Go2Sleep

AJ on commentary was basically Daniel Bryan the last 3 weeks in the ring. Eventually she got drowned out by the good ol' boys network (due to numbers not quality work), but she got some quality shots in first and came away looking way better. "Watch the product" was the best and funniest insider comment on a show with HHH/Steph and Edge working the 2003 Wrestlecrap message board gimmick in full force. Orton/Goldust was good, but I'm not sure it's even Orton's second best match in the last three weeks. Outside of crowd heat, I'm not sure how it was better than his match with Christian, or even his match with RVD on SD. Maybe I'm overreacting to that really awful super-slow "drop to the knees and punch" spot where Orton's head was up the whole time staring right at Dustin. The crossroads spot was great, though. Perfect nearfall, there. I'm glad I'm not the only one who loves Booker T's current gimmick. I hope he expands his range and starts offering unsolicited advice to midcarders as well. It's probably too much effort since the payoff would just be someone finally saying "Why are you still here?" months later, but I'd love it. And finally, something that no one has really talked about yet, it's becoming more and more obvious that Seth Rollins is the future star out of the Shield. The fact that a Daniel Bryan main event match has only gotten 3 or 4 mentions in 15 pages isn't a good sign for Ambrose. He's kind of in a shitty spot where his biggest strengths are heel promos, heel mannerisms, and selling, while his biggest weakness is being interesting on offense. Having watched some of his FCW work, I know he can do better, but he's really underachieving these days. A 10+ minute match against Daniel Bryan is the time to step up, and he just looked really flat out there, especially compared to the last few times Rollins got a similar opportunity.

Orton vs. HHH (last man standing, No Mercy 07): I don't think these two have had a good match together before or since, but this match was pretty much perfect. I don't know if it was the horrible setup or the fact that no one has ever really liked face HHH, but it never seemed this match got its just due.

I'll probably watch this week for the latest Bryan/Rollins match. Orton standing over Bryan every week is approaching "running joke" territory, but I don't know why they'd change it up on SD. I figure they'll do that on Raw in Toronto.

Anyone have a screencap of that tweet that was total gibberish during the Orton/Cody match? Not sure how that one got selected. AJ storyline is probably being shot for Total Divas 2 more than it is for Raw. If the current season is any indication, they're probably going to make this whole thing look like a shoot on Total Divas. Hence shouting over the "pipe bomb" promo last week, the more shooty looking beatdown this week with one girl holding AJ's legs while the other two stomp her and no wrestling moves, and finally Nattie's look of remorse as she's heading back up the ramp. The only thing I wanna say about Bryan is I'm not 100% convinced he's losing at NOC. I agree a clusterfuck ending with Orton retaining is the most likely answer, but I could see some faces taking some gold to give them leverage against Evolution Inc. Cody and Ziggler winning the tag straps as the Matadores would be perfect (great idea whoever started that one), and Bryan could get the WWE title off Orton as his big comeback moment. With at least those three holding major titles, they can hold them hostage and threaten to walk out, which gives everyone else some courage to fight back against HHH. Then you have the grounds for a more even stable war that can go back and forth ad infinitum.

I wonder if there's enough overlap in viewership to get a "Brie Mode" chant going during the next Bellas match. I also enjoy Cena fucking around in all his scenes. It's the reality tv equivalent of Shawn Michaels having to do a job against his will.

Can't let the thread get too far without this classic:

People liked Kaval's rap? Huh.

He may have gotten a new name and Heyman as a mouthpiece, he'll always be the NXT Season 2 runner-up to me. Of course, NXT 2 was notorious for its bad promos, so let's just get some more of those out of the way.

I thought it was a nice call back to a similar situation in WWE history but I also remember Edge and Christian being members of the McMahon/Helmsley Regime, or Factgime as they would refer to it, or at least they where in favor with HHH and Steph. I mean they were there playing triple H's theme on kazoos. They were after they turned heel around April/May 2000, but right after HHH and Steph got together, the Hardys and E/C were on their weekly bullying list with The Rock, Foley, Kane, and Show for some reason.

How does he play that character? How is it reinforced in promos and on commentary?Well, he looks grizzled. And last night during his promo he talked about being a survivor of the Attitude era and the McMahon/ Helmsley regime. And the commentators always talk about him being a vet. That and all his matches are based around him not being the quickest or the strongest, but still being able to outsmart most of his opponents and counter a lot of their signature spots. Lately, most of his wins have been with timely roll-ups.

Is there any word on if Ziggler is in the doghouse or something? Even though I've been high on him, I can't really justify him the main event right now, but you'd think he'd still be stable midcarder right now.

