Raw Thoughts and an Apology
I see some of you are starting to complain about the recent infrequency of posts here, and I’m hearing you loud and clear. I really do feel terrible and will double my efforts to get back to a regular schedule here. Just to give you some perspective, I’m just weeks into starting a new beat covering transportation here at Newsday, and it comes at a time when a number of major stories are breaking on the beat. So that’s been pretty hectic. I also just went back to teaching journalism at Queens College. And some of you may know about my other wrestling-related activities, which can be Pretty Wearisome and Intense. On top of all that, I’m expecting my first kid in three months, so there’s a lot of preparation going on in the homefront.
Suffice to say, something’s got to give. And, inevitably, that something will be the job that doesn’t pay me a dime and that I am discouraged from doing during my normal work hours.
Nevertheless, I’m sure none of you are interested in hearing my whining and are just interested in seeing something new up here whenever you stop by. As best as I can, I’ll try to get back to near-daily posts.
To kick things off, I’m expecting to conduct a pretty major interview in the next couple days that I’m sure will be a big hit, man.
As for last night’s Raw:
. If I never see another DX reunion, I’ll be just fine. That said, having Triple H partner up with Shawn Michaels against Chris Jericho and Lance Cade was, from a booking standpoint, the right move. Raw’s top priority last night was to Smackdown’s move to MyNetwork this Friday. And with Triple H and Jericho set to square off in a triple threat match on the show, putting them together on last night’s Raw provided an organic way to build a backstory for the match.
. A smile comes to my face as soon as Santino Marella appears on the TV screen. Fans can’t get enough of him, and WWE seems to be catching on. He’s been getting a ton of TV time as of late.
. How the mighty have fallen. It was rather apropos that C.M. Punk and Rey Mysterio would be teaming up in a mid-card six-man tag match last night on Raw. The design of Punk’s world title reign is very reminiscent of Mysterio’s – put the belt on him to shut the Internet marks up, have him survive as the champion for a few months by the skin of his teeth while only earning a few meaningful wins, take the belt off of him ASAP, and moving him back into the midcard where he belongs.
. I’d be lying if I said I haven’t been fairly entertained by Charlie Haas’ antics over the last couple weeks. His Mr. Perfect bit last week had some legitimately funny moments, and his Great Charli impersonation last night was dead on. The problem, of course, is that once he takes off the wig and disguise, he’s still plain old, bland Charlie Haas. I just can’t see this gimmick having any sort of legs, but I guess as long as they can come up with good characters for Haas’ to mimic, it could be amusing mid-card fair.
. Why even bother with Deuce? They drafted him to Raw from Smackdown to have him use the same corny gimmick, only without the help of Domino and Cherry. If WWE feels he’s got something to offer, why not acknowledge that he’s the son of Jimmy Snuka and hook him up with the second-generation superstars stable.
. Jericho was golden, as always, in cutting his promo hyping the ladder match on Sunday. That said, I think it’s fair to say that after six tremendous months, the Jericho-Michaels feud is starting to grow a little stale. I think it’s been a big mistake to have the two square off in relatively meaningless tag team matches on Raw two weeks in a row. Hopefully, their match this Sunday will reignite some energy into their feud. But if they decide after Sunday to go in a different direction with each wrestler, that could be OK too, as long as they give the rivalry a real sense of closure.
. Otherwise, last night’s Raw was just OK. With a new timeslot for ECW tonight, the WrestleMania special on MyNetwork on Thursday, the premiere of Smackdown on MyNetwork on Friday, and No Mercy on Sunday, there was a lot to accomplish last night, so I’ll give WWE a pass for being a little undisciplined last night.
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Comments (10)
Keep grinding, Al.
As for Raw, it was terrible.
I hope that in a couple of months all of these feuds will be over with.
I was busy watching Monday night football and a re-run of sundays DEXTER. The bits I saw of raw were awful.
Alfonso, Congrats on the new baby!
I agree the DX reunion seemed predictable and the idea is worn out in my mind. Its weird to see Michaels jogging around in the same goofy way he did back in 2006, when he has this hatred for Jericho and the way they had built up to the ladder match. I tuned out as soon as DX hit the ring. BTW, I think its just about time for a HHH heel turn. His character as is stale already in my book and I am sick of seeing him as champ with that stupid spinner belt. You would think he would have enough stroke to get a decent looking belt for his run.
