By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

After taking a few weeks off due to illness and some other issues, I'm back this week with Hits & Misses for one of the better recent Raws.

RAW HITS

New Day Celebrations: I loved how The New Day continued to celebrate during the show after their opening match win against Randy Orton and Roman Reigns (a solid match, but not quite Hit worthy). It started shortly thereafter when Kane went backstage after announcing the main event of Orton vs. Reigns and they were celebrating and telling Kane that they told him they would win. It continued much later in the show when The Bellas were walking through the hallway and they were in the background still celebrating after all that time. After a commercial, they interrupted Renee Young's attempt to interview Sami Zayn interview. They are very good at playing their current heel roles. And the fact that they were still obnoxiously celebrating their opening match like two hours later was awesome.

Ryback Interview: I was disappointed that Bray Wyatt's recent cryptic promos were aimed at Ryback and not Roman Reigns. I thought there was some potential in a Wyatt vs. Reigns feud. It would have also kept Reigns out of the World Title picture for awhile as it seems to me to be a mistake that they went to Reigns getting a Title shot so soon. I'm not sure that a match between Wyatt and Ryback will be very good. But, I am at least curious to see where they go with it. At the very least, this interview with Ryback was a good step in the process. Ryback did a nice job. I liked how he actually acknowledged the "Goldberg!" chant (come on Montreal, that is so 2014) and actually got the fans to start a "Feed Me More!" chant instead. Ryback is getting good reactions from the live fans. He came across here as a good guy and a good juxtaposition to Bray Wyatt's character.

Rollins vs. Ambrose: This was definitely the highlight of Raw. I liked that Kane added the stipulation that if Dean Ambrose beat Seth Rollins, he would be added to the Payback main event which would be turned into a fatal four way. That put something very important at stake in this match. Ambrose and Rollins delivered very well in this match. It went over 16 minutes and was fun to watch from start to finish. These are two very talented workers. They have a history and have had plenty of matches since The Shield broke up a year ago, but it doesn't feel stale. I could watch these two over and over again and I wouldn't get tired of it as they continue to build on their previous matches. In the end after some distraction from J&J Security, Ambrose got the big win. I like his addition to the match. I would have preferred a singles match for the WWE World Title, but once you make it a triple threat match last week, then adding Ambrose to me makes it better. The fatal four way hasn't been done as much as the triple threat so it shouldn't be as formulaic and Ambrose certainly brings a level of athleticism and intensity and positive fan response that was somewhat lacking in the match.

Lana: I'm not sure that turning Lana babyface just because the fans cheer her for her hotness is a great way to go. Yes, some fans are cheering her because she is good at her job, not just because she is hot. But, if she is good at her job as being a heel anti-American manager, then will she be good at being a babyface? And babyface managers don't really work, just ask Zeb Colter. That being said, I did enjoy Lana's work on Raw this week. She is doing a nice job of enjoying the cheers and adulation of the fans. She started out losing her Russian accent. Is this a hint that she is actually American and only pretending to be Russian to work with Rusev? I did laugh when she started Fandangoing. That was pretty funny and she played her part to perfection. Rusev does a nice job of getting mad at her and shaming her as well. But, I don't think they should break up.

Cena vs. Zayn: This is a marginal Hit. The match quality was hurt by Sami Zayn's shoulder injury. It is nobody's fault. It happened and it distracted from the match. However, it was still a good match and nice way to introduce Zayn to the larger WWE audience who aren't familiar with his work in NXT. John Cena actually did a better job applying the STF on Zayn than he usually does. I still don't like the fact that the US Open Challenge has shown that Cena can't force anyone to tap out to the STF. It has also enforced the fact that it now takes two AAs to finish off an opponent, not just one. I would not have had Zayn kick out of the AA, but it does make him look resilient. I appreciate the fact that unlike the other Open Challenge opponents, Zayn didn't hit his own finisher in this match. Having Cena kick out of Zayn's Heluva Kick in his first match on Raw (or I guess second after a tag match last year) would have been a huge mistake. I was impressed that Zayn was able to fight through the injury and still hit some of his big high spots. The flying DDT through the ropes on the outside (what is it, a torpedo DDT?) is awesome. There were a few sloppy spots and the shoulder injury brought the quality down. But, it was still a good match. I hope the injury isn't anything serious, so WWE can capitalize on this exposure to the larger WWE Universe with more appearances for Zayn on the main roster.

