The Good, The Bad & The Ugly - 25th July WWE Raw

The first Raw of the "Triple H" era

The Good

• John Cena vs. Rey Mysterio
  All the people who say John Cena can't wrestle, John Cena only has 5 moves etc. were once again proved wrong tonight, as they were at Money In The Bank.  Obviously haters will continue to hate, and in a way it is good because it's one of the driving forces in the Punk/Cena angle - but this match was amazing for a TV match and was a much more exciting affair than the 1st title match of the evening.  Mysterio locking in the STF will probably be the most memorable moment, but overall the match was well worked as you would expect from these two top stars.

• CM Punk Appears
  This was an awesome moment and unexpected.  I think if anyone was expecting a swerve at the end, it would have been Del Rio cashing in his Money In The Bank briefcase and I doubt many saw this coming, even with Punk interrupting the Triple H press conference earlier in the week.  I didn't like the theme tune change, but having read that it was his original music in ROH it seemed like a cool idea.  'Cult of Personality' definitely fits the character of CM Punk.  I think Punk has arrived at the point where he can truly consider himself on the top level of stars now, along with John Cena and Randy Orton - the only other 2 current members of the WWE roster I consider to be at that top level.  And when are they going to put that white shirt on WWEshop.com?  I need it!

• Triple H
  I'm still undecided on whether it is a good move to have Triple H as the new on-air authority figure, but I'm tilted more towards it being a good thing right now.  The fact he is going to be on Smackdown as well this week is good too, as I'm sick of seeing Smackdown get the B-show treatment.  If you treat it like a B-Show, fans will think of it as a B-Show and stop watching.  The comedy bits with R-Truth were particularly funny and Michael Cole was awesome as usual with his delivery.

• Michael Cole
  While I'm a big fan of Michael Cole, I feel his time on commentary has run its course and it's time to move on.  Hopefully they transition him into a full time comedy-wrestler act, because he could actually have some engaging lower-card feuds and put guys like Zack Ryder over with his promo skills.  The main event was much better without Cole commentating on it and felt much more like a sport than an entertainment show, which is the difference between J.R. and Cole.  I also thought Cole coming out to King of Kings was hysterical.

• Dolph Ziggler
  I loved the Ziggler theme tune already, but this new remix with the guitar solo included is truly "perfection" for his character.  I loved Ziggler's ad-libbing, but I didn't really get the "follow that" bit.  Is that referring to Twitter?  I love seeing the sleeper come back as his finisher too, the Zigzag thing seemed ineffective to me.

The Bad

• The Miz vs. Rey Mysterio
  This match didn't really deliver and was definitely overshadowed by the later main event.  The fact it was on first

• Kofi Kingston vs. Alberto Del Rio
  I understand why this needed to happen, since Del Rio lost to a mid-card guy last week and needed to regain his heat, but it isn't a match that should have been hyped throughout the show as if it was something special.

• John Morrison's Return
  I can't stand the guy, he's so dull and pointless and has had enough chances to prove himself and never done so.  The only good thing that could come out of this feud is if R-Truth gets more mic time (and Morrison hopefully gets none).

The Ugly

• Rey Mysterio's Champagne Celebration
  This champagne celebration after Mysterio winning the WWE title was so lame and corny - it made Rey look like a clown who only hangs around with NXT jobbers.  I didn't even know half the guys' names in the background since I haven't watched that show since the classic 3rd season.

• That guy from the beer adverts tattooing one of the Bella Twins
  I got a laugh out of it, but still.. it brought back dark memories of the celebrity guest GM days of yesteryear.

Overall Rating and Summary
Until the CM Punk reveal at the end of the show this felt like a disappointing Raw, but in retrospect it was pretty good.  I had negative feelings for most of the show because I didn't see the Punk reveal coming after the title match and felt like things had returned back to normal with them putting out a thoughtless, campy Raw - but more things made sense in the end and storylines developed further.  Setting up Cena-Punk II at Summerslam is awesome and I like the idea of them both holding a different title belt.  Raw is doing a great job at getting you to come back next week and see what happens at the moment and is rewarding hardcore fans who invest time in the product.
Mark: 7/10

How I Would Book John Cena vs. CM Punk at Money In The Bank, or what I think is going to happen

Since CM Punk's shoot-style promo on Raw a couple of weeks ago, the internet has been buzzing over the forthcoming match between John Cena and CM Punk for the WWE title.  If you've been living under a rock, the jist of it is that CM Punk's contract with WWE is due to expire and his final match will take place at Money In The Bank for the WWE title.  The big stipulation here is that Cena will be "fired" if he loses and Punk has claimed he will leave the company with the belt and namedropped 2 small-fry promotions, ROH and NJPW, along with a bunch of other guys like Colt Cabana to get the smarks wetting themselves.  So far, so good, but WWE is known to fuck up these hot angles (see Nexus), so I'm gonna help them out by giving them some free advice on how to book this epic feud of feuds.  Well, it's sort of a prediction too.

Plenty of insider references have been mentioned by all 3 men involved in the angle - Punk, Cena and Vince, and a lot has been made of the difference between the two opponents - Punk being the outside and Cena being the company guy.  Punk calling John Cena not the Boston Red Sox but the "New York Yankees", the "dynasty" and "everything that you hate" was a genius touch to set apart the difference between the two guys.

