Official Raw/Smackdown Aftermath, Ratings and Review Thread

[It's...Baylariat!]

The entire show was great. Even with the slow start from Mark Cuban, he's going to give the WWE some serious publicity. Guess who's featured during the beginning montage of Sportscenter... exactly.

The matches were great. It had an old school feel to it. Having Carlito come out, do a clean job to Cena, then having Legacy beat on Primo and Evan Bourne without them looking terrible. What a concept. Elevating talent and putting over who needs to be. Something I'd have never thought would be done in the WWE again.

Also, Cuban was one of the best non wrestling hosts since the Celebrity guest host was installed on Raw. And he took a pretty sick spot, too.

And speaking of Sheamus, he really elevated his game tonight. Cena provoked him to do a great job and despite his broken English/Irish, he got his point across. He's tough, mean, and doesn't have to pin Cena to win, which makes this match intriguing. Cena's brought up his game, too. At least he acknowledges that some people hate him.

And the Miz/Mark Henry match was great, too. Did you see the crowd when he had Miz ready for the World's Strongest Slam? They nearly exploded...but alas, Miz needs to keep the belt for a bit. The end result was satisfying to me and to most of the crowd. Miz is over. Don't want to kill that momentum just yet.

Something tells me that DX/Jerishow's going to be better than we all thought it would be. Tables, ladders, and chairs. This is one of the many matches that have me guessing as to who could win. I hope Jerishow wins, just to see Jericho on Raw.

Overall, this Raw was really good. I guess the WWE's stepping it's game up to try to show TNA that they can't hang with them. Something tells me we're going to see a lot of really good shows in the future. Can't wait, either.

 

[Kenny Powers]

I know I've been negative nancy on the WWE, but this was was truly an abomination. It's a shame to since they were coming of a strong PPV. I'm not going to go into much detail about Dennis Miller or the Slammy Awards since there are separate threads for that.

I will say that the whole Slammy Awards concept needs to be nixed. I don't know how they did it last year if it was on WWE.com. If they do it next year, its needs to either be done like it was 10 years ago, or not done at all. Do it online, but don't waste time on Raw with bullshit categories and even more bullshit winners.

As far as Miller goes, beyond terrible. I thought I was watching the Republican National Convention.When did he become such a right wing conservative? and why did he think a wrestling audience would find his banter amusing? I don't think all wrestling fans hate Obama and listen to Fox News, but that shouldn't be talked about on a wrestling show anyways. I watch Bill Maher, but even I wouldn't want him hosting a wrestling show talking about atheism, weed, and Sarah Palin's bush.

That might actually be amusing, but not for Raw. There were tons of matches but they only lasted maybe 2 minutes if that. The main event although short, was the only good match on the 3 hour show. Everything was rushed. I would be surprised if there was even 20 minutes of wrestling on Raw last night.

The most shocking thing to occur all year if not years in WWE, was Sheamus winning the WWE title. What do they do to capitalize? keep him off the show, except win he wins the breakout star of the year. I think Big Dick Johnson had more mic time then Sheamus. There were no new feuds established, no good matches, horrendous jokes, and eye gouging segments.

People have said this was the worst Raw in 15 years. If Mantaur and Papa Shango came to the ring, it pretty much could have been. Hopefully the Raw audience had a better time then us.

 

[Ambiguous Turd]

Vince mine as well just roll out the Red Carpet for TNA on the 4th with programming like this.

Truly one of the worst Raw's of the decade. It has to be in the Top 15 or so. Everything went wrong.

Miller was an awful host. Not funny in the slightest and none of the audience live audience found him humorous either, which translated over to TV as such.

The audience was obviously not pleased with the concept of the Slammy Awards being done for Raw. The show was too long, and it wasn't filled with enough excitement for them to deliver.

The Slammys should be treated like a Hall of Fame event like it used to. Fans have the expectation that it is going to be different, and have something to look forward to as far as seeing a completely unique event with superstars out of their element in a semi-kayfabe, semi-shoot environment.

When fans go to Raw, they expect action, and the WWE failed to deliver.

Fans were not in the mood for Vince McMahon and Dennis Miller's political commentary, which brought the show down even more, given the frequency it was done.

The new WWE champion not even getting more than 3 minutes on a 3 hour broadcast! Are you kidding me?

The DX crap with Hornswoggle in the back wasn't even that bad tonight, but still was just something worse to add to every other thing wrong with this show.

CM Punk being squashed on Raw ... again, by Cena.

The stuff with Jericho was ridiculous, because I don't know if WWE feels that Jericho is a top Heel on Raw or something, but the crowd certainly didn't think so. They were dead quiet as he was being carted off. Jericho isn't a big enough player for the crowd to care about all that garbage they did with ushering him out of the arena. They simply did not care.

I can not say enough bad things about tonight's Raw. Just beyond awful. And I've checked a couple other forums, and the feelings are all mutual.

And the only way they can add some icing on the cake is to deliver us Little People's Court next week.

Gotta love that PG Era of WWE.

 

[Roark77]

The stuff with Jericho was ridiculous, because I don't know if WWE feels that Jericho is a top Heel on Raw or something, but the crowd certainly didn't think so. They were dead quiet as he was being carted off. Jericho isn't a big enough player for the crowd to care about all that garbage they did with ushering him out of the arena. They simply did not care.

