Read on for my segment-by-segment thoughts on Raw.
The opening segment was crazy awesome. It started off kind of slow, but once it picked up it was pretty awesome. The crowd was all over it, too. Good stuff from everybody. This angle needs to continue past MITB.
And Sheamus gets another win. Not much to say about that one.
There better be more from Del Rio tonight. There's not much of an issue between him and Sheamus.
I'm worried that Santino chasing the Raw GM will end in something stupid. But maybe it reveals who the next GM is?
The tag match was fine for rebuilding Tensai as a credible challenger. I was hoping they'd be elevating Kidd with his MITB spot, but it looks like he's forever an undercarder.
WWE has a talented roster busting their asses for TV time, and they're giving us two commentators fighting AGAIN? I'm kind of disappointed. I guess they're pushing WWE.com ahead of the interactive elements on 3-hour Raws.
McIntyre's way too good to be losing to Clay in less than a minute. Drew came in as someone who was going to be pushed as a serious deal and now he's fodder for a comedy act.
So-so backstage segment.
Usual intense Cena promo. It's just the same song and dance it always is.
The Raw MITB tag match was fine, though they didn't do a good job at all of explaining Cena and Kane getting along.
The post-match ladder shenanigans was fine, too. It's just that we've seen so much from Cena, Jericho, Kane, and Show over the years that it feels a little ho-hum.
Fine backstage segment with Eve and Punk.
The crowd was appropriately dead for Santino and Khali.
Sin Cara's matches are just excuses for him to do some flashy moves that have to be set up by his opponent. While what he does is impressive, it doesn't really look like a match.
Backlund vs. Slater was something, alright. Backlund is still in good shape.
I can't believe that 75% of the audience wanted this. I wish I could have fast-fowarded through that.
Waste of a segment with the anonymous GM stuff.
Good little tag match to set the stage for Sunday.
I liked the post-match. Good intrigue built for the PPV. Everyone played their part well.
I'll be back for Superstars and Impact on Thursday. A news post will be up later tonight.
With all of the speculation surrounding the anonymous GM and who she/he was, I was very disappointed to see it being Hornswoggle. I expected someone from outside of the box, so I was very disappointed. Those months with the anonymous GM and that segment here on Raw with Hornswoggle was horrible and devalues the whole anonymous GM acculmination. Odd to me how someone who couldn't speak can come up with creative dialogue through email.
ReplyDeleteI understand how Sheamus has a lot going for him (size, personality, good in-ring talent) and minus his pigmentation and a few minor details, I understand his push. However, he literally wins like 19 out of every 20 matches he's in. Most of the time he faces a guy like Swagger or Ziggler, it just seems like a waste of time to me, because he's reveared so heavily in the minds of the WWE. How do you feel about him in general and how obvious some of these match outcomes will be/are?
On the other side of the coin, there's Miz. Is there a reason the typical viewer may not know as to why he's been buried so heavily? He was WWE Champion and would be booked to win against guys like Cena and Orton, yet now isn't even on television and lost a U.S. Title (mid-card title) to Santino a little while back. I'm not the biggest Miz fan, but that is one heck of a downfall there.
They probably weren't originally planning for it to be Hornswoggle. WWE has a history of deciding to do ludicrous things, so I pretty much just shrug it off at this point. Though it is possible that someone can type well but not speak, I doubt they were thinking of it like that. I think they just do some things to amuse themselves at times (pretty much anything to do with JR or Michael Cole for instance).
ReplyDeleteI think Sheamus has what it takes to be a top guy. I don't necessarily see him as someone of Cena's star-caliber, but he's only been around a few years. They have him beat people who are lower on the card than him to make him look like a credible champion (it's like a team going 13-3 on the way to the Super Bowl). Matches to me are about the journey, not the destination. As long as the story of the match itself is good, it doesn't matter to me who wins (usually).
At a time when they need some fresh blood at the top of the card, I'm glad they're pushing someone. Given how many people they've derailed (Swagger, Ziggler, Barrett, Miz), it's good to see they're still able to get consistently behind someone. It can take years for someone to become a top superstar like Cena, who can still be considered a main eventer when he's not in the title picture.
All that said, it's definitely good when bad guys have some kind of edge over the good guys and it's not just "top face can beat ANYONE". That's what made Cena/Brock, Punk/Jericho, and the Nexus angle so good. The good guys were actually in peril for once.
