We started with a brutally acted segment with actor Luis Guzman (I kinda remember him from Boogie Nights and Traffic) joining guest host Roddy Piper. They talked about some movie, I could barely hear it and then got to Iron Chef, which led to an appearance by the Iron Shiek. Piper sold it like they misheard him or something. Shieky baby went on this rant about Hogan like he's prone to do. Then they totally stole the SNL bit by saying "Live from New York it's Monday Night Raw." Not a good start, but it got better thankfully.
New intro with Nickelback's song "Burn it to the Ground." I actually think the video package worked well with the song. Thing is, I live in Canada. They play the song on radio here so damn much. I'm sick of the song. Still, the video matched the beat of the song well.
Good to see a packed house at MSG. They used the short entrance that MSG is famous for rather than putting in the Titantron and the ramp. They did that to get as many people in there as possible, which is why they got over 20,000 in attendance. And you could tell. Looked full. Crowd was hot for much of the night too. You would think WWE would care enough to put on a huge show in every city, but they really only go balls out for NYC since it's their home city basically.
The Miz d. MVP
A typical good promo from The Miz before the match ripping on New York for buying the World Series. Why do fans boo that? Yes it's true in the sense since they bought Sabathia, Burnett and Teixeira, but so what? Be proud that you won. Those are the rules of baseball and they played within that. By the way, I'm tired of Miz saying "really" all the time. It's from Saturday Night Live and it's one of the few things that's funny on that show these days, so don't steal it. The match was a typical four minute Raw match that saw Sherri Shepherd cheering her loser MVP on. Too short to be very good, but not bad either. Just okay. Remember in the summer when I thought maybe MVP will get a push? Not happening.
Santino d. Chavo Guerrero
I love how they feel the need to recap Chavo's humiliation from the week before. Santino did a sight gag by wearing a bunch of sports jerseys. They were mostly New York ones with a Phillies one thrown it for some boos. He ended it with a Jeter Yankees jersey. A shot of Jeter in the building? Of course he wasn't there. Jeter is a ladies man. And I respect him for that. Chavo hit the Three Amigos, then went for the frog splash immediately. In a funny spot, Santino rolled to the other corner. Then Chavo climbed that corner, so Santino rolled back leading to a "Santino" chant. Hornswoggle showed up in DX clothes to distract Chavo, which led to the rollup win for Santino. I'm a little disappointed that we didn't get to see Santino's trombone celebration as well as a segment where he called Hot Rod, "Roddy the Piper" like he has in the past. Oh well.
Right after that match ended, DX came out. They barely mentioned the PPV main event by saying they will work together to make sure one of them leaves Survivor Series with the belt. Of course that's not really important because they had to call Horny out for wearing their merch. They teased that everything was cool, that he could still wear the merch and then HHH turned on him, giving him a Pedigree. The crowd didn't really boo it. It was mixed. This was both the greatest moment in the history of sports entertainment and also one of the biggest wastes of eight minutes on Raw I've ever seen. A two in one special. I can't wait for Hornswoggle vs. HHH, the feud of the year in 2010.
They showed a video package to the tune of Jay-Z's great song "Empire State of Mind" focusing on WWE moments at MSG. Lots of great stuff there although no visuals of Benoit winning the World Title at WrestleMania XX obviously. It was well done like all WWE video packages. My favorite match ever in MSG? Probably Owen Hart beating Bret Hart at WrestleMania X although I loved the Michaels/Razor ladder match and HHH/Cactus a lot too. I'm actually shocked that they showed Angle, Foley and Hogan in the video. They should do Raw live at MSG at least twice a year.
It was time for some backstage fun with Piper getting ripped on by Jericho for not respecting him enough. He wants his picture on the wall. Instead, Piper brought in Chris Masters to do the titty dance to the tune of "Boom Boom Boom" by the Black Eyed Peas. I can't believe I typed that sentence. It was kinda funny, though. I feel like less of a person for enjoying that. Vince thought this was the greatest thing ever and so did the Bellas apparently. Then Piper blew his nose on Jericho to end it. The two guys in the Black Eyed Peas that aren't as famous as the other two were at ringside.
I have to give credit to WWE's performers for the European tour. They've spent about two weeks straight on the road. It's a hot market for them, which is why they hit seven countries and did 22 shows total. That's not easy. I have lots of respect for the WWE performers for enduring that.
Melina d. Alicia Fox in a Women's Title match
A comedian from 30 Rock, Judah Friedlander, came out to announce. I doubt Vince has any idea of who he is. Then somebody told him he's on a TV show that Vince has never heard of. Then another person mentioned that it might make it on for 2 seconds of Extra, so Vince threw him out there. I have sources. This turned into a Lumberjill match with the eight other chicks in the Survivor Series match coming out. That meant a Mickie James-Canton sighting. Nice outfit with the super tight jeans. Oh, there was a match. They didn't really fuck anything up and Melina won in under two minutes. Good for her. Then all the girls fought with the face divas winning. The Judah guy hugged them all. Notice how Mickie didn't touch that rube? MJC is loyal, fellas. No Natalya at Survivor Series because she can actually wrestle.
They announced WWE and USA Network extending the deal for Raw through 2014. Good for Raw. No idea on the future of Smackdown and ECW since the networks they are on are in trouble.
