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GOALS AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS – LOOKING AT RAW 1/9/12

RAW – 9/1/12
What needs to be accomplished on this week’s Raw?
•I might be mistaken, but I believe only Wade Barrett, Sheamus and Santino Marella have been announced as Royal Rumble participants through promos or backstage segments. No official participants have been announced and if we take those three guys as announced that means Santino is the only guy from the Raw brand that has been listed as a participant for the Royal Rumble and that has to change on this week’s Raw
•John Cena. I believe Dave Scherer on one of his audios last week said it best, Cena has no instincts for the business and somehow they need to take this Kane storyline somewhere that doesn’t involve Cena pandering to the fans and Kane cutting long scripted monologue promos, I don’t have high hopes
•CM Punk-Dolph Ziggler-John Laurinaitis, I am slightly intrigued by this program, but both Punk and Ziggler were made to look rather foolish last week. I am interested to see where they take it this week and I hope Ziggler isn’t treated as a bit player in a bigger picture feud between Punk and John
•Chris Jericho – The online response to this has been interesting with lots of mixed opinions. If I were WWE, I’d wait one more week before having Jericho talk, but either way this is the first story of 2012 that has really caught my interest
•It’s been announced via a cute Raw promotional video that Kofi Kingston will be taking on Daniel Bryan. I am enjoying the Bryan heel character, I just question how it will be promoted as we all know how WWE treats their heels, none the less this should be a good match and Bryan needs a decisive win here.
Show Breakdown  

1. So Chris Jericho returns last week, but instead they don’t even acknowledge that to start the show and instead start with this putrid Kane-Cena storyline, maybe they know their own audience better than I do, but I doubt it.

2. And it looks like one of my first goals is going to not happen, because we appear to be getting a long Kane diatribe written by a WWE script writer.

3. Kane is actually very good at doing these promos, he really gets into the character, but it’s very hard to sustain disbelief with him and the supernatural aspect of his character.

4. I’ve stopped paying attention to Kane’s promo and I am checking out my fantasy Basketball team.

5. I thought Kane was going to pull a Mountie – Jacques Rougeau promo there and say “Unlike you people, I always get my man” instead of what I want.

6. I’m shocked Cena actually comes out and starts a fight instead of smiling and overacting.

7. Pretty good backstage brawl with Cena and Kane.

8. This isn’t a nitpick, but a major flaw in the WWE product. They just recapped the Sheamus-Mahal-Barrett segment from this past week’s Smackdown, yet didn’t take the time to let us know that Sheamus and Mahal will be going at it this week on Smackdown, I mean my goodness, it doesn’t get any more ridiculous than that for this company.

9. Michael Cole in passing has let us know that these four men will be in the Royal Rumble match, but as I said in my goals for this show, they need to do a segment dedicated to announcing the participants, but that’s probably too old school for WWE in 2012.

10. Nice touch for Cole to touch on Barrett and Santino’s time in the Royal Rumble last year.

11. So either Vince McMahon has changed his mind and Mahal-Sheamus won’t be happening on Smackdown or WWE promotes a match by having Santino pin Mahal in preparation for Mahal-Sheamus on Smackdown. I’m without speech.

12. Still loving David Otunga in his new role. I’m not sure I understand the point of Miz complaining that Truth is assaulting him, but I’ll assume its going somewhere logically, actually I won’t assume that, I’ll just assume it’s going somewhere.

13. I like Edge headlining the HOF class, but I was hoping it would be in Toronto next time Wrestlemania came to my city. I’ll take that as an assumption that Wrestlemania isn’t Toronto bound anytime soon.

14. Mason Ryan makes his first television appearance in some time. I’m glad they drew back his push, because he just wasn’t ready.

15. Are WWE recycling what they did with Truth and Miz last week on Kane and Ryder? This show hasn’t been awful, but they miss so many major, not minor, but major details of how they present their product each week.

