A Week in Preview 5.12.08

Posted by Stuart James on 05.12.2008

A Week in Preview debuts as I look forward to the next week of wrestling, including the fallout from Sacrifice, Regal's madness and Judgment Day!

~~~A Week in Preview~~~
By Stu

Introduction:

Welcome to the very first edition of A Week in Preview. This is your guide to wrestling this week from the biggest promotions in the United States, where I look forward to the next week in the unique world of professional wrestling. I look at all the "must-see" shows and moments that are confirmed for the following week, as well as predicting some things that may transpire.

A Week in Review

Sacrifice was this week, and overall it was a fairly below standards. It has abruptly ended the year's consistency of great PPV's across the wrestling world since the start of the year. The tournament was overbooked, but the right men went over in the right places; Samoa Joe retained in a fine match, and Kaz made a name for himself (again) last night. The biggest problem was that the heel turn by Booker T was nearly forgotten about since they booked too much.

Raw was fine for what it was. It seems as though they're taking it easy so they can build up characters once more. The show got a lot of criticism, which I can understand due to the lack of good quality wrestling, but they went a long way to build the characters of Regal and Kennedy, which is really important I feel to making them stars. Its just the problem lies in the fact that not much has changed since last week, so it just feels like "another two hours".

ECW's 100th episode was pretty fun, I thought. The commentator angle isn't going anywhere, but at least it's restored my faith that Adamle's display could be a work after all. Colin Delaney getting a victory made my day, as I think he's a great gimmick. Everyone needs jobbers, so why not make them jobbers with fun characters? To me, I think the ECW Title needs more direction, and Punk/Kane/Morrison & Miz can do just that. Tease some tension between Punk and Kane, and have Morrison bide Kane's time for a while, as he deserves to be back near the top, I feel. Other than that, nothing of note happened to interest me.

SmackDown! has been pointless the last month. Where have we gotten since last month? The title was vacated and now we've got the same main event two months in a row, which just feels stale. I know that other than Batista there's not many other real main eventers, but how awesome would it have been to see CM Punk win the battle royal, and then face Undertaker, only to come this close? You can't make stars without effort.

Unfortunately I missed TNA iMPACT this week, due to studying for exams, so I apologize for the lack of review.

Sacrifice's STARZ!:

Sting & James Storm vs. Team 3D *3/4
Robert Roode & Booker T vs. Christian Cage & Rhino **
Kip James & Matt Morgan vs. LAX ½*
AJ Styles & Super Eric vs. Awesome Kong & BG James *
Terrordome ***1/4 Co-Match of the Night
Team 3D vs. Christian Cage & Rhino **1/4
AJ Styles & Super Eric vs. LAX **1/2
Knockout's Match **3/4
Team 3D vs. LAX ***
Samoa Joe vs. Scott Steiner vs. Kaz ***1/4 Co-Match of the Night

Overall:


Last Week's Random Facts and Tidbits:

*Undertaker's gogoplata has gone 109 days without a proper name, making it one of the longest running finishers without one.
*On the 6th of May, it was be exactly six years since the WWF changed its name to WWE
*On the 7th of May, it was the nineteen year anniversary of Ricky Steamboat vs. Ric Flair from WrestleWar 1989.
*This is the week that David Arquette lost the WCW World Title in a triple cage match, which is surprisingly good actually.
*If Triple H defends the WWE Title at Judgment Day, it will be the first time he's retained, excluding Umaga at No Mercy, a World title since January 30th 2005.
*The World Title being vacated is the fourth time in the six years of its inception that it has been vacant/stripped.
*It is also the third time in as many years that this has happened.
*The TNA World Title triple threat at Sacrifice was the second year in a row that a triple threat match has headlined Sacrifice.
*It isn't the only triple threat to happen between the 5th and the 11th of May, as in 2000 at WWF Insurrextion The Rock defeated Shane McMahon and Triple H in a triple threat match for the WWF Title.
*Between the 5th May 2007 and 11th May 2007, there was only one title change in WWE and TNA, when Edge cashed in his money in the bank to defeat the Undertaker for the World Heavyweight Championship.

Comments:

None this week, but with a good response this week I'll reply to any others.

