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WWE RAW ON-SITE REPORT
JANUARY 22, 2019
OKLAHOMA CITY, OK.
REPORT BY MARCUS PRINCE, PWTORCH CORRESPONDENT
WADE KELLER PODCAST covering this episode of Raw…
Including Live Callers, an On-Site Correspondent, and Mailbag with Wade Keller & Jason Australia…
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Attendance Note: There were three rows near ringside and a few more near the time keeper’s area that weren’t full at the start of Raw. They filled the ones near ringside shortly into Raw, but the ones but the time keeper’s area were left empty. Usually they get those pockets filled in before Raw goes live… They normally have the whole upper deck tarped off, and this time there was a section or two opposite the hard camera that was filled with fans. The rest was tarped off.
MAIN EVENT TAPING
(1) Rezar from AOP beat Tyler Breeze
(2) Mojo Rawley beat No Way Jose. Mojo got some heel heat by the end of the match.
NOTES FROM RAW
-The crowd wasn’t quite able to transition from the MLK video package at the start to the Brock Lesnar ring entrance.
-Vince McMahon got the biggest pop of the night. Seth Rollins, Ronda Rousey, and Finn Balor were next.
-When the word “hillbilly” was mentioned, we were like, “Oh, yeah, there’s a lot of those around here. We try to avoid them.” Fans were nodding, like, “he’s not wrong.”
-Baron Corbin got the most heel heat of the night. The vile hatred people had for him was fun to be a part of.
-During the Revival tag match with Curt Hawkins, it made me really happy to see the audience behind he enforcement of the rules and realizing there are rules in place and they should be followed.
-During commercial breaks they occupied fans with different “game ops” stuff like a contest with some kids doing a dance-off and then a trivia game.
-Fans sided more with Ronda Rousey than Sasha Banks, but not by a lot. It was almost half and half. People wanted to see more of Rousey in the tag match, but I got why they built to the tag. There were a couple of people yelling “We are Drowsy” during the match. After the show went off air, they took a couple swings at each other and then Sasha rolled out of ropes. Rousey and Natalya stood in the ring. Ronda’s music hit. She waved and walked out. That was it.
PWTorch correspondent Harlan Morgan also attended. These are his additional notes…
-Alexa Bliss got one of the biggest pops when she said she would be entering the Royal Rumble.
-It was strange that no women appeared on the show until about two-and-a-half hours into the live experience for “A Moment of Bliss.”
RELATED: TOP 3 DEVELOPMENTS – RAW 1/21: David vs. Goliath, Rollins defeats McIntyre, Sasha and Ronda
I was there too! Additional additional notes:
I watched Raw the next day to hear the commentary. It seemed like most of the matches started during what would have been commercial breaks for the home viewer. The Rollins/McIntyre match in particular was great live, but a disjointed mess on TV. I wish everyone could have seen that one with no breaks.
I think audiences in OKC are generally nice. Not sure whether the Lashley/Crews poseoff would have gotten such a positive response elsewhere.
It seemed like a lot of my section was unsure whether to boo or cheer for Lacey Evans. I was irritated that no women appeared until Moment of Bliss, but really excited to see Evans. “Sawed-off runt” was pretty good.
Heavy Machinery’s debut was exciting to see, too. The crowd seemed to love them. I was disappointed that EC3 didn’t wrestle. I got to see him when NXT came through last year, but I wanted to see him on the big stage.
In addition to the dance-off and trivia game, three fans did impressions. The Macho Man Randy Savage guy was amazing. I thought they might actually put him on YouTube, but they didn’t.
WWE emailed me a survey the day after the show to ask what might make me attend more shows in the future. It was tough to answer, since I already go to every show that comes to town. But I asked for more women’s matches and the chance to see 205 Live guys other than LHP.