RAW IS BRAINS STROWMAN~~ - 4/2/2018

[Rows]

3 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

Just last year Shane and Styles got 20 minutes and I think Jericho/Owens was 15+.   I'm not saying they are as over as the aforementioned but the issue is they aren't being positioned to be either. It's actually quite amazing that Sasha and Bayley still get reactions despite all the poor booking they've been victim to.  

And at the same time Daniel Bryan had a World Title match reduced to 18 seconds to save time, after he and Sheamus had their US title match turned into a dark match/battle royal the year before. The Usos have been on the Pre-show their entire careers, and others Main Event a PPV then get put on the Pre Show for a battle Royal the next month. For some reason, as long as this PPV is they still have time issues all the time.

The women were spared this last year because they packed them into a Fatal Four Way match and a 6 pack match. Singles title matches means they'll end up in situations like this year again.

[Nice Guy Eddie]

15 minutes ago, (BP) said:

Corey got me with, "Look at the size of that guy. Where did Braun find him?"

even better was his namedropping Phil Anselmo

[Niners Fan in CT]

9 minutes ago, West Newbury Bad Boy said:

I’m glad we’re on the same page here.

I don't believe we are.  Being "On TV" means nothing to what I said.  We are discussing the biggest show of the year.  These two along with Becky anchor the women's division and none of them are in a better place than they were three years ago.  Sure,  there's two title matches one of which is looking to be a sub-five minute squash. I don't believe it's equal.  

I just watched Roman Reigns for the 4th year in a row receive a "uhhh okay.."  reaction from the crowd six days before WM.  But they can't find 15 minutes for their two best RAW women.  

[Casey]

15 minutes for Sasha/Bayley would be dwindled down to 8-9 minutes with entrances and the video package before the match. I can't believe you're actually advocating for this. The battle royal on the pre-show is a set piece in their feud, it will shape the ongoing story. How it is right now, Bayley JUST NOW fought back against Sasha - and now, according to you, let's hot shot it into a singles match at WrestleMania.

Their story isn't over, and they will get a bigger slot/more time on the following PPVs.

[caley]

9 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

 

I just watched Roman Reigns for the 4th year in a row receive a "uhhh okay.."  reaction from the crowd six days before WM.  But they can't find 15 minutes for their two best women.  

Gotta disagree here.  Crowd cheered Roman, chanted at the wrestlers to let him through, cheered him beating up Brock and booed when he got laid out.  Now to be fair, this crowd was into everything and the booking for Brock and Roman is 200% to get fans on Romans side, but tonight it worked.  It didn't sound like an eh whatever pop to me.

***

Now can we talk about that women's battle royal trophy?! It looks like Vince yelled "I already paid for a nice Moolah-Shaped trophy, I am not paying for another one.  Grab something from the pawn shop and tie some ribbons to it!"

Also as suggested on the DVDVR Twitter it looks...uh, to paraphrase Maude Lebowski: "strongly vaginal". 

Like it is quite possibly the worst wrestling trophy ever.  Think about the ground that covers!

[Niners Fan in CT]

6 minutes ago, Casey said:

How it is right now, Bayley JUST NOW fought back against Sasha - and now, according to you, let's hot shot it into a singles match at WrestleMania.

Hot shot?  I didn't just start advocating for it tonight.  I was advocating for it months ago.  And most posters here had it penciled in for the show.  They're getting better reactions than Orton,  Jinder Mahal and Bobby Roode were.  Rusev was just added last second but at no point were any of the other three in danger of missing the show. 

[John from Cincinnati]

5 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I don't believe we are.  Being "On TV" means nothing to what I said.  We are discussing the biggest show of the year.  These two along with Becky anchor the women's division and none of them are in a better place than they were three years ago.  Sure,  there's two title matches one of which is looking to be a sub-five minute squash. I don't believe it's equal.  

I just watched Roman Reigns for the 4th year in a row receive a "uhhh okay.."  reaction from the crowd six days before WM.  But they can't find 15 minutes for their two best RAW women.  

The Universal match was in the five minute range last year. Length doesn’t mean as much as you think it does. And that Alexa-Nia build has been prominent enough for me to feel it’s near equal. 

As for anchoring a division and not getting a prominent Mania spot, the guys get it too. So yay equality. Only so many spots to go around. Like I said, proportional to their roster space they’re well featured this year. 

