thing.

    CORINO MAKES AN IMPACT: ROH has always been criticized for having a lack of good promos. With Jimmy Jacobs leaving last year (PLEASE COME BACK JIMMY!), truly awesome ROH promos have been a rarity. ROH has worked to correct that, bringing in Eddie Kingston, letting Aries get more over the top, allowing Hero and Cabana to get a little more serious, helping Roderick Strong and Tyler Black sound older than twelve, and of course, hiring Jim Cornette. Corino, while not a great promo, is a good promo and another step in the right direction. Corino put himself over and decided not to have a match with Lance Lewd, giving him a win by forfeit before beating him down. This didn’t go too long and it established Corino’s character to people who may be a bit unfamiliar with him

    PICK 6 – DELIRIOUS VS. KING: This was our opener and the first match in the Pick 6 Contenders series. These was a good match because I believed either man could win. Honestly, I’m glad I didn’t read the spoilers, because I thought King was going to win, and when Delirious won it surprised me. The match was competitive, it had the requisite comedy in Delirious matches but didn’t go too long, Kenny King looked like a star with his athleticism and Delirious was his usual awesome self. This wasn’t mind-blowingly awesome, but it’s the sort of quality opener that I’d like to see each and every week on this show, and ROH has the talent to do it.

  • PURGATORY:

    ERICK STEVENS SQUASH: I like Erick Stevens and I feel he’s underutilized in squash matches. The reason this is in purgatory is he wasn’t his usual happy self that was out to impress the crowd, he was angry and wanted to kill a jobber and he did that. This is a foreshadowing to his heel turn with the Embassy, which hasn’t made its way to HDNet yet.

  • The wRong:

    PICK 6 – BLACK VS. DUTT: This was the worst ROH on HDNet Main Event since Necro & Delirious vs. Jacobs and Brodie Lee. If this had been the opener, it would be in purgatory, but it was the main event, and **1/2 is unacceptable to me. This is not a knock on Tyler Black, who actually showed a lot of the aggression and edge that made him popular in the first place. This is a knock on the booking and on Sonjay Dutt. Either Sonjay needs to learn how to be an interesting heel, or he needs to turn face so he can do all his cool flips and twists, which is the only thing he’s ever proven to be good at. His heat segment was DREADFULLY boring. As for the booking? Tyler Black is the #1 Babyface in the company, on the road to his first World Title. Sonjay is a midcarder and will always be a midcarder. Black is bigger, stronger, more talented and more important in ROH than Sonjay. Nobody, and I mean nobody, gave Dutt a chance in this one. Black winning was inevitable, and you could see it with the crowd, who was just waiting for it to happen. This would be like Stone Cold having a 20-minute match with D-Lo Brown on RAW where D-Lo controls him before beating Shawn Michaels at Wrestlemania XIV. Black should have beat Sonjay in about ten minutes in dominating fashion, giving him some shine but ultimately putting him in his place. He should not be at Sonjay’s mercy for ten minutes or be having a competitive match. They tried to save this match by actually having some cool counters and moves at the end, but by that point, it was too late.

  • THE RIDICULOUS:

    NONE:

    The 411

    This show started out really well and gradually got worse. The opener is a perfect example of what a TV match should be, competitive, exciting, fun, and not over the top. The main event is a perfect example of what a TV main event should not be, as it was a competitive match between a guy who stood no chance and a guy who should have no problem beating his opponent. The rest is good but not particularly great.

    SHOW RATING: 6.0



    By: Chad Nevett

    iMpact! 12.17.09:

    QUICK RESULTS:
    – Roxxi defeated ODB [*1/2]
    – Brother Ray defeated Matt Morgan [**]
    – Hamada & Awesome King defeated Sarita & Taylor Wilde, and Velvet Sky & Madison Rayne [3/4*]
    – Tatanka defeated Jay Lethal [**]
    – Daniels and Desmond Wolfe wrestled to a time-limit draw [***1/2]
    – A.J. Styles, Tomko, Bobby Lashley, Abyss, and Kurt Angle defeated Scott Steiner, Dr. Stevie, Raven, Doug Williams and Brutus Magnus [**]

  • THE RIGHT:

    ABYSS CONFRONTS MICK FOLEY: A short interlude in the neverending ‘Mick Foley is paranoid about Hulk Hogan’ saga, but a strong one. This was all emotion as Abyss accuses Mick of forgetting about him and their partnership, while Mick fires back with more skill and energy than he’s been able to muster in any other segment since Hogan’s signing with the company was announced (maybe even before then). If you needed a reminder of how good Foley can be in non-wrestling segments, this was it.

