Wrestling’s 4R’s Friday Edition 02.20.09: Raw and ECW on Sci-Fi Reviewed!

Posted by Larry Csonka on 02.27.2009

It’s the Friday edition of the 4R’s, and I dare Chris Jericho to disrespect the IRON SHEIK! I have a feeling that Sheiky baby would HUMBLE him!

How the 4R's of wRestling Work!
Here is a quick explanation of the 4R's. The column will run TWO times a week. On Tuesdays I will discuss TNA Impact and Jeremy will discuss WWE Smackdown. Also, if there is a PPV, that will be covered in this column as well. The column will run again on Friday's, covering WWE Raw (with Jeremy Thomas) as well as ECW on Sci-Fi. If there is a PPV that weekend, I will also run the RETRO R's of the show from the year before as well as address some comments when time permits. I will group my feelings on the shows in various categories: The Right, the wRong and the Ridiculous. The Right is stuff that worked very well: a great promo, a great match and so on. PuRgatoRy is a section between the right and wrong. It shows equal traits from both sides that cannot be ignored and need discussed. It is not a bad place per say, as things can get remedied or go the wrong way the very next week. The wRong is what it sounds like: bad matches, bad or boring promos and so on. The Ridiculous is stuff that had no right on TV: Stupid angles, Diva searches and so on. And there is always a possibility of a 5th R, which is as bad as they come, unless you are TNA. They have a special R all of their own, the 6th R; the Russo-FN-Riffic~! This column is supposed to be analytical, and at the right time very critical of the shows, it was the whole reason it was created. This is not a "mark" column, nor a "smark" column, my goal is to analyze the show from many different fronts, reward the good and call out the bad. I will not apologize for my opinions, they are as they are, whether positive or negative.

---

By: Jeremy Thomas

Raw 02.21.09

The Right:

VICKIE GETS A PROMOTION AND CENA GETS A MATCH: After another of those recap videos the ‘E Production Staff does so well, we went to the ring where Vickie the Chipmunk was standing. She did her little "Excuse me!" bit a few times to get the crowd riled up, then told us that due to Shane-O getting punted and Steph getting RKO'd she had been named the interim General Manager for Raw. So, I guess "Fuck the Brand Extension" isn't just a fact, it's now a mission statement. She didn't get to speak for too long before Cena's music hit and he made his way down to the ring. Cena got off some great lines in expressing his disbelief that Vick had been chosen by the Board of Directors. The Adamle reference and "Vintage Michael Cole" were just incredible, and Cena delivered them quite well; the look on Cole's face was absolutely priceless to boot. The gist of Cena's promo was pointing out that Vick only really cared about Edge and that he wanted to cash in his rematch clause. This brought Edge and Show to the ring, with Show having a great reaction by trying to wave Edge's smoke away from his face. The work here from Edge was well-done, with both of them approaching but never quite crossing the "worked shoot" line with Edge's comment about Cena trying to be the new Bruno, Hulk or Stone Cold and it resonated well with the fans. Cena on the other hand was trying to be the Rock or face Jericho a little too hard, particularly with the "barbaric, disgusting 400 pound beast…and of course you brought the Big Show out too" line, which was almost a direct rip-off of Jericho's dig at Stephanie McMahon and Rhyno in August of 2001. Cena pulled it off rather well to be fair, it just seemed to be a bit unoriginal from him to go with it. It ended with Vickie saying that Cena would either face her family or her friend, and I think we all knew where it was going at this point. Even my wife knew where it was going and called it right as Vickie said it, and she's about as casual a fan as it gets. The segment carried itself off well though, and while it wasn't the best opening promo they've done in a while it was pulled off pretty nicely and got the crowd hot.

