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Shane McKinley of Danville, Calif. (3.0): Best Match: Jehrico's Promo. Worst Match: Lazy Writing. Batistia doesn't make his championship match a no-DQ match despite knowing full well that Kane and/or JBL will run in (which they did). Lance Cade begging fans not to change the channel during his match because "HBK might show up." Because, you know, fans don't want to see Lance Cade vs. Paul London make their own mark, they want HBK 24/7. Despereration. It's a bit cheap to show the same HBK video package twice. Call me crazy, but I think that one time is plenty enough (you know, for people who actually watch Raw all the way through). Liked Jehirco's "Corrupt Savior" character and promo. He's easily the most interesting heel either TNA or WWE have had in a long time. Liked the Jim Duggan bit. What wasn't so good was the 6 man tag team match. Kudos for JBL limping and Cena wearing a bandage, but Cena certainly didn't seem (from a fan perspective) to have come off such a "brutal match" with him flying around the ring and him FUing both tag team champions. The announcers tried to cover it up, but to no avail. What they are doing with Cena has gone way way WAY beyond the point of believablity. In the last week or so he's nearly been run over, been nearly lit on fire, thrown through a front shield window, and now he's got "superhuman strength." Ridiculous. Good stuff with Kofi Kingston, Jamie Noble, D-Lo Brown, and the "SantinoBeth" fling. Main event was a dud. Not only did you have a run-in before the match ever started (so the only real reason to watch was to see if Punk dropped the title, since getting a win over Batistia would prove nothing for Punk's character), but the end was just a utterly shameless move to start up a possible Cena vs. Batistia feud. Ugh. Will Punk ever win a clean championship match? For building possible feuds (Cena vs. Batistia, JBL vs. Punk) it made sense, but it sure did not make watching this show fun. One could argue that they really didn't need the six-man tag team match and main event to get to their goal, but they were worried about ratings so they threw stuff up there and didn't care about the negative consequences. The show mostly felt cheap and shameless.

Dan of Stockton, Calif. (9.0): Best match: Batista vs. C.M. Punk. Worst Match: Six man tag. This was easily the most entertaining Raw from start to finish that I've seen in a long time. The balance between in-ring matches and promos was almost perfect. I'd like to see Punk get a clean win over a decent opponent eventually. Chris Jericho is golden on the mic. Cena should be taking notes. The Beth-Santino kiss was the best. I saw it coming from a mile away but, as usual with Santino, it was wildly entertaining. Jerry Lawler wondering out loud whether JBL arguing with the ref would constitute a DQ after last week's b.s. DQ finish was the line of the night.

Dan Strauss of Goodhue, Minn. (7.5): Best: Cena's double FU. Worst: Santino loses again. It was great to see Hacksaw receive such a crowd response. You don't have to be a 75-time world champ or sell a million t-shirts to be always remembered and appreciated by longtime fans. Good mic work by the tag champs and great job including Lawler, who will hopefully be Hacksaw's partner in their presumably upcoming feud. Rumors had mentioned Hacksaw and Holly but that would would have been a boring feud and just a filler on a PPV card. Lawler is a fan favorite alongside Hacksaw and will make this one interesting feud. I like the creative ways Cena has used his FU finisher the last few months. Santino is great. His charisma and personality have got to be the envy of most of the lockerroom. I just wish he wouldn't have to job every week. How can he look at his kids (if he has any) and family and tell them that the nice house and cars he has is because he goes on TV and loses every week? Punk's promos are good. They could seem corny with someone else, but he is believable that he wants to prove that he's legit, and the only way he can do that is beating all his challengers. Michael Cole is not that bad. His main criticism could very well be that he's just not J.R. Other than that, I think he does fine and some are too critical of him. The main event was a let-down since they had been building up how special it was to see that match on live TV, as well as all the other non-endings at the PPV last night. The ending actions did, however, set up a Cena-Batista confrontation, which will hopefully be just a tease for now and build into a feud much later down the road. Pretty good, enjoyable show, with credit due to a hot crowd.

SUPER-BONUS SMACKDOWN READER REAX

Terrie Neilson of Las Vegas, Nev. (8.0): Best: Kennedy vs. Umaga. Worst: Show four-on-one. WWE knew its track record for botched weddings so messing with the reception was something different. It also was something effective in terms of transitions. The show becomes the post-wedding entertainment, and that works. Finlay/Hornswoggle-EdgeHeads gave the Irish some screen time and a reason to plug the four-way match. But this match, and Kendrick-Yang fit the least into the cumulative theme. J.R. and Foley tried too hard to verbally repackage Kendrick in a one-shot deal, and no one in the crowd bought it - and I doubt the home crowd did either. Kendrick looked more like Morrison in an oversized jacket than Shawn Michaels at any time during his career. And Ezekiel is no Diesel or Sid by any stretch. Methinks Kendrick's job security... isn't. Show gets punished for cutting into the first dance and gets a huge handicap match for his trouble. The match did nothing for no one. And boy, has MVP really been on a downslide lately. Kennedy-Umaga still needed a reason why Umaga attacked him last week besides "just because," but the match itself was pretty decent. Umaga does need to get off the repeated use of the merve hold as he's got plenty other stuff in his arsenal, but he did get a strong win against a strong face opponent. The Hardys' match was clearly booked for the the post-match plans. The crowd didn't get behind the match for what could have been; either they didn't want to cheer one over the other, or they knew fully well to expect something else. Does set up a potential Hawkins/Ryder vs. Hardys match, but kinda ruined the mystique of Matt and Jeff as opponents. And Triple H's video gets kudos for setting up yet another meltdown between Edge and Vickie, but the effort missed the mark as the video was of just the day before and not that there was a longer term affair behind Vickie's back. This does fit Edge's character patterns in regards to women, even with what his relationship with Vickie where he was trying to go a little straighter. But now Edge really has revenge on his mind and that intensity should show come Sunday. The rest of the go-home PPV build on the Smackdown was a little weak, but it was tied in fairly well to the big theme of the show.

We welcome your 1-10 score and comments on this show for a "Raw Reax" feature in the Torch Feedback section of PWTorch.com. Just to add a twist to this feature, include not just your hometown, but also your occupation (mechanic, lawyer, stay-at-home-dad, college student, etc.) so readers get a flavor for what everyone does as "day jobs." To contribute your thoughts on Raw, click here.

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