Wrestling’s 4R’s Friday Edition 12.25.09: ECW and Raw Reviewed!

Posted by Jeremy Thomas on 12.25.2009

D-Generation X had an extended stay in Little People's Court, Sheamus crushed MVP, Cena beat Jack Swagger and Jeri-Show were foiled again, while the ECW Homecoming continues and Tommy Dreamer gives us one last match for the memories! Wrestling’s 4R’s break down all the action from WWE Raw and ECW on SyFy!

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By: Jeremy Thomas

WWE Raw 12.21.09

QUICK RESULTS:
Melina, Triple K & Gail Kim defeated Jillian, Alicia Fox, & Maryse [**]
Kofi Kingston, Mark Henry, & Evan Bourne defeated Randy Orton & Priceless [***]
John Cena defeated Jack Swagger [***]
Chris Masters defeated Carlito [* 1/2]
Sheamus defeated M.V.P. [**]
The Miz defeated Santino Claus [* 3/4]

THE RIGHT:

RANDY ORTON & PRICELESS vs. KOFI KINGSTON, EVAN BOURNE & MARK HENRY: Well, this was certainly an interesting match-up. The presence of three very good to great wrestlers, two good ones and Mizark who works when he's booked right had me hoping for this match and they didn't disappoint. This was a solid match here that the crowd was super-into and had a lot of great spots to boot. Kofi worked early on as the face-in-peril while Bourne got some impressive high spots and all three members of Legacy looked pretty decent here, in both credibility and work rate. Bourne got a boost just by hanging in there against their opponents, and by the time Kofi and Orton got in the ring together the crowd loved it. This was the match that got Kofi back on the winning side after TLC, and it was a good match for everyone all-around to boot. Color me not complaining.

JOHN CENA vs. JACK SWAGGER: Ahh, battle of the winning streaks. Or at least, it could have been. But I digress. This wasn't the first match pitting Swagger against Cena that we've ever seen, and once again I was impressed. I find it interesting that they will spend months making Swagger go absolutely nowhere, then pit him against Cena to make him look very good only to let him go nowhere again. I don't know if this match was just a way for them to rebuild Swagger so they can actually take him somewhere or not, but it certainly repaired a lot of the damage his credibility has taken with his on-off-on-off feuds with Bourne, Miz and MVP. Swagger and Cena work very well against each other and Cena seems to have a lot of confidence in the guy to let him look so impressive in their matches; you won't see me complain. These guys got a good amount of time and it went back and forth nicely before Cena picked up the win as should have been expected. Good work by both men, and kudos to Cena and the booking team for trying to repair some of the damage done to Swagger over the last several months.

THE MIZ vs. SANTINO CLAUS: The "set-up" for this had the Bella Twins being all over the tiger suit guy while Miz took Santa R. Shyster to task for not getting him what he wanted when he was nine, then they babbled about tax stuff. The tiger's wife came in and chased her off and then IRS left so that Mae Young could make out with Johnny Damon. Yeah, this kind of thing doesn't really need to be criticized…just writing it out is criticism enough. The match came and Miz came down, then Santino came out as Santa and cut a promo (complete with song sung far better than Jillian would) about how Santino Claus wasn't feeling very nice. Miz then treated Santino how every wrestling Santa in history has ever been treated. Honestly, I didn't mind this at all. Santino's little promo was brief and inoffensive and then Miz beat him badly outside of a brief flurry from the Italian in the red suit. Miz then destroyed Santa's gifts for the kids. How can you not like that?