A Week in Preview:

Raw:
On the red side of WWE, the main story of the week has been William Regal's ascension to madness and turning out the lights. Once again, Regal turned off the lights amidst a match I was very hyped to see (CM Punk vs. Orton = a dream match for me). However, it didn't leave a sour taste in my mouth like Orton/HHH did the week before. But it's a really genius way of gaining heel heat, as long as they don't turn away viewers. It'll be interesting to see how this develops even more, as Randy Orton and Regal seem to be on their way to making a team where Regal helps Orton win, and Orton gets Regal all the power. Look for more Kennedy/HHH teaming up, trying to get ahead of Regal.

On the subject of Regal, he and Kennedy had another nice interaction on Monday last week. It seems like WWE are really determined to have Kennedy as a face, which is good news in my opinion. He's taking the Stone Cold route, by starting as a heel but gradually turning face. While I don't expect him to make a fully-fledged turn, it's a good way of building face heat for Kennedy, as Regal is one of the more over heels at this time. This week, I expect the feud to get a bit more violent, probably with Regal beating down Kennedy, and thus leading to a match between the two at Judgment Day. I don't understand the logic in Kennedy losing already, even if it was in a 14 on 2 tag match.

The other main feuds from Raw are the JBL vs. John Cena and Y2J vs. HBK. Personally, I love the JBL feud with Cena, despite it only being five-minute segments; I think they could do some wonderful stuff on the mic with it. I hope they continue with JBL abusing him, while Cena doesn't turn up – and then he'll get a huge reaction at Judgment Day, when they inevitably do fight. Look for more hard words from JBL this week, in what should be another step to a great build to a potentially great feud, while Cena should come back to a huge ovation. This is the right way to rebuilding Cena as a legitimate face again – putting him against people who can get heel heat no matter what.

The Y2J vs. HBK feud is intriguing also. Personally, I like the direction WWE have taken with all three of HBK's feuds this year, with Batista, Flair and Jericho. They've all been face vs. face, but they've been entertaining as hell, and they act like they genuinely hate one another, and it all seems more realistic. It makes the characters more three dimensional, which I feel is important for WWE. I am not expecting either person to turn this week on Raw, but with two great mic skills such as these two, I think it may take the same route that JBL/Cena is taking, with talking doing most of the build up. With just a week until Judgment Day however, it wouldn't surprise me to see one-person attack the other. This is another must watch segment of Raw this week, as it is one of the better builds due to the unpredictability of it. Lets hope for the Y2J/HBK match at Judgment Day to be even better than the Wrestlemania XIX match. It is also a possibility that Batista gets involved again, since he doesn't have any ongoing feuds right now either, so don't be surprised to see him at Judgment Day either.

Outside of these parts, it seems like WWE are determined to build up the tag division. Unfortunately, there's not a great deal of storylines going on around these ranks, and while its fine for Holly/Rhodes, Cryme Tyme, Londrick, etc to fight in three minute matches each week, nobody really cares that much about them yet. Thankfully, though, this week we got Carlito's Cabana, with Roddy Piper! If you ask me, this was the right thing to do to get the crowd into the tag titles, and while it may just be for Night of the Champions, I'm still fine with two months of tag team wrestling.

The women's title is still looking towards a Beth Phoenix vs. Mickie James match, so don't be surprised to see that penciled into the Judgment Day card, and personally it looks to be getting to a really stale now. The lumberjack match this week … wasn't good. I think you should look for Beth to kill Mickie this week somehow, leading to the match at Judgment Day. Either that or we have no title match at Judgment Day. It's all the same to WWE …

I know it looks like I've written tons more for Raw, but there was just far more angle advancement on Raw, as opposed to the "same old-same old" style of ECW and SmackDown!.

ECW:

COLIN WINS!!! COLIN WINS!!! That made my week, and I hope they follow it up nicely this week. In all honesty, it's hard to decide where he goes from here. Does he become the ultimate underdog (who needs Mysterio, amirite?) or does he go back to being the good old regular jobber that we all know and love?

So what to expect from the 101st episode of ECW on Sci-Fi? Well, Kofi Kingston will win, because he always wins in unimpressive three-minute matches. This is why I loved Morrison, he'd do the awesome fifteen minutes of fame. For a one hour broadcast, it's not that much to ask is it?

