By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

RAW HITS

Show Focus: I like it when Raw has a focus or a theme which this week's show certainly did. The opening segment, although flawed, established the theme of the show, which was a series of matches between the members of Nexus and Team WWE, in which any Nexus losers would be eliminated from the group. That set up a series of matches, and something for the fans to look forward to for the rest of the show.

Barrett vs. Jericho: I would have liked to see this opening match go longer than five minutes. I find it a bit hard to believe that Wade Barrett would be able to defeat Chris Jericho in such a short time. But, it was good while it lasted, and it accomplished an important goal. That goal was to get Nexus' night off to a strong start with a clean win for Barrett over one of the top stars of Team WWE. If Nexus is going to be rebuilt following SummerSlam, then they have to get some wins like this to establish the fact that they can compete in the ring with top established stars like Jericho. As the leader of the group, Barrett in particular needed this win. Also, you knew there were going to be some cheap wins throughout the night (which is fine under the circumstances), so it was nice to see a clean one to start things off.

Miz - Bryan: I was very disappointed a few months ago when WWE released Daniel Bryan for a number of reasons, including the fact that his feud with The Miz was over when it was just getting started. It is good to see WWE return to that feud now that Bryan is back. Bryan's match against Michael Tarver was well booked to give Raw fans a glimpse of Bryan's offense, while keeping Tarver in Nexus by having him pick up the cheap win after the distraction from Miz and Alex Riley. Bryan looked good for the attack on Miz and Riley afterwards, but the heel duo got their heat back by ultimately beating up Bryan, culminating with the Skull Crushing Finale on the MIB brief case.

Orton - Sheamus: It was predictable that Sheamus would somehow interfere to cost Randy Orton his match against Justin Gabriel. That worked ok. But, this Hit is really for what happened afterwards, as Orton snapped on Sheamus and gave him a Kofi Kingston style beat down including multiple chair shots to his back (not head). This was a good way to follow up on Orton's frustrations over not winning the WWE Title at the PPV. The crowd was hot for the beating, particularly when Orton went back to deliver the RKO.

Closing Segment: I had mixed reactions to the main event and end of Raw, but felt I should comment on it, so I am giving it a marginal Hit. The main event itself was solid. Darren Young has never been very impressive in the ring, but he looked fine here. One thing that always annoys me when John Cena does it, is when he is being counted out and he lays perfectly still for the first nine counts, then magically jumps up and into the ring before ten. It is so cheesy and unbelievable and he always does it and it always annoys me. But, the rest of the match was fine. It would not have been believable that Nexus would win all their matches, and after setting up the idea that some of them might get exiled from the group, WWE needed to follow through with that and they did. The post-match beating to exile Young from Nexus was well done. Nexus didn't look as physically dominating as they could have. Perhaps they didn't get as much heat back on them as they should have after the PPV loss. However, I have never felt that Nexus should be a physically dominating group. Their strength is in their numbers advantage, the fact that they always have a plan, and are unified. I like that they cut out the weakest link this week. I can't imagine WWE is done rebuilding the group, so I look forward to seeing where they go from here next week.

RAW MISSES

"You Tapped Out!": I have never been a fan of the "you tapped out!" chants. I particularly disliked it during the opening segment. Ok. I'm just going to say it. WWE fans can be very annoying sometimes. They started the chant before John Cena came out and encouraged it. I just find it annoying that the fans in the arenas will boil down an entire feud or angle, some of which (including Nexus vs. Team WWE) have been done very well and are fairly intricate, to a simple "you tapped out!" chant. It bugs me. Really? After all that we've been through building to Nexus vs. Team WWE at SummerSlam over the last few months, and that's all you can think to chant? I also believe that it is a mistake to have Cena encourage the chant. He is mocking an opponent for tapping out, suggesting that it is worse to tap out than to get pinned. I don't understand that logic. Also, if an opponent is to be mocked for tapping out, that must mean that he is in some way a weakling or coward for tapping out. If tapping out is so distasteful, then only weaklings would do it, right? And if Wade Barrett is a weakling, then Cena can't really brag about forcing him to tap. Instead of making fun of Barrett for tapping out, Cena should be bragging about being such a badass than he forced him to tap out.

Cena's Humor: I laughed at his joke about his mom having an affair with Buckwheat in regards to Darren Young. But, the rest of his humor fell flat. Lines about male escorts and strippers just weren't funny. The bit about Wendy's was lame. "Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery" hit theaters in 1997. In it, there is a Meow Mix jingle reference. Cena, that was 13 years ago! I give him credit for the relevant Snookie reference, but making jokes that others have been making for over a decade? You can do better than that. And of course, doing his best Triple H imitation, he has to work in a gay joke about Justin Gabriel. I don't know where that came from. It had no place on tv in 2010, as if being gay is something to be made fun of.

Guest Hosts: I am a fan of Justin Long, from his days on "Ed" to his I'm a Mac commercials, to some of his movies. However, I didn't need to see him and the rest of his crew on Raw. They added nothing to the show. They all looked like fishes out of water during their first appearance. After what seemed like stalling from the trio, they just introduced The Hart Dynasty, for what appeared to be a totally random segment. Why have guest hosts, just to do that? Their later appearance with The Great Khali was ok, but still wasn't needed. I complained about Barrett vs. Jericho only lasting 5 minutes. They could have easily found 2-3 more minutes for that match without the guest hosts.

Edge Counted Out: Edge vs. Heath Slater was a solid match. But, the ending was cheesy. The idea that Edge wouldn't realize he was about to be counted out made a veteran look like a rookie. If he had hit the Spear on Slater, it would have still been a double count out. It made Nexus look more lucky than good, which they already did with Tarver getting a cheap win and Gabriel getting a cheap count out win. They even did the same exact thing earlier with Orton hitting an RKO on Gabriel after being counted out as they did here with Edge hitting a Spear on Slater after being counted out. One of these count outs worked, but two was too many. This one in particular wasn't well thought out, plus it came second so it gets the Miss.

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's WWE Hits & Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw, Smackdown, NXT, and Superstars each week. Email him at jmezz-torch@sbcglobal.net.

For another view from the original Hitlist author, compare Jason Powell's views to mine by visiting prowrestling.NET's "Hitlist" section here.

[Torch art credit Grant Gould (c) PWTorch.com]

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