As for Roman, I’m not going to litigate his merits or lack there of for the thousandth time. I don’t know how the complainers find the energy.

All of this said, enough people feel your way that I’d book Sasha vs Bayley as the main event of Raw next week. 

[Niners Fan in CT]

3 minutes ago, caley said:

Gotta disagree here.  Crowd cheered Roman, chanted at the wrestlers to let him through, cheered him beating up Brock and booed when he got laid out.  Now to be fair, this crowd was into everything and the booking for Brock and Roman is 200% to get fans on Romans side, but tonight it worked.  It didn't sound like an eh whatever pop to me.

Nah I didn't feel at any point during this build that the crowd has been reinvigorated.  You're not wrong.  There were some cheers.  But it's pretty light especially for a dude who is supposed to be the face of the company heading into the biggest show of the year. 

[Niners Fan in CT]

6 minutes ago, West Newbury Bad Boy said:

As for anchoring a division and not getting a prominent Mania spot, the guys get it too. So yay equality.

I don't know man.  I don't have much more to say on it,  I mean Jinder Mahal and Randy Orton weren't worried about missing the show this year. Bobby Roode was feeling pretty good about his positioning.  I can almost guarantee that Sasha and Bayley are out here moving more merchandise than Bobby Roode. 

[Brian Fowler]

I think at one point Bayley/Sasha was penciled in for the show. But when it looked like they changed their minds on turning Bayley and kinda froze the angle for two or three weeks, they decided either that the build was too short or they didn't have enough time.

Either way, the real right idea is to build it long enough to blow it off in Brooklyn in 4 months, so it needs patience.

[piranesi]

The trophy is that cow head diagram that I was led to believe by my jr. high school health class was what a vagina was going to look like.  I made a lot of very specific plans-of-action based on that information.

I later learned that I was deceived but it was far too late and I had mere seconds to react to the reality of things before it was all over and I was unconscious. But some day, so help me, I'll encounter another one and this time I'll be prepared.

[Victator]

43 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

The visual of Ronda handling Hunter was hilarious 

Guessing Hunter is not a fan of Ronda if the cartoonish selling. 

Golden Moose McMahon chokeslamming her was hilarious. Steph had her usual tell of no hooker heels. 

Was disappointed they did nor have Braun shout "BRAINSS!!! for the intro. 

Think the partner is going to be either Show or Henry at this point. 

[piranesi]

Just now, Victator said:

Think the partner is going to be either Show or Henry at this point. 

Still hoping it's the lifeless body of Ellsworth dragged to the ring by one foot behind Braun.

[John from Cincinnati]

1 minute ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I don't know man.  I don't have much more to say on it,  I mean Jinder Mahal and Randy Orton weren't worried about missing the show this year. Bobby Roode was feeling pretty good about his positioning.  I can almost guarantee that Sasha and Bayley are out here moving more merchandise than Bobby Roode. 

I don’t think Roode felt too secure he was going to make the main show till he was programmed with Orton. For a female equivalent, see Nia paired with company gal Alexa (I don’t have such a negative view of Alexa, but for the sake of argument...). 

I’m trying not to compare the women directly to the men, but rather I’m segregating them proportional to roster size and considering that representation on the Mania card. Which maybe makes me a bit backwards now that we’ve gotten this far. So fair play to you. You have a bit of a point. 

Beyond that, I also think we’re reaching an impasse. So I’ll drop it. 

[MORELOCK]

Minus 5 points to Graves for saying Elias looked like "Jonah" from BoJack Horseman when the character's name is "Judah."

[Niners Fan in CT]

Well, it looks like Elias is setup for something cool, some type of concert which should be amazing. That's a good spot for him.   

On to Undertaker and Cena.   I'm actually seeing people on Twitter saying "this must be the build up for NEXT YEAR"..   No way,   this HAS to be happening at Mania this year, right?  I've never seen anything like it.  Possibly the biggest match on the show in terms of crowd reaction and neither are advertised.  Well,   no Cena is advertised to be there but Undertaker isn't.   

What's everyone thinking on this?  I liked the 'Dead Man Walking'  line.  That definitely seemed to foreshadow possibly a Biker Taker appearance.   Will it be an appearance?  A match?  Build up for next year?

[Eivion]

It was nice seeing the crowd into most of the show.