CM PUNK vs. JOHN MORRISON vs. THE MIZ: This was a Triple Threat match to qualify for Money in the Bank at WrestleMania; as a nice touch, they had the briefcase suspended above the ring, which provided the competitors an opportunity to stare longingly at it as they came down to the ring. You know though, it becomes very obvious who the ‘E is really behind in MnM 2.0 when they enter separately; Morrison gets to keep the greatest entrance in professional wrestling today while Miz gets his super-generic rock music that seems better fitted to a curtain-jerker. The match started out as expected with Miz and Morrison double-teaming the Intercontinental Champion and doing a damn fine job at it, though I was legitimately concerned that Morrison had hurt himself before the commercial break the way he hit the ring apron and flopped on the ground with that clothesline out of the ring to Punk. They were clearly doing their best to put Punk over in the match by having him fight against both of the Tag champions and did a pretty good job of doing it without burying Miz and Morrison. The springboard kick by Morrison to Punk on Miz's shoulders was nicely executed before the two partners started to battle each other, which allowed Punk to get the G2S on Morrison to win the match. This was given a decent amount of time and the three men didn't disappoint, delivering a damn good match.

JBL vs. SHAWN MICHAELS: This was the match in order to determine who from Raw would get a chance to challenge the Undertaker's undefeated streak at WrestleMania; as we learned during Shawn's entrance, the winner here would move on to challenge the "undefeated" Kozlov on Raw to earn said match. This was a perfectly acceptable TV match between the two, with Bradshaw working fairly stiffly and not dragging the match down too badly while Shawn bumped gamely and delivered on his end with the offense. The match was a little slow early on but picked up a bit after the commercial break and built to a decent ending. JBL actually had a little psychology to the match, focusing on Shawn's well-known weak back and working it over which allowed Shawn to fight back and hit his trademark moves to move onto next week's Raw. Shawn's pulled better matches out of JBL before but there was nothing wrong with this one and it did its job nicely. Of course, we got the post-match stare down between Vlad and Shawn which lead into Kozlov hitting his finisher to stand tall, which leads into next week's match nicely.

JERICHO GOES AFTER ANOTHER LEGEND: Piggy-backing off of the announcement of Ricky Steamboat's well-deserved induction into the Hall of Fame, Vintage Cole was on-stage to interview the Dragon. It was nice to see the Nashville crowd give Ricky some love as he came out. As a side note…it may just have been me, but did Ricky look a LOT like Eric Bischoff? Steamboat gave a brief thanks to the crowd and called the impending event the greatest moment of his life before Our Savior's music hit and Jericho came out to the stage. He brought up Rourke's failure to win the Academy Award and called him a washed up has-been and a loser just like Flair, Piper and Steamboat. Jericho did his usual great job and once again brought up some great points, pointing out the same criticisms that people have been leveling at the ‘F/'E for years about the way Steamboat was handled with the whole stereotype-feeding and silly fire-spitting, Komodo dragon-accompanying entrances. I was actually surprised that the ‘E let Jericho go with the line about Steamboat getting his Hall of Fame moment due to being a loyal company man, even if we all know Ricky deserves his spot there; I get the feeling that almost any other guy wouldn't have been able to get away with that line, but the ‘E knows that Jericho is working so well as a heel that he can probably write his own ticket with his speeches. Steamboat then did a surprisingly good job in turning the tables on Jericho and threw the hypocrite label back in his face. I know it's not exactly going against the grain to call Jericho's promo work amazing each week, but the truth is the truth, and it's shown every time he manages to get the crowd just rabid against him like he did once again this week. Hats off to both men for doing some incredible work.

puRgatoRy:

H-MAN & TWO SLEDGIES > ORTON, PRICELESS & ONE SLEDGEHAMMER?: You know, this started off so well. I was a little bit frustrated to see Orton feeling like he needed Legacy and a sledgehammer to keep ‘H McMahon (hey, he is being called "the last McMahon standing" by them now) at bay, but considering the "high emotion, running on fury" thing the Game was sure to be coming in with, I was able to deal with this. Orton cut a nice little promo, pointing out that ‘H really was a McMahon—arrogant, out of touch, and stupid. Randy pointed out how he felt justified by his actions because Vince, Shane-O and Steph wouldn't stay out of his way. It was a pretty fundamental heel promo done quite well, providing justifications that at least seem perfectly reasonable to the heel, then turning it to a rip on the audience for some extra heat before going off the deep end and saying something truly vile—in this case, hoping that the Lil' McMahons were watching their mother get RKO'd so they could learn from their mom's mistakes.

