So earlier this week I was very critical of Monday Night Raw from last week when Sgt. Slaughter guest hosted. I told them in no uncertain terms that the biggest party of the summer SummerSlam (I thought was Summerfest?) was just around the corner and business definitely had to pick up. Unfortunately I'm just one guy and they don't give a rat's ass what I think but oh well, this is my blog and I will write what I damn well want to. I got even more to say about this week's RAW than last week's RAW. When watching it I actually took notes. I never do that but this time I wanted to be sure I didn't forget anything. Strap in, this could take a little while.
First and foremost my apologies to one Freddie Prinze Jr. I was not excited when I heard he was hosting, in fact I groaned out loud. This is not a reflection on him as an actor but I just did not think he had the charisma to be able to entertain a live crowd. Secondly he's a WWE employee so I kind of felt cheated in this selection. However he was charismatic, in the segment with Santino he was funny, and I was quite impressed with the neckbreaker he took from Randy Orton. I was kind of worried when they took him out of the show so quickly that he might try to come back the next week as a host to try and do all the things he wanted to do but I like the way he came back at the end and did to Orton what Orton did to Jeremy Piven, what with making the lumberjack match and all. I actually think Prinze's performance was one of the highlights of the show and I will admit when I am wrong. And I was wrong to be critical before I saw how he did. So for that to all of you, and to Freddie (I doubt he'll ever see this though), I am sorry.
Okay so the main event on last week's Superstars was a mixed tag between Mickie James and Kofi Kingston against Carlito and Rosa Mendes. I wasn't surprised at the pairings but I was actually surprised that Kofi got pinned by Carlito. So this Monday Night there was a United States Championship match between Carlito and Kofi. Kofi retained his title but this was the first title match in some time that I was 100% convinced the title would change hands. Carlito is red hot right now. Nice lengthy run first as a WWE Tag Team Champion and then further as the Unified Tag Team Champion, a couple of awesome of matches with Primo, an awesome showing in the 6-Pack Challenge at the Night of Champions and now a win over Kofi Kingston in a tag match. Why wouldn't I think Carlito would win this match? Because Kofi is also red-hot right now. This was a very solid match and has the potential to be quite the feud, I hope when next month roles around we are treated to a longer pay per view match between these two for the title. It feels like we've not done as much with the United States Title on RAW as we could, so maybe it's time we change that.
So let's talk about Rosa Mendes for a moment.
So she was the random tag team partner for Carlito last Thursday. And because of that she's his on-screen girlfriend now? Is that all it takes in wrestling? One match and we're together? Is that how you show someone you like them? This had absolutely no back story and it feels more than anything like a weak (and frankly unnecessary) way to split the friendship up of her and Beth Phoenix. Also is this a Mexican thing? Is WWE playing scratch and sniff with it's employees? These two match like that so put them together? What the hell man? Matching divas up with superstars is nothing new in wrestling but at least we're usually given a courtesy reason.
He's THE MIZ and he's ...
I can't bring myself to say it. Probably because I don't believe it. I don't care how successful he becomes he will always be that loser reality show guy that was on Smackdown cowering from The Undertaker and Chris Benoit. Rightfully so I would have cowered too but that's not the point. So he takes on Evan Bourne and beats him without mercy. Bourne did not get a whole lot of offense in which is not standard in a Bourne match.
You know Legacy have a t-shirt that says "Born Better", I got one for you though "Bourne Better" as in Bourne deserves much better than he was treated this past Monday. A number of weeks ago he pinned Kofi Kingston. Unlike Carlito Bourne did not receive a title shot. And when Big Show was placed into the tag team match at Night of Champions and Primo got his spot instead of Evan Bourne, I was not happy. Bourne is main event caliber. I think they are trying to hold him down and frankly I'm upset by it. Give him a good feud, give him a nice lengthy title reign, plant this kid as a seed and watch how big he blooms. But no! Instead we're "treated" to more Miz. Maybe he could invade ECW and Abraham Washington could interview him and I could nap for about 10 minutes.
The DX reunion. Yay! What's this like the 7th or 8th time they're reunited? It's kind of like The Undertaker coming back from the dead, no matter how many times it happens it's always an event. I'm a big DX fan and was happy they were back together and that HBK was back. And I don't want to hear that he didn't even connect with Sweet Chin Music to Santino, because he was wearing cowboy boots and probably would have seriously hurt Santino. I was kind of worried for their Summerslam opponents. Because I figured that DX would come out and do their insults and make Legacy look ridiculous and then beat them silly at Summerslam (seriously it's not SummerFest?) and they'd be horribly buried, especially after all the time they've spent building Legacy up as a good team, which they are. It didn't quite happen that way.
Instead Legacy jumped them and kicked their asses. Cutting this little reunion down to about 3 minutes. This was exactly what they should have done. To show DX they are not intimidated and that they are definitely in their league. A win over DX this Sunday would be huge. I'm putting my money down on DX but would love it to no end if I was proved wrong this Sunday. These guys are bonafide superstars and it's only a matter of a couple of years before we see some serious gold on their waists. And I mean singles gold. And practically beating HHH and HBK to death with their own shoe? How Wayne's World 2 was that?
Okay so Mickie James retained her title over Gail Kim. She hit her with his impressive spin kick which knocked Gail out and then followed it up with an elbow to the jaw for the victory. Now I have a very large TV that I sit pretty much right in front of (small room) to watch all my wrestling on and I can tell you all with absolute certainty that the spin kick never connected to Gail. She didn't miss her by much but she never touched her with her foot or leg. So, what's the story? It seemed like this match ended in a big hurry for no apparent reason. Is this going to James' new thing? Knocking her opponents out? Is this going to be some new violent streak we see in her? Are we getting the old crazy Mickie back? Time will tell. What do you guys think?
Josh Mathews should never interview on RAW. Not because he's not good at it but because he's the announcer on ECW. I feel like it kind of demeans his role on ECW to see him backstage interviewing folks. We don't have a shortage of people to do this. Maybe it's a minor bitch but again this is my blog and I'll say what I want.
You want to put Mark Henry with Hornswoggle for comedy purposes? Fine. I'm ok with that. But I think he should be wearing green not red. I think it would add to the humor.
Floyd "Money" Mayweather is going to host RAW next week. Will we be treated to another Wrestlemania moment with him and The Big Show? Probably which is unfortunate since Mayweather has nothing to prove. What would be great is if we had a moment with "Money" and MVP. Because they are both, straight up, BALLIN'! That would be great. But it won't happen.
Closing thoughts.
HOLY SHIT JAMIE NOBLE WAS ON RAW! I was as surprised as all of you because I didn't know he still had a job either. Which raises the very important question.
Can Evan Karagias be far behind? Okay so it wasn't that important.
So RAW was infinitely better this week than it was last week. But I still don't feel it was the over the top, go-home, show that they needed before such an important event. Maybe I don't know all the things that they should have done but I can damn sure recognize the things that could have been better. I will watch SummerSlam this Sunday with great interest. But I definitely feel Smackdown has the matches I want to see.
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