What made no sense to me was that the guys that helped DX eject Jericho were mostly guys from Smackdown and ECW. After the talk about Jericho being forced to get off of Raw if he lost at TLC, it would have made far more sense if it was the Raw locker room that escorted him out instead of a mix of Smackdown and ECW talent. I could understand the guys on Raw being pissed at Jericho but Shelton and Christian didn't make much sense at all.

 

[X]

Yeah tonight's episode of Raw was for the most part completely terrible from start to finish. You brought up pretty much every point there was Sid, but the one I want to focus on in particular is the booking that the WWE showcased on tonight's episode.

CM Punk, a multiple time World Champion and one of your most over heels, should not be being fucking SQUASHED by John Cena in under two minutes and made to tap out like a bitch. Seriously, are the WWE purposely trying to kill Punk? He has been getting an incredible amount of heat since the summer but all he's done since "retiring" Jeff Hardy is job to 'Taker, and get into a feud with R-Truth. I don't mind the R-Truth feud so much as long as Punk is headed back to the main event soon. But seeing him job to Cena in under two minutes is just unacceptable, it completely buries the man. How the hell is a fan supposed to take Punk seriously if he fights Cena in the future knowing that he tapped out to Cena within two minutes in their last encounter? This could be a GREAT feud between these two men if the WWE had any sense in their booking, but instead we've seen it wasted on Raw twice, once a fairly good match-up that made both men look good, but tonight was just unacceptable.

I also really wish Vince McMahon would keep politics out of wrestling. I don't watch the WWE to see Dennis Miller crack a joke about Obama or the Democrats. We don't give a fuck about your politics, keep it to yourself, and just entertain us. By frequently showcasing their conservative bias the company is alienating parts of it's audience, they have to realize that. Politics and wrestling simply do not mix.

Every match was over or underbooked to death, the only match that could've been deemed as acceptable was the main event, and even that was mediocre simply because we've seen Cena and Orton wrestle about a thousand times and it's never been interesting.

And what about that extended infomercial? Oops, I meant DX promo. Seriously, that was the most blatant shilling I've ever seen in my life, atleast before they used to crack jokes at it and kind of shill ironically, but now they just don't even care, putting DX into pointless skits that might as well be commercials for WWE action figures or DX merchandise. Seriously, a fucking DX snuggie? Stop wasting TEN MINUTES on this bullshit when every single match on the show has been about twenty seconds long.

Sheamus getting three minutes on the show? Are you kidding me? How the hell are we supposed to take this man seriously if all he ever does is walk around not getting into confrontations with anyone? He got some heat atleast for the first time in his career, though not very much. The fact that the world champion got only three minutes really speaks volumes to the future booking. The WWE is basically tellilng their fans "Hey, this Sheamus guy? Yeah, he's going to be losing that belt very, very soon. So don't worry about him."

Overall just a shit Raw from start to finish with only a moment or two of humor or entertainment. What a total letdown after the excellent PPV on Sunday night.

 

[Ambiguous Turd]

What made no sense to me was that the guys that helped DX eject Jericho were mostly guys from Smackdown and ECW. After the talk about Jericho being forced to get off of Raw if he lost at TLC, it would have made far more sense if it was the Raw locker room that escorted him out instead of a mix of Smackdown and ECW talent. I could understand the guys on Raw being pissed at Jericho but Shelton and Christian didn't make much sense at all.

That was awful booking, I agree because it looked extremely out of place.

But, I can guarantee you that was done, just to give those guys a paycheck. They were there anyway, so WWE just gave them some TV time, and some money for the actual appearance.

 

[MikeKillam]

So, I took three hours, watched Raw and typed up this long review of the whole thing. But then I went back and looked at it, and realized that it wasn't worth posting. Seven matches, all under five minutes, and they all sucked. Out of 14 divas, 2 got in the ring, and that's probably a good thing. Morrison and Miz in one ring and they keep it under three minutes and give them zero time to work together. Terrible. If you have talent, use it.

Tonights show was an awards show with a few matches to keep things going. The show should never be about the awards. It should be a wrestling show with awards in between to keep things going. I'm torn because the promos were all pretty decent tonight. It was a really entertaining episode, with no good wrestling. The only match that was any good was Orton vs. Cena, and we've seen that five hundred times already. They could have done without Christain and gang vs. the Roundtable. They could have done without both of the qualifying matches. They could have given the new WWE Champion a match... Even if I hate him. They could have given Morrison, Kofi Kingston, and Jericho some actually time.

I get it, they're going to shove Sheamus down our throats until the ratings won't let them anymore. Whatever. But he's still not credible. I can get over hating a guy. I can get over him not having any charisma. But for god's sake, make him credible.

DX look stupid. They are two legends, former World Champions, that are dressed in brightly colored merch, chasing a midget, holding titles they don't need. THey could take a giant dump on the tag titles, and it wouldn't matter. They're going into the Hall of Fame and nothign they can do (short of quitting and going to TNA) will ever change that.

Points of Interest:
HBK challenges the Undertaker to Round II at Wrestlemania 26. Bret Hart was mentioned on WWE programming. Vince insulted a live crowd for being dead (WORST THING YOU CAN DO!). Undertaker lost in four minutes by countout. CM Punk was listed as a possible superstar of the year and than squashed by Cena. Vince took credit for making the guest host thing, when it was actually Donald Trump. John Cena is the Superstar of the Year. Did he REALLY need it? "This is a new John Cena." No, no it's not. Just because he lost doesn't make him any different. It makes WWE writers stupid for giving the belt to Sheamus.

