By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

RAW HITS

Ambrose: I have mixed feelings about Dean Ambrose going after the Intercontinental Championship as it is a Title that suddenly makes the Champion lose a ton of matches. So, part of me is worried that he will win the Title and then lose all of his matches (though I guess he loses a lot of his matches anyway). However, I liked his short segment with Curtis Axel and how he held up the IC Title as being very important. I also am looking forward to some good verbal exchanges between Ambrose and Bad News Barrett. And a big PPV Title match between the two has a lot of potential as well.

Ryback vs. Harper: After way too much talking in the first hour of Raw (much more later), this 6 minute match between Ryback and Luke Harper felt like a marathon. So maybe I am over-evaluating it based on being happy to see some actual wrestling on the show. But, I did enjoy the match. I continue to enjoy the work that Harper is doing in the ring. And Ryback is solid with what he does even though he will never be a guy I want to watch in longer matches.

Cesaro vs. Uso: This was another good 6 minute match. I am not totally sold on the team of Cesaro & Tyson Kidd. But, they are growing on me and it at least is giving them both some nice tv time on Raw and Smackdown. Their budding feud with the Tag Team Champions The Usos has potential. This match between Cesaro and Jimmy Uso makes me want to see more matches involving these two teams. Jay Uso and Tyson Kidd played their parts well on the outside during the match. The end of the match with Cesaro popping up to hit the flying Uso with that huge European Uppercut was great.

Ziggler vs. Wyatt: There was some really good wrestling on Raw. After the two good 6 minute matches, we got this very good long match with Dolph Ziggler taking on Bray Wyatt. This one went about 15 minutes and was fun to watch from start to finish. The match had good wrestling action and featured good psychology as well. I liked how Wyatt would roll out of the ring to break Ziggler's momentum. Ziggler was good in selling the shoulder injury during the second half of the match. The match went back and forth nicely and built well to the end. I wasn't fond of how Wyatt totally no sold the famouser to hit Sister Abigail. But, that was my only complaint about this match. It makes sense given the presumed WrestleMania match of Wyatt vs. Undertaker that he would be kept strong here after his long time in the Rumble.

I will say that on a side note, I am not looking forward to Wyatt vs. The Undertaker. I don't want to see Undertaker period after last year's loss to Brock Lesnar. That match was bad and didn't make me want to see Undertaker wrestling again. And The Streak was really the only reason to have Undertaker on WM at this point. What's the point of having him on to wrestle Wyatt? If Wyatt wins, he can't brag about breaking The Streak. If he loses, it makes him look bad since Undertaker lost last year already. Having Taker come back to avenge himself against Lesnar would make sense. Having Taker on against another legend like Sting would make some sense just from an icon vs. icon situation (again, I wouldn't want to see it, but it would make more sense). This presumed match against Wyatt doesn't make any sense to me.

Bryan vs. Rollins: As good as that match was, the main event was even better. It is not surprising that Daniel Bryan and Seth Rollins would have a great match against each other, especially when given 17 minutes to work in a match that was built up as being very important. These are two great wrestlers. I can watch them wrestle over and over again without getting tired of it, at least for a long time. There were too many good moments in this match to highlight them all, but I will say that I particularly was impressed when Bryan attempted the running knee only to be caught by Rollins who turned it into a great running power bomb into the turnbuckle. Obviously, there was a lot of gimmickry at the end with The Big Show and Roman Reigns. I wish Show had actually cheated and pulled Rollins to the rope at the end to break the Yes! Lock. That would have been better to put more heat on Show, give Reigns more of a reason to get involved in taking out Show with that highly impactful spear, and ultimately help Bryan get the win. One small change would have made the end of the match much better. But, it was still a very good main event.

RAW MISSES

Opening Two Segments: It is one thing to have a long talking segment to start Raw. But, when that long talking segment is interrupted by a commercial and stretched out over two segments totaling nearly half an hour, it is way too long. There was good wrestling on this show, but it took too long to get to the first match. I was not a fan of Roman Reigns winning the Royal Rumble and was not a fan of how he was booked to win and the overall booking of the Rumble itself. However, I don't think this was a great way to follow up on the anger from the fans. I don't like devaluing the Rumble match by possibly switching the winner out of the main event of WrestleMania. We don't know that that will happen, but I don't like the possibility. Would I rather see Daniel Bryan face Brock Lesnar at WM? Yes! But, it seems like once he lost the Rumble they should move on. Now, if Reigns is going to win at Fastlane, then aren't they doing even more damage by teasing Bryan's fans like this? I don't get it.