Right now Miz is filming a (WWE) movie, but before then there was concern that he wasn't performing on the level that he was performing at when he was a top guy. Even when that's the case, it's really been excessive. There's also the fact that he's been dating Maryse, who said it was WWE's loss that they fired her. I know that's a really petty reason to bury someone, but the WWE machine will pretty much keep making money in spite of who they bury. It all goes back to the "Vince is a millionaire who should be a billionaire" thing.
That is an accurate assessment in saying the WWE has the tendency to be a bit ill-fated. It seems like at times they don't really think long-term with their decisions. The Hornswoggle GM thing to me was just so stupid, because the anonymous GM was 1) Thought to be a heel character and not a panderous and playful mascot, 2) Took up such a big part of 2011 and 3) Definitely took up a lot of our thought process and was a let-down once it was revealed it was Hornswoggle.
ReplyDeleteI agree Sheamus has the tools to be a sustainable top guy. I guess my "beef" is that he has been built as basically indestructable. To me, if you have a win percentage of like .900 like he does (something of that nature), you'd have to be HEAVILY reveared. I mean, guys like Cena even lose once every four matches or so, and even in non-matches, when was the last time you saw Sheamus get taken out or dominated? I like him and think he has a lot to offer, but SO MANY matches with him have been so axiomatically obvious that I just turn the dial.
I just wish (and we talked about this before, but) it wasn't the same five guys or so being sustainable. I mean, it's all been a bit of a tease to bring Ziggler or Swagger to main event status, because 1) They won't stay there and 2) We'll know they will never be "champion" material and will always be one step away. You get what I mean there?
I have always been a little off and on when it comes to Miz. I think he gets a little stale at times, but he has always been a good promo and has that "hateable" factor that a Ziggler, for example, lacks. It indeed would be a bit unjustified to make him take SO MANY steps back like he has if it is indeed the Maryse guilt-by-association fallacy taking place. I agree he hasn't been "on" with his promos like when he was champion, but he took SUCH a large fall that he he's been booked to fall to mid-card guys. How do you feel about Miz? I know you've always liked his intangibles for the most part. How do you think he'll be booked in the next year (mid card vs upper card)?
I was of the mindset that they didn't need to reveal who the GM was in the first place. If that were the case, they could have the character do anything they wanted because it wouldn't contradict any other character. The anonymous Raw GM, to me, was just a way to put matches together.
ReplyDeleteI think they could be looking at Sheamus as someone who's champion and a main event guy now but they want to make sure he's a top guy for the future so they're keeping him strong. It took a long time for Cena and Orton to be where they are now, where a loss doesn't hurt them (Kane and Big Show are here, too). It's kind of hard to have that and good stories where the good guy's in some kind of danger.
I'm tired of some of the top guys, too, but it's usually someone like Show or Taker who's been around so long that they have almost nothing else they can do to be fresh again. Kane has reversed this feeling by returning to his masked character. Show's changed a bit, but is still a big, lumbering giant. Back "in the day" main eventers were kept as big deals you only saw so often. That's one reason Lesnar feels so fresh- we haven't seen him do the same thing every week for 10 years.
Sometimes people surprise us and get the big push like has happened in the past with MITB. I definitely thought Edge, Bryan and to some degree Punk would end up back as guys who weren't quite champion-caliber after their initial cash-ins. It's tough to tell who will stick around (and it's not all Creative's fault when they don't succeed).
When Miz first came around, I thought he was terrible. Like "I didn't want him on TV" bad. But slowly he's earned his keep both backstage (a lot of what he said in that promo to MVP a few years ago was legit) and on-screen by becoming a better wrestler and being able to work the crowd better. He's grown from a "punk kid" to someone comfortable controlling the crowd with the mic.
That said, I think he'll stay in the midcard with Swagger, Kofi and maybe Rhodes and Ziggler. I'd like to think that he won't just be there to eat RKOs and lose to people like Brodus and Ryback since he's filming a movie for WWE, but they can be petty.
I agree that Ziggler isn't someone fans have a reason to hate (other than being with Vickie), though he works really hard in the ring and can cut good promos sometimes (when he doesn't just yell like he's done in the past).