By Wade Keller, PWTorch editor

In an effort to play to Vince McMahon's odd (creepy? sad?) juvenile sense of humor on the New Year's Eve Raw this week, WWE entirely missed what should have been the biggest story of Raw.

The main event of Raw, which they barely had a chance to talk about, what with all of the New Year's party skits, was Ryback vs. The Shield. There was a strong story here they could have told.

Vickie Guerrero was manipulated by Paul Heyman and C.M. Punk into booking Ryback against three opponents at once. (Don't get me started on the logic that led to her thinking that was a good idea.) The story from then on throughout the three-hour show should have been:

"Can Ryback make it through that match healthy enough to compete against Punk next Monday?"

The announcers should have been all over this unjust, indefensible decision by the clearly incompetent Acting G.M. They should have hyped all show, in a serious tone, that Ryback has been screwed time after time and it's happening again. As soon as he gets close to a title, Punk and Heyman manage to screw him out of getting that even playing field he deserves.

Then, by the time the match occurred, maybe there'd be more viewers instead of fewer than in the second hour. Maybe fans would have anticipated the main event for nearly three hours, nervous and curious how Ryback would survive. Would The Shield - in their first-ever official Raw match - once again derail Ryback from his title aspirations by taking him out of next week's match or, at least, weakening him?

Then when Sheamus and Randy Orton ran out, there'd be a huge sense of relief and justice. Cole and Lawler could have stressed that normally they don't approve of wrestlers interfering in matches, but this match was an injustice to begin with. They could have also said The Shield brought it on by their attack of The Shield earlier in the night and what they did to Orton backstage a couple weeks ago.

That would have gotten the Shield over as "getting what they had coming." It would given viewers a sense of relief that Ryback wasn't screwed over once again. It would have also given the announcers a dose of credibility for pointing out what should have been stressed all along, not glossed over, which is what an injustice the three-on-one match was. Cole or Lawler should be consistently questioning the reason Vickie still has any power given the decisions she makes.

WWE, instead, presented a show that delivered segment after segment of quirky, creepy juvenile skits that did nothing to promote next week's show and embarrassed many fans who really genuinely like pro wrestling when presented with more of a straight face as a dramatization of competitive combat.

The structure was there, the storyline was there, the match was there, and WWE's delivery was just awful. Time after time lately, they seem so scared to give fans a story to believe in related to the battle between cheating heels and admirable heroes and instead veer off into this weird unfunny slapstick crap.

I presented more analysis of Raw, start to finish, in my 48 minute Wade Keller Hotline exclusively for PWTorch VIP members. If you aren't a VIP member, you can sign up here: http://www.pwtorch.com/govip. New VIP-exclusive content, including the daily Keller Hotline, is accessible via iTunes, the Podcast app on iPhone, the BeyondPod app on Android, streaming or downloading via our VIP website, and within the new VIP sections of our new Apps for Android and iPhone.

(Wade Keller is founder and supervising editor of PWTorch.com and MMATorch.com. He began Pro Wrestling Torch in 1987, starting as a print newsletter and expanding since into a website, mobile apps, and podcasts.)

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