Overall, this was a fun entertaining night. But it wasn't for any of the matches. THe promos were good, the guest host was good, and Bret Hart and HBK/Taker II were both teased. It was a great promo night, and a terrible wrestling night. Honestly, I give it a 3/10 for wrestling and a 8/10 for promos...

 

[Kenny Powers]

I almost forgot to comment on the nail in the coffin as far as the show went last night was Big Dick Johnson. I was amused that he was actually given a mic, sad thing was he had more time then the new WWE Champion. The mention of the troops and Bret Hart was the only applause Miller received. WWE teasing Bret Hart coming back is as old and tired as Vince's ego. I expect to see Hogan wrestle Austin as Wrestlemania before we see Hart again.

Even if we do seem him, will his one time appearance really make up for horrible booking and non creativity? I don't think so. After Big Dick Johnson, Lillian's singing, and DX's snuggie, I'm ready for another Black Machismo Invitational Tournament. God help wrestling fans. January 4th, you're my only friend.

Here is memo for the WWE. I know they have to sell merchandise during the busiest shopping holiday of the year, but why not just have 20 second DX holiday commercials instead of using 10 or 20 minutes of air time plugging merchandise. I would rather seen a karate fighters tournament with Doc Hendrix. That brings me back.

 

[Toroc102]

What can I doexcept to agree, tonights show was TERRIBLE, Dennis Miller's ass had no place on Raw and he looked like he hated it, the fans, and the concept and on top of that he left early.

CM Punk not just losing but getting FUCKING SQUASHED killed the night for me, I COULD NOT BELIEVE IT.

Also, and this really doesn't have too much to do with the WWE imo, THAT CROWD DID FUCKING SUCK and I think they we're going to suck no matter what, no more shows in Corpus CHristy damn it because they popped for like 2 people all night.

You know what, if they can show Big Dick Johnson's fat disgusting ass in a G-String on television I want so see some fucking Bra and Panties matches. They had 14 fucking Divas in Evening Gowns tonight dammit and they show him in a G-String? That was my breaking point, I pretty much fastforwarded through the rest of the show. The WWE has completely let me down. This was a post PPV show dammit, there were so many things to address.

 

[JGlass]

I can not agree any more with you guys. Last night's episode of RAW was terrible. I blame Dennis Miller, Vince McMahon, the announce team, and the audience. The wrestling itself was mediocre, though some matches were terrible, including one that had a lot of potential to be quite good in the 6 man tag match.

A few notes...

I don't know if the crowd killed Dennis Miller or Dennis Miller killed the crowd, but neither had anything going for them last night. The crowd seemed to react to nothing, especially Dennis Miller who couldn't buy a laugh. He threw everything he had out, liberal jokes, conservative jokes (not the best move in TEXAS), pop culture jokes, even a couple vulgar jokes, but dry comedy like his has no place in the WWE. The crowd itself sucked ass, they didn't have any really outstanding reactions, though I did turn the TV off before the Cena-Orton match (not because I was disgusted with the programming but because I needed to study, though the show WAS pretty damn awful).

The announce team was also terrible. I think they might have been a little drunk because they kept on making inside jokes that nobody got except for themselves. There was one point during a match... I think it was the divas match, where I literally had no idea what was going on because they were all just laughing. It was like all three of them were drunk Dusty Rhodes.

My favorite part of last night was having Christian bring out Kane and Khali. When I heard Kane's music hit and saw the explosion I thought, "Oh sweet, brothers of destruction." Then I saw Khali and realized that the match was now going to suck. Khali did see some good ring time though... if by good ring time you mean one Khali chop and a pin. The ending was pathetic, which brings me to my next point.

The endings of the matches were the worst. The divas tag match was abysmal and had one diva from each team in the ring, horrible. The 6 man tag would have been good had it not ended on a single kick to the head from Yoshi Tatsu, that sucked. The Orton-Undertaker bout ended with a count out that was not suspenseful at all. If you didn't realize Orton was going to hop back in the ring at 9, get your brain checked. Even the Cena-Punk match had a weak ending. My opinion is either tap out to a submission really quickly, or don't tap at all. Long submissions kill crowd reaction.

Overall, last nights show was a bomb. Hopefully, the WWE's 3 hour show in November will be the complete opposite of last nights. Otherwise, the scoreboard will read TNA and Hulk Hogan 1, WWE and Vince McMahon -12

 

[Belladonna29]

Ok, some random thoughts and questions on Raw last night:

• Did someone NOT tell Dennis Miller beforehand that the WWE is now PG and the average person in the audience is a child, and therefore would not get/have interest in whatever political jokes he was going to spew?
  
  
• I thought the show being 3 hours would guarantee a series of matches that were at at least 5-10 minutes long, but it felt like the average match was 3 minutes, IF THAT? Was I wrong here?
  
  
• I'm sure some DX fans are going to claim that the bait-and-switch they did with Jericho and Show was hilarious to them, but considering how bad the show had be going, a good match between those 4 would have evened out some of the crappiness of the show, but alas, it wasn't happening.
  
  
• I'm having a hard time in general understanding the appeal of DX and Hornswoggle. I just don't find them funny and quite frankly, I remember what I liked when I was 10 years old, and this would probably seems lame to be back then, so someone help me out. Why are DX and/or Hornsswoggle funny, at all?
  
  
• And in relation to that, why was Jericho trespassing just cause he was now officially a SD superstar without the titles, when on 3 hours shows, everyone is invited from all brands anyway? I mean, a bunch of people from SD threw Jericho out the building! Why weren't those guys trespassing. That felt pretty lazy of the writers (and it wasn't the only thing). Jericho no longer being on Raw is going to hurt, but if it means he's back on in World Title hunt on SD, then that's fine.
  