Everything was going well at this moment, until the Game showed up on the teleprompter getting followed by an ignored T-Grish. ‘H coming out without music was nice as it showed us that he wasn't waiting for the big entrance and this wasn't about that; it was about hurting Orton. Unfortunately, his walk to and entrance into the ring was a carried on a bit long. Orton then made a deal to have them drop the sledgehammers so it would be a fair three-on-one—wait a minute, what? Okay, so they've acknowledged that Orton considers himself unable to handle the Game one-on-one, that's kind of dumb. That being said, I didn't at all mind the fact that he brought another sledgehammer to the ring; it at least shows that he needed SOME help to deal with all three men. What I want to know is…that was a big damn hammer. Where did he have it? Was it in the Sphincter of Holding that the guys from Highlander seem to have when they whip their katanas out of nowhere in order to fight in alleys? I suppose that makes some sense, since Hunter is treated like he's an Immortal anyway. Then again, maybe we don't want to know. The chase through the backstage area was a bit overdone, and I was irritated by DiBiase getting up from the Sledgie shot to the back of the head, but hey, at least SOMEONE besides the Game is being treated like a Superman in this feud. Ultimately, while there were some definite issues with this I was able to tolerate it due to the fact that Trips needed to use Sledgie to go after the trio, and that at least doesn't make them complete bitches.

The wRong:

MELINA & CRYME TYME vs. BETH PHEONIX, SANTINO AND DOLPH ZIGGLER: Before the match, we got a little comedy moment with Beth, Santino and Rosa running across the Dolphster, who tried to introduce himself to the ladies only to be stopped by Santino each time. Clearly, it's developing that there's a little two-timing going on between Santino and the ladies, or at least some wishful two-timing. They did the comedy here fine between Santino and Dolph, and while I really wish they would progress Dolph beyond the one-note "Hi, I'm…" gimmick so maybe he can actually become something, this worked for what it was.

After the break we went to the ring entrances; Melina wasn't looking quite as ravishing as usual somehow. It was something about her hair…too much hairspray or something, but it brought her from solar-hot down to just molten. The heels came down with Glamarella's music, denying Dolph his own entrance, which I was honestly pretty okay with. This match just didn't click at all, being too schizophrenic between the men's work and the ladies' work, particularly since Melina and Beth just didn't click tonight. Their ring work seemed choreographed to a Triple K level l and had some awkward moments to it. Shad and JTG were alright, but they don't work as well against other teams as they do against Miz and Morrison and it just seemed to pale in comparison. The ending was pure comedy, which while amusing enough added to the schizophrenic nature of the match, and the whole thing was just totally lacking.

JAMIE NOBLE vs. MIKE KNOX: This was a re-do of last week, with Noble trying to earn his shot at WrestleMania. This time he got to face off against Mountain Man Mike, saying that he knew that if he could outlast last week then he could make it to WrestleMania. Well, he beat last week's sixteen seconds by a whole nine seconds, getting flattened quickly after a brief flurry of offense. Just like last week, I question the decision to bury Noble, who could be a valid midcarder in ECW, by putting him through this. If this somehow has a payoff then I'll eat my words, but frankly, I don't see it so I just don't like this.