The midpoint of the show saw Piper doing the promo in the ring. He did semi-coherent ramblings and called out Vince for a match. They exchanged lines with Vince making fun of Roddy because he's overweight, and then Vince said he's not wrestling anymore. Thank you, Vince. Piper said he's been in 7,000 car crashes and 30 matches. Then he corrected himself. He didn't want the match at PPV, he wanted it tonight. Then he left, Vince went to say something more and he got cut off. That was a highlight of the show too.
Next week's Raw is a three hour show with Jesse Ventura hosting. It's going to have a Thanksgiving theme. Does that mean they'll move the annual food fight brawl to Raw? Wrestlers from all three brands will be there. There will be a three hour Slammy Awards show in December too.
Sheamus came out. They mentioned Noble has retired. For those that don't know, Noble works backstage as an agent helping the young guys put together the matches. He wanted a match. Nobody came out. He beat up the timekeeper by kneeing him and then sliding him across the announce table. Jerry Lawler was wondering what was up. Sheamus KNOCKED HIM THE FUCK OUT~! with the big boot. Yes, thank you. Imagine if he did that to Michael Cole on the same show that Hornswoggle got a Pedigree? Would have made this a 10 easy. This was an effective segment. I like Sheamus being booked like a badass.
Jack Swagger d. Evan Bourne
Matt Striker joined Cole on commentary. We've seen this before. Bourne can only win if he gets a distraction or if he faces Chavo. Against anybody else he's a jobber. What a shame.
Orton threatening Piper leads to a Kingston/Orton brawl
We got Orton coming out instead of Vince. Terror filled the building with Michael Cole pissing himself most likely. Due to the short entrance his walk to the ring didn't take forever. He took a shot from Piper, then took him down and stomped on him. He had him set up for the punt, he waited, waited and then finally Kofi's music hit. Somebody fucked up there. Kofi/Kobe Kingston/Johnson came out for a brawl with Randy. They fought outside the ring, taking it into the crowd, then back at ringside and then some refs came to break it up. Didn't work. They kept going, showing real intensity. The crowd kept getting more into it. Kofi got a production case, drilled Orton with it (I mean it looked pretty stiff) and it looked to have cut Randy open a bit. Call the medics to cover the wound! Vince must have been asleep. They set it up for a Jeff Hardy-like jump off a barricade onto Orton about eight feet blow when the refs stopped him. The crowd booed. Then he broke free, climbed back up and hit the "Boom Drop" double legdrop thing that he does to put Orton through the table. The crowd exploded. They really went nuts for Kofi here. This was fantastic. Best segment on Raw in a long time. It makes me wish they had a singles match on Sunday rather than the ten men tag. By the way, kudos to WWE for not ruining this brawl by involving the other eight guys in the elimination tag. It worked better just one on one.
Cena did one of his goofy promos that wasn't funny. They tried to do a bit where Cena called it a handicap match at Survivor Series, then was handed a paper saying it was a triple threat. The promotion of this match has been poor. Doing silly bits week after week doesn't put over the seriousness or importance of the WWE Title.
DX vs. Jerishow vs. John Cena & The Undertaker
This match started after the two hour mark, so they had a 12 minute overrun or so. The match got about nine minutes. I was hoping for something like twenty minutes. Of course considering it was three guys in the ring at once that meant for spot after spot, I guess to promote Survivor Series. I liked when Michaels got in there against Undertaker he took off his stupid green DX armbands to show that he was serious. Things started to break down with Show whipping Undertaker into the guard rail. Vintage elbow by Michaels on Cena, who then turned it into the AA, which led to HHH tagging back in with a spinebuster. Show gave him the headbutt, HBK superkicked Show and Jericho hit the Codebreaker on Michaels, which led to Undertaker giving Jericho the chokeslam. Hunter clotheslined Undertaker out of the ring, then turned around and Cena pinned him with the Attitude Adjustment. I'm picking Hunter on Sunday now. Post match, Undertaker gave Cena a Tombstone to mostly cheers from the NYC crowd. The show ended with Undertaker posing with the title as everybody else was out on the floor selling the beating from "the biggest main event in the history of Raw"...that only got eight minutes.
There are probably people out there that think Undertaker giving the Tombstone to Cena to end the show means they're doing Undertaker vs. Cena at Mania. I think, as I've written before, that it's a possibility only because it hasn't been done since Cena's been a top guy. I have no idea, though.
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Three Stars of the Show
1. Kofi Kingston - Great work by him again. The crowd believes in him.
2. Randy Orton - Loving what he's doing with Kingston right now. As I wrote in the roster evaluation he needs to have a defining feud with a new star. This is perfect so far.
3. The crowd - They get a star. I love the New York crowd. Like I said before they need to do Raw live at MSG twice a year at least. If every crowd was as hot as this it would make the shows better.
It was a much better show than last week. Wrestling wise it wasn't a great show although I did enjoy the main event for the spotfest that it became. You'd think that they'd get more time for the match, though. I'm assuming the Piper/McMahon and DX segments were the culprits for taking up too much time because they both seemed to run too long.
The question I have coming out of this show is will people remember the big moments like Kingston putting Orton through the table or Undertaker giving the Tombstone to Cena? Or will they forget about it by next week just like Cena giving Orton the Attitude Adjustment on top of the cell? It's important to make these things have a significant impact on the future of the show.
I don't want to say that WWE fails to try in other venues. It's just that they clearly try a lot harder when they're at MSG. Why not have that effort every week in terms of the booking as well as the execution of the show? I don't know. The crowd helped a lot, though. It reminds me of ten years ago when every week it was sold out. The more legit noise you can generate from the audience the better the show.
Sex 4 Dez 2009 - 22:35