  
• If the Divas are going to always wrestle matches that are less then 3 minutes, maybe the WWE should consider just turning them all the sucky ones into valets and letting chicks who can actually pull a decent match together go to TNA so they can call themselves wrestlers and it not seem like a joke.
  
  
• Who did CM Punk piss off. I know the Slammys aren't really that important, but I thought he deserved Superstar of the Year, but instead, he loses to SuperCena in basically a squash match. CM Punk, 3 time World Champion, who was in a series a great matches this year; who had the most important and interesting heel turn this year; who exiled beloved Jeff Hardy to the hysterical dismay of emo tweens everywhere, and contributed to the awesome run SD had during the late-spring to mid-fall, was squashed by Cena so were could see Cena vs Orton part 245, with Cena predictably Hulking-up and winning in the end. Ugh.

I really hope TNA puts forth the great shows on Jan. 4th, because with the way Raw have been lately, it's like they want some competition. Watching the trash tv Impact last week and then this has confirmed that I'd rather watch a bad episode of Impact than Raw. And considering how many more resources the WWE has compared to TNA, that is NOT good. The only good thing to come out of this shows was HBK's challenge to the Undertaker and the foreshadowing of Bret coming back to host. Other than that, could have done without watching Raw.

 

[D-Man]

Ok, some random thoughts and questions on Raw last night:

[*]Did someone NOT tell Dennis Miller beforehand that the WWE is now PG and the average person in the audience is a child, and therefore would not get/have interest in whatever political jokes he was going to spew?

THIS^^^ I couldn't agree more with. But not just because the pro-wrestling audience has a majority of children in its audience, but besides the aupport for the troops overseas, wrestling fans haven't always been well-versed in political comedy, since they don't understand politics.

I had a feeling going into this show that Dennis Miller hosting was going to be a train wreck. Let's face it, the guy is BRILLIANT. But he's also light years ahead of every wrestling fan in terms of intellectuality and the caliber of his comedy.

[*]I thought the show being 3 hours would guarantee a series of matches that were at at least 5-10 minutes long, but it felt like the average match was 3 minutes, IF THAT? Was I wrong here?

Another great point. The matches were entirely too short. Considering that most of the matches were easily PPV caliber, you'd think the WWE would give them more than 3-4 minutes for a few of them. Especially with the CM Punk/John Cena match, but that's a different discussion in itself.

[*]I'm sure some DX fans are going to claim that the bait-and-switch they did with Jericho and Show was hilarious to them, but considering how bad the show had be going, a good match between those 4 would have evened out some of the crappiness of the show, but alas, it wasn't happening.

But, I did find entertainment out of the outcome of the JeriShow vs. DX rematch. I think it went perfectly with DX's brand of humor and was the perfect outcome for the end of JeriShow.

[*]I'm having a hard time in general understanding the appeal of DX and Hornswoggle. I just don't find them funny and quite frankly, I remember what I liked when I was 10 years old, and this would probably seems lame to be back then, so someone help me out. Why are DX and/or Hornsswoggle funny, at all?

Call me crazy, but I'm starting to get it. Last night's segment made me laugh a little bit. I mean, whether we like it or not, kids love little people. And you could hear the crowd's reaction in the background as the segment unfolded. Knowing that the WWE feeds their segments off crowd reaction, there is no denying that Hornswoggle is actually entertaining the majority of the people out there. Granted, the majority is children and parents and the minority is probably the IWC and smarks, but majority rules here.

[*]And in relation to that, why was Jericho trespassing just cause he was now officially a SD superstar without the titles, when on 3 hours shows, everyone is invited from all brands anyway? I mean, a bunch of people from SD threw Jericho out the building! Why weren't those guys trespassing. That felt pretty lazy of the writers (and it wasn't the only thing). Jericho no longer being on Raw is going to hurt, but if it means he's back on in World Title hunt on SD, then that's fine.

I think you're over-thinking this one a little bit. DX just wanted to be portrayed as two me that got the best of the egotistical Chris Jericho. I doubt that the majority of the audience put this segment under the microscope the way you did here.

[*]If the Divas are going to always wrestle matches that are less then 3 minutes, maybe the WWE should consider just turning them all the sucky ones into valets and letting chicks who can actually pull a decent match together go to TNA so they can call themselves wrestlers and it not seem like a joke.

BINGO. I couldn't agree more. Having the girls play dress up only to walk out to the ring, be falsely advertised to wrestle a match, and take their shoes off as their only form of action in the match is just plain stupid. Even a child can see the disappointment in a match like that. Horrific booking and a terrible way to give the girls face-time. There are a billion other ways they could be utilized if they're not going to wrestle. The WWE needs to wake up and use them.

On these forums, I'm known as a man that spreads a positive message to all of the IWC. However, last night's show made me embarrassed to be a wrestling fan. It was nothing more than a play on an awards show that was poorly executed from the moment that Dennis Miller cracked his first joke and R-Truth forgot his lines during the first awards segment. I wish I could stricken the entire night from my memory banks. For shame, WWE...

 

[LongHessa]

Last nite was the most hideous RAW i've seen in years, literally. Everything was flat. The booking was terrible. Sheamus pulls off the biggest upset in WWE history and is granted a two minute promo on a three hour show???? His face should have been all over RAW. The only thing remotly good about last nites show was when Miller mentioned the Hitman, other than that.....oh my god. I will never forgive Vince or the WWE for taking three hours of my life watching the god awful RAW.