Zack Ryder, Sin Cara, Kofi Kingston, David Otunga, Justin Gabriel, Brodus Clay, Darren Young, Khali Miz is also highly debatable. Miz is probably the only one that's even close, based on his horrible extended beatdown with Riley on Cena during their I Quit match. All those other guys have at least an ounce of charisma and/or would improve tremendously from being paired with Heyman. Bitter Kofi beating the hell out of his former tag partner would be awesome. I've called Seth Rollins a top 5 WWE guy before. I'm not sure if it's still true, since the top is absolutely loaded right now with Bryan, Cena, Punk, and Del Rio ahead for sure, but it's hardly a slight on Rollins. If you count Lesnar, he easily gets the last spot, but if not it's between Rollins, Cesaro, Sheamus, and Christian. I've also said he was easily the best Shield guy from day one and his bumping and offense is the main reason their matches are so good. Also no surprise his singles matches have been the best out of all of them. So I have plenty of love for Rollins, and I think he'll end up being the most successful (though maybe not the first pushed) once the Shield breaks up.

The best part of Raw was Kofi's tweet "Well, if he's just gonna keep leaving his cars around..." AJ's promo was kinda funny, but I'm not sure what the point of burying Total Divas is. RVD looked awful in his match with Del Rio. He was whiffing on everything. I know a Ricardo turn at NOC would be super obvious, but if you want to make one of your faces look like a total dope, RVD is guy the do it to. I don't mind the Punk/Heyman feud, but god damn Curtis Axel is the black hole of black holes when it comes to making shit interesting. I mean, that was no Show/ADR duct tape beatdown or anything, but damn if Curtis Axel didn't completely suck the life out of it with his stupid generic moves, his stupid generic look, and his stupid generic trash talk. I dare anyone to name one full-time wrestler on the roster that wouldn't have made that segment more interesting. Forget the Miz, Axel is easily the most useless guy on the roster. Christian/Orton was a good match. Just two wily veterans trying to outmaneuver one another, and Orton put in a particularly good transition performance where he still used/tried to use a lot of his face spots, then eventually resorted to some mild cheating to win. The subversion of the "clothesline, clothesline, duck, powerslam" spot could've been executed better, but really nice work from both guys for the most part. The crowd reactions to Orton were perfect, just a faint hit of leftover cheers when he hit his signature spots, but most everyone behind Christian at the end. Bryan/Rollins was another great match for those two, and I'm glad Rollins got another chance to shine. His bumps on the tope and the avalanche German were sick. Not that Bryan really needs the help, but that's how you put a guy over. The post-match stuff was pretty lame, but I'm not ready to write off Bryan's push or anything. If the writers wanna channel Austin/McMahon, they can have Bryan win the strap at NoC and continue the angle with him on top and "the man" trying to bring him back down.

That whole episode sucked and everyone was unlikeable or pitiable at best. I did like Trinity using the "who wins matches" argument irl, or i"rl" as it were. This episode needed Daniel Bryan, or perhaps Dr. Shelby.

I remember Jericho doing that spot to Rey at Souled Out 98. It was definitely a planned a spot, and under normal circumstances, I wouldn't even say a particularly dangerous one with two pros like Cena and Bryan doing it. However, Bryan might be slightly crazy for trying it with torn-triceps John Cena... There were a couple other spots where you could tell Cena's strength wasn't anywhere near 100%, and that spot wouldn't be one of my first suggestions when working with someone in that condition.

Mco is right, there's really no need for him to go to WWE at this point. But if he did, coming in under the name Koby Willis and having everyone give him shit about his giant AJ tat would be a great first gimmick. If they wanted to give him a serious push later, he can just say he wants to go by his real name, Art Jamison or something.

It says a lot there isn't a clear-cut answer to this question. Even though it's early, I would go with Bray Wyatt whose first two singles matches have been pretty bad. The gimmick is nice, but there's nothing to back it up in the ring it looks like. One of the other two Wyatts could easily surpass him soon, but so far, I've only seen their 3-minute slugfest with Tons of Funk which I kind of liked. They don't look like they're good for more than that, though, I'll admit. Roman Reigns is another possibility, although it's tough to say because they book to his (limited) strengths so well. His one singles match with Orton (who has been very good this year) was a total mess and I don't think they've let him near a singles match since. Being paired with the top-10 Seth Rollins covers up a lot of his deficiencies though. Other candidates include guys like Brodus and Titus who have shown next to nothing in the ring, but aren't doing matches longer than 5 minutes (usually tags) so they're never in anything too offensive. Then there's the criminally boring crowd like Miz, Fandango, Axel, Primo/Epico, and Kofi who are at least still competent and/or have shown flashes of break-out potential. I would agree that the front-end is very strong. You've got 9 guys wrestling at an elite level this year (Bryan, Cena, Punk, Del Rio, Cesaro, Christian, Rollins, Orton, Sheamus) which is probably the best since the mid 2000s. I think 2006 was a pretty strong year top-to-bottom if I remember. Cena and Edge were hitting their stride in the main event scene, and you had guys like Finlay, Benoit, Rey, Matt Hardy, and MNM tearing it up in the midcard.

