SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
Lesnar in the Rumble – HIT: I was very intrigued by the announcement from Paul Heyman that Brock Lesnar would not defend the Universal Championship at the Royal Rumble, but compete in the Rumble itself as the #1 entrant. There isn’t an interesting challenger on Raw for Lesnar who deserves a Universal Title shot at this point. I would like to see Aleister Black or Drew McIntyre face Lesnar down the line, but not now. This is way more interesting to me. The idea that we might get several Lesnar moments in the Rumble match has me more excited for the show than I was before (and it is my favorite show of the year, so I am always excited for it). There are so many possibilities of what to do with Lesnar in the Rumble which can set up his WrestleMania opponent, whether or not that eventual opponent wins the Rumble. Heyman was great in making the announcement too.
Mysterio vs. Andrade – HIT: The end of the match was odd with the referee stepping in briefly to (I guess) check on Rey Mysterio, pausing the match to allow Mysterio to roll out of the ring and check on Zelina Vega whom he had accidentally run into a moment before. What happened there? Did Mysterio forget to check on her and the ref had to remind him to do so? I’m not sure. It is a shame, because that was a great match until that point and it went 20 minutes. You don’t get 19 minutes of greatness ruined by 1 minute of oddness, so it was still a big Hit. We’ve seen these two in the ring several times in the past and it is alway a good match. It was just a pleasure to watch.
Mystery Partner Mystery – HIT: I will talk about the payoff to this mystery partner angle later, but for now I will say that the mystery part of it was very well done. Samoa Joe and Kevin Owens played their parts well in setting this up. In their first interview, they did a good job of setting up why they are teaming up despite their history of not playing well with others and the fact that Joe had a partner for them against Seth Rollins & The Authors of Pain. It was great later on when Owens wanted to know who the partner was as he didn’t fully trust Joe. I loved how Charly Caruso followed them when they went to see the partner. Too often in the past, a WWE interviewer would just let them walk away at that point. She actually realized that she might get the scoop and do her job by following them. Those are the little details that made this storyline work so well. The reveal to Owens with Joe stopping Charly from seeing who was in the room worked well, particularly the ending when Joe told whomever was in the room to lock the door. Again, that was a little detail that made the angle work.
Tag Title Match – HIT: The very good first hour of Raw continued nicely into the second hour with the second Title match on the show as The Viking Raiders defended their Tag Team Championship in a triple threat match against The Street Profits and The OC. All three teams put on good performances in this match. It was fun to watch from start to finish. It was nice to see the Street Profits in an important match for a change. The Viking Raiders needed the strong win in the end and it was smart to have it come against the OC since they had lost twice to them in the past. They needed to avenge those losses here and they did.
Lynch – Asuka – HIT: WWE continues to do a nice job building to the Raw Women’s Title match at The Royal Rumble PPV between Becky Lynch and Asuka. Becky started this segment off well by talking about her own doubts about facing Asuka. It is a little odd to have the usually super confident Man talk about having doubts, but that adds a layer to this match which makes Asuka stand out from other Becky opponents. The video package on their history was very well done to underscore the fact that Asuka has had Becky’s number. We never got to hear more from Becky as Asuka interrupted and made her way to the ring. Asuka was great here in getting under Becky’s skin. The punch to Asuka’s throat worked well to end the segment with Becky doing something to get some momentum back and end the segment in a stronger position than where she started.
Mysterio Attacks Andrade – HIT: When you have a feud, you have to have good reasons for the feud to continue after a big match like the US Title match on this show. The attack on Mysterio after the match with Andrade stealing Mysterio’s mask worked in the moment to get heat on Andrade. Then later on when Andrade and Vega were being interviewed, Mysterio attacked him and got his mask back. That fight over the disrespect towards Mysterio and his mask worked perfectly to give a reason for them to have another match.
