Raw and Smackdown Round up

Instead of blogging about Raw and Smackdown after every show I thought I would do a round up every so often. So let’s crack on with what has happened since Summerslam.

It is clear that the Kevin Nash/Triple H/CM Punk feud is going to be absolutely huge. It all started when Kevin Nash told the WWE Universe that he had received a text message from Triple H asking him to attack whoever won the Undisputed WWE Championship match. Triple H has denied this since the accusation was made. CM Punk doesn’t believe Hunter, and I guess you’d have to agree, especially since we’ve seen Stephanie again.

Me personally, I think Hunter’s being worked like a puppet. Last week Triple H was told by John Laurinaitis that Nash had been in a car accident, which proved to be a lie when Nash interrupted Cena and Punk’s number one contender match, distracting Punk and handing Cena the win. This week when called out by Triple H to clear the air and clear up the lies we found out that Nash is now a full WWE employee. His and Punk’s demands for a match were granted by Triple H, who booked Nash vs. Punk for Night of Champions.....although the match didn’t stay that way for too long. By the end of the night Hunter, who has been goaded by Punk about the fact that he isn’t really in charge for the last few weeks, gets cleared by the WWE board to have one match.....with Punk at Night of Champions.

We were also treated this week to Live Smackdown Super Show, as well as on Raw Triple H announcing the scrapping of the Brand Extension, and now everybody can be on both shows. My two favourite segments of the year happened on Smackdown, if you’ve not seen them I suggest searching them out on Youtube. One was the contract signing between Punk and Hunter, the other was John Cena calling out Alberto Del Rio and being met with Ricky Retardo.

Del Rio...what to say really. He had a rematch with Rey on the Raw after Summerslam, and beat him which coincidentally all his earlier promo had been about that he is a true hero and Rey isn’t. An announcement on wwe.com later that week explains this, Rey is injured and is out of action for a few months. Cena came out at the end of the match to save Rey from the beat down that caused the aforementioned “injuries” (its been addressed in wrestling circles for a while that Rey needs another knee operation and this was clearly the way to get him off tv).

Cena told Del Rio he had no integrity, and this was proven again the following week when Del Rio attacked Cena at the end of the number one contenders match with Punk. We didn’t see Del Rio this week on either “Super Show” which initially I found strange but I have been informed this is something to do with his work visa.

John Cena is on fine form again, his promos are fun and the seemingly relaxed rules on what can and can not be said on air is doing wonders for him as has his work with CM Punk.

Sheamus is another who is coming on in leaps and bounds. Since he’s become a face his character has becoming a joy to watch. It was interesting to see on the Raw Super Show Sheamus and Cena team up as they have had some epic battles as opponents. Laugh all you like but I was moved to tears when Sheamus came out to make the save as Cena was confronted with a beat down from Mark Henry and Christian, resulting in the tag team match.

Randy Orton is consistent as ever. His cage match on Super Smackdown with Christian was outstanding but my highlight was the promo with Cody Rhodes and Ted Di Biase on the Friday night after Summerslam. I hope in the future that Cody does really well and we see a repeat of this because now the “freak” Cody Rhodes is an extremely well built character and with Ted as the side kick I really see this working. It is interesting to think that after Legacy broke down Ted was the one who had the bigger push. Funny how thing work out huh.

Mark Henry is number one contender for the World Heavyweight Championship. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this. I think he deserves to be a champion because he has been around for a long time but I just don’t see a personality there, which for me is one of the important elements. If you don’t love or hate the character then you will not give a damn if they’re champion or not. Maybe that’s just me.

