Alright I've been flying home but it's still Raw tonight.  And apparently we have a new set.  Check it out tonight!

https://411mania.com/wrestling/note-on-recent-wwe-raw-smackdown-segments-using-different-styles/

Fightful is saying HHH and Borash are bringing in their production people from NXT to replace Kevin Dunn which is why the Pete Dunne/Tyler Bate segment had that kind of look

People are going to flip when R-Truth costs Priest the cash-in. Great build in this angle throughout. They really caught lightning in a bottle with Truth doing his best work and it playing off so well with the dark emo dudes. One of the most underrated parts of Judgment Day is that despite their general goth stuff they are pretty much a comedy act. I can’t believe I am such a fan because Edge and dark underlings was absolutely not for me. But they have really been the anchor of Raw the past 18 months. 

There is a way where we get Becky and Rhea to headline Night 1 of WrestleMania. I would much rather see that than Punk vs. Rollins in their lame ass shooty reality TV feud coming up. Fired up Becky rules when she has something to be fired up against and maybe realizing Rhea has surpassed her is a great approach. 

As much as I do not want to see Seth/Punk, I did enjoy Seth vs. Jinder. One of the reasons why WWE is so hot right now is because matches are laid out so well. They did a great job in using Jinder’s goons, the looming presence of Priest, the distractions and all of that to get to some really good heel near falls before Seth figured out the puzzle. 

Even the women’s tag match — while it was sloppy, it had a fun layout. 

Good show from what I was able to watch.

Even though WWE's product in general is kind of bland, their booking is at least somewhat logical and everything is laid out very well as far as agenting, timing, etc goes. This Jinder/Rollins program is nothing but filler but the end of the match had it looking like Jinder might actually win.

When Truth popped up I had no idea he was still working there. But then he almost got Priest to corpse in their first segment and I see why.

The Drew/Cody segment was solid. Should be a fun feud/match post Rumble.

DIY vs. Dom/JD was longer than expected and pretty good with them really getting the crowd into everything as the match went on.

Indi/Candice vs. Chelsea/Piper was alright while it lasted. Indi and Candice got in a decent showcase, but Chelsea and Piper tend do better with more time for breathing room.

Gunther giving praise to Kaiser, the return of Woods out for vengeance, and subsequent Woods/Kaiser match was all good. Particularly dug the finish with Woods no longer giving a fuck and just being out there to beat Kaiser's ass. The backstage attack by Kaiser after the match and save by Jey was nice to see. Hopefully Vinci isn't out too long because I'm all for imperium vs. New Day & Jey to build to Jey/Gunther.

Tozawa/Ivar was fun while it lasted. Was pleased to see Tozawa sneak out a victory and the post match beatdown was a good way for Ivar and Valhalla to get back their heat. Looking forward to seeing what Ivy and Valhalla can do with each other next week. Gable/Ivar could legit be great.

Was nice to see them stop pretending ad finally start building Becky/Rhea as the big women's title match for Wrestlemania. If not for Punk's return it would have been the main event of Night 1 for sure with the crowd reactions the two full blown interacting got here.

Awesome Truth vs. Finn/Priest was fun. Truth is a treasure and has been wonderful with all the Judgement Day stuff. Loved the earlier segment between him and Priest and how it played into the match.

Shayna/Zoey vs. Nattie/Tegan made the most of its time for something pretty solid. Decent showcase for both teams.

Seth/Jinder was good. The general action was solid, but they made perfect use of Sanga, Veer, Priest, and Drew to add some extra drama and make you think there was a chance of a title switch tonight. 

Nothing blow away great match wise, but DIY vs. Judgement Day, Woods/Kaiser, and Seth/Jinder were all worth a watch. The segments were solid and did well building up the Royal Rumble, Wrestlemania, and just general Raw stories. Pretty solid show.