Naturally, the only big angle in ECW (and lets face it, its not that big a deal) is the CM Punk/Kane vs. Morrison/Miz. Well, I think this could be a really fun match at Judgment Day, and they just need a good bit of build up. Now what I'd do is have them handcuff Kane, while they pound CM Punk into the ground, and it seems likely that the heels will get the upper hand, as Punk and Kane won last week. On the other hand, you don't want the ECW Champion and Money in the Bank winner to look too weak, so its 50-50 booking. The problem is, if they don't want to take the titles off Morrison & Miz, then they've booked themselves into a corner for Judgment Day and we'll get a screwy finish.

SmackDown!

The lack of Undertaker last week seriously hurt the show, I feel. As the main challenger, he should have made more of a presence on the show, even just a little. The fire to the championship does nothing to make me want to buy the show. It was poorly booked, but so I think it'd be wise to see Undertaker this week. Ideally, if Undertaker is going to take the world title at Judgment Day like I expect, Edge should get the upper hand, possibly busting him wide open to make it more interested. Heck, don't be surprised to see a big gimmick match between Edge and Taker – you can't just have three single's matches, otherwise (in the words of Larry):


There was no angle advancement really on SmackDown!, which probably indicates there won't be any more this week, since they'll be concentrating on the World Title. Ideally, I'd like to see Matt Hardy get into a US Title program with someone for a match at Judgment Day, but I don't think it will happen. Last week, I felt like nothing happened, and it was a failure show – for the most part. Kozlov wins, Edge is number one contender, CM Punk loses. Really, what's changed?

TNA iMPACT:

The fallout from Sacrifice is this week. Look for Booker T to solidify himself as a heel, possibly aligning himself full time with Robert Roode (which would totally disregard four months worth of feud). Booker T's turn got very little attention at Sacrifice, so good booking would say they give it a bit more attention.

One thing to expect is Samoa Joe's next challengers for the King of the Mountain at Slammiversary, possibly a returning Kurt Angle (although I hope he sits out for a bit longer) or maybe Scott Steiner, or even Kaz. TNA will look to fill up the KotM match as soon as possible for more time to build it up, but don't be surprised also to see a mystery superstar left until the end.

LAX capturing the TNA Tag Team titles was a great move, and with a whole roster of potentially fresh feuds (such as the Murder City Machine Guns) or even older feuds such as Team 3D, or even one of the makeshift teams from Sacrifice. One thing I am disappointed in was that Awesome Kong got a great bit on TNA when she was announced as the last superstar of the egotistical eight, and they blew it at Sacrifice.

On the subject of Kong, I'm glad her and Kim have renewed their rivalry, so look for that to kick off. Roxxi will also be looking for some serious revenge, possibly initiating a big non-title feud (which is very rare for women's wrestling in the two big promotions) with her and the women who caused her this hell.

One advantage to overbooking Sacrifice is there's a lot of loose ends, so the TNA iMPACT events should be really fun to watch. Should be.

Overall:

With just a week to go until Judgment Day, look for several go home shows to push the PPV hard, which is always good for promos. As well as this, there's all the fallout from Sacrifice, which should entertain people also. The only problem with this is that you shouldn't expect too much wrestling this week, but it should be a fun week on all parts.

Judgment Day Predictions

Triple H over Randy Orton to retain the WWE Title
Undertaker over Edge to win the World Heavyweight Championship
HBK over Jericho
John Cena over JBL
Kane & CM Punk over Morrison & Miz to win the WWE Tag Team Titles

The One to Watch This Week:



Mr. Kennedy got an awesome pop on Monday for interrupting William Regal, and following a defeat last week, look for Kennedy to regain his momentum this week and head to the top of Raw, improving on his already impressive return. If Kennedy can get more great ovations like he did last week, then he could be big. Really big.

Competition Time
Just for shits and giggles:

1. Name all the people who have held both the ECW World Title (both original and modern day version) and the WWE Title (all versions) at various stages in their career. [Hint: There's four]
2. Name this match: It took place on May 16th 1999. The match was fought outside of WWE, by two former tag team champions (but not with each other). The match ended via a submission, to a chokehold. It main evented a pay-per-view and took place in the home state of the winner of the match.
3. True or False: The ECW Title, ROH World Title and TNA World Title have never changed hands in the month of May?
4. The WWF/E Intercontinental Title has been won by three "Canadian Chris'" in May. Name these three superstars [Hint: Trick Question]
5. On May 17th what did Samoa Joe officially do for the first time in ROH?

Send answers via e-mail to [e-mail] or leave a comment below along with any thoughts.

Until next time,

Stu