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Here are my thoughts on the show as I take a look back at two hours of my life that I won’t get back and won’t spend going to see ‘The Goods’, coming to a theater near you.
I did not have high expectations for this week’s guest host even though I am a fan of some of Jeremy Piven’s earlier work, but this was not PCU, Grosse Point Blank, or even Lucas. After listening to Mike and Mike talk about the way that Piven was a television/movie actor and not a ‘stage’ actor might have explained his problems with Speed the Plow.
It is interesting to see how many actors who are supposed to be better at this than the wrestlers are woefully unprepared or unable to be on the same level as the wrestlers.
Over the last few years, I have been critical of Melina’s numerous shrieks during her time as manager for John Morrison and Joey Mercury or in her matches; Randy Orton’s promos; and the Abraham Washington Show; but I would have rather seen all of those happen tonight than any of the Jeremy Piven and Dr. Ken segments.
I wish I knew why Jeremy was on the show because he definitely did not plug anything.
Miz cut one of his better recent promos but it was not enough to save the segment. I guess they figured that Shaq did a good job with the ‘Christina’ for Jericho that they decided to go with ‘Les Miz’ for The Miz and I thought it bombed. It didn’t help that Ken was yelping like he was trying out to be Dino in the next Flintstones Movie.
Here is a brief memo for anyone who wants to be a guest host, KNOW THE PAY PER VIEW you might be mentioning. Summerfest?
John Cena made the opening segment worse with his forced attempt to try to keep the crowd from leaving really early. It came off amateurish with Cena repeating everything for Piven.
After the opening segment, I would have expected more wrestlers to demand that if they lost they would be banned from Raw.
After an upset victory last week to bring Evan Bourne back up to a level he was at before Night of Champions, they did a great job of lowering Bourne below where he was. This was a squash victory that while it did get Swagger his win back, it did nothing for Bourne because it makes his upset victory look like a complete fluke not a battle between two equal competitors.
I did like the post match attack by Swagger and that MVP came to make the save. I guess the MVP/Swagger feud is still ongoing.
After the opening segment, should they have shown the publicity that the Shaq episode got and how good it was?
So the Divas are all friends outside the ring because that is the only way that you can justify Alicia Fox and Kelly Kelly in the same room
Did they forget that Mickie James and Gail Kim were in the ring for about five minutes between their entrances and the presence of their opponents. At least we got a clip from The Goods.
It was good to see Jillian Hall back after some time away from the ring. I thought the women’s tag match was okay and did more to build Beth Phoenix than sow the seeds of Gail possibly turning on Mickie James.
When was the last time that there was an Epsenhart Special where the team beat the individual wrestler? I was probably not the only one who was shocked that Triple H lost to DiBiase and Rhodes since they have been as effective against Hunter as the Spirit Squad. However, if Hunter had won the match, we wouldn’t have had his great promo that made a mockery of his whole feud with Legacy.
How many other wrestlers in WWE could have gotten away with a promo like the one that Hunter gave. He got beaten by Rhodes and DiBiase and then acted as if they had been dominating him for the last four months when it was anything but the case. Then he gets to talk about possibly reforming Evolution only to rip on Orton, Batista, and Flair. I wonder who Hunter was talking about calling to bring him to take care of Rhodes and DiBiase since he finally needs help to stop them after one loss.
Who did Chavo anger to be given the Hornswoggle feud? If it wasn’t for the fact that the previous segments with Piven were horrible, I might have enjoyed the Joe Rogan and Jon Favreau comments. It was interesting to hear Rogan’s name mentioned when you consider his comments about Brock Lesnar on the UFC broadcasts.
I think any build for a potential Carlito/Primo feud was seriously harmed. With such a short match, why would anyone want to see a somewhat longer match on a pay per view? Primo has so much potential, but they look like they are going to give him the Chavo treatment.