The Bayley/Sasha segment was neat. I'm disappointed the match isn't happening at WM, but at the same time I'm kind of happy it won't get 5 minutes as a pre-show match.

The Cena/Taker thing is just confusing at this point.

I like this Brains Strowman. He is going places.

I was surprised Roman got such good reactions. I still assume the WM crowd boos him mercilessly, but they were actually behind him a good deal tonight.

 

[odessasteps]

Brains Stroman = Joseph Park, Esquire? 

[John from Cincinnati]

9 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

Well, it looks like Elias is setup for something cool, some type of concert which should be amazing. That's a good spot for him.   

He’s gonna get Dwayne.

So yeah, good spot. 

[(BP)]

Someone here recently suggested Taker shows up and beats the shit out of Cena to build to a retirement match at Survivor Series. I'm leaning towards something like that now. Or Cena cuts a promo, a pair of heels come out and pick a fight with him, and Taker makes the save for an impromptu tag match. 

[Gonzo]

1 hour ago, piranesi said:

Still hoping it's the lifeless body of Ellsworth dragged to the ring by one foot behind Braun.

And then the match can look like this:

Spoiler

 

[HumanChessgame]

4 minutes ago, Gonzo said:

And then the match can look like this:

  Hide contents

 

Spoiler

 

[Ziggy]

2 hours ago, Casey said:

15 minutes for Sasha/Bayley would be dwindled down to 8-9 minutes with entrances and the video package before the match. I can't believe you're actually advocating for this. The battle royal on the pre-show is a set piece in their feud, it will shape the ongoing story. How it is right now, Bayley JUST NOW fought back against Sasha - and now, according to you, let's hot shot it into a singles match at WrestleMania.

Their story isn't over, and they will get a bigger slot/more time on the following PPVs.

After the last 2 WrestleMania made me realize that the show is about featuring everybody instead of putting together a really good card. WM 31 was the last Mania that had a really good card were at least 3 or 4 matches were great. That Main Event was one of the best ever. The last two Manias was a drag to get through.

If we're oing to have 12 PPVs that's over 4 hours why complain if Sasha vs Bayley isn't on bc it's going get rushed. Even though I do believe the Women deserve to have a strong singles match featured on WM. Heck it's hard enough for the Men to get strong singles matches on Mania that don' involve HHH or Taker or a retired Legend that isn't on a full schedule.

I was at Raw live and Sasha is pushing merch and Bayley was over as Fuck tonight, I always say that I don't watch the TV consistently but tonight they was eating that shit up with Bayley and Sasha. I hear people say around here that they killed Bayleys momentum but she seems fine judging from tonight

[Niners Fan in CT]

13 minutes ago, Ziggy said:

I was at Raw live and Sasha is pushing merch and Bayley was over as Fuck tonight, I always say that I don't watch the TV consistently but tonight they was eating that shit up with Bayley and Sasha. I hear people say around here that they killed Bayleys momentum but she seems fine judging from tonight

It sounded on TV when Sasha made the save it got a strong reaction and then again when they started brawling.  Hoping they get the USA portion of the kickoff at least.  

@(BP) I'm also beginning to think that they don't have an actual match.  Taker will show up and something will happen but with 10 matches already on the main card and the possibility of a lengthy Elias concert segment is there going to be time for Undertaker and Cena with full entrances and 20+ minutes?  

[Phantom Lord]

I thought a few years ago when they had some random 4 way match on RAW to determine who would face The Undertaker at Wrestlemania, that was the worst idea for a match build for him. Tonight they have surpassed that. I mean, they seem to like doing that cellphone video promo stuff. You're telling me that The Undertaker couldn't have just sent one of those in sometime in the last two months so they could have that on hand to give Cena an answer?

Hell...at RAW 25 when The Undertaker was actually there. They couldn't have set up the match right then and there? They've done more with less.

The Ronda thing has been ruined from the start all cause they hedged all their bets on The Rock teaming with her and they never thought for a second that it probably wouldn't happen. The "which hand do you use" reminded me of that scene from Casino where Pesci breaks the card cheater's hand with a hammer. It's a shame they're over scripting her to the point she can't even say "now I know which one to break so you'll still be able to sign my checks". 

I was half expecting when Triple H and Stephanie kept saying "we make the rules" that Stephanie was gonna ban Ronda's arm bar. Such simple stuff and they don't do it.