I DVRed Raw and watched some of it, I didn’t make it to the Main Event though. I may watch the rest later, but of course in this age where you can just read about the results there’s not much point.
I just thought it was kinda boring, I thought Bray cut a good promo, Ziggler and Rollins were a very average match, not much else of note. I fast forwarded through a lot of the Slammy presentations.
In the run up to Survivor Series Raw had actually turned in some good shows, it isn’t back to being absolute garbage like it was prior to that, but the last few Raws have just felt pointless/boring. Not gratingly terrible, just not terribly interesting.
The Slammies used to be a separate show, formatted like the Grammy awards. The nominees sat in the audience, winners came up to make speeches, and they had corny sketches and song & dance numbers in between. It didn’t have kayfabe social media voting either. I guess they decided to incorporate it into RAW because it was becoming more of a pageant anyway.
I assume that any of the online voting they do is rigged, right? I mean I assume they had already determined who was going to win these awards, sorta like when they let WWE App Users vote on match matchups I always assumed that was rigged as well.
I’m pretty sure the votes they run are fair - of course, they are usually set up with a particular result in mind (“What kind of match do you want - Blindfold, Chair on a Pole, or Tables Ladders & Chairs?..The runaway winner is TLC!”).
The original Slammys only had five categories, and of those, only two were fan voted (either by phone or by postcards - and again, it was fairly obvious who would win; Roddy Piper for Best Appearance in the “Land of 1000 Dances” video, and Junkyard Dog for Best Song on the WWF Wrestling Album), and the other two were selected by the “Academy of WWF Arts and Sciences” (i.e. the writers).
They’re as legit as the tweets you see rolling across the bottom of the screen during the matches.
These are performers who know how to improvise. The showrunner might tell the participants ahead of time “OK, be prepared to do either a ladder match, a street fight, or a mudbath match” and they take it from there.
Gotta say last year’s Slammys were vastly better than this year’s. My assessment may or may not have something to do with the fact that last year I was in the second row, it was for all intents and purposes a hometown show for Daniel Bryan, and the final segment ended with him kneeing Shawn Michaels in the face.
I’m thinking there’s a teeny tiny possibility that Rollins will be victorious over Cena. Why? Because there’s that lingering story element that Cena can reinstate the Authority, and he would be more conducive to doing so if he loses his #1 contendership status. Seth’s security midgets will interfere of course, and they’ll be SuperCena’ed into oblivion. Orton could also make a surprise return to prevent Seth from being victorious. I’m 99% sure Cena’s going to win, but at least this way I predicted an angle before it happened, in case it happens.
Dean Ambrose vs Bray Wyatt: I’m going with Wyatt, just because I want my fucking storyline to happen where Bray springs Dean’s pop from jail and takes him under his wing. The smart money’s on Dean, but I’m going with the upset this time.
Big Show vs Erick Rowan: BS trips and falls on the steps or something.
Zig vs Harper: Since Zig lost to Seth the other night, the Survivor Series Savior gets his belt back.
Rusev vs Swagger: Rusev platchka. Rusev winnah.
Ryback vs Kane: Kane win? Are you kidding? Only over Ziggler, just like everybody else.
The Miz and Damien Mizdow vs. The Usos: They’ll probably have Cameron turn on Jimmy and make the Lusos Ooze.
I think I agree with all those predictions. I actually think some of the matches may come in good just because the wrestlers are going to fell pressure with all the “toys” to turn in a performance. Well, some of them (I doubt guys like Big Show give a shit), anyway.
But this whole PPV has felt counterfeit, like we’ve had a bunch of hackneyed segments featuring weapons for the past few weeks in preludes to these weapon gimmick matches for no real storyline reason at all. The only guys who have any legit beef are Bray/Abrose and Cena/Rollins. The rest of these are all manufactured. Swagger/Rusev is not a rematch we needed, that’s a feud already set sail, and Rusev should be doing something more meaningful than wrestling a guy who has an 85% chance of injuring him anytime he steps in a ring with him.
I continue to enjoy Harper and Rowan getting singles pushes as I like both guys, I’ll be surprised if WWE can keep them going, though.
Dunno, but naming him Adolph Hittler is just fine.
Was pointed out elsewhere (probably Cageside, that being one of my main wrasslin’ hangouts) that while they probably don’t exactly toss the votes into an electronic wastebasket, there are probably other ways that they can and do rig the votes. Roman Reigns, Superstar of the Year? FFS. I’m starting to develop a theory that someone is deliberately sabotaging the guy with this down-our-throats push.