Hopefully the stories of Seth being injured isn't too bad or not true at all.   They really can't afford to lose Seth at this point

3 hours ago, hammerva said:

Hopefully the stories of Seth being injured isn't too bad or not true at all.   They really can't afford to lose Seth at this point

What happened? Only seen R-Truth breaking Damian Priest:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=B-OENKmdXbY&pp=ygUDV3dl

11 hours ago, dogwelder said:

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/r-truth-knocks-cm-punk-172411186.html

That wink would have been the thing that got me. 

Another good episode of RAW. Love seeing Indi on my TV. Becky/Ripley should be a banger. I am thinking they'll build to Bailey/Io on the Smackdown side so that should be two really good matches at 'Mania. 

Truth continues to be amazing. Woods/Kaiser was a fun brawl. 

I also thought the show's production felt different. Is that just projection on my part? Not sure but it was on my mind throughout. 

My wife actually wanted to watch Eagles/Buccs AND I have today off so I could check out all of Raw on delay. Win-win! Cole mentioned the crowd is light due to the weather, they certainly were quiet for some matches

The Raw Opening Promo was pretty good again although it could always be condensed a little. Drew throwing down with two of the top talkers on Raw two weeks in a row and coming out on top shows how much he's grown in the past few years. I don't think he's winning the Rumble but I'm down for another Drew championship reign. Also, I like that other people have taken Cody's dumb 'finishing the story' bit

JD/DIY was solid TV rasslin, I bit on a couple of the nearfalls. Gargano didn't work the corner at all so I think Ciampa has surpassed him at this point and should be on his own but they need something for smaller dudes to do. WWE have too many titles already but with a reshuffling I wonder if they could develop a strong cruisers division again to give some of these guys a focus besides the tag titles

Piper Niven ain't giving a shit right now. I think Indi has something, maybe just height

Gunther and Kaiser are fantastic, I'm trying not to read too much into why I'm such a fan of the presentation. WWE has figured out how to conquer the What chants, hopefully they fade away now. Kaiser/Woods was decent, Woods can't quite generate the sympathy that Kofi does though. What's the blow off? 6-man between Imperium and New Day and Jey or a grudge tag between the New Day/ Kaiser and Vinci?

Professional Tsunami Bronson Reed looks good, vague tweeting at every champion is quite the placeholder

Even trying to watch everything I skipped Ivar/Tozawa

Ripley and Becky were pretty good. Rhea is turning face, it can't be unintentional at this point but it is confusing things and leading to some mixed reactions. I'm into Becky and Rhea, not so much if they include Nia in there

Awesome Truth/JD pushed the ball forward

I like Nakamura's promos, not sure what to do with him at this point

Shayna and Zoey are a bad ass team but need a manager to get them heat. Actually, a lot of people could use managers right now

Jinder and Seth was fine for what it was, the match needed Indus Sheer, Priest, and McIntyre but it got there in the end. Mahal looks great and can cut a heel promo when he wants to but imo his offense is just too basic to capture people's attention in the main event. I'm not saying he shouldn't work an abdominal stretch but in a world title match there needs to be more to it, fish hook him or something

Just looking at this write up it's clear Raws tend to start well and peter out as they go along until the main event

Not sure where to put this but apparently Cora Jade is injured. 

That sucks considering she just came back.  Hope this won't take her out long.

Raw was a fun watch but had me wondering if they were using the house show entrance setup due to the weather.  I liked how different it looked though it's hard to tell if it was a one-time thing or not.  Granted I haven't seen how they do it for house shows but it did seem a bit toned down compared to the giant wall of doom.

I believe Cora tore her ACL so… yeah that’s 9 months minimum I’m pretty sure?

Meltzer brought it up but there has been a real string of injuries within the women’s division in NXT, specifically ACL tears. Nikkita Lyons, Sol Ruca and Wendy Choo are the others I think.

Its a shame about Cora. Felt like she was getting built up to be the one to take the belt off of Lyra.

4 hours ago, RazorbladeKiss87 said:

I also thought the show's production felt different. Is that just projection on my part? Not sure but it was on my mind throughout. 

https://www.pwinsider.com/article/179311/why-monday-night-raw-looked-so-different-last-night.html?p=1

You're right, it was due to the weather

Too many injuries lately, I wonder if it's bad luck or from changes backstage

2 hours ago, Eivion said:

Its a shame about Cora. Felt like she was getting built up to be the one to take the belt off of Lyra.