    DANIELS VS. DESMOND WOLFE: I read a lot of complaints about this match ending in a time-limit draw, but that seems like the best possible outcome for this pairing. About halfway through this match, I realized that they would be going for the draw and loved the idea as it allows both men to walk away strong and sets up their feud, which looks like a real possibility in January. Wins and losses do matter and a loss here would have hurt the loser going into Final Resolution. There’s a constant complaint about TNA matches being too short, so why not turn that negative into an advantage by actually taking a match to the time limit? Both men obviously could have gone a lot longer, but I’m left wanting more and not sure which man would have won. The match was a slow-building one and stopping it as it approached its peak was a smart move. Neither man lost, both looked great, and I want more. That’s doing things Right.

  • PURGATORY:

    JUDGEMENT DAY FOR DOUBLE J: Like last week’s Foley/Jarrett Summit story, this felt like a necessity on the road to an eventual endpoint rather than something genuinely worthwhile in and of itself. But, unlike last week, this week’s segments were actually interesting with Jarrett going from pissed off about the idea of coming back and genuinely caring about the company he founded. It still wasn’t that great, but Jarrett played it well and actually made himself and his position look a little more complicated than the average character in a wrestling storyline.

    ROXXI RETURNS TO DEFEAT ODB?: The Hardcore Knockout Roxxi returned after her quick appearances in September to defeat ODB in a non-title match. Her pre-match promo was solid, but did feature the cringe-inducing line “Almost unique as me…” The match itself with ODB was a little slow and never really got going despite being given more time than most matches. But, the two Knockouts worked well together and various near falls made it interesting until a rather inane finish involving ODB’s flask that allowed Roxxi to return and defeat the Knockouts champ. The post-match altercation did nothing but allow Tara to run out and accomplish nothing. This was the first sign that most of the build-up to Final Resolution was actually done last week and they had no idea how to further build the matches this week. Extra points for Mike Tenay using the terms ‘bronco-muncher’ and ‘carpet-buster.’

    BROTHER RAY VS. MATT MORGAN IN A LUMBERJACK MATCH: The pre-match promo actually had some strong mic work from Morgan as he put over Hernandez as more than able to withstand five minutes against Team 3D, Rhino, and Jesse Neal. The match itself was adequate, but didn’t do anything to build up Sunday’s match that last week’s match hadn’t already accomplished except making Morgan eat the pin this time.

    THREE WAY KNOCKOUTS TAG TEAM MATCH: This was thankfully short as I really dislike three way tag matches and this looked like it could get out of hand quickly. It did, but it allowed Sarita and Hamada to show off a little before it turned into a brawl outside of the ring and Awesome Kong got the win by killing a bitch dead. A few small things irked me like Lacey Von Erich standing on the ring apron alongside Velvet Sky and Madison Rayne, or those two not executing their double basement dropkicks at the same time. One positive is that this sets up the possible Knockouts Tag Team tournament for New Year’s Eve.

    THE BLACK MACHISMO INVITATIONAL OPEN ROUND TWO: The (apparently) monthly Black Machismo Invitational Open continues with Jay Lethal taking on the second wrestling legend to step up: Tatanka. Man, that is just an awful character at this point. Actually, it was an awful character when it debuted, too. Putting that aside, the match wasn’t nearly as bad it looked like it could have been. Tatanka wasn’t flashy, but took some decent bumps and kept up pretty well with Lethal. I’m not sure what’s gained by having Black Machismo lose once a month to veterans, but I’m not sure what would be gained by having him win either.

    MOTOR CITY MACHINEGUNS PROMO: Chris Sabin pointed out how accomplished the duo are everywhere they’ve been that’s not TNA, while Alex Shelley counterbalanced that by stating that he’s proud that they’ve had to work hard for their spot and don’t want anything handed to them. The content here was strong, but the delivery was a little weak.

    TEN MAN TAG MATCH: Surprisingly, the two brawls that broke out helped this match since it cut it down to a more manageable three-on-two match with Kurt Angle, AJ Styles, and Tomko taking on the British Invasion while Abyss brawled backstage with Dr. Stevie and Raven, and Bobby Lashley fought Scott Steiner. The backstage fights were nothing special, but kept up the personal nature of those feuds, while the match was solid work. Both groups of men looked good, but the British Invasion looked a little better showing that they can deliver in the ring with the likes of Angle and Styles. The post-match run-in by Daniels and Desmond Wolfe made for a powerful image to end on going into Final Resolution.

