Old School Raw opens with Ric Flair. Randy Orton interrupts him and bullies him. John Cena makes the save and talks. Orton cowers away and the chicken s*** character of Randy Orton continues. Fourteen minute opening segment. Thanks for dragging your words, Flair. Or was that the booze talking?
Replays from Raw last week. You know, in case you didn’t see it last week? Because it would make total sense that the regular viewer wouldn’t watch from week to week to know what’s happening.
Daniel Bryan, Luke Harper and Erick Rowan take on the Usos and Rey Mysterio in a six man tag. Bryan comes to the ring with the Wyatt Family and is dressed like them(looks like a redneck mechanic much like Rowan). The Usos and Mysterio get the win after some miscommunication between Dbry and Harper. Good wrestling, but what’s more interesting is how involved Dbry seemed with the family.
Ryback does commentary while Curtis Axel takes on Big E. Langston…again. Langston wins the short match with the big ending despite Ryback trying to distract him. Short and sweet, but done more to put over a possible Ryback/Langston match in the future. Ryback on commentary was actually not as boring as I expected. Maybe this guy can find his personality after all…or not. His comment to put a bra on Big E. was horrible and stupid for him to say.
Roddy Piper does Piper’s Pit. The Shield come out and they all exchange words. Piper points out that Reigns will be better than both Rollins and Ambrose if he can beat CM Punk tonight. The Shield start to bully Piper and CM Punk makes the save with the New Age Outlaws. Excellent segment here! The push of the Shield has been exceptional and I’m curious to see where WWE takes this group in 2014 direction-wise.
Alberto Del Rio takes on Sin Cara…again. Del Rio wins the match with a kick to the skull of Sin Cara after he misses a senton bomb. Good back and forth action here, but short and very memorable when we’ve seen these guys wrestle three other times in the last month or so. Del Rio cuts a promo after the match saying everyone should be talking about him winning the Royal Rumble instead of Batista. I hope neither of them wins it.
Daniel Bryan talks with the Wyatts backstage. Bray tells Daniel that next week the two of them will be teaming together. Good acting from these four.
Cody Rhodes and Goldust take on the Real Americans in a non title match. Cody fights to get out of the patriot lock until Goldust comes in the ring to break it up with a kick to Swagger’s head. Goldust tags into the match and takes care of both men with a flying crossbody before clotheslining Cesaro from the ring. Goldust with a scoop slam on Swagger but Cesaro breaks up the pin. Swagger fails a schoolboy rollup and Goldy gets the win with his cutting edge finisher. Excellent tag team match!
DDP is shown stretching backstage and Booker T walks in. They embrace and promote DDP Yoga. DDP raises his leg up and holds it, and then Booker does his thing but can barely lift his knee. Nice segment to joke about how old these guys are. Ron Simmons comes into the scene and gives us a damn. Nostalgic.
Damien Sandow takes on Khali in a rematch from last week. Sgt. Slaughter is the ref. Sandow’s foot is on the rope and Slaughter counts to three regardless. Sandow gets angry and Slaughter puts him in the cobra clutch. Nothing special here. Khali is a joke, but this is WWE’s idea of family entertainment. Slaughter dances with Rahjin Singh and Khali after the match.
Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman come out. Paul Heyman runs his mouth. Mark Henry comes out for revenge on Lesnar. They brawl and Lesnar puts Henry in that arm lock and it appears that he snaps Henry’s arm(we learn later on it’s only a dislocated or sprained elbow). Whatever. Try something original for Lesnar, WWE. I’m surprised he didn’t break Punk’s arm last summer.
Big Show comes down to save Henry(even though he’s been destroyed) and challenges Lesnar to get in the ring with him. When Lesnar finally does, he gets thrown across the ring by Show as he slides out to the floor. Lesnar sells the throw by limping to the back while he’s being held back by Heyman. I liked the effectiveness of this. I hope their potential Rumble match goes longer than five minutes(the approximate length of their WWE Title match at Survivor Series eleven years ago). Good stuff here.
The Bellas take on Alicia Fox and Aksana. Cole and JBL hype Aksana and Nikki’s rivalry that has developed in the past week. Brie misses a dropkick from the middle rope on Aksana and gets pinned as a result. Not much of a match at all, and a very lazy finish for these divas.
The 3MB take on Too Cool and Rikishi. Rikishi ends up sitting on Mahal for the win. They dance after the match. Some nice nostalgia from back during a time when wrestling was a whole lot more fun. I do miss it every now and then.
Bray Wyatt and Daniel Bryan will take on the Usos next week. Can’t wait for that one!
The legends come out to the stage and are announced in order: Scotty 2 Hotty, Grandmaster Sexae, Booker T, Rikishi, Nikolai Volkoff, Sgt Slaughter, Irwin R. Schyster(Same eyes as his son), Bob Backlund, Ted Dibiase with his throwback laugh, Arn Anderson, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Ron Simmons, Diamond Dallas Page, The Godfather, and Ric Flair. Nice selection of legends there. No Dusty Rhodes or Jerry Lawler though. Bad News Barrett pops up and runs his face. Talk about a pointless gimmick with zero personality. Leader of the Nexus to idiot on the mic; I wonder what he’ll do next.
Randy Orton will face Big E. Langston on Smackdown. Should be a good one!(Haven’t watched the match yet).
Mean Gene Okerlund introduces the New Age Outlaws after talking about being proud of being back in Baltimore and promoting his hotline(the one that went out of style sixteen years ago). Road Dogg cuts a good promo with Gunn in the ring before they go to the back.
Roman Reigns DEFEATS CM Punk with the spear after getting lots of distraction help from the Shield. Excellent match with an interesting finish. WWE must be really set on pushing Reigns as one of the top faces of the future.
The Shield try to attack Punk after the match until Jake the snake Roberts surprises us all and comes to the ring with the snake bag. The Shield look scared as the Outlaws and Punk jump the Shield. Punk spins Ambrose around multiple times before nailing a GTS. Jake puts the snake on Ambrose and celebrates with Punk and the Outlaws to close out the show. Outstanding ending with some good nostalgia to finish out the program.
It’s a 7/10 show for quality. The wrestling was good, the Lesnar/Show stuff was good, and the legends were good. Was anything epic? Nope, but it was still worth watching. Thanks for reading!
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