And what about Rusev? If the controversy is that Rock interfered, then Rusev is the one who should have the beef as he was the only one left in the match at that point. Where was he? I do appreciate the fact that Bryan brought up how he deserved a rematch after being stripped of the World Title. I would rather see him facing Brock Lesnar at Fastlane, but that was probably not in the cards given Lesnar's contract. I wonder if WWE considered a WrestleMania 10 situation where Reigns faces Lesnar early in the show and the winner faces Bryan in the final match (after he had a match earlier). And if you are trying to get Reigns over with the portion of the fans who boo him (reportedly he got great babyface reactions at the weekend house shows), then making him look like a gullible idiot at the hands of The Authority isn't going to work. He was damaged by the way he won the Rumble. He was damaged in these opening segments for looking stupid. So, either Reigns wins at Fastlane and is resented by Bryan's fans, or he loses and even more damage is done either way. And Bryan himself looked like a bit of a jerk for trying to wriggle himself into Reigns' Title shot.

Reigns vs. Show: After all of that talking, they finally got to a match and it was a rematch of a bad match from Smackdown. And it was very short. I guess they want the anti-Reigns fans to ease off on the boos, so having him losing makes it look less like he is getting that super push. But, I'm still not sure that having him lose is the way to go.

Secret on Camera Conversations: I hate these moments in WWE. It is ridiculous how The Authority would have what are supposed to be secret conversations about their evil master plot in front of a camera that is broadcasting their conversations to the live audience and the millions of people watching around the world. It honestly makes me angry watching it. Now the opening two segments didn't make sense, but they make more sense in terms of The Authority's revealed plot to manipulate Reigns into giving up his automatic Title shot at WM. However, this was a terrible way to reveal that plot. Also, that plot and the fact that Triple H and Stephanie McMahon were laughing at Reigns for falling for their trick makes him look even worse than the opening segments did which is saying something.

The Ascension vs. The Dusts: This match was too short to amount to much and it does give The Ascension another win and it does continue the tension between Goldust and Stardust for what will likely be an eventual match at WM. The reason I'm giving it a Miss is that it was the second match of the show and was under 2 minutes. The first match was under 3 minutes. So, the first hour plus of Raw had less than 5 minutes of wrestling action.

Cena Segment: Where is the wrestling? Instead of staring the 2nd hour with a match, they started it with another long talking segment, this one featuring John Cena reintroducing Dolph Ziggler, Ryback and Erick Rowan to Raw. Cena was ok, but it wasn't a great promo. I appreciate the fact that WWE made it clear that his match against Rusev at Fastlane will be for the United States Championship. I guess part of my issue with this segment is that the rehired wrestlers had appeared on Smackdown at least once and at the Royal Rumble. So, yes this was their first time back on Raw because of the snow storm last week, but it seemed like WWE was trying to make a big deal out of something that wasn't that big of a deal. It was too late for that moment. And then we get the interruption from Stephanie which continued to suck the wind out of the show. And I am so tired of Ziggler looking sad at the prospect of having a match.

Miz Fired Mizdow: You don't create a babyface star by having a heel group kick him out of the group. That is why Randy Orton failed initially as a babyface after Evolution kicked him out over 10 years ago. Damian Mizdow should not get fired by The Miz. He should quit. Now, he has been rehired as Miz's personal assistant so he still has that chance to quit down the line. And there is some intrigue to see him still wanting to mimic Miz even though Miz tells him not to. But, I still didn't like having Miz fire Mizdow. It is backwards storytelling to me. Later on, it was stupid to hear John Bradshaw Layfield talking about how Mizdow should be happy to have a job as Miz's assistant. He has a job as a WWE Superstar. If he didn't work for Miz he would still have a great job. And the other announcers look bad for not standing up to JBL to talk about this (much more on the bad announcing later). WWE missed the boat with how they booked Mizdow in the Royal Rumble. And I'm worried they are going to miss the mark on how he ultimately breaks away from Miz as well.

The Announcers: The announcing continues to be atrocious in WWE. At times, Booker T sounded as just as big a heel as JBL. JBL is inconsistent, heeling on most of the babyfaces, but also on a few random heels like Axel. Booker and JBL's argument about tag teams during The Ascension match was terrible. The Ascension are heels, but Booker was defending them and JBL was bad mouthing them. Booker T heeled on the recently rehired wrestlers saying they should do their job and listen to The Authority and do what they're told. That was right out of JBL's script and suddenly Michael Cole was left as the one lone babyface voice on a show with two heel announcers and heel authority figures who all combined to make the babyfaces look weak. Why was Booker saying that Ryback looked to be in so much better shape after taking the time off when he was fired? He looks exactly the same. That statement is a credibility killer for him to make. Either JBL or Booker (can't recall which one), said that the Usos were not only the Tag Team Champions, but the best Tag Team in WWE. Doesn't being Champion mean that you are the best? At one point, it seemed like they were more interested in Ziggler's new boots than what was happening in the ring. I could go on, but I am tired of talking about it. It was bad!

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's WWE Hits & Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw and Smackdown each week. Email him at his NEW email address - jmezz_torch@yahoo.com.

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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