Is it too early to include "Backstage Bully" Ryback? Skip Sheffield didn't work out, Poor-man's Goldberg Ryback started out ok but quickly wore out when he was over-exposed in the main event. But post-Cena back-of-house employee-harrassing Ryback is fucking hilarious. I look forward to his segments every week, which is something I've never said about Ryback before.

You know, with HHH, Orton, and Vince likely forming a heel stable of some kind, would it be the worst idea in the world to turn the Shield face by having them save Bryan from a big beatdown? They've been floundering lately and this would be a big boost and it would clear up the heel stable clutter going on with Evolution 2.0 and the Wyatts. It seems like people want to cheer them too, not just based on the chants they get from smart crowds, but their entrance gets a good reaction everywhere. Storyline wise, it totally fits their injustice narrative, and I think the wrestling statute of limitations has expired on them feuding with Team Hell No. Plus I'm trying to think of ways out of this angle that don't involve Bryan and Cena respect-teaming to save WWE or Vince turning face and keeping the focus on him vs. HHH with Bryan and Orton as seconds.

They really should've just called this episode "Boobs." I mean there was Tyson/Nattie bullshit too, but I pretty much just watched an hour of WWE divas discussing the practical and moral implications of real and fake breasts while gratuitously groping one another. I need to re-evaluate my life.

Every wrestling fan gets an "achievement unlocked" when they correct someone on the usage of Air Raid Crash and Kryptonite Krunch.

That was a really great ppv, even if I'm not too high on the finish (could've been a lot worse, though). The top 3 matches were all MOTYC's for the company, and Punk/Lesnar might be the front-runner right now. Just really well-paced matches with some creative spots and good finishing spots. I'll reserve my judgment on the HHH turn until the angle plays out a bit more on Raw tomorrow. Underrated moment of the show was definitely Ryback's skit backstage. Holy shit, that was easily the funniest segment this year. "I knew that," "You made a mess, you look like a three year old," and of course "Feed me, moron" had me dying. This should've been his first gimmick. Hopefully a promising low-carder can get a decent rub by ending his reign of terror on backstage employees.

More Scott Steiner goodness. This time beating up Lenny Lane and Eugene.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXWbPAizEQg Vader demolishes Barry Houston: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPZe0Efo5c0 Here's 2 new guys to this thread. Beatdown plus trash talk. Also like that there's actually story in the match for why they kill Sandlin. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDsJceo-q4U

Colt Cabana as Matt Classic: Everyone on WSX had funny characters, but Classic stood out among them all. Wish that promotion got an hour timeslot and stuck around.

The best Undertaker character is summer of 99 after the Corporate Ministry disbanded. The one who took Big Show out for a motorcycle ride in the desert with half a tank of gas, revoked Michael Cole's interviewing privileges weekly, and threatened to stab Jerry Lawler in the face. It was like halfway between the Deadman and Bikertaker and it was awesome. He got hurt a couple months into it, but even the way he left was great. Chris Jericho: Crusierweight/TV champion. Not only one of the best comedic runs of all time, but it was probably the most credible in-ring stretch he ever had too. Second run whiny heel Michaels: He spent all but a month of his second run as a face, but outside of the Jericho feud, his best stretch was the one month he went vintage HBK on Hogan. I don't care what anyone says, that match was freakin' hilarious. Best In The World Bryan Danielson: I love him as a babyface and it's much a more marketable character for him, but I still kinda miss him as a heel trolling ROH fans and dissecting guys with vicious mat-wrestling. Positively Kanyon: Needs no explanation, but the time WCW just had a wide shot of the arena from the outside and Kanyon delivered a Kanyon cutter to some guy off in the distance that wasn't even acknowledged was a shining moment from 2000 WCW. 5 Second Pose E&C: MITB/GF-stealing Edge and wily veteran Christian are both close, but nothing tops their ridiculous segments in 2000. 3I's Kurt Angle was a natural fit with the group (although I liked his fired up babyface run in 01 and his shooter phase in 06 better) Recently-unmasked Kane: Might have been the funniest guy on the roster from 2003 to 2005. The Shane feud, the Matt Hardy feud, and the Edge feud were all brilliant, and he was key player two of the best WWE weddings ever (him and Lita and Edge/Lita) I have a thing for comedic heels who play it totally straight, btw.