But there is one thing that both wrestlers share in common: they both hate The Rock.  Punk has shot out at the Rock legitimately through Twitter and on TV, referring to his "bad Disney movies", disrespectfully calling him "Dwayne" as Cena often does, as well as putting over Cena by comparing him to The Rock at a house show, basically calling out Rock for not being a wrestler, but an actor - just like Cena does.  But where am I going with this, you may be asking yourself..

The fact that this match is at Money In The Bank is no coincidence.  They could've ran this angle at any time in the past few months and I don't buy that Punk's contract is legitimately ending that very night.  This angle must have been planned long in advance, but there are too many things that add up to say this isn't something they've just thought up on the spot (which they often do), such as the PPV being in Chicago and the last Raw before it being in Cena's hometown of Boston.  Remember, in the weeks prior to this, Punk had kept hinting something "big" was coming, which means they knew well in advance what they were doing.



What I predict will happen in the finale is CM Punk will win the WWE title clean over John Cena to the adulation of his hometown crowd.  They have played up the fact this is Punk's hometown on Raw, something they wouldn't usually do as they try to keep Cena from taking a beating from the fans as much as possible. The Miz, accompanied by Vince, will come out and cash in the Money In The Bank contract and become a two time WWE champ.  But this is where the whole angle begins, rather than ends.

The following night on Raw I expect Vince to dress down Cena and go ahead and "fire" him for losing the WWE title to CM Punk and putting the WWE in jeapordy.  Cena will then be kayfabe out of contract, much like CM Punk and The Miz will be Vince's new golden boy.  There are things that I have seen hints of to make me believe that this is the plan - such as Cena putting Miz over as a guy who works hard for the WWE brand on his Twitter account.  Many believe Alberto Del Rio will win the match, but I think him becoming #1 contender on the 4th July Raw was a red herring to make you forget about The Miz.

This is where things get interesting, as one thing that has been buried in this whole feud is the fact that CM Punk is the leader of Nexus.  Nothing has been made clear about what is going to happen after Punk leaves and Nexus are left to fend for themselves and they haven't referred to it once on WWE television.  The history of Cena and Nexus is also no secret.  Bring up the Nexus angle and one immediately thinks of the 6-month feud between the faction and him.  Why am I mentioning Nexus though?  Because I believe that Cena will become not a heel, but an edgier outsider anti-WWE character and either join forces with CM Punk, a guy who despite their war of words, have shown one another some kind of mutual respect - and/or he will become the new leader of Nexus, who will return to being a strong anti-WWE faction like they originally were.

This whole angle goes back to what I mentioned earlier, which is The Rock.  Everyone knows Cena will get booed out of the building at Wrestlemania.  Despite the fact Cena cut some great promos and Rock's were not up to his high standards in their mini-feud pre-Wrestlemania, Rock still won over the majority of the fans and overshadowed the main event of Wrestlemania, John Cena vs. The Miz.  Having not been seen in a WWE ring for 7 years, it was understandable that fans would go crazy for his return, but The Rock harmed Cena even more than he would have by directly targeting him in his opening promo.  The anti-Cena bridgade has become even more vocal than ever since that moment and it will be the loudest it has ever been since the ECW One Night Stand in Chicago - by design!

So WWE have realised they need to do something about the Cena character, while still not effecting merchandise sales on his "fruity pebbles" t-shirts.  Instead of being fully heel, as leader of Nexus, Cena could remain in-character but feel hurt and bitter about how Vince treated him after working hard for years to put the WWE brand over (as he has mentioned in all the promos leading up to the PPV).  Now Vince has a new posterchild and has disposed of Cena, he feels betrayed that Vince only ever saw dollar signs in him.  He and Punk can agree with each other that Rock was only brought back for the money.  Here, Miz will be the full-blown heel and the anti-Cena fans will naturally begin to side with Cena and/or CM Punk as the outsider anti-heroes.  This angle can carry on easily til Wrestlemania, with Cena inevitably winning the WWE championship back before then and putting it on the line against The Rock.

Come Wrestlemania, the difference then will be the crowd will more likely be a hot-crowd and give Cena less of a bad time than they would if the worst of the worst happens on Sunday: Cena wins the belt and holds it all the way to Wrestlemania.  Let's hope they don't fuck it up this time!

Opening Promo

This is probably my 50th ever attempt at writing a blog, but this time I'm determined to follow through with it and make it a smash hit.  The basic idea is this: I love watching wrestling and I love to chat shit about it... that's it.  Simple, concise and effective.

But this won't be your typical run-of-the-mill wrestling blog.  I hate most other wrestling blogs, especially amateur ones, because they're so negative and critical.  That is what is wrong with the whole internet wrestling community these days - y'all can't just enjoy some good old fashioned wrasslin' without bitching about something.

I had a subscription to Wrestling Observer for about a month, but it wasn't worth the dollars I parted with, because all I got was Bryan Alvarez and Dave Meltzer telling me how much wrestling sucks and MMA rules.  I get that negativity sells, but don't completely downplay the product you cover, otherwise you'll kill off your audience. Your site is called "Wrestling" Observer for a reason, so either change the name or stop moaning.

So in short, I aim to bring some of the joy back into watching wrestling by posting blogs that will be humourous, positive - not that I'm ruling out negativity entirely, cause that shit sells.  In fact, this debut post itself is highly negative and somewhat inflammatory.. but thats because I'm here to challenge your current perceptions and misconceptions.. It's all because I'm a passionate fella and in time you will see me sing praise and spew vitriol in equal amount - but you'll like it all because it's original and I'm here to shake things up.. My name is Washington David and this is No Smark Chicks!  Now hit my fuckin' music.. *drops mic*