The John Report: The WWE Raw Deal for 09/12/11 (Punk/HHH)
By John Canton
Follow me on Twitter at @johnreport
This will be an abbreviated Raw Deal because I’m heading two hours away to Toronto for Smackdown tonight. Live from Ottawa, Ontario this is the Raw Deal…
The show started with WWE Champion Alberto Del Rio already in the ring along with his personal ring announcer Ricardo Rodriguez. He cut the usual promo about taking out Rey Mysterio and also retiring Edge, which had an added meaning since they were in Canada. Bret Hart came out to a big pop. Del Rio said he looked like one of the illegal Canadians he pays to work for him. Funny line. Bret talked to him about being a great champion while Del Rio wasn’t paying much attention to it. He threatened Hart, which brought out John Cena.
Cena went on his usual spiel of Del Rio being a coward with rental cars, even going into the specifics of Del Rio’s car while claiming that ADR had no idea what he was talking about. Del Rio suggested they give the fans a match they want to see, which was Cena vs. Rodriguez. Rodriguez was awesome during all of this with cowardly facial expressions. He plays a great “manager” type to Del Rio. Then Cena suggested that Del Rio put the WWE Title on the line against Bret Hart. The courageous babyface suggests that the champion wrestles a retired stroke victim? What a nice guy! It was interrupted by John Laurinaitis, who can suddenly book matches, and he set up the obvious Del Rio/Rodriguez vs. Cena/Hart tag match. The crowd was really hot for Bret during all this while they mostly cheered Cena.
John Morrison & Alex Riley d. Jack Swagger & Dolph Ziggler (*)
Not much of a match. They barely got three minutes, ending with Riley hitting his finisher on Swagger with the idea that Ziggler could have saved it, but chose not to. The camera even zoomed in on Ziggler during the finish to illustrate the point. It’s like there’s a script! No, it’s real to some people dammit! Not me, but to some people. Crazy ones, I’m sure. How far has Morrison fallen? He’s filler to a Ziggler/Swagger story now. Ouch. The idea is that Ziggler wants Vickie to manage only him. Not Swagger.
We got the weekly entertaining promo from The Miz & R-Truth, who are the number one contenders to the tag titles. They took it from backstage all the way to the ring. The best part was R-Truth saying “Ninja please” when he didn’t like something Miz said. These two were the highlights of the Raw house show I attended on Saturday.
The Miz d. Kofi Kingston (**)
Good match for about 9 minutes with a commercial break in the middle. Miz went over clean with the Skull Crushing Finale. That pretty much assures that Kofi Kingston & Evan Bourne will retain the titles at Night of Champions, which is the right call since they are the more permanent tag team.
Backstage, Vickie was arguing with Ziggler. Teddy Long, the Smackdown GM who has authority on Raw also as established last week, announced at Night of Champions it would be Ziggler vs. Swagger vs. Riley vs. Morrison in a fatal fourway match. I like three of the four. Riley’s just average to me.
Then Vickie turned her attention to Kelly Kelly, who happened to be laughing close by. She said she can’t wait for Beth to beat Kelly for the title at Night of Champions. That led to match between them. I cringed at the thought.
Back from a break, McGillicutty and Otunga were cutting a promo on Lawler. MM mentioned his dad without saying his name, Curt Hennig aka Mr. Perfect. It’s so stupid that they don’t let him use his real name. Anyway, Otunga mentioned being a lawyer. Then Lawler said MM wasn’t like his dad and that the last thing they need is another lawyer. That’s the best line they could come up with. They brought out Lawler’s partner: Sheamus.
Sheamus & Jerry Lawler d. Michael McGillicutty & David Otunga (1/2*)
This was basically a squash tag match with Sheamus destroying the former tag champs, who are now full time jobbers apparently.
They plugged a Triple H/CM Punk “face off” later in the show. It’s a contract signing with a different name basically because they already did one of those.
They showed Ricardo preparing for the match by doing pushups that weren’t really manly. The idea was that he was nervous. Del Rio told him to get ready.
John Cena & Bret Hart d. Alberto Del Rio & Ricardo Rodriguez (1/2*)
They got about three minutes. It was mostly comedy with Cena starting off playing a matador to Ricardo, who was running at his red t-shirt. Yes, he’s a grown man that’s an idiot apparently. Del Rio bailed. Cena hit the usual offense on Ricardo while Hart tagged in to finish it off with Rodriguez. The idea is that Cena still hasn’t got his hands on Del Rio, but that he will finally get his chance on Sunday.
They had a video package about the anniversary of September 11, 2001 with clips of WWE’s Smackdown show in Houston two days later. The video was narrated by John Cena. Well done.
Kelly Kelly d. Vickie Guerrero (DUD)
They did one actual wrestling spot, a bulldog, and they messed it up because Vickie dropped down too quickly. Kelly was lost at that point. Thankfully all she had to do from there was a stinkface, then the rollup. Don’t put Kelly in there with a non-wrestler. Bad idea. They should know better. Meanwhile, Dolph Ziggler was arguing with Jack Swagger, who came out to ringside. Swagger decked him with a punch. This story sucks. I like the people involved, but it’s not working. Meanwhile, Beth Phoenix tried to attack Kelly, but Kelly avoided it and took off. Everything felt rushed in this segment. Not well done.