Barrett & Sheamus vs. Ziggler & Neville: While I'm not a fan of the new gimmick for King Barrett (more later), this was a pretty good tag match. The babyface team got in plenty of offense to excite the fans. Neville is very exciting to watch and had a chance to show off those skills here. Sheamus continues to do a nice job of playing his bully role. I love his "Are You Not Entertained!" exclamation in the middle of his matches. The even-steven booking with these four is annoying. They just keep trading victories in various types of matches. But, at least Neville had the out that Sheamus had taken Dolph Ziggler out of the match which allowed him to distract Neville so Bad News Barrett could hit the Bull Hammer Elbow for the win.

RAW MISSES

Opening Segment: While this was a pretty good Raw, it didn't get off to a good start. This was an overly long talking segment that really dragged. I wasn't particularly impressed with the mic work from anyone involved. While I have enjoyed the recent heel work from The New Day, they did feel out of place here. There was so much uninspired talking that I wanted them all to shut up. It was also the set up for a handicap tag match that I wasn't particularly interested in and was the start of what turned out to be a night of major overexposure for both Roman Reigns and Randy Orton.

Stardust vs. R-Truth: This is exhibit A in the case that Raw is too long at 3 hours. Even on a pretty good show, they still have way too much time to fill. So, we end up getting a match where one wrestler plans on winning by scaring his opponent with a bag of plastic spiders.

Cena's Talking Segment: This was another overly long talking segment. Obviously, the Montreal crowd was a largely anti-Cena crowd. That caused him to go off his talking points at a number of times during his long promo. He was attempting to play off of the energy of the fans in order to possibly get some more positive responses by kissing up to them for their passion. But, it didn't work. To me, Cena was very unfocused in this promo. He rambled some. He had to deal with the smart fans correctly anticipating that Zayn would be his opponent. But unlike some crowd chants, he couldn't acknowledge it specifically so he wasn't in the best situation. Still, he didn't make much of the situation. Bret Hart was a nice surprise. The problem is that Heath Slater dragged this segment on even longer. While it did fit in with his program from the past two weeks, it didn't work here. We didn't need to see any physicality from Hart. His surprise appearance and his endorsement of Zayn was all that was really needed. By the time Hart finally got around to introducing Zayn, I was like "get to it already!"

King Barrett: Bad News Barrett is too good at being Bad News Barrett to suddenly be doing the lame King gimmick. I don't mind Barrett winning the King of the Ring tournament. But, not every King has to play that same "king" character doing the "all hail" mantra. It works for some, but not for all. The King gimmick can be a boost to a character, but that doesn't mean that the character has to start acting like a lame English royal stereotype.

Orton vs. Reigns: I referenced earlier that Orton and Reigns were overexposed during this show. They had the long opening talking segment, followed by the tag match against New Day which went 13 minutes. At the end they then wrestled each other in the main event. The match did nothing for me at all. It was clear that they were holding back here and I can't blame them for doing so as it was a meaningless match with a planned non-finish. It seemed to me that they were going through the motions. It didn't help that the fans appeared to be tired after a long show and being so hot earlier in the night. They were quiet for this match and I can't blame them. They were waiting for The Authority run in as much as Orton and Reigns were. I did like that Ambrose came in and made the save at the end to ultimately stand tall over Rollins, Reigns and Orton. But, the main event was a let down after one of the better recent Raws.

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.

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

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