 

[Serious Mozzarella]

I initially thought the Raw was going to be pretty good - it started off well enough. Dennis Miller, being the obnoxious fool that he is, was pretty funny, even though I knew right off the bat this his jokes were way above the crowd. As many others have pointed out, people don't tune into wrestling to hear Vince and Dennis' political commentary. Especially since their viewers are mostly liberal students.

Then the segments just got worse and worse. I don't know why DX keeps doing these stupid segments with Hornswoggle. This isn't the same DX that we know and love. Those guys were edgy, breaking rules, being absolutely and hilariously immature. Now they're chasing around a midget, suing a leprechaun, and trying to sell merchandise. They don't even look like legendary wrestlers, let alone a threatening force, so it makes no sense to me that they hold the Unified Tag-Team titles. They don't even wear the belts.

Jericho should have had one last match on Raw. Though I wasn't surprised at last night's terrible booking that they set him up to lose without even lifting a hand.

CM Punk, a holder of the Heavyweight champion multiple times, tapped out to Cena in under two minutes. I'm completely speechless.

14 diva tag match. Two divas wrestled. Match ended in two minutes. Speechless.

I just don't know what Vince is doing. Surely he must have heard that TNA has decided to move to Mondays. They need to step up, and quick. But as of now, I have no interest in next week's Raw.

EDIT: I forgot to mention Matt Striker on the announce team. This dude was last night's saving grace. He needs to be traded to Raw. Though I'm not sure it was as funny to the regular viewer as he was to the IWC, but regardless, it was nice to see a little Heel commentary again.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

I thought that the first hour or so of the show was pretty good, but it just started to go downhill from there. This is the weakest Raw the WWE has put on in a while and it really could have been a great show. Every match that was booked for the show served little to no purpose at all and barely lasted 3 or 4 minutes. I was hoping for a night of good, solid wrestling and some reall fall out from the TLC ppv and we never really got either one.

I was especially pissed at the Cena/Punk and DX/JeriShow matches. CM Punk basically got ass raped by John Cena and was made to look weak as hell. And the whole thing with DX...just fucking pathetic, absolutely fucking pathetic. The WWE should be ashamed of themselves because they could have put on a MUCH MUCH better show than that. In my opinion, this is probably the worst Raw of at least the second half of 2009. Most of the content in the second or third hours of the show wiped out any positives achieved in the first one. I very much the WWE decides to step up their game over the next few weeks. Anymore Raw's like last night and I'm definitely switching over to Impact January 4th.

 

[robwylde90]

3 Points to be addressed coming out of last nights Raw :

1) Randy Orton not winning superstar of the year was a disgrace.
2) Sheamus has won the WWE title but is still firmly on the way to becoming a footnote in WWE history.
3) Matt Striker = Commentary gold.

1) 2009 has been the year of Orton. A royal rumble win, headlining WM, 3 WWE title wins, the best rivalry of the year with Cena, the best heel in WWE as a whole and some fantastic matches to boot. Randy Orton should have been hands down, Superstar of the year. But no, let's instead drag out the little known "Cena can't lose 2 nights in a row" rule. Why not just have Orton be awarded the slammy and have Cena beat some other monster to reestablish that he is indeed Superman's long lost brother? No, let's take Orton's achievements for the year and piss all over them by letting cena basically squash him. This has to be the most that WWE has disgusted me for quite some time and that's saying something.

2) Now on to Sheamus. Not only did they make Sheamus' title win look like an absolute fluke, but after having won the WWE title in record time and going over the WWE's top guy in controversial fashion , but then he gets about 10 seconds of screen time consisting of one generic promo and standing at the top of the ramp? I was absolutely dumbfounded by this move. How are we ment to take a young star seriously if even after winning the top title, he doesn't even get any decent exposure with his attained title? Not that it matters, Cena will probably win the title back sooner rather than later and if he doesn't he'll most likely lose by countout after slipping on a banana peel, and then go on to squash the entire WWE roster the next night.

3) Please, please, please get rid of Michael Cole and get Matt Striker onto WWE Raw. Striker and Lawler have better chemistry together after 2 nights of commentating than Cole and lawler have had after 18 months. The king and Striker are a throwback to old school heel and face commentators and are a far better duo. Oh, and is "Oh My" really ment to be an original catchphrase? lolx100

If Monday night Raw doesn't move in a different direction soon and not just feign one then come the 4th of January I'll be one of the many fans wanting to stick it to them by watching Hulk Hogan debut on TNA rather than watching the John Cena show.

 

[VKO]

I can describe Raw in one word from this week. Dissapointment. Whenever there is a three hour Raw it means you should expect something big to mark the event since it differs from the traditional two hour show. This past Monday that was not the case. Add in the fact that it was the Slammy Awards and it still sucked and you realize why Raw was so dissapointing. First off all of the matches were incredibly short aside from the main event which makes me wonder why the show was three hours. I guess it was to put focus on the slammys. Which were all fails except tag team of the year and extreme moment of the year. Seriously why did Cena win superstar of the year. Why are we going to have to sit through an undefeated streak of Cenas until he inevitably wins the title back from Sheamus. Orton was much more deserving of the award so was Punk or Undertaker take your pick. Cena did not have a special year at all in comparison to other years he has had. Just terrible booking,terrible matches,terrible guest host,terrible everything. The one positive people took from this show was the foreshadowing of Taker/HBK 2 at Wrestlemania. Which I don't wanna see again. What else could they do? It will do nothing but ruin the mystique the first one had.