PURGATORY:

OLBIGATORY TIGER WOODS JOKE/SANTA'S LITTLE HELPER MATCH: Raw kicked off with an advertisement for the upcoming Little People's Court segment—more on that later—before we got our weekly guest host Johnny Damon. Damon came on down to the ring, high-fiving on the way, and had a distinctly mixed reaction from the crowd. He was cool enough to acknowledge it for a moment and said he wasn't sure where he'd be in 2010. Can't say I care too much personally, but to each their own. Apparently we had some Secret Santas granting Raw wishes before a guy in a tiger suit came out of the crowd, chased by a blond with a golf club. Oh, for fuck's sake. I'm sorry, but I can't imagine anyone found that remotely funny and it made no sense to boot. Damon brought out the Divas in their Christmas suits for a "Santa's Little Helper" six-woman tag. Good GOD. Maryse always looks hot, but this was a new level of hot. Gail and Jillian started it off and it wasn't too terrible between them. As usual things weren't all that crisp with them in the ring but they didn't have anything too bad going on there. Hell, even Triple K looked somewhat decent in there. This was remarkably short, even for a Diva's six-person tag, but that probably worked to their benefit. I didn't love this and the opening portion with Damon and the Tiger Woods joke was pretty dumb, but the wrestling was above what I would expect for these ladies and that keeps it out of the wRong.

MVP vs. SHEAMUS: This match was set up backstage by MVP asking Santa Rhodes for a match against Sheamus to prove that he belongs in the World Title hunt. Damon approved and the match was on. When the match came up, Sheamus entered first to a fairly moderate crowd reaction…one that was frankly a fair amount weaker than Montel's face pop. Probably not a great sign, but it's also still early in Sheamus's title reign. Whereas Swagger got to look damn impressive against Cena, this was pretty much a squash of MVP in order to build up the champion. I actually had no problem with that since they need to put Sheamus strongly over some bigger names in order to help push his legitimacy as champion. Montel got a few token moves in before Sheamus stood up and took the man's head off and then picked up the win with the Celtic Cross. Nothing great here, but it did what it needed to. My biggest problem and what keeps this out of the right is Sheamus's ducking of Cena. I've said it before…they've built Sheamus up as a monster and then had him duck Cena. It's not pure cravenness that he's displaying, but it is a problem that damages his monster mystique a bit.

THE WRONG:

CARLITO vs. CHRIS MASTERS: This was set up with a backstage segment with the two competitors as well as Johnny Damon, Santa Slaughter and Eve. The Bella Twins were there too, but they did nothing of note. As usual. Basically this equated to "Carlito hits on Eve, Masters gets in the way, fight is set up, and Slaughter implies his own alternative lifestyle." Yes, it was about as off-putting as it sounds. In reality though, the segment was pretty harmless and set up the match all right. Once the match occurred, we had Carlito come down alone while Eve came down at Masters's side. They did okay work in the ring there for the time they got; the problem was that the crowd just didn't give a rat's ass. They tried in there and the crowd just wasn't interested. I'm curious to see in later weeks whether Master's pec dance has already worn out its welcome with audiences and if now that it's translating into actual wrestling the fans aren't interested or if this is just a one-time anomaly. Either way, this segment dragged, even as short as it was though I don't think it's the participants' fault. Sometimes, stuff just doesn't go over well.

THE RIDICULOUS:

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

THE RI-GOD-DAMN-DICULOUS:

LITTLE PEOPLE'S COURT – THE HORNSWOGGLE/DX SAGA: I'm without words. Okay, actually I'm not, but that was pretty much my reaction as I was watching this whole fiasco. Now listen, I don't mind that they did a Little People's Court thing in theory. I could bitch and moan about the stupidity of the general idea and how there's no reason for it at all. I could complain about how Hornswoggle, who can be funny in very limited, non-Chavo-humiliating doses, doesn't belong anywhere near a group of main event guys. But really, there's no point for me to criticize these generalities when there's so much more to complain about regarding the specifics. Let's just start with the idiocy of the segments as written and performed, where DX goes into a "whole other world" under the ring and find a Little People's Court where no one but the narrator, Shawn and 'H speak English. I'm not looking for anything serious out of this, and goofy is fine, but this was about as funny as the worst moments of The Love Guru and Disaster Movie combined. Ha ha, Shawn and Hunter are trying to defend themselves but are screwing it up by saying synonyms for "little." Oh, ho ho ho. The whole thing was just one funny joke after another, complete with so-over-the-top-I-cringed performances by Shawn and Hunter. It's one thing to be playing it up as silly and having fun; it's another entirely to be so outlandish that Caligula would look up from his orgies dressed as Hercules and say "Oh my god that's too MUCH!"