  • THE WRONG:

    MICK FOLEY MEETS HULK: This week’s episode kicked off with a brawl where Mick Foley attacked Kevin Nash only for the World Elite to get involved and allow Nash the upper hand before security intervened. The reason why? Apparently, the meeting Nash set up with Hulk for Foley last week was with Lou Ferrigno. A funny enough idea, but also a rather stupid swerve. I liked the promo Nash delivered against Foley backstage as you so rarely see the cool and collected Big Sexy that pissed off and ready to kill someone, but, overall, this just didn’t work at all and felt like worthless prolonging of this story until January 4th.

    HOGAN IS STILL COMING TO TNA IN CASE YOU DIDN’T KNOW: The addition of Sting made last week’s promos rather good, almost on par with the video packages that the WWE puts together. This week, Sting is nowhere to be found and this is really just an ad for the live January 4th show disguised as a video package.

    FEAST OR FAMINE PROMO: Because actually booking a match to promote this would be too much trouble.

  • THE RIDICULOUS:

    NONE: I’m as surprised as you are.

    The 411

    On the whole, stronger than last week’s episode with the Daniels/Wolfe match carrying the load quite a bit, while most segments did what was required, but never went above and beyond. That said, last week’s episode was more effective at building to Final Resolution, something that this week’s show didn’t do nearly well enough. If anything, the heat for some feuds cooled as a result of this week’s events, which is the last thing you want going into a pay-per-view. Oh, and the Foley/Nash/Jarrett/Hogan/Carter story continued to sleepwalk its way through the episode.

    SHOW RATING: 6.5



    By: Jeremy Thomas

    WWE SmackDown 12.18.09

  • THE RIGHT:

    IT’S TIME FOR DAVE vs. REY REY…AGAIN: SmackDown began with Teddy Long making his way down to the ring, much to the delight of the crowd. T-Grish called him “one of the most controversial general managers of all-time” while Striker complained about Long’s actions at TLC. Long then mentioned the events that happened at TLC between Taker and Batista, and said we were going to get a new number one contender tonight. Big Dave wasn’t having any of that though and he came out to say he was still the top contender for the belt. He repeated his threat toward Long to “make it right” or else, and he was interrupted by Rey Rey who was dressed, in what is the very definition of “poor choice,” in a sort of pastel flannel shirt and jeans. He busted out with the argument that you don’t need to be 6’5″ and jacked up with muscles to be WWE champion. Umm…does anyone else find it odd that Rey Rey is being presented as the babyface example of the Wellness Policy argument? This was a good promo by Rey though, who’s never been a great promo guy but did quite well here in selling the emotion and pointing out how the Manimal never really respected him. The crowd was behind it too, and Teddy made the match. I enjoyed the mic work here, and while I’m starting to get a little tired of Rey vs. Batista, it certainly is a TV main event-worthy match. It worked as an opening segment for sure.

    JOHN MORRISON, MATT HARDY & R-TRUTH vs. DREW McINTYRE, CM PUNK & LUKE GALLOWS: This was, unsurprisingly, a good choice for an opening match as the crowd was hot for it and the participants. That’s one of the problems with your opening match sometimes…if you put someone in who the crowd doesn’t care about, it can drag the mood down too early for it to recover. The heels were all on one page and got a pretty badass pose in the corner during the entrances. As Striker pointed out there were a lot of interlocking rivalries in this match and that’s why the booking totally made sense. We had three guys who are proven to be consistently good in the ring here, one who can bust out good matches when he wants to in Truth and a couple who we’re only starting to see some wrestling out of in Gallows and McIntyre. Yes, I know we’ve seen Gallows as Festus, it’s a different character and that means a different move set and style. Considering that varied mix here, I thought the match worked out pretty well. Morrison sold the offense of the heels nicely early on and it gave Gallows and McIntyre an opportunity to look good. Punk and Gallows busted out a modified Demolition Decapitation, which was absolutely awesome and I hope we see more of it. The faces got their moment before Punk won with a Slammy shot to the gut, which works for me since Punk needs to get a little cred back after the CenaSquash on Raw. This was a solid opening that, frankly, got about half as much in-ring time as the whole of Raw.