JOHN CENA vs. CHAVO GUERRERO: As I mentioned in the opening segment discussion, my wife—who is not a hardcore fan and watches fairly casually—actually called this the second that Vick said that Cena would be facing her friend or her family, and that's because it wasn't at all hard to figure out by the way it was worded. So we did have time to let the disappointment fade before this happened. Cena hit the ring, Vickie came out and said he wouldn't be getting a title shot, so instead we got Chavo who got squashed in forty-five seconds. The poor guy doesn't have anywhere to escape to now, with Vickie being on both shows so he can be her fall guy TWICE a week now. Obviously, this was a waste of time and a poor way for them to build the feud between Edge and Cena. They could have at least had Edge come out of the crowd after the match to attack Cena, but instead we got Cena and Vick sniping at each other. Whee.

The Ridiculous:

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

TRIPLE H SIT-DOWN INTERVIEW REDUX: You know, when I heard they were doing the ‘H interview with J.R., I was thinking (or maybe "hoping" was the more appropriate term) that this would be a second part of the interview where he came back in and started talking again. Unfortunately my hopes were in vain, as the replayed the entire interview a second time. Now as noted in the last R's, I didn't hate the segment but I felt ‘H could have done better. Playing it a second time was not only unnecessary, it was a waste of airtime. Listen, I realize that SmackDown and Raw air on different networks and people who watch one may not necessarily watch the other for a variety of reasons. But with the super-heavy cross-promotion the ‘E is currently doing between Cena/Edge, Orton/'H, Miz & Morrison in general and now Vickie as GM of both shows we have kind of acknowledged that to follow the ‘E you have to watch both shows. In fact, it may have been a great way to force fans to do so, by not airing the segment and making Raw viewers start tuning into SmackDown in order to get the complete gist of what's going on. Instead we got this two-minute interview played a second time, time that along with the intro from Cole and Lawler could have been given to one of the shorter matches or to another angle to develop. Furthermore, there was nothing in this interview that was absolutely necessary to follow the feud, which makes it even more unnecessary. It was a time-waster for the Raw creative team, and that's just lazy.

The 411

Well, the streak of great-to-really-good Raws is over, as this week's episode was a definite drop in quality. From the lack of real development in the Cena/Edge feud to the bad decisions in the handling of Trips/Orton for the show, things just didn't work as well as they have. We got a couple great promo segments, one really good match and one decent match to balance things out so that it wasn't a total wash, but they need to pick things up for the road to WrestleMania because they're missing more than they're hitting at the moment. An average, but not particularly good, two hours for us this week.

SHOW RATING: **½

Comment Time With Jeremy~!

From vintageHBK:
larry come on now, that was the worst divas match in quite some time

maria is god awful

"just get naked you strange whore!" - joe swanson

Um. Wow. That is, to date, the most random quote appended to a comment ever. However, it being from Family Guy makes it almost okay to be random. Anyway, I think you've probably not been watching a lot of Diva's matches lately, because while things have been improving, that really was Maria's best match in a while and it was definitely the best Diva's tag match in a long while. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this one.


From Shockmaster :
Jeremy, I was looking forward to that date segment all week! I understand your dread but I knew MnM2.0 would find a way to polish a turd and entertain me. The best line to me came from Morrison when he proclaimed "The colons!" just before sidestepping a pie. It wasn't just the line but the way he delivered it, like a wooden hack of an actor to deliberately underscore how Ridiculous the segment was. I also noticed that the Bella sitting next to Miz was the one having a good time, subtly reinforcing his chick magnet gimmick.

A lot of people seemed to like the Date Night segment so fair enough, I may have to review that segment again, and Miz and Morrison I'll admit now were quite good. It was just a little to silly for my tastes, I suppose, and reminded me in spirit too much of the past "Date Night" segments such as Mizark and Chyna. I should note that compared to that one it was cinematic gold, though that's not saying much at all. But hey, if it worked for some folks than more power to it.


From ZeroVX:
I agree with you whole-heartedly on the Kozlov situtation, Thomas. I really wish that they'd stop calling him "undefeated"; mostly because I want my brother to shut up and stop buying into it.

