By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

RAW HITS

Ziggler vs. Rhodes vs. Ryder vs. Bryan: This was one of the few bright spots on this terrible show. The fatal fourway between the nominees of the trending superstar award was a solid match. I am probably being generous giving it a Hit, considering it was 15 minutes, but only about half of it aired after two commercial interruptions. The wrestling action that we did see from Dolph Ziggler, Cody Rhodes, Zack Ryder and Daniel Bryan was quite good. They put in a good effort to entertain the fans after so much crap that came before it. The match shouldn't get a Hit because the outcome of it wasn't even important. It was more important to find out who was the most trending Superstar than who actually won the match. I just don't like the idea that Ziggler was more concerned with losing the Slammy to Ryder than anything else.

Miz & Del Rio: After last week, it was good to see The Miz and Alberto Del Rio stand tall over C.M. Punk this week. The tag match was solid, but the ending stood out with the two challengers for Punk's WWE Title leaving him beat up. They needed to stand tall and WWE needed to make Punk's Title appear to be in jeopardy which they accomplished nicely here.

RAW MISSES

Opening Segment: This was such a terrible show which was pretty predictable after such a terrible opening. I hoped the show would get better, but I doubted it would. In fact, it took me parts of three days to get through this show and a large part of why is that I wasn't motivated to keep watching after how bad it started. I don't care about the Slammys. I don't want to see 3 hour Raws at all. This opening just went on forever. It continued a terrible theme of 2011 of too much time being given to feuds among the announcers (which will definitely be brought up in my Misses of the Year column that is currently in the works). It was just so random with the battle rap. It was terrible. It was not entertaining. Jim Ross forgot his lines. It was awkward to watch. I don't think it would have been any better if Ross had gotten his rap right. This was a bad omen pointing to a bad bad show.

First Hour: Why add a third hour to Raw, when you don't have anything of quality in it? After that terrible opening segment, nothing that followed for the first hour was any better. We got about 90 seconds of total wrestling action in that hour. We got multiple cheesy Slammy awards with cheesy cameos from cheesy retired wrestlers. You could hear crickets during Jesse James' presentation. He has some value as a nostalgia act with his DX ties, but why waste his first appearance this way without really introducing him to a new generation (or new generations) of fans who don't know him? CM Punk's promo about John Lauranaitis was lame. The fans didn't seem to care about Lita. That was all they had for the Divas for an entire 3 hours? That was pretty much it for the first hour. I'm not saying that the second and third hours weren't also Miss worthy, but this was the additional hour and it just isn't needed.

Cena Runs Down The Rock: I get that WWE is selling a major PPV match several months in advance and want there to be tension at the last if not hatred between John Cena and The Rock. But, the problem with their feud has been both of them constantly pointing out each other's faults. So we've been reminded by Rock about the things that make people boo Cena and now we are being reminded by Cena that Rock isn't in WWE full time. I don't see why this needs to be pointed out to the fans. You want to sell WrestleMania on the grounds of seeing Rock wrestle Cena. But if before you get there you have convinced the fans that Rock isn't really into this angle, that he is too distant, then will the fans stop caring?

TLC Booking: Can someone complain to me why the TLC WWE Title match between Punk, Miz and Del Rio is suddenly pinfall or submission? Isn't a TLC match just a supersized ladder match (for lack of a better phrase)? By definition, the only way to win a regular triple threat is pinfall or submission, meaning you can't be disqualified. So, you can use weapons including tables, ladders and chairs in any triple threat match without getting DQd. So what makes this match special?

Slammys: This does not make for a good show. I liked a few individual moments here and there, but hated the vast majority of this show. The fake award show format is lame. I already have touched on most of the problems with the bad humor and bad cameos and meaningless awards which overshadowed the wrestling and the attempt to sell a PPV. It took me three days to get through this show, but if I had been more diligent with the fast forward button, I would have gotten through it in three minutes. By the way, I'm taking a "wait and see" approach to Kane. I'm not a fan of the new mask, or him wearing a mask at all, or having hair again, but I am a bit curious to see where they go from here, so I won't give it a Miss.

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's WWE Hits & Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw and Smackdown 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.

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