Now, if it was just over the top retarded silliness, I could just slap a Ridiculous on it and move on. But I need to point something out. Folks, if you cut out commercials, Raw was about 93 minutes this week. The Hornswoggle-DX stuff equated to almost thirty minutes. Fully one-third of Raw was used to set up a segment where….a leprechaun becomes the mascot of D-Generation X. I can't wait to hear how the apologists for this whole thing try to explain it off. And four minutes of that was recapping the seventeen minutes worth that had gone on before. Why, for Christ's sake WHY? If anyone wanted to see it, they would have tuned in. I guarantee—I absolutely GUARANTEE—that no one was sitting at home, watching House or Two and a Half Men and suddenly thought "Oh shit! I missed Little People's Court and I need to know what happened!" No one. Not a single person in this country or any other did that. This whole thing was stupid on new, new levels and I concur with a statement by Lawler early on… "Did we just see that?" Unfortunately…very unfortunately…the answer was yes. But hey, at least we got to see Chris Jericho with some rosy cheeks, right?

The 411
This was a tough show to rate. On one hand, you had a few pretty good matches; the six-man tag was good, Cena vs. Swagger was a great little match and the Women's match was better than expected. On the other hand you had the whole Little People's Court that took up ONE THIRD OF THE SHOW and was just mind-numbingly awful. Viewed as a whole the show was generally a very disappointing show; there was a lot that I did enjoy but I can't condone a show that wastes so much time on something so stupid. I hate to wonder where this is going, and just hope it doesn't take up nearly as much time as it did this time around.

SHOW RATING: 4.5

From Nice:
Another new challenger to a title (Rey) and people do not like it?

My problem with Rey Rey is what I've said before; Rey Rey is working after a quick-fix injury and I think both he and the 'E would be better served by taking time off to heal instead. Putting him in a high-profile match puts more pressure on him to perform, and he's more likely to do something that will end up with him injured. I would have no issue with him competing for the title in any other situation.


From fanboi13:
"Eric's punishment streak is going to get old fairly soon".

Guess what? I am already tired of it! I do not care enough about Vickie to care about her punishing this man. I hate Vickie because she sucks at what she is doing and I would like to see far more talented folks get her spot . I hate CM Punk because he comes across as a first rate Holier than thou, pompous ass and it is fun to cheer against him. If Teddy Long was punishing Escobar I might care. I think Long does a good job in his role and I enjoy what he does.

I'm personally with you, FB. The big problem is that the crowd reacts to Vickie, and as long as they do the WWE isn't going to get the hint that we hate her for the wrong reason. The 'E doesn't exactly know when someone is buying a ticket for Vickie or for Dolph Ziggler or whoever; they could do surveys, but that only tells them a sampling. So as long as she gets the X-Pac heat, she'll still have a prominent role. Unfortunately.


From Nimesh S.:
I know that many people weren't a fan of John Cena steamrolling through CM Punk last Monday night, but I think that I can explain why it went down the way it went down. There are people who look at Randy Orton and love the little things that he does in his performances that add to his matches, but Cena is right up there with him. I noticed one little nuance, such as where he went for the STF and locked it in the first time with a little more intensity than I'm used to seeing him lock it in. After Punk got close to the ropes, he released the hold and then locked in a tighter version. With more pressure added on the move, Punk was forced to tap.

I'm guessing that WWE books matches based on what the talent is doing during a certain period of time. Say if Punk was in the World Heavyweight Championship picture rather than what he's doing now, there would have been a different outcome.

Also from Raw, it would be intriguing to see Michaels/Taker II, but can they really duplicate a match like that? That match was truly one for the ages. Cena/Taker seems like a fresh matchup because it already adds intrigue. Can the guy who supposedly "wins 'em all" be the first to break the legendary Streak or will he be added to the proverbial WrestleMania graveyard of the Deadman?

