WWE RAW Live Event Results
July 18th, 2009 – Aiken, South Carolina
Report by F4Wonline.com, Anthony Esposito
Show was sold out days ago. Relatively small venue (WWE has always previously run in a larger venue 20 minutes away in Augusta, GA), but capacity crowd at around 4,000. This was the first time the WWE had come to Aiken, SC – the hometown of the Big Show.
First Match: Evan Bourne defeated The Brian Kendrick with a 450 splash. Good opener with back and forth action. Crowd was very much against Kendrick and got into Bourne’s comeback. Match was given plenty of time and crowd was hot for the entire match.
In between matches Kelly Kelly appeared by some fans in the upper level and asked them a trivia question: What is the WWE’s next PPV called? Amazingly, the answer did not change between the time the question was asked and the kid answered. They then got moved down to better seats for getting the question right.
Second Match: Maryse and Alicia Fox defeated Mickey James and Gail Kim when Maryse hit James with the French Kiss DDT. Most athletic match of the night as all the women hit some amazing moves. Alicia Fox seems to be the real deal and TNA has to be kicking themselves (for the 1,000th time) for losing Gail Kim.
Third Match: Jack Swagger defeated Primo with his gutwrench powerbomb. The crowd seemed to like Primo and Jack Swagger was booed by the crowd. Good reaction for two guys that are pretty new to the RAW audience. Amazingly, my U-S-A! U-S-A! chant failed to catch on with the always heel-hating crowd. Communists.
Fourth Match: Kofi Kingston successfully defended his U.S. Title against Chavo Guerrero via his Kofi Kick. Chavo dominated the middle of the match with his vanilla heel beatdown and the crowd responded with a Southern helping of apathy. Hornswoggle interfered, Kofi finally fired back, and he got the pin (and the attention of the crowd). Afterwards a bad mash-up of Kofi and Hornswoggle’s entrance music played as they each performed each other’s signature dance moves. Shockingly entertaining for a segment involving Hornswoggle.
Right before intermission, the ring announcer (not Lilian Garcia) brought two young kids into the ring and gave them T-shirts to throw out to the crowd. She then pimped the autographed copies of John Cena’s 12 Rounds that they were “selling” at the lone merchandise stand. She gave a copy to each of the boys, so it looks like they unloaded at least two copies on this evening.
Intermission.
Fifth Match: Santino defeated Carlito with a small package. Mic time by both wretlers before the match. Santino played up the comedy and then got a small package pin on Carlito out of nowhere.
Sixth Match: The Big Show defeated MVP with a choke slam. Aiken, SC is Big Show’s hometown (widely known by pretty much every adult in the audience) and so he received a face-like reaction. In fact, it was the third biggest babyface reaction after John Cena and Triple H. They did comedy spots early playing off Big Show’s height and weight and MVP played a great “babyface who finds himself in a tough situation” role. As one would expect, Big Show is, well, big, in person.
Seventh Match: Triple H, John Cena, and Mark Henry defeated Randy Orton, Ted DiBiase, and Cody Rhodes when Triple H and John Cena simultaneously hit their finishers on DiBiase and Rhodes. Triple H came out last for the faces, but Cena got the bigger (and higher pitched) reaction. Man, did this crowd ever love Triple H and Cena. The beginning of the match saw Orton refusing to tag in and then a very extended face in peril beatdown of Triple H. They kept teasing over and over Triple H making the hot tag to Cena and the crowd was into every bit of it. Numerous big “Triple H” chants and a huge pop when he finally made the tag to Cena. Finish saw Orton get tied up with Henry outside the ring and the remaining faces his their finishers on Orton’s lackies to send the crowd home happy. Triple H and Cena then shaked the hands of fans around the railing and that was it for the evening.
Best house show I’ve ever been to and the sell-out / relatively small arena atmosphere really added to the event. The set-up of just a ring and two small light poles is a huge contrast to the TV and PPV set-up, but the matches were much better than you get to see on a typical Monday Night. Strange how a wrestling show can get over with a crowd by, you know, focusing on wrestling.
Best Match:
The Main Event 6 Man Tag
Worst Match:
Chavo Guerrero vs. Kofi Kingston
Biggest Babyface Pops:
#1 – John Cena
#2 – Triple H
#3 – The Big Show
Biggest Heel Reactions:
The heels were all booed (except for Chavo – people just wanted that match to end), but none had mega-heat. Randy Orton probably got the biggest reaction from the crowd just by refusing to tag in to face the faces in the main event.
Pictures of the event are available at: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/album.php?aid=14766&id=1654874879