 

[MizMark]

Right, WTF was this weeks raw?

Postives first -

1, Swagger v. Cena - They had a quality match on Raw earlier this year, and this one was pretty good too with Swagger getting alot of offence in, and coming out of it looking strong. Hopefully WWE will follow up on this nicely for Swagger.

2, Orton + Legacy v. Kingston, Henry + Bourne - Good match with back and forth action.

3, Another Bret Hart tease

4, Jericho impersonating Santa and then Jeri Show beating up a midget - Some pay back for the other awful segments. Hunters line - "You know what I want for xmas? I want to squash him" - Hilarious.

Negatives -

1, Little Peoples Court - Seriously, WTF was that?!?! AND if it wasn't bad enough, we have to sit through a 2 minute recap later in the show.

2, Tiger Woods spoof - It's safe to say that I wanted to pull my hair out watching that crap.

3, All of the fake santa spoofs back stage - Awful filler.

4, Hornswoggle becoming a member of DX - I officially HATE DX, and I hope they turn heel.

5, Raw ending with Hornswoggle joining DX - Did anybody watch Raw until it ended or had everyone turned it off by the time Horny came down?

Lawler summed the night up saying it was the most bizarre night at Raw. Crap might also be a good word to use too, Jerry.

 

[Midnight]

I'm going to go with the above as far as how I address my points. Positives first

1) 1st Tiger skit. Okay the first one was funny and a bit random. Damon is in the ring and you see the tiger come down. I found that a pretty good way to cut Damon off and segway into the 1st match.

2) Masters and Eve. I've always been a big fan of the couples/valets and it has been lost a bit lately. Bringing Eve and Masters together can maybe push Masters back into the midcard and create good storylines with Miz/Swagger.

3) Cena and Swagger. Another good match between the two. I want to see a full feud between the two sometime in 2010.

4) Kofi and crew vs Legacy. As usual these guys are putting up quality and I want them to keep it up.

Negatives.

1) Little Peoples Court. I tried hard to give this a chance. I did. I really and truly did. It sucked. The humor just wasn't there and it was just bad.

2) 2nd Tiger skit. When he appeared the second time, we knew what would happen. The first time was funny due to the sheer randomness, but the second was bad.

3) Hornswoggle being the "mascot" of DX. These two guys are going to Wrestlemania. They had such a good chance of shaking him off but it didn't happen. I'm going to put this on the "wait and see" plate, but I don't have many high expectations.

4) 1 real match in the first 45 minutes. A skit or 2 isn't bad, but come on 45 minutes in and you get the 6 man tag, and a 6 diva tag. Bad blocking WWE.

Nothing else but this show was worse than last weeks.

 

[Serious Mozzarella]

I honestly thought you couldn't get any worse than last week's Raw with Dennis Miller. Boy was I wrong.

Granted, the one thing I actually expected pretty much ruined the show for me.

I honestly can't think of any pros for the show. Everything I would consider a "pro" about this show has a negative attached to it to turn it right into a big fat neutral.

Starting out with Jack Swagger v. Cena, which actually was a pretty good match - Cena does a good job of making people look like worthy opponents without actually losing. The problem I have with this storyline is the same I had for Ric Flair's storyline. You already know Cena's going to win the match and every match right up until his title match which whomever actually has the title.

Legacy v. Kofi, Henry, and Bourne - A pretty good match. Sure it was entertaining, but it provided absolutely zero narrative to the feud between Orton and Kofi. Nothing happened between them last week either. I mean, this is basically a diva-style storyline, which is a feud between two people that exists solely in the ring.

Onto the cons - pretty much everything else in the show.

-Once again, we have a failure of a guest host - someone who knows nothing about professional wrestling and is crap on the mic to boot.

-The Santa thing was pointless. Nothing more needs to be said.

-I didn't get the Tiger Woods jokes until someone on the live discussion boards mentioned it. I didn't get the joke because I don't watch wrestling to hear Vince's commentary on celebrity news. It doesn't belong there. Even if it were funny, and it wasn't, it was weeks late.

-And last, but certainly not least, my main gripe with the show: the Little Peoples' Court segment. First off, it took up way, way, WAY too much time on the show. It was crappily done and completely unrealistic for something that's been built up for weeks. DX doing the same shameless plug joke week after week is getting old. It wasn't funny; in fact, it was borderline offensive, and I wouldn't be surprised to see major complaints reported from interest groups.

Anyway, it was a completely unfunny two-part segment that had nothing to do with wrestling, it never started out having anything to do with wrestling, and after the segment, it still never made a connection to wrestling. Did I forget and change the channel to daytime Comedy Central? Am I watching old MadTV sketches?

It wasn't only unfunny, it went on for a good 1/3 of the show, counting both parts as well as the recap, which was actually a reair of the entire thing. It's almost as if Vince decided he wanted to be cheeky and troll the entirety of the Internet Wrestling Community at the expense of the casual viewer. If anyone had turned wrestling on and saw this garbage, they would immediately turned it off. Wrestling? Nah, let's watch two old men laugh at little people for being little, something that's been offensive to people with the condition in the mainstream since the mid-90s. Yeah, that'll help our ratings.

Granted, at least this was hyped up, so its not as if I went into this show with high expectations. If I did, I probably would have switched over to TNA, so fortunately for the WWE, it didn't seem as bad as I thought it would be.

I would still put it up for worst segment in WWE history.

 

[Future World Champ]

HEY YO........Raw Review time......let's get to it.......