They mentioned Hugh Jackman hosting Raw next week. Or guest starring. Whatever the hell they call it now. I can’t wait for Lawler to tell us he’s the best actor ever. Yawn.
Josh Mathews interviewed Mark Henry about his “hall of pain.” He said something about how it’s been 15 years and he’s never got an opportunity to be a number one contender. I remember Royal Rumble 2006. Main event on that show was Angle defeating Henry to retain the World Title. I guess we’re not supposed to recall Henry having a title shot. I do. Sorry. Henry is on the best roll of his career and he’s ten times better as a heel than he was as a babyface.
Cody Rhodes d. Randy Orton in a non-title match (**1/4)
Before the match, all three announcers basically agreed that it was Mark Henry’s time to be World Champion and they couldn’t see Orton beating him. Guess what? Orton will win. This was the main event on Smackdown last week. It got less time here, but it was still a good match. Orton was in control for much of it, and then Henry made his way close to the ring to distract him. The ref paid attention to him, as did Orton, so Rhodes hit Orton with his mask and then hit Cross Rhodes for the pin. He celebrated huge while the announcers put it over as a big deal too.
Does Cody even have a match of Night of Champions yet? I assume they will give him something at Smackdown this week. He deserves it.
They plugged Edge on Smackdown hosting the Cutting Edge segment with Orton & Henry. It’s in Toronto and it’s Edge Appreciation Night too although I think some of that stuff will be off camera with Bret Hart & Trish Stratus announced as being there too. I will be there. It will be loud. I’ll write about all of it in Canton’s Corner on Saturday.
CM Punk and Triple H have a “Face Off”
This was another good promo from them. If I had a negative it’s that there were too many closeup shots of Triple H’s scarred up forehead as well as his giant nose. Come on man, we don’t need to see that up close in HD on a big screen! I think it was nice how Triple H gave it to Punk straight, saying that he complains a lot yet he’s won Money in the Bank twice, been a multiple time champion and always wants more. Punk told him to listen to the fans chanting his name while Hunter pointed out that they didn’t do that last year. Well yeah because he was a heel, but I guess it’s a valid point. Punk told a story about his PPV debut five years ago when he teamed up with DX at Survivor Series and the Philly crowd, knowing him from ROH, chanted his name. Punk talked about things like Vince and him favoring the guys with the bigger muscles while Hunter refuted that talking about the likes of Mysterio, Foley (he’ll be back soon!), Michaels & Hart as examples. I’d fire back by saying most of those guys took a long time to get to the top unlike a bigger muscle guy such as Lesnar, Batista or the best/worst example of height over talent…The Great Khali.
They ended it by going even more personal with Punk saying this is Phil Brooks (him) talking to Paul Levesque (Hunter) and that was the cue for the microphones to be cut. First Punk’s got cut off, then Hunter’s. Then Hunter got another one, but that didn’t work either. He gave it to Punk, who hit Hunter on the head with it. The show ended with Hunter selling the blow while Punk walked away smiling. I like the idea of it being more personal than it is business. I think it works. My only issue is they’ve been cutting promos on eachother for two months and this didn’t feel like anything new. It felt like the same thing presented under a “face off” format. They are handcuffed because they didn’t want to put Hunter in a match on TV, which is fine because the idea of him having only his second televised match of 2011 is a selling point of Sunday’s PPV.
I’m picking Hunter to win at the PPV. I think Nash returns to help him win leading to Triple H turning fully heel in the process. It’s way too soon for Hunter’s reign as COO to end, which would happen if he loses. It would also be foolish for Punk to lose clean. Good ending with Punk getting the upper hand to close out the show. Get beat up on TV, win on PPV. That’s my theory.
Three Stars of the Show
1. CM Punk
2. Triple H
3. Cody Rhodes
Shoutout to Ricardo Rodriguez for being hilarious too.
4 out of 10
Last week: 4.5
2011 High Score: 9.1 (March 28)
2011 Low Score: 4 (Jan. 10/May 9)
2011 Average: 5.75
Last 5 Weeks: 4.5, 5, 7.5, 4, 6.5
Poor show in my opinion. The build for Cena/Del Rio is still week. It’s obvious that it will be a feud that carries on past this month because they haven’t turned up the heat for it yet. The Punk/HHH offered nothing new. They’ve been cutting promos on eachother for two months now. Having a “face off” is no different than the “contract signing” they’ve already done. I would have liked something more creative.
I’m off to the Smackdown taping. I won’t write anything about it until Saturday’s Canton’s Corner column, which will be all about that experience. On Thursday or Friday we’ll have the TJR Staff Preview of Night of Champions up on thejohnreport.net so be on the lookout for that along with the usual array of daily articles. Also please be sure to check out my Twenty WWE Ideas piece from last week. Got an amazing reaction to that one. It’s inspired me to work on some other big ones soon.
Thanks for reading.
John Canton – [email protected]
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