    THE HART DYNASTY vs. SLAM MASTER J & JIMMY “WANG” YANG: Well, I’d suggested Slam Master and Kung Fu Naki, but I guess this works, too. Yes, for once we got the Harts facing a tag team on SmackDown that wasn’t Cryme Tyme, and that made me very happy. The crowd actually kind of popped a little for them too, which was a pleasant surprise. Apparently Jimmy Yang is now the Asian Redneck Gangsta. Okay, then. The faces got a few moments of control and hit a crowd-pleasing dive through the ropes before the Harts took control and put on a minor clinic in the ring. There was even a brief comeback by the new team but the outcome wasn’t much of a surprise here, as Natalya got involved and that let the Harts take control and then get the win with the modified Hart Attack. This was actually a nice little match from these two teams, and I really hope we see more of Jeezy and the Wang. The freshness of the match-up, even if we’d seen it on Superstars, made for an enjoyable experience. After the match we got a promo by the Harts basically talking about revenge against DX and how they were going to take the tag titles next week. That’s a match I’m looking forward to. Oh yeah, and the oblique Bret Hart reference was there too. This has officially become the worst kept secret in the last few years, but I’m okay with that.

    REY MYSTERIO vs. BATISTA: We actually had about eighteen minutes before the entrances, which was an encouraging sign. Again, that was practically the entirety of the wrestling on Raw. We’ve seen these guys face off quite a bit lately and while the match-up has gotten a little stale, they put forth a good effort here. The crowd was really hot for the match and Mysterio chants came up early in the match. We had a couple fun spots like Rey Rey blocking the Batista Bomb via the ropes and flipping outside to do a springboard dropkick. The story was the same we’ve seen from all these match-ups of Rey being the underdog with heart and the match was far from perfect, but it was still an enjoyable effort and both guys were motivated for it. I still say that Rey coming back this soon was a mistake but he looked pretty decent in the ring here. Batista’s heel act is doing better and better each week and he was selling the emotion here nicely, which helped the crowd get behind the match. This made Rey look more credible than he has been even with the out-of-nowhere roll-up and we ended with a number one contender, in a match, which could be very interesting considering the style differences between Ray and Taker.

  • PURGATORY:

    ERIC ESCOBAR vs. KANE: Before the match, Escobar came out and busted out a few more insults to Vickie. Based on the way the crowd reacted to him, they aren’t working all that well. Give it time though Eric, you may just come through yet. Basically Eric said that no punishment could be worse than dating Vickie, and Vickie came out to prove him wrong by tossing Kane at him. This was the same situation as the last few weeks…Escobar fought bravely but came up short. Kane kept himself as a pseudo-face by giving Vickie a few glares while he beat on Eric, and this match was over quickly. It wasn’t that good, but it was short and Kane looked more motivated than he was in his couple of matches against Knox. And afterward, Eric got the moral victory over Vickie by standing defiant, insulting her and leaving the ring. I’m giving this one a pass, but they need to go somewhere with this because Eric’s punishment streak is going to get old fairly soon.

    MARIA vs. BETH PHOENIX: We had a segment earlier in the show where Mickie and Maria were playing SmackDown vs. Raw and Beth got on them for not being focused. This was basically a chance for them to sell Maria’s Diva of the Year Slammy win and set up the match; since Beth did most of the talking, it wasn’t bad at all. We then got a segment where Michelle and Layla sucked up to Beth and trashed on Mickie for being overweight, which Beth didn’t like. We then had the match itself, which was…well, about what would be expected. Beth beat the crap out of Maria, who was spunky and tried to fight but pretty much got destroyed. Works for me. This wasn’t anything in terms of a match, but it helped Beth get over by wiping the floor with the Diva of the Year and I can handle that.

  • THE WRONG:

    CHRIS JERICHO vs. THE GREAT KHALI: This was Chris Jericho’s return to SmackDown as a singles guy and non-champion, and I’m sure people would have preferred he be in the main event, but ah well. Jericho had the crowd’s derision, and he got on the mic to complain about being a victim of “the biggest screwjob in WWE history.” Hmm, another, more subtle Bret Hart reference? Jericho gave a pretty decent promo here about being punished for being the best. He then complained about being without his best friend the Big Show but promised to dominate Friday Nights…then Khali made his SmackDown return to a decent crowd reaction. Well, if anyone can get a good match out of Khali, it would be Jericho. He bumped his ass off for the big guy and then bailed when Khali went for the Vice, resulting in a countout victory for Khali. This was not only an iffy match, but wishy-washy booking. Listen, if you don’t want to hurt Jericho’s cred, put him in a different match. If you want to put Khali over strong, have him actually win. This didn’t do anything for anyone, was too short to be worth it as a match and generally just seemed lost as to its purpose.