I agree Santino is becoming the most entertaining thing on Raw.
Not to nit pick, but it was an 8 man tag, not a 6 man.
I've been disappointed recently that the top article never seems to change, but jeez, this is not your job guys, so im not gonna complain. Post when you can and keep up the good work. And hopefully Mates will answer my question from his last post lol.
I took a journalism course at Queens College. Wish I could have had you as the Professor. We could talk WWE after class. haha
Great blog guys please post when ever you can....
Thoughts about last nights Raw...
I hate to say it but I'm starting to mark out for Orton more and more each time he comes out unexpectedly each week. Lets hope the brass has enough sense to keep these interuptions UNEXPECTED, Ortons character these days reminds me alot of the Stone Cold character after the piledrive incident at Summer Slam. Austin would come out and cut off a segement and hit the stunner on someone and the crowd would pop like crazy. Austin wasnt able to wrestle at match but it was a great way to keep him hot and keep him on tv week after week...
As for the the dx love fest last night... Hey i was just glad they didnt wheel NASH down to the ring to HBK's partner
Great blog guys please post when ever you can....
Thoughts about last nights Raw...
I hate to say it but I'm starting to mark out for Orton more and more each time he comes out unexpectedly each week. Lets hope the brass has enough sense to keep these interuptions UNEXPECTED, Ortons character these days reminds me alot of the Stone Cold character after the piledrive incident at Summer Slam. Austin would come out and cut off a segement and hit the stunner on someone and the crowd would pop like crazy. Austin wasnt able to wrestle at match but it was a great way to keep him hot and keep him on tv week after week...
As for the the dx love fest last night... Hey i was just glad they didnt wheel NASH down to the ring to HBK's partner
I honestly think anytime DX merch starts to dip a bit they come up with any reason possible to throw them together. I get that it was to add a little build to the upcoming Smackdown but good lord, I think it's safe to say WWE has spent entirely too much time blowing their load over DX reunions.
They could have at least attempted to surprise us. When Goofy HBK shows up Trips is never far behind. It probably would have been a lot more effective to have Shawn get torn apart and have Triple H save him. We'd get the "face in peril going into PPV" AND HHH/Jericho heat.
The Punk match didn't bother me. Midcard or not they seem to be slowbuilding to Punk/Orton, there is no way that is going to be a bad thing. I also really believe they're invested in Punk as a future main-eventer, as opposed to Rey who was mostly an incident of momentum turning him into a belt pillow.
Congrats on the kid. As long as having him doesn't interfere with you posting blogs, I'm happy. LOL just kidding.
I'm not a "smart mark" internet cynic, so I though RAW was a pretty good show. It kept me entertained, so I enjoyed it.
I'm pretty sure DX was sporting new merchandise, which is kind of sad...
I'm hoping the feud with Randy Orton can lead CM Punk somewhere. People were really starting to get behind him.
The WWF made the Michaels-Jericho fued stale. Shawn should've gone away for awhile after Jericho won the belt. Then come back for Survivor Series where Jericho would beat him, then they'd rematch at the December PPV and Jericho would beat him again then Michaels asks for 1 more shot at the belt, but Jericho refuses until Michaels offers to put his career on the line giving Jericho a chance at the thing he wants most of all to eliminate HBK and take over HBK's place in the WWF, but Michaels says there's one condition it has to be a ladder match. They have the ladder match at Royal Rumble and Michaels finally wins to blow off the feud. Batista wins the Royal Rumble and you have a fresh Michaels-Batista match at Mania. Batista wins and either turns heel at Mania or slowly over the next month turns heel over the fans cheering Michaels instead of him. Ending with Batista destroying Michaels and injuring him. Michaels goes away for awhile and you set up the Cena-Batista fued off of Batista's beatdown of Shawn leading to Cena-Batista at SummerSlam with Cena going over. Batista wants a rematch, but he gets interrupted by Shawn (who's been gone for 3 months or so now) who returns to attack him and restart their feud while Cena can feud with Jericho.