Talking of caring about characters. The Divas of Doom. Bloody AMAZING booking, and well overdue. Natalya and Beth changing the face of the Diva division. Surely this means there will actually be a women’s WRESTLING division. I miss the days of Trish, Ivory, Victoria, Kat, Terri, Chyna and hell I even miss Steph. At least in the Attitude era the women actually had matches that would go longer than 3 minutes, and although you had had some gimmick matches every women worked hard. I’m not disrespecting the ladies who are there now, I know they work hard too I’ve seen them at houseshows and the matches have been brilliant, I just think it has taken this to shake up the way the fans think about the division as a whole. I think Kelly Kelly has come on in massive amounts since this programme started, I can’t really say what I thought of her before because the fact is I didn’t.

(This blog is quite rambley, I apologise, I’ll work on my formatting for the next one.)

Other notable news

·         New Tag Team Champions – Air Boom

o   Kofi and Evan Bourne, I think it’s great for Evan’s career. Hope that there are some new tag teams coming through from FCW soon.

·         Sending lots of love out to Santino Marella who escaped a car accident with a separated shoulder when it could have been a hell of a lot worse

·         Vickie  Guerrero is striking up a new partnership with Jack Swagger as well as managing Dolph Ziggler, expect to see some fireworks there  soon.

o   Dolph had a brilliant match with Orton on Raw this week. Really looking forward to seeing him developing over the next few months.

·         Sin Cara is now a heel. A kick to the back of the head of Daniel Bryan brought the change. Bu now I think we’re all aware that it’s a “new” bloke under the mask. There are rumblings in the wrestling community of an evil Sin Cara vs. A good Sin Cara. Me, I don’t know. Great idea, BUT the original guy was banned under the wellness policy, and if dirt sheets are to be believed he returned and his match was so bad that he was sent home and the match had to be re-taped later in the show with the new guy.

Well I think that just about sums up what’s been happening. I’m looking forward to seeing how the shows go forward now the brand extension had been dumped. Triple H is really doing it for me as COO, now all that needs to happen is that Anonymous GM has to be scrapped, the stand and laptop was STILL at ringside this week.  

If you’ve taken time to read this, Thank You. I’m still getting to grips with blogging about something I love and I appreciate people taking time out of their day to wade through this.

Something I forgot? Something you’d like to hear my opinion on? Drop me a comment and I’ll see what I can do.

Summerslam 2011 Review

Hey guys, here's my review of Summerslam...it's my first attempt so be nice!

6 Man Tag

Great opener, glad to see the Miz on the card, Del Rio didn’t need to be there , would have preferred it to be a normal tag with Miz/Truth Vs Mysterio/Morrison. Was not aware that Kofi was in a feud with Del Rio, but in fairness I’ve not seen a lot of Raw recently. Mysterio picking up the win, unsurprising. Possibly would have been better for the feud of Truth/Morrison to have Morrison gone over.

Rated 2.5/5

Sheamus vs. Mark Henry

I surprisingly enjoyed this match more than I’d anticipated. Felt that it was cut short and the finish unrealistic.  The spot was great though, really brought the match to a high point. I understand that the finish had to be so that neither man lost their momentum going in to their respective heel/face turns. Would assume this is going on to at least another match, although rumours of Henry challenging Orton persist which may close this well built feud early.

Rated 3.5/5

Beth Phoenix vs. Kelly Kelly

Going into this match I genuinely hoped that women’s wrestling is on the up, and I was not let down. Although the match did not end the way I’d hoped, with Beth becoming the new champion, it was an excellent showcase of how, when given time and a good opponent every “diva” can be a good worker. I hope in the coming months the diva title is dropped and the Women’s championship resurrected. Kelly looked like a different person, and the quick roll up, while not my finish of choice, made perfect sense as in fairness no one would have given Kelly a chance of retaining going into the match. With Kelly being accompanied by Eve and Beth by Natalya I think we’ll see a few decent matches between the four of them developing of the course of the next few weeks.