  • THE RIDICULOUS:

    DID YOU KNOW?: Nope. And, as always, I don’t care.

    THE MARINE 2 TRAILER: Honestly, I’ve left this one alone to date, but I can’t keep from making some sort of comment…

    HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA….oh, that’s going to be terrible.

    The 411

    After all was said and done, I found myself happy with SmackDown. All the bullshit for the week was dispensed on Raw, and the Blue Brand came out the better for it. We had a few solid matches, and even the Escobar/Kane match had some value in continuing the Vickie/Eric storyline. Only the Jericho/Khali match was too problematic to handle and when the show faded to black, I found myself satisfied overall.

    SHOW RATING: 7.5

    From ha:
    cena does deserve superstar of the year. i know it is kayfabe but name another man who represented wwe of the last year, only one man-john cena.

    I didn’t say he didn’t deserve it. The only thing that bugged me was that they had him steam roll through Punk in about a minute’s time and then faced off against Orton, which is far from a new match. The latter is a minor gripe compared to the first one which (obviously) bugged the hell out of me. I’m totally okay with him being Superstar of the Year though.

    From Big Lantern Ghost:
    “Listen, I’m used to random pairings, but can we at least point out that Kane was the very person who Khali last faced in the ring during a two-month long feud?”

    To be fair, Christian did say something about them willing to put their differences aside to beat Koslov and Jackson (which actually makes sense in Kane’s case considering he hasn’t been happy about Mike Knox thinking of himself as a “monster” either, or whatever the hell that stupid backstage segment on Smackdown was about)

    I know he did, and that did provide some explanation for it. I just thought that, of all the people to have come down with Christian, they chose very strange in Kane & Khali. It’s not like they have a built-up feud between the two and the Roundtable that would cause the big guys to have motivation to set their animosity aside. Ahh, well.

    From Jeremy from Palmdale:
    Lets see, HBK throws out a random challenge to The Undertaker 4 months before the event or John Cena vows to not lose a match until he wins a world title. Undertaker is currently a World Champion. Which would have a better build up.

    Perhaps they are building for an HBK/John Cena/Undertaker match at WrestleMania.

    You know, that actually wouldn’t shock me if they did. As 411’s own Chris Lansdell has pointed out before, the pattern as of late has been one triple threat World Title match and one singles World Title match. So a Cena/Michaels/Taker match at ‘Mania wouldn’t be out of the question; it’s really too early to say for sure what they’re thinking about though.

    From AGRREedd:
    I assume Maria was used as either:

    A) WWE.com voting was legit, and she is a popular diva or more likely

    B) Maria is like Taylor Swift in being the sweet, quiet innocent girl and/or Maria will be on the Celebrity Apprentice, so she will be lots of face time from now on.

    I tend to think it’s probably more option B, although the fact that Maria was the last Playboy Diva probably got her a lot of votes. Either way, I still think Melina & Maryse got screwed.

    From Triple J:
    If Bret Hart is the guest host of Raw, I hope he brings the Hart Dynasty over to face DX for the tag titles and then uses an screwjob finish against Shawn to give the belts to the Dynasty.

    I have a funny feeling it will be something more significant than that. Just a little rumor that’s going around.

    From Shaun J.:
    Completely agree with you on RAW, Jeremy. This year’s Slammy Award Show was very lackluster. Lame short matches and lame guest hosting, with just a few good or funny moments in the show. Very disappointed with this 3-hour RAW.

    What bothers me m,ost about it is that I was actually pretty jazzed about this. Last year’s Slammies were actually quite good so they set a certain bar…then didn’t even try to meet it. That’s just lazy and bad.

    From Gnarly:
    Best-case-scenario would’ve been for Jeri-Show to invoke their rematch-clause this week on Smackdown. You know, have DX appear there, they have an actual match, Smackdown benefits (well, ever so slightly) from their presence, so forth so forth.

    Instead, they job Punk and Undertaker to RAW guys and make Batista look like a whiny bitch.

    Fair enough.

    I don’t think it was an intentioal screwing of SmackDown, but I do think that was the result to some degree. At least Taker looked strong and only lost by the countout, and I think you could see the Jericho & Show thing coming. Either way, the overall effect didn’t help the show any.