Rowan’s Pet – MISS: There is nothing WWE can do with the reveal of what is in Erick Rowan’s cage that won’t be a let down. Now they are teasing that it is something terrible with Mojo Rawley’s reaction to seeing it and later on when it seemed to try to bite off the face of the jobber facing Rowan. What could it possibly realistically be that would garner that type of reaction? Whatever it is, I doubt it will feel like a strong payoff to what by then will be a months long mystery.
Styles Emulates Orton – HIT: The short squash with AJ Styles beating Akira Tozawa worked because of the way Styles mocked Randy Orton throughout the match by using his signature moves and gestures. Tozawa has too much talent to be a jobber, but unfortunately that seems to be his role at this point. Otherwise, the Styles portion of the match was very well done.
Lana/Lashley/Rusev – MISS: This continues to be the biggest Miss on what has been a very good stretch of Raws lately. There are some other bad things here and there, but in terms of the long term storylines, this is the worst part of Raw. The mic work from everyone involved was bad. I guess the beach background behind Rusev was supposed to be cheesy and obviously not real, but that didn’t make it any less stupid. I don’t understand having Bobby Lashley telling Lana to shut up as that actually gets him a babyface reaction. He challenged Rusev to a match and Rusev said no, but then he clearly did accept the match so that was odd. It was all awkward. It didn’t make me look forward to seeing them wrestle next week.
Flair vs. Logan – MISS: The third hour of Raw was clearly not as good as the first two. Sarah Logan may have been on Main Event a lot lately, but who would know? I can’t imagine many fans watch that show. It is certainly a small percentage of the Raw audience. So if she’s had a different look lately, how would we know? I didn’t even recognize her and didn’t fully believe it was her at first. I suppose that doesn’t matter, but this was a lame attempt to get her some heat and momentum by having her attack Charlotte Flair before the match. She got heat by attacking Charlotte’s robe, but Charlotte stood tall in the end. She ended up dominating Logan, so what did Logan get out of this? Nothing. What did Charlotte get out of it? Nothing. She stood tall after someone attacked her before a match could start, but that someone is a total nobody, so it doesn’t really matter. If Logan had stood tall in the end, she might have actually gained something and you could build a little program before the Rumble between them, with fans wanting to see Charlotte getting revenge. But, that’s not what happened.
McIntyre – HIT: I still think that right now the best role for Drew McIntyre is as a heel. But, I have to admit that I am thoroughly enjoying this (babyface?) character. He certainly seems to be having a lot of fun with it and the fans responded accordingly. If he were beating heels, his character might be better defined. But, he is having a lot of fun interacting with the fans in a babyface manner while beating up babyfaces like No Way Jose. His line about the cheeseburger seeming like a nice guy was hilarious.
Murphy Attacks Black – MISS: This is a marginal MISS. Aleister Black had a decent short match against Sheldon Benjamin. It made it look like WWE was going to continue to build up Black for a new opponent. Instead, Buddy Murphy attacked him. Part of why I’m calling this just a marginal Miss is the beatdown itself was very physical and well done. Like I said above, you need to do something to have a good reason for a feud to continue and after Black won both of their matches, there wasn’t a reason for a third match. Now they have one. But, I wanted to see Black move on to something new. I wanted to see Murphy move on to something new. I do want to see these two wrestle each other again as they have had two great matches so far. But, that doesn’t mean that the next match has to come right away. They can always go back to it. I am worried that by having (presumably) a best of 7 type series, it will get old by the end.
Main Event – MISS: I was disappointed with The Big Show being the partner of Joe & Owens. After being gone for so long, I wouldn’t mind if he stayed away at this point and retired. He has had so many heel turns over the years, I assumed from the start that he was going to turn on Joe and Owens which took away from my enjoyment of the main event. The match itself was ok, but nothing particularly good. The fact that they built up to it all show long and then ended it in a purposeful disqualification was disappointing. It set up a fist fight next week, and I do once again lift up the strong way that WWE hyped next week’s show with that match announcement along with several others. But, that doesn’t change the fact that they built to a main event and didn’t really deliver.
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@yahoo.com.
Kind of weird to have a WWE “reviewer” who doesn’t recognize Sarah Logan beacause she has a different make up…