Random observation: This really bugs me fsr. Partially because I know just enough Russian to know Lana doesn’t say anything even vaguely resembling “drazir” and partially because I’m fond of Rusev, secret babyface. Not asking you to stop, just finally had to say something, because gah.
Anyway, the actual reason I popped in was to express my excitement for the upcoming NXT show, Takeover 3: R-Federalism, and to mention that, since I’m still not watching main roster weekly shows, I saw the following spoiler for this week’s Smackdown:
[spoiler]They ran an Ascension video package.
Not that it was ever really in doubt, but this pretty much guarantees that Hideo and Finn will be tearing them a new one tomorrow. [/spoiler]
"As far as the decision of who went over, those decisions are heavily debated and made. It is what it is. At the end of the day, for me, it’s about promotion. When you look at what they have done in NXT and every place else, the amount of the people that see them there compared to the amount of people who will see them on Monday Night Raw with the whole world watching - the difference is mind-boggling. Just for them to be exposed in that vein is massive.
“A lot of people say, ‘Oh, it was her debut and all those things.’ Well, it was, in some ways. But, it’s not like she’s going to be on there again next week. By the time she’s is back on Raw and ready to be competing on Raw on a regular basis, you’re going to see a different Charlotte and see it presented in a different way. It was really just exposure. As far as the outcome goes, it can be debated. It is what it is… You know, you can go back and pick apart bits and pieces of it, but when you overall look at it in the bigger plan, six months from now, a year from now, two years from now, whenever it is, no one is going to go, ‘Well, they killed her on her debut.’ The bigger picture is involved.”
-Triple H on Charlotte losing her RAW debut to Natalia in about two and a half minutes.
I notice he says, twice, that it was debated and “it is what it is”. Pretty much tells you he lost that one to Vince.
This ep was about 6 minutes short. WWE would never let a show sign off early like that. They’d repeat the opening sketch 15 times to fill out the entire time block if they had to. Maybe it was because they didn’t take any commercial breaks during the ladder match…
which was SICK! The audience shouted HOLY SHIT! many a time. I still can’t get over the way Ryck gorilla-slammed Puma onto the ladder horizontally braced on the ring’s edge. Puma landed squarely on it with his tailbone and bent it into a wide V-shape. That had to hurt. There was no way he could break the fall or roll with the landing. It helps that Puma’s got abs you could tenderize meat with, but that’s the type of hurt that comes back to haunt you in later years. It doesn’t equal Mick Foley’s HIAC fall, but it comes close!
Chavo’s match with Fenix seemed a little off. Chavo used Four Horsemen-style offense to work on Fenix’s leg, which took away a lot of the high-flying element. Then, Fenix kicked Chavo in the leg a few times and Chavo acted like he was almost crippled. There were also a couple of occasions where Chavo used the heel tactic of concealing his chokes and stomps from the referee with his back, but it was right in front of Sexy Star who could have done something or at least scream to the referee. It could have been a case of lucha style and American style not meshing.
Speaking of non-lucha style, they showed a vignette of Kage, who looks like a modern day Ivan Putski. Short and packed with so much muscle, he doesn’t seem capable of touching his fingertips together. Smapti, can you provide us any info on his background?
Looks like they will be continuing the King Cuerno/Drago feud for a while. Both are silent mythical beast characters, and not the typical heel/face dynamic. Interesting deviation from the usual method of establishing storyline rivalries.
According to the stories that are going around on the wrestling news websites this morning, that’s pretty much what happened. It was originally scheduled to be a tag match where Charlotte would get the win for her team, but due to time constraints (because after 21 years of doing this every week WWE still hasn’t figured out how to handle basic time management, apparently) they changed it to a singles match. Triple H wanted Charlotte to win, and Natalya apparently insisted that she be allowed to do the job, but Vince insisted Natalya win.
If true, it fits with the rumors we’ve been hearing for months about there being creative discontent between Trips and Vince. Vince still has an old-school mindset and probably sees the NXT guys/gals just as fit to be used as enhancement talent until they’re ready to go full-time on the main roster, while Trips would obviously prefer to put the spotlight on them and build them as the next generation of champions.
Cage is, in fact, his real name - the man in the promo is Brian Cage, who wrestled briefly in NXT (then FCW) in 2008-2009, but is mostly known as a mainstay in Pro Wrestling Guerilla, one of the bigger southern CA indie leagues. I can’t say I’ve ever seen him wrestle, but I look forward to seeing him. LU continues to excel with their promos this week - forget Drago being a legit dragon, Pentagon Jr. is apparently a chi master who can kill a man with a Kimura lock.