    From Loki:
    “I know a lot of people are going to toss up comments about how I’m whining like a little internet fanboy”

    They probably will, however I believe you are totally correct. 3 months ago Punk was the top heel in the business, and now…this? It’s disgusting.

    It also makes Jeff Hardy look bad – he was retired by a guy who Cena beat in 100 seconds – which is quite bad from a DVD promotion POV. It buried Punk, it buried Smackdown and it stunk.

    And it will probably be on the Best of Raw 2009 DVD knowing WWE.

    Exactly, Loki. I couldn’t have put it better myself.

    From Mr Quimby’s Beard:
    “Plus, he can slot into the singles roster on SmackDown nicely.”
    Of course, as DX can now be on all three shows, it would make sense for Jericho to search for a tag partner on the SD roster to try to take the gold back (it’d be a HUGE boost for Dolph Ziggler).
    Of course I have to believe that Triple H doesn’t want to lower himself to appear on Smackdown. Especially not when the glory of Little Peoples Court beckons.

    “Maryse and Melina got screwed.”
    Was Tiger Woods backstage?

    It would make sense, but I’d rather not see it as I don’t think they’ll guive it back to Jericho that quickly, so it would be a fruitless chase. Better that he get in a singles feud with someone he can elevate or get elevated by. And no, Tiger wasn’t backstage…I just wish I was.

    From Guest#0975:
    “And then there was the Batista West thing. Funny? Yes. It was definitely funny. But it was also goofy, and I really wonder where they’re going to go from there. This was all just dumb when it was all said and done…sorry guys.”

    No, it wasnt funny at all. It was lame, outdated, and completely out of character. Have Santino do it. HE cant be hurt by old, dumb jokes.

    I guess “funny” was a bit of an overstatement…it was somewhat amusing. As in, I smiled and shook my head. And yes, it was something that Santino should have done, but ah well. I think it was somewhat in character…this is the guy who gave a visual demonstration about how the spotlight was on him the Friday before this. But it was too goofy instead of being serious. So we agree, 0975…to a degree.

    From DeeRayMoore:
    Obviously…since nobody watches wrestling as a fan anymore…you’re all wannabe smarts…i’ll explain CM Punk vs. John Cena to you…

    John Cena was PISSED about losing to Sheamus. We know from past matches that when Cena is PISSED, he’s pretty dominant.

    Now, let’s say that Cena loses to Sheamus, admittedly a newcomer…and then comes out and has a long match with CM Punk and barely beats him…how does Cena look in the fan’s eyes?

    So…to summarize…he won the match the way he did to show the fans that a) he was angry about his loss, and when someone is angry and determined, they are hard to beat…and b) he hasn’t lost a step, just because he lost the title the night before.

    As far as CM Punk…did he lose any momentum? Hell no! Who cares how fast or slow he loses? Do you think he’s going to lose heat? You DO realize that ultimately, the goal of wrestling is for the heel to lose, right?

    Stop bitching just because CM Punk is your darling, and start looking at things OBJECTIVELY, I know that’s a hard word for some of you, and try to understand WHY things were done.

    Hey Dee. Welcome to the R’s…good to have you. For the record, Punk isn’t my darling…as most people around here can tell you, that’d be Randy Orton (or Maryse). I am a fan of Punk’s work but he’s not “my boy” or anything like that, and I’m perfectly accepting of losses. I also understand ~why~ they had Cena win as quickly as they did. However, if they wanted to have Cena come back strong and dominate someone, it should have been someone whose credibility could take a hit. Punk’s been on a downward slide for a while now, and when they are as obsessed as they are with pushing new talent, sliding Punk a bit down the card doesn’t make much sense. It also irks me because Raw is so obsessed with being THE show over SmackDown; again, I don’t think it was intentional, but it doesn’t change what happened. Finally, the goal of wrestling is to entertain and to sell tickets, not to have the heel lose. If the heel winning sells tickets then the heel is supposed to win. I realize that fans love to see the self-righteous heel lose and Cena win, but they also want to see SmackDown look strong. That’s the only point I was making.

    From Peep#6742:
    5.5? Man, you were way to generous Thomas. A 2.0 would have been better.

    That’s just how nice of a guy I am.

    From Taker/Cena >>> Taker/HBK II:
    I don’t care if I m alone here but I m taking a FRESH Taker Streak match Up over an already done and STALE ONE every day and night.