I'm guessing that if Cena/Taker happens, Cena would take on a heel role sort of like Michaels in the Hogan/Michaels buildup toward SummerSlam in 2005, albeit with a little less comedy. If the heel turn resonates well with fans, keep it for a while. If it doesn't, he could save face by saying that he underestimated the Deadman at 'Mania. And a heel angle could be in the cards, especially with Cena vowing not to lose another match until he reaches the top of the mountain. If he does lose a match, that could segueway perfectly into a heel role. Rob McNew pointed this out in the Raw Review, I do believe.

You're definitely right about the Cena/Punk thing, and I'm sure the match would have gone rather differently if Cena had been World Heavyweight Champion. I guess my problem was that they've never seemed to have faith in Punk when he faces off with one of the 'flagship' main event guys. He can go over Jeff Hardy okay, but that seems to be his ceiling. I'm not one of these guys that go all paranoid and think Punk's being TOO unfairly treated, but I did have a lot of irritation with his squashing at Cena's hands.

For Michaels/Taker vs. Cena/Taker, I totally agree that Cena/Taker would be the better & fresher match-up. If they want to go Taker/Michaels though, I'm willing to see how it turns out. I don't think it's a guarantee that they will be able to top 'Mania XXV; frankly, I think that Taker's too banged up to put on the kind of match he did at 'Mania but I think that they could still put on a good-to-great match.


From david:
i just saw marine 2 and its way better than the first. The first one was corny and sucked. If you like a van damme dvd flick than check out Marine 2

From Guest#5692:
At least DiBiase doesn't have any signature moves to pull off in the movie. Looks ok.

From JaydenD:
The Marine 2 looks way better than The Marine, will be checking that one out!

From Burnout:
Look at the explosion at 1 min 11 seconds into the marine 2 trailer. Horrible.

Burnout, I agree completely. David, I haven't seen it yet obviously but I'm sure I will. Hell, I watched End Game and very little can be worse than that flaming piece of crap. 5692, he may not have many signature moves, but that could well mean they'll just resort to generic body slams and clotheslines, which isn't much better. And Jayden...we'll just agree to disagree.


From The Great Capt. Smooth:
A Beth face turn? Make it so, WWE!

I agree with this completely.


From Justin Case:
"Nope. And, as always, I don't care."
I've been meaning to ask this for a while. Is English your second language?
See... you contradict yourself by saying that you DON'T care over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over, yet you always label it "Ridiculous."
If English IS your second language, you have made great strides in your learning. if it isn't, then it's no wonder you don't get payed a fucking dime for writing this shit every week.

Hi Justin! Thanks for your comment, I'm glad to have you as a new reader! I say "new reader" because I have addressed this before; I don't care, and that's why I don't even bother to remove it. That little category stays in my template week after week after week, untouched and without any effort by me. So no, English is my first language, and I'm perfectly comfortable not typing a single keystroke to criticize the little bumpers each week. I've also mentioned that the bumpers don't influence my overall rating for the show, and that remains the same. So there's your explanations; thanks for reading buddy!


From Mr. C.:
Oh yeah, I'm in complete agreement about Ziggler not being in a Superstar of the year tourney. I thought that tournament wasn't that great of an idea either. Just have Cena be the Superstar of the year and then he can squash someone like Ziggler or Swagger since they seem to hate that guy too.

I can see that and that would have been a better way to do it. I see the point of the tournament and I guess they felt they needed to build Cena after his title loss, which is a bit silly of a sentiment as Cena wouldn't lose cred at this point if he lost to Moppy. But yeah, your idea would have definitely been better than what they did.