Anyway, I really hope they don't let him face Taker at Wrestlemania. I know Taker can have a good match with a broom, but still, I wouldn't enjoy it as much if it was with someone else.

Glad to know I'm not the only one who hates it, Zerovx. As for the chances at Kozlov/Taker at 'Mania, I would much rather see Shawn vs. the Dead Man myself. At the same time, I don't see them having Shawn end Kozlov's "undefeated streak" on Raw; it wouldn't have the build appropriate for what I imagine the 'E is going for, and I can see them going with the Kozlov "Streak" vs. the Taker Streak as a selling point. I guess we'll find out soon enough though. Thanks for reading!


From DaJ:
isn't it pretty obvious why the edge-jeff match was non-title? john cena has a genuine rematch clause that vickie and edge are trying to avoid him using come hell or high water. it wouldn't make sense to just go ahead and give jeff a title match out of the blue.

I figured on that as well, DaJ, but then by that thought Vickie is obviously not trying to give Cena his rematch. Why not point out that there are other worthy challengers and have Edge do a title match against Jeff and some other folks as a way of stalling Cena? It would actually give them a supposed reason to stall the rematch rather than Vickie saying "I don't want to give you a rematch" and would still add that extra bit of emotion to the matches. Generally, I'm just a fan of matches being for the title if the champion is going to win, as it adds legitimacy to the reign.

---

By: Larry Csonka

ECW 02.24.08:

The Right:

Air Bourne, Requesting Permission to Take Off… There is NEVER a good time for someone to get injured, and it was the worst possible time for young Evan Bourne to get a severe injury when he did. Bourne was in the middle of the biggest push of his career. While he was on the losing end at Cyber Sunday and on Raw before the injury, his performances were very good. Also his match against Chavo to get into the voting for Cyber Sunday was a great match. His association with Rey Mysterio has also helped his stock rise in the eyes of the fans, to make them give him a chance, while his athletic ability has been so good that they have stayed with him. He was planned to work with Rey more and tag against Kane and Henry last night on the big three-hour Raw, but due to the injury that was obviously off. "What will happen next" is the big question. With WWE, many times a guy will come back with fanfare from an injury: see Cena, John, and H, Triple. Other times they just show up and are there: see Ceros, Rhino. While they seemed high on Bourne, four months is a long time, and there was the chance he will get the Rhino treatment. But thankfully they have been running some very good video packages for his return, this has me happy. Also, Bourne has been allowed to be himself largely as a performer in the ring, and has also been allowed to do moves (shooting star press) that had been supposedly "banned" to other performers. But he is a "high flying" performer that was injured while performing a "high risk" move. WWE has been quick to control high flyers in cases like this, and there is the possibility that they could do that when Bourne returns. Personally I hope that they think long and hard about his return, see how well he was doing, hype the hell out of his return and then I hope that they don't change a thing with him. All right, let me correct that, let's have him hang out with Hayes, Arn, Dusty and some others and teach the kid to cut a promo. That they can change. But the packages have highlighted his skills, and that has me encouraged that he will return the same as he was. Get this kid in Money in the Bank, he doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of winning, but he'll put on a show, that's for damn sure.

ECW Title Match: Christian vs. Jack Swagger ©: The return of Christian had been geared towards this week's main event. Christian debuted, talked shit, beat SWAGGA one on one, and then in a tag team match. Now it was time for SWAGGA to put the title on the line. Last week I had this to say as I looked to this week's show:

"Some are questioning the win by Christian for the second week in a row, but the facts are that he HAS to win when he comes in to look strong. With the announced title win for next week, I smell SWAGGA retaining the title, either through a non-finish, or through some nefarious means. I have high hopes for next week's main event."