    Taker vs Cena = WIN

    Taker vs Michaels II = FAIL

    Fresh is obviously good, and I would rather see Cena/Taker than Michaels/Taker. I’m okay with Michaels/Taker though if that’s what we get, and I certainly wouldn’t call it “fail.” To each their own though.

    From Guest#9094:
    I stopped reading after sheamus was in the right…

    Thanks for reading as much as you did!

    From Mr. C.:
    The last time Punk fought Cena, it was a decent amount of time for a Raw match, and Punk still came out looking strong. If they had at least done the same match this time, I wouldn’t have minded. Or if they need Cena to squash someone so he can show how mad he is, then have him squash Dolph Ziggler since they’ve given up on him already anyway.

    I agree with this…except that Ziggler never would have been in a Superstar of the Year tournament.

    From The Great Capt. Smooth:
    I have to agree about Big Dick Johnson’s bit. That didn’t sound right. Anyway, it was a bit of a random moment. Sometimes, it’s the little things that can help you get through a bad show.

    That didn’t sound right at all. Certainly, the little bits can get one through a bad show and there were some of those overall throughout; it was still definitely a bad show though.

    From Da Cinder:
    Hey Jeremy still love your column and the R’s. I just had to write in about what happened on Raw last Monday. I wanted your opinion on the Maria/Batista/Kanye Cluster%$^$. I mean what the hell with it!? I didn’t know Batista became Santino overnight (but when Sheamus wins the belt anything is possible)! Who the hell came up with this idea Batista, Vince, Dennis Miller, Tony Russo? This had no rhyme nor reason to it. They just killed and raped any heat that batista had as a Heel. What purpose did it serve? I guess Chavo, Gillberg, or Doink were too busy to do this. Shouldn’t he be pissed that .. oh I don’t know… HE GOT SCREWED OUT OF THE TITLE LAST NIGHT!?! Not only that he didn’t even say “Ima let you finish” to make it seem like he was imitating Kanye. The fans are all like: “Well, this just turned into Bull$#!^”. Please explain to me there’s a reasonable explanation to this and that it was impromptu, and why you guys shouldn’t make a new R for Retarded. What’s next Sheamus vs. Santino? And that would only be good if it’s a “Kill your opponent then kill yourself match”.

    Yeah, I know it was irritating, and I didn’t get why they decided to go all jokey with it. I think it makes sense because it’s his arrogant “It’s all about me” persona, but the humor part was problematic. I smiled and shook my head, and moved on. I can see why everyone else is irritated over it because the humor aspect was jarring and completely out of what we’ve seen from Big Dave as of late, but there were other things that pissed me off more about the show.

    From Michael:
    You forgot to mention that there was only 25 minutes in ring action and only one match got even close to ten minutes. Three hours and that is the best they can do? Give me a break, people give TNA a hard time but they never say a thing about WWE with their two minute time limit matches. Personally if I was in the crowd and had brought a ticket to Monday’s Raw I would demand my money back. Terrible show.

    Actually, I referred to the massive shortness of the matches all the time. Thanks for reading!

    From Guest#3095:
    Most of the ‘Rights’ should have been ‘Wrongs’ or lower.

    After his big-time PPV match Kofi did nothing and was in fact damaged by having no further contact with Orton and losing to his boy toys, who in an winning effort showed once again they have nothing to offer while Borne once again showed in a losing effort he’s more talented than at least half the guys being pushed.

    Jericho getting booted off RAW was just pure ridiculousness and was sad to watch.

    And seriously, Cena vs Orton part 82365890656 in the Right? One of, if not the, most stale pairing the WWE has to offer getting the most time and thoroughly stinking up the ring yet again with another boring match? A few weeks after the ‘epic conclusion’ to their feud? Which features Cena winning superstar of the year, an award which should have gone to the thoroughly buried Punk? Seriously, this was one of the worst things on the show and that’s really saying something.

    RAW was painful to watch from beginning to end. 0.0.

    I don’t think it was 0.0 bad. That would indicate to me that there was not a single moment of value in the show, and there was some good stuff. The Cena/Orton thing has obviously been done before, but it wasn’t a terrible match; just one that was far from fresh. I also didn’t think Priceless looked as bad as you did, and Kofi’s loss can be easily attributed to the injuries he was still selling. I can understand your points, I just disagree to some degree on them. To each their own.


    And we’re out of here!

    ~430~

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