Intro is definately different. I'm mad they took out Foley.......that was the bump that defined the generation.

Tiger being beaten by a blonde with a golf club was hilarious. Right into a 6-woman tag match.....

Gail Kim/Melina/Kelly Kelly vs. Maryse/Alicia Fox/Jillian
Quick match. Gail Kim did most of the bumping in the match. She's too good for this women's division. I'd much rather see her in TNA where she can actually showcase her abilities instead of being a "Diva". Stupid Dixie Carter I give this match 1 star

Little People's Court Segment - Hunter and Shawn crawl under the ring and..........I can't continue..........6 minutes of FAIL with more to follow.

Legacy vs. Kofi/Mark Henry/Evan Bourne
Glad to see that they're still continuing this Orton/Kofi feud. They had the best match at TLC while being the only straight up 1 vs. 1 match on the card with no gimmick. Orton can still help make Kofi. Kofi will have a clean pinfall on Orton at a PPV during this feud.

Another D-X/Court Segment........another 8 minutes of fail........thats 14 minutes now wasted for those of you keeping score at home. 1/8th of the show. Hey Dixie Carter........wanna pull a 3.0 rating on 1/4? Put Hogan on TV when Hornswoggle is on screen.

Cena vs. Swagger
They had a good match last time they met on Raw. Lets see how this match goes. Good match, bad finish. Typical Cena match with him taking the brunt of the beating and hitting his 5 moves of doom spread throughout the match. Finish is very anti-climactic as Cena just put the STF on Swagger out of nowhere with Swagger tapping. I give this match 3 1/2 stars........would have gotten 4 if the finish was better.

Carlito vs. Chris Masters w/ Eve Torres
Food for thought, I'd love to see Eve Torres pose for Playboy. She's so fine. OK........the match. Quick match. Waste of TV time. Masters should not be a face and Carlito should be future endeavored. End of story. 1 star match.

Mae Young kisses Johnny Damon (GO YANKEES!). I knew this would happen when I first heard Mae Young was going to make an appearance. Still, it was funny seeing JOHNNY DAMON kissing Mae Young.

Sheamus vs. MVP
Another quick match. Cena comes out and challenges Sheamus to a rematch. Sheamus walks away. Wow. Time to rant. Sheamus is being booked like shit as champion. Sheamus beats Cena for the title in a shitty fashion and the next night at Raw, only gets 2 minutes of TV time. Now this week, he's walking away from Cena. Question, why did he even get the title if you're going to book him so weak? This was the biggest upset win of the year and WWE refuses to take advantage of the situation. Why not let Sheamus look strong by accepting a challenge from Cena for next week (which was the plan anyway) instead of making him look weak by having him basically run away from Cena...........UGH!

The Miz vs. Santino ClausMiz
HOW THE FUCK IS THIS ON AFTER THE SHEAMUS MATCH? WHY WAS THAT MATCH NOT MAIN EVENT? Santino is golden on the mic. Quick victory for the Miz tonight.

OMG.........A RECAP OF THE LITTLE PEOPLE'S COURT SEGMENT. DO WE REALLY NEED TO SEE THIS AGAIN? HOW HAS THIS GOTTEN MORE SCREEN TIME THAN THE WWE CHAMPION HAS IN THE LAST 2 WEEKS COMBINED?

Santa and Big Show Segment - Show asks Santa for Jericho to be back on Raw. Jericho is Santa and its obvious. HORNSWOGGLE IS OUT. OMG, ENOUGH ALREADY. Hornswoggle rips Santa's beard off and its revealed to be Jericho. Suddenly an enormous swarm of midgets appear from under the ring all wearing D-X gear. Big Show slams a midget and hands him to the refs. Jericho brings Hornswoggle into the ring. Hornswoggle tunes up the band and hits Sweet Shin Muic on Jericho. D-X comes out and cleans house. D-X makes Hornswoggle their official mascot.

Overall Grade - D

This weeks episode of Raw was ok at best. It was all about Santa Claus and midgets, things EVERY wrestling fan loves. Basically Miz vs. Santino Claus was the main event.........read that sentence again. Vince McMahon needs to stop babying John Cena and trying to protect him all the time because its killing angles. John Cena is an established star and can afford to look weak once in a while. Match of the Night goes to Swagger vs. Cena.

 

[Kenny Powers]

The six man tag and the Cena/Swagger match were the only 2 decent things good about Raw tonight. Why the hell does WWE have to be a comedy show? Do we really need half of Raw to be nothing but Santas and Little People? Not to mention the awful Tiger Woods guy getting beat by his wife. That's real family oriented entertainment WWE, lets glorify domestic violence! It wasn't even funny to begin with.

Next week, WWE can have Timbaland beat up Eve Torres like Rhianna. How exciting will that be. Sgt. Slaughter actually made advances toward Johnny Damon. How wrong is that. If it was Pat Patterson maybe it might be funny but Sgt.Slaughter? What's next Hacksaw Jim Duggan is a member of Al Qaeda?

Johnny Damon didn't help matters. What a warm reception he got. Why not just have him host the show in Boston and see what a "warm" response he gets there too. WWE really doesn't have a clue as far as guest hosts go. You want a host the crowd will cheer not boo. Not to mention the fact that the guy shouldn't be anywhere near a microphone.

The Little People's court was atrocious as we knew it would be. It lasted way too long. I was going to give it a chance if it lasted a few minutes, but half the first hour of the show? Then we have the last 10 minutes of the show recapping it and throwing Hornswoggle into DX. Maybe next week the show won't be revolved around Hornswoggle and DX, but I doubt it.