You didn’t ask, but this week’s new debut, Super Fly, is a young guy best known in Mexico for four-on-four matches as part of a stable made up of all high-flyers. We probably won’t be seeing much more of him, though - at AAA’s Guerra de Titanes (Clash of the Titans, if you will) PPV this past Sunday, he lost a mask-versus-mask match and was forced to unmask. For the uninitiated out there, once a luchador has been unmasked, he is generally prohibited from ever wrestling masked again, and this rule is actually taken quite seriously by the government body that regulates wrestling in Mexico. Rey Mysterio Jr. is a notable exception, and actually got a special dispensation from said body before remasking upon his WWE debut on the grounds that WCW had forced him to unmask without his consent. (The same PPV I mentioned above also saw Alberto Del Rio win the AAA world championship and Pentagon Jr. become one half of the tag team champions in a match that also included the team of Fenix and Sin Cara I.)
As to the ladder match - that may be the best ladder match I’ve ever seen, aided in no small degree by the fact that it ran for nearly half an hour with no commercial interruptions. The spots with Puma going through the ladder, and with Puma RKOing Johnny off the top of the ladder, were both simply amazing. Big Ryck really came out of this match looking strong - WWE has the habit of booking stables like this with the leader being a chickenshit who always runs away and relies on his goons to do the job for him (think of Seth Rollins and Noble/Mercury, for example), but Ryck here comes off looking dominant, like he actually could win the match on his own - he just doesn’t feel like it. Johnny winning via kick-to-the-balls was hilarious, as was the spot where Cisco found himself on top of the ladder and unable to reach the briefcase. The post-match segment with Dario Cueto definitely looks like it’s setting up something down the road - I don’t think they’ve established exactly what that key unlocks, but whatever it is, it’s going to be good. I don’t know anything about the “fan” in the Pentagon mask who tried to interfere, but I’m sure that plot thread will also be addressed in the weeks to come.
Gotta give props again to the announce team. I’m loving Striker as the historian who can rattle off factoids about the history of ladder matches and obscure Eastern Championship Wrestling feuds. Vampiro is probably the weaker link of the two - I love his color commentary, but I don’t think he’s very accustomed to doing commentary in English yet, and his faux-Chicano accent keeps slipping at times (he was born and raised in Thunder Bay, Ontario, and began his wrestling career in Montreal, and you can definitely hear it if you pay attention.)
Lastly, highlighting the fact that Danny Trejo was in attendance was a very nice touch - I almost expected him to get up partway through the main event and intervene personally, because he’s just the kind of guy you’d expect to do something like that.
I think both sides of that coin actually have merit. From the perspective of fans, we’re told NXT are the “Next Superstars”, if NXT wrestlers are beating main roster wrestlers, it begs the question “why not put them on the main roster?” I actually think WWE may be putting people into NXT for too long. Wrestling is a craft to a degree, but it’s also a measure of an intangible “it.” In the old days when guys got hired from an indy, maybe worked a few dark matches then made a TV debut they had a few weeks or months to get traction and if not they were out. I’d argue while a developmental approach like NXT is prudent, at a certain point these guys/gals shouldn’t be coddled excessively. Give them runs on the main roster quicker, and if they don’t work out, send them on their way.
Takeover 3: Take Over With A Vengeance has just wrapped up, and I have to say, this was a great show. The main event stole the show, but the Charlotte/Sasha match and the tag matches were great as well. Finn Balor’s body paint is amazing, and his entrance wasn’t just main-roster quality, it wasn’t just PPV-quality, it was WrestleMania-quality. Zayn’s big win and post-match celebration with the entire roster (and Pat Patterson, for some reason) and reconciliation with Neville was a great end to a great feud, and I look forward to seeing what’s in store for Zayn next. The easy booking says it’ll be Zayn vs. Kidd at Takeover 4: Live Free Or Take Over, but it’s anyone’s guess at this point. I’m rather surprised that Charlotte and the Lucha Dragons both retained - who else is there to challenge either of them at this point? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
The only low point was the Roman Reigns promo, which showed that he obviously hasn’t learned much from those acting classes he’s been allegedly taking, and proving the extent to which WWE intends to shove him down the viewers’ throats no matter how green he is or how little he has to do with what’s going on. He’s running the risk of getting Batista’d if he comes back and wins the Royal Rumble acting like he did tonight.
PS: SUDDEN KEVIN OWENS HEEL TURN. Zayn/Owens at Takeover 4: A New Hope?