Speaking of Chavo Guerrero, at least he did not lose to Hornswoggle this week. If Mark Henry did not beat Chavo as easily as he did, it would say a lot that Hornswoggle had an easier time with Chavo than a man who should be in the main event picture. At least Hornswoggle got to add insult to injury. The only thing worse would have been to have Henry wearing green. Why ruin the momentum of Henry as a tough guy who the fans were behind and make him guy dancing in the ring. I wonder what Dave Scherer thought of the way they portrayed ‘his guy’?
Does Piven realize that if Randy Orton is going to be a guest ring announcer, it will take twenty minutes for him to do the introductions for the main event? When Orton said that he could have kicked Piven and Ken in the head, was I the only one who wanted it to happen?
While some wrestlers have been hurt by poor booking, some have been harmed by bad music. While I think Dolph Ziggler’s music change has hurt his character a lot, the mixing of ‘out of left field’ tag team music might have been at its worst with the new JeriShow mix.
Did you notice that Chris Jericho almost mentioned Charles Robinson by name before remembering that the referees do not have names?
The Show/Kofi match was okay and I did not have a problem with the disqualification finish because you don’t need a title change and to have Kofi win the match would have been a bit questionable since they are trying to build Show as someone who does not take crap after the Shaq confrontation. Kofi got in some offense in the match but it was Show trying to prove that he was a tough guy that led to the disqualification.
Why was Triple H using a ‘standard’ phone to call whoever it might have been on the other end of the phone, but maybe they don’t allow cell phone calls to San Antonio? Why couldn’t I have made the same decision as Shawn Michaels (or whoever Hunter was talking to) not to watch this week’s Raw.
If I could be serious for a moment, with Raw in Calgary, Alberta, Canada next week, there are so many options for wrestlers from the area or even Canadian entertainers to be guest host, they had to get Sergeant Slaughter? Is this a tie in for GI Joe? Why not bring in William Shatner since he inducted Jerry Lawler into the WWE Hall of Fame? Can they find a way to bring in the Hart Dynasty (if they can bring in Cryme Tyme for Shaq, why not bring a link to the history of Stampede Wrestling?
How much better would it have been if they decided to make Shawn Michaels the guest host of Raw in Calgary. I don't know if we would be able to hear anything on the mic over the 'Michaels sucks' and 'You Screwed Bret' chants from the Calgary crowd. Maybe they do something where Hunter points out that he couldn't get an answer from Shawn on the phone, so he wanted to make sure he got an answer and bring him to the ring for a segment.
So Jeremy Piven and Ken were evil because they wanted to screw over John Cena during the lumberjack match? How many more people in the WWE Universe are that way?
What a bunch of lumberjacks. Outside of Legacy, it was a who’s that of the heels on Raw. With the way that Chavo was treated by the guest host and Kato, why was he standing on the same side of the ring as them during the match and talking to them? They expect fans to have short attention spans, but that is ridiculous.
The main event would have been better if Miz found a way to win. Other than the lumberjack situation, what disadvantage did Cena have? His title match was not on the line so if he loses, Miz stays on Raw.
During the main event, John Cena was placed in the Master Lock until he went limp in the hold and Legacy treated Cena like Triple H treats Legacy but Cena is still able to win in the same amount of time that he beat Miz last week to win the Beat the Clock Challenge (which was not the two minutes that Cena claimed, but four plus minutes because there was a little more than two minutes LEFT on the almost seven minute time that Mark Henry set). Then after the match, Cena is able to fight off all of the lumberjacks who try to attack him.
The only thing that I will give Jeremy Piven credit for was the cross body that he tried at the end. Cena did a good job of catching him. I don’t know if Sim Snuka was supposed to be at ringside for the catch of Ken after the press slam to the floor, but that looked a bit scary. However, based on his performance, why shouldn’t there have been some problem with that move.
If you DVRed the show: You are probably better off deleting the show and hopefully you have any of the wrestling shows from last week because last week’s Raw, ECW, Smackdown, and Impact were entertaining and worth your time to watch again before trying to watch what was presented from Mohegan Sun on Monday night. It is not too often that an episode of Raw (or any of the three WWE shows or Impact) makes me look forward to an episode of FCW, but I think that show might be better than this week’s Raw.
