The Steel Cage

WWE hasn’t tipped its hand much regarding what’s on tap for the go-home edition of Raw before WrestleMania this coming Sunday.

John Cena will kick off the show, no doubt hyping the three-way main event at Mania.

The only match that has been leaked is a Money in the Bank preview pitting Carlito and MVP vs.Chris Jericho and C.M. Punk. I could see Mr. Kennedy involving himself in the match to cause the finish.

And with Raw emanating from Flair Country, in Columbia, SC, the Nature Boy is expected to give what may be the last great interview of his career. If it is really intended as such, WWE writers are best served putting their pencils away and letting Flair go at it alone.

I’ve been watching a lot of Flair’s interviews from over the last 20 years for another project I’m working on, and it’s worth noting that, even when WCW was at its absolute worst, Flair was still delivering money promos whenever given the opportunity. Does anybody remember the short-lived “Magnificent Seven” faction led by Flair in the waning months of WCW? I didn’t either. But go on youtube, and you’ll get a kick out of seeing Flair do his thing, even as many of his colleagues were phoning it in.

That’s what’s been missing from Flair’s current retirement angle. Whenever he’s been given the chance to speak, it hasn’t really been Flair behind the microphone. WWE writers feel the need to script every word of every wrestlers’ promo - effectively robbing all of them of their individual voices. It may be that Flair isn’t the talker that he used to be, but I’d rather see 50 percent of an authentic Flair promo, rather than a 100 percent manufactured one.

But I digress.

With only days to go before the biggest show of the year, fans should be expecting a lot out of tonight’s Raw. I think there’s a popular sentiment right now that WWE has done only an adequate at best - and lackluster at worst - job of building anticipation for the WrestleMania card.

With Smackdown and ECW not given nearly as much importance that WWE’s flagship show, tonight is the last real opportunity to do something to get fans buzzing about the big show on Sunday. Let’s cross our fingers.