So that was my thought heading into this match, and I was half right. My high hopes were met with ease, but SWAGGA took the victory, clean. Simply put they had a great WRESTLING match, an easy contender for the "Free TV Match of the Year" category in my opinion. It had all the makings of the basic wrestling match. They had the feeling out process, Christian got the shine and looked great, and then the arm got hurt, and SWAGGA had a great heat segment. Christian made the comeback, there was a tremendous reversal sequence at the end and then SWAGGA used an "instant classic" from his repertoire, he used the corner to slow Christian, hurting the arm further and it led to the clean pin. In a phrase I use often and will use in this column later, it is not IF you lose, but HOW you lose. Cage lost a hard fought battle to a champion that is proving himself weekly, maybe underestimating him. SWAGGA comes off as a deserving champion, as well as a thinking man's champion, with the work of the arm and how it led to the finish. It all worked and it was great. SWAGGA continues to roll, and now I want to see how Christian answers this defeat.

puRgatoRy:

Tyson Kidd vs. Matt Boyce: Week #3 of Tyson Kidd was on display this week. It was a very quick squash, Kidd looked good once again and that was that. One thing that has been a trend of the ECW brand in the on again off again pushes of the new guys. Examples are Ortiz and Gabriel being brought to TV, getting momentum, and they disappearing for no reason. At least Ortiz has kept a presence on the shows at times, but Gabriel had disappeared until his job this week. Shit like this hurts the new guys as they are fighting for the audience to care about them. Shit, throw them on SD or Raw once and a while for a job match, just to remind us that they are still there. Kidd needs a feud ASAP, these squashes only do so much.

The wRong:

Tommy Dreamer vs. Paul Burchill: Oops, I forgot about this one. My bad. The short of it is this. Average match, too short to mean anything and while Dreamer got the win, he shouldn't have needed help. I suppose the salvation of the program is him avenging the losses of the last few weeks, but if the valiant face always needs help, is he really that valiant, and do we really care?

DJ Gabriel vs. Mark Henry: The opening match on this week's show was Mark Henry vs. DJ Gabriel. Once I saw that this was the match, I was worried, and when it was over, my fears were realized. I have said it before and I will say it again, it doesn't matter IF you lose, it matters HOW you lose. DJ Gabriel had been brought in, he an Alicia were a fun little act, they had a mini-feud with the Burchills and then disappeared, something I discussed last week. So he returns this week, and is fed to Mark Henry. Let the jokes begin. This match was nothing more than en extended squash, and extended is a kind term as the match didn't last much more than three minutes with very little comeback from Gabriel. Henry dominated, and while Gabriel got some fire, he was caught, planted and defeated. If the plan was for Gabriel to lose, then this was the "Reader's Digest" version of the right idea, but of course the execution was wrong. If the plan was to get Henry back on the winning side of things, fine, either cut the Kidd match and add the time here to make Gabriel look like a threat, or feed the jobber to Henry. Sacrificing Gabriel here wasn't a smart move, the way they did it that is.

The Ridiculous:

NONE

The 411

The show was a good one this week, highlighted by the excellent main event match. SWAGGA is coming along VERY well thus far, as working with Finlay, Hardy and now Christian is only helping him improve so fast. You can't hate a show with a main event like this. I am not sold on the Dreamer angle yet and hated how he got his win, and Gabriel was damaged this week. Kidd looks good, but they need to get him into a feud so that people will card about him. The squashes only do so much.

As a reminder, I will be going by the 411 scale. Also, PPV rankings can and will likely change through out the year:

0 - 0.9: Torture
1 - 1.9: Extremely Horrendous
2 - 2.9: Very Bad
3 - 3.9: Bad
4 - 4.9: Poor
5 - 5.9: Not So Good
6 - 6.9: Average
7 - 7.9: Good
8 - 8.9: Very Good
9 - 9.9: Amazing
10: Virtually Perfect

SHOW RATING: 7.0

---

A Note…
By the time you are reading this, I will have left my comfy South Carolina home on a trip to the beach. Tomorrow is my 32nd birthday, and Christi has hooked us up with a trip to the beach for a weekend of relaxation, golf and debauchery. Have a good weekend all, and behave.


And I'm out of here!