Oh Yeah it seemed like she was going to win at the next PLE or the Mania one. 

8 hours ago, Casey said:

I believe Cora tore her ACL so… yeah that’s 9 months minimum I’m pretty sure?

Meltzer brought it up but there has been a real string of injuries within the women’s division in NXT, specifically ACL tears. Nikkita Lyons, Sol Ruca and Wendy Choo are the others I think.

Yeah, it's usually 9 months for an ACL. Can be longer. It's an injury everybody dreads for that reason. Over here in the UK, there's talk as to why female footballers (soccer for Americans) are more at risk with ACL tears. There's been too many in quick succession.

Edited January 17, 20242 yr by The Natural

NXT was decent tonight. Thought the NA Title interview segment was brutal though. 

 

One thing that stuck out to me was the amount of dives towards the announcer's desk. Seemed like I saw a lot of people divie out that side and hit the desk awkwardly. 

I'm a sucker for battle royals so the main was one hundred percent fine by me. 

Bron and Corbin are actually kinda entertaining as a team. I wonder how much longer until Bron gets called up though. 

Enjoyed the battle royal with a legit feel that a ton of different choices could actually win and a bunch of different stories/rivalries ongoing throughout.  Cool to see Madi Wrenkowski (now Wren Sinclair) in her first NXT match go all the way to the final 6 or so.  Lyra's my fav and a big fan of Rox as well so that's a fresh match to look forward to. 

TrickMelo vs. Blade/Enofe was a little rough at times with the sense of the teams not being used to facing each other, but it weirdly worked in the match's favor me. Felt more loose than the usual structure we see and both teams looked good overall. Blade and Enofe even felt like they had a chance at winning once or twice which wouldn't normally be the case against guys at Trick and Melo's levels in NXT. Pretty good match overall, probably the best of the tournament so far.

The Oba/Lee segment was alright I guess.

Lyra/Tatum vs. Elektra/Lola was fun. Tatum dressed up as Lyra and sneaking in during Lyra's entrance was delightfully creepy. Was amused at Lyra even creeped out trying to teach Tatum how to properly do her hand signs.

Ridge/Joe was fine while lasted. The post match beatdown from Gallus as decent. Still not sure where they are trying to with Holland.

LWO vs. Chase U was good as expected with both teams getting a decent chance to shine. Kind of torn about LWO moving on as they aren't really in NXT anymore, but it was nice to see an actual team finally move on in the tournament. 

The Bron/Corbin interview was good fun. I continue to like the two admitting they are both assholes and finding some sort of strange common ground to bond over in that fact. 

Dijak/Bearhill was fine. Bearhill looked decent for his first NXT tv match though it will be hard for him o stand out as anything special when guys like Dijak, Hank, , Briggs, Gallus, erc. are around. NXT has a good amount of big bruisers right now. I was happy to see King attack post and Bearhill link up with Thorpe earlier in the show.

The battle royal and eventual 4-way was actually pretty solid with a good amount of the women getting chances to shine even with their loss. Roxanne winning was a surprise though is at least a fresh match. Curious to see where things go considering Roxanne's recant temper issues and Tatum stalking Lyra. Will say the lack of Stratton and Lyons was odd.

The Dusty Cup matches and main event all delivered and were well worth checking out. TrickMelo vs. Blade/Enofe was probably MOTN for me. The segments were generally decent-solid. I particularly dug how many centered on the various women of NXT to build up the main event. Arianna Grace's segment in particular was fun. She ha sben such a joy since returning. Solid-good show overall. 

I'm sort of confused what is the point of Damian Priest holding the Money in the Bank Briefcase at this point? Edge had his longer than this and never had this many failed cash-in attempts. 

Priest has become annoying with his amount of failed cash-ins, and it's making him look like a goofy idiot much like Theory when he held the briefcase. Not to mention, Priest has had plenty of opportunities where he could've cashed in but he didn't.