Rated 3.5/5

Wade Barrett vs. Daniel Bryan

Most underrated match on the card in my opinion. Both are extremely hard workers and Daniel Bryan is the man in some circles. Me, I wasn’t aware of him until NXT. Good result for both men, gives Barrett momentum, shows that Bryan is fallible. See this going into another match as wade brags up the fact he won, perhaps ending in a match for the MITB briefcase 3.5/5

Christian Vs Randy Orton

Massive surprise to see Edge. Was not expecting it, although it seems I’m the only one in the world who didn’t! Calling Christian out on his behaviour, also unexpected, reminiscent of the E&C breakup. Edge however had no bearing on the match, leaving after calling Christian a bitch. A strong match contested between Orton and Christian, with some brilliant table spots. Kendo sticks once again coming into play, as happens in all good no holes barred matches. I was clearly surprised to see Orton win; I don’t understand why WWE keep passing the title to Christian to take it away from him in such a short space of time. I hear rumours of Mark Henry being next to challenge for the title. I wonder where this leaves Christian.

Rated 4/5

John Cena vs. CM Punk

After a hot month of Punk Promos and Cena not backing down it was another good solid match between the two. I was convinced that Hunter would have FAR more input and I half feel that his involvement was completely unnecessary.  I’m going to say it, I’m a Cena fan and I’m not ashamed of it. People write him off with his “five moves of doom”. It is fair to say that his current position with CM Punk has given him a better stage to perform on and I enjoy watching them both together. The contract signing on Raw last week was electric. Both can drop a promo well and have worked some excellent matches.

I’ll be honest the entrances were enough to give me goose bumps! The pop CM Punk got was totally cool. I should mention here that I don’t think the audience came over too well, maybe it was just a sound thing, but they hardly seemed into any of the matches. Match is typically back and fore, with the standard let’s go Cena, CM Punk chants. Mainly gets going when both mend are flat out on the outside of the ring, Triple H starts to count them out and when he gets to 9 and realises that neither men would make the 10 count, he hauls both CM Punk and Cena back into the ring. I think this was a great move, as I felt completely cheated when Cena/Miz ended in a count out at Mania and would have been epically pissed off if this match had ended that way. The match continues and we see a good drop kick from Cena which leads to the 5 knuckle shuffle (by the way, did anyone else realise what a five knuckle shuffle apparently is?? Gobsmacked when I found out the term meant!) and an attempted AA which Punk counters into a pin which is met by a 2 count and another pin from Cena which Punk bridges out of. I loved this exchange. Showed exactly how good both men are.  I also enjoyed the battle of the finishing moves which followed and the flurry of 2 count pins. This match went less time than their MITB encounter, but seemed to have much more going on. The homage to Macho Man by Cm punk did not go unnoticed, well apart from by the announce team (more on this later). The GTS gets the 3 count BUT Cena’s foot was clearly on the rope from the first count. This OF COURSE is not spotted by COO Triple H.

Cena, for me, gave in too easily which aroused suspicions that something else was to happen and lo and behold as Hunter walks away and Punk over celebrates the camera pans back and KEVIN NASH is stood behind Punk. Quick punch to the face and a power bomb and Punk is left flat on the canvas. Did Hunter know that he’d be there, doesn’t look like.

We all know what would happen next. Yup there’s Del Rio, briefcase and all, cashing in to become champion.

A solid match ruined by the ending in my opinion. Still worth 4.5/5

Raw will certainly have some questions to answer.

A few other things to mention:

Stephanie, what was her role in all of this? Great to see her and I’m hoping that it brings in a good story, perhaps another corporation? Or she’s looking after her father’s interests? What is Nash’s role? Working with Del Rio?

WHY were there so many adverts? I get the one for 7/11 but its unusual to show film trailers unless it’s for a WWE film...well at least I don’t remember seeing many over the last 10 years.

Overall a great PPV and worth a solid 7.5 out of 10 for me.

As always would love to hear your views, hit that comment button and let’s talk!

Welcome!

Hiya,

I'm Tinks, and this is my wrestling blog which is going to be mainly predictions and reviews of Pay Per Views, bits of Raw and Smackdown thrown in for a good measure and hell if we hear some interesting rumours then we'll talk about those too.

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