Sheamus vs. MVP put me to sleep. Sheamus does have a cool finishing move though. Swagger and Cena did a great job though. Hopefully Swagger won't be in Jobber land too much longer. The Miz does a great job too. Santino jobbing to everyone under the sun is getting old.

Next week we get to see the rematch for the championship. Cena vs. Sheamus. Hopefully it will be an actual match and not end in a DQ. Which is what I'm betting. Overall if it wasn't for the Little People's court, maybe Raw would of been alright tonight. It wasn't worst then last week, but it wasn't that much better.

I don't see how Bret Hart or anyone can make Raw a better product if they continue showing this garbage week in and week out.

 

[Baller]

Oh my god, where do I begin with this..... O yeah I turned the show before the first hour was up. I hate Johnny Damon considering I'm a Red Sox Fan, but that is besides the point.


Damon was awful on the mic as expected, as he could never handle press conferences very well.

Let's see how many comedic bits did they have in the first hour that wasn't funny

1. Tiger Woods spoof = Unoriginal at this point and it wasn't funny as it was uncalled for. Thats 2 weeks in a row the WWE has done a spoof on a celebrity, last week being Kanye West.

2. Little Peoples Court - Terrible in just one word. As some one mentioned before 14 minutes of garbage comedy that isn't funny. Did anybody tell Vince McMahon this is a wrestling show? I mean this was just bad, and I found it absolutelty disgraceful to all of the short statured people out there who watched this.

3. Secret Santas - I didn't see most of them as I had already turned off Raw for the night but I was reading the LD from what I heard it was another waste of time on a WRESTLING show for COMEDY!!!

Overall I would say 1/4 of the show was comedy bits that was just plain bad, and I only saw 2 matches one being a shitty divas match as usual and an actually good tag match.

 

[Baximus]

Continuing in the vein of positive/negative from this week's Raw.

This was overwhelmingly another reason to just avoid wrestling until 1/4/10....

Positives first:

1) Cena v. Swagger was excellent. Two matches from these two and both have been sterling. I don't know what Jack did to get in the doghouse but I sure as hell hope he's out of it. I would LOVE to see these two feud this year. Maybe Cena FINALLY realized that every match can't finish with the five moves of doom.

2) Legacy v. Kofi/Henry/Bourne. Continued Kofi's push towards the top. I also thought it was a strong match and Bourne in paricular looked solid. Henry was generally a waste but what do you expect from him anyways?

3) Bashing Tiger. Pretty funny. Made up for a clearly-nervous Damon nearly screwing up teh opening segment

4) Another Bret Hart name drop. Can't wait to see him back.

The 'Eh' Portions

1) Masters/Eve/Carlito. Gotta build at least one mid-card face to challenge Miz, right? Nothing special about this match but it was good enough.

2) Legends in the Santa suit. Moderately decent.

3) Jericho/Santa was pretty funny. I didn't realize it was Y2J at first.

The Negatives.....Where to begin?

1) Anything involving DX. What the hell was that? They climb under a damn ring for midget class that wasn't even funny, get a frickin mascot and that's the MAIN EVENT? God, the WWE has been terrible with crap main events lately.

2) The complete and utter demolishing of MVP. That was a 2 minute match and was, for all intents and purposes, a squash. Should've put MVP with Kofi/Bourne and let Henry get smashed. I hope they turn him heel soon because he's been a waste as a face.

3) Sheamus' continued 2nd fiddle to Cena. He's the champ but no promo. He's the champ but everyone talks Cena. He's the champ but he ends up looking like a puss backing out of a match. He's the champ but he was just....there.

4) Mae Young needs to stay retired.

5) I wish the WWE would start Raw off with a match for once. Just start the show with the bell ringing, a promo getting cut and a fast-paced match to get things going. Just once, instead of the hours of waiting to see a match that we've been subjected to.

6) Creative has no idea what to do with The Miz. Santino Claus? Are you fucking kidding me? Since we have exactly five faces on the entire show and double that number of heels, Miz is left arguing with I.R.S. about taxes and beating up a short italian. What a waste of the best mic performer that they have.

7) Finally, I have to say that if Rock/Hart isn't on Raw on the 4th, I'm done. TNA is at least going to be interesting while I have no hope that the WWE will ever Fucking Figure their shit out and Find their Fucking stride and reach back to the days of the WWF because this current product sucks if you're older than 12 and aren't parenting a little kid.

I went back and watched a Raw from 2000 the other day and i was 10X the show that this was. What a waste of a show. So glad I DVRed it instead of watching live because there were a half dozen points that made me want to gouge my eyes out.

 

[Suneeboy]

There is no need to give a review of this show. If you saw it, you know it was awful. If you didn't see it, you are one of the lucky ones. If this show was on and one of my friends walked in and saw me watching RAW I would be completely embarrassed that I had that on the television. It was just a bad show from start to finish. Little People's court? Santas? Tigers? Swagger being fed to Cena? MVP being fed to Sheamus? Why are they not building any feuds? They have wasted two weeks and have accomplished nothing except for make Cena more annoying, and make Sheamus look weaker than CM Punk did during his 1st reign.

There just too much tom foolery for me to even be mildly entertained. I watched with more of a scowl.

I honestly was on the fence for 1/4, but the last two weeks have helped me make up my mind on what wrestling show I'm going to watch. Because Vince has just told and showed me his show is not the one to watch.