---

By: Michael Bauer

ECW on SyFy 12.22.09

QUICK RESULTS:
Zack Ryder defeated Tommy Dreamer [**1/4]
Vance Archer defeated Goldust [*]
Yoshi Tatsu defeated Jack Swagger [***1/4]

THE RIGHT:

TOMMY DREAMER GIVES US ONE LAST MATCH: Our opening match was Tommy Dreamer taking on Zack Ryder, stemming from the comments made by Ryder last week. Now, thanks to the internet, we all knew this was going to be Tommy's last match in the WWE, but everyone in the crowd probably did not know this. I'm sure if they did, there would have been huge Tommy chants. Even if you didn't know it was, Tommy sure performed like it was, because I haven't seen him look this good in quite some time. Dreamer came ready to put on one last performance and thankfully Ryder was more than willing to make it a memorable one. Ryder went over, as he should here, but Dreamer got to pull out all of his spots to some extent. Still wish he would have hit the cannonball roll again. This was Tommy's moment and I have nothing more than praise for all his years of performing for the fans. Thank you Tommy and please let this not be the end.

JACK SWAGGER RETURNS TO ECW WITH PROMO WORK AND A MAIN EVENT VS. YOSHI TATSU: The big deal for the Homecoming this week was the return on Jack Swagger. Unlike Kane, Swagger coming back allowed for plenty of interactions and plenty of goodness. It started with him coming to the stage and hyping up all of his greatness, including a pretty damn good video package from both his ECW days and his Raw days. He is then backstage with Tiffany, who took charge before Swagger was traded away, wondering how she is still around and how much she would love to have him back. Of course, this also made way for the Hurricane to get a lisp joke in, which really, there is nobody better to do it. Christian then was giving tips to Yoshi and how to beat Swagger, which brought us another great segment between Christian and Swagger. Yoshi played his part perfectly there and then proceeded to put on another great match, this time against the former ECW Champion in Swagger. Say what you want about Swagger, when he is on his game though, he is some sort of amazing talent. This match proved that point as it was a great back and forth match with numerous times both men should have won. But the fact that Swagger had to work here and couldn't just put Yoshi away was also a great sign to how much Yoshi has improved in his months on ECW. And while this ending was out of nowhere also, that is just how Yoshi's eet have been built up and I have no issues with how this match ended. Now, it's time to see Swagger carry the momentum from this week on Raw.

PURGATORY:

NOTHING

THE WRONG:

VANCE ARCHER vs. GOLDUST: The first of the Homecoming matches saw Vance Archer take on Goldust. After seeing Archer face Dreamer, I had some decent hopes for this match, but they were quickly erased. The match was quick, the action wasn't that good, and Archer really took a lot of offense from someone that hasn't been relevant in quite some time. With the way Archer has been booked, he should dominate someone like Goldust, despite every veteran advantage Goldust would have. My other compliant was that the ending was really out of nowhere. I mean, for as much as a cunning strategic person Archer is, it should be much more than a missed charge in the corner to get Goldust scooped up and in position for the reverse DDT. Because outside of that, Archer did not get in much offense against Goldust outside of forearms into the back, a few stomps and some chinlocks. This match, despite advancing Archer in the Homecoming, felt like a step back for him and he needs to get back on track.

THE RIDICULOUS:

NOTHING, BUT…

THE RI-GOD-DAMN-DICULOUS:

TRENT BARETTA AND CAYLEN CROFT ON THE ABRAHAM WASHINGTON SHOW: I have no issues with trying to hype up these two on the show, I really don't. But this attempt was futile and quite pathetic. I mean, seriously, when the best part of the show is Washington cracking jokes on Tiger Woods, you know you have a problem here. And when those jokes are bordering on passing the PG rating, you have another problem. So what exactly did this interview accomplish? All I know about these guys is that they are so ego-driven and they say they will be Tag Team Champions by this time next year. Good luck when those titles will never come close to being on ECW… or FCW. And then, they get into an argument with Tony Atlas, who doesn't matter because he is old. Is that the best they could come up with? After this, I have desire to hear these two speak or watch a match with them. They need to go and they need to go now.

The 411
This was a much better ECW than we have seen the past two weeks. We two matches this week that top ANY match from last week, both in quality and in time fought. Swagger coming back was much better than I expected and now we have Evan Bourne and Matt Hardy to look forward to next week. Hopefully, next week can top this.

SHOW RATING: 6.0

And we're out of here!


~431~