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.