16. Looking forward to Bryan-Kingston if they get time...and it’s over as quick as I can type that.

17. I find it very overproduced that Bryan just gets in the ring and has a microphone after he won a match just because Big Show’s music plays and he strolls out to the ring.

18. A partial makeup for the idiocy of not mentioning that Mahal-Sheamus is planned for Smackdown this week during a recap of last week’s Smackdown by promoting a World Title match for this week’s Smackdown between Show and Bryan.

19. Good segment with Show and Bryan, both play their roles well and Bryan is a great heel. I am concerned that once he goes full fledge heel that WWE will just use him like they use any of their other heels and turn him into the ultimate coward.

20. Chris Jericho gets his first mention of the night. I have to question if the politics of the company are getting involved in the Jericho return and of course this brings up another huge problem this company has, which is too many chefs in the kitchen.

21. I can just see Vince McMahon teaching Brodus how to dance pre show...

22. Brodus looks to be doing a modern day Akeem gimmick, which I’m not sure will be a main event level character in 2012.

23. Brodus has himself some Funkettes ala Flash Funk while using Ernest Miller’s theme music, creative to say the least...

24. Rosa Mendes looking extra hot in that tight dress

25. Should ‘Big John’ really be at ringside texting on his phone while the WWE Champion is in the ring? What does that tell the audience in the arena, let alone the audience at home? The Bubble has totally lost track of what this business is all about.

26. Cool finish to the Punk-Swagger match that they don’t do very often at all and I assume perhaps it will play into the storyline.

27. I guess neither John Cena  or Zack have been watching the show or anyone else who can let Zack know that Kane has been standing behind Zack two times now.

28. The WWE Network commercial is needs an overhaul already.

29. I still don’t know why The Bella Twins just argue with each other all week.

30. Love that the Four Horsemen will enter the HOF! Does that mean Flair appears again?

31. This Truth-Ricardo segment is just putrid and is a waste of time when they could be promoting the Royal Rumble. I guess the senior citizen in charge of this company needs to get his chuckle on backstage.

32. Well I guess Truth is now a total idiot, because he falls into the trap set by Miz, but then Truth recovers so both guys look like idiots. This company doesn’t think anything through.

33. Speaking of someone who does think things through...Chris Jericho has arrived yet again!

34. I’m laughing out loud at Jericho doing a great job mocking the returning babyface legends. Jericho playing this perfectly by not speaking for the second week in a row.

35. The Royal Rumble flashback segments continue be a nice trip down memory lane, but it’s not enough to hype this show. I guess WWE feels they can do these flashbacks and then waste time the rest of the show with Truth getting Ricardo to sing for the paying audience.

36. I’m actually glad the supposed Eve-Beth match didn’t place since it would have been a 45 seconds cog in the machine match that being said it’s hard for me to sustain disbelief that Ryder and Eve couldn’t find another car or others to ride with at a Raw show instead of Ryder changing a flat tire to get away from Kane stalking him.

37. I’m guessing this show will end with Kane driving away with Eve...

38. John Cena’s not good at comedy. Are you kidding me? No John, you suck at comedy.

39. Isn’t CM Punk a good friend of Zack’s? I guess he’s nowhere to be found to save Zack.

40. Well I guess I was wrong about my Raw ending prediction unless that footage is especially for wwe.com, which wouldn’t surprise me with this company.

What this show accomplished?
The Good
•The John Cena-Kane storyline finally went somewhere meaningful. I kind of see this in the same light of the big guy taking out Hulk Hogan’s little buddy and Hulk must come to his rescue. I don’t like that they don’t just announce this match for the Royal Rumble and instead we will probably have to have some “creative” way they get there so the match will be announced two weeks out. Unless they announce it on wwe.com right after the show, which also wouldn’t shock me knowing this company
•Daniel Bryan-Big Show promo. Good exchange to setup a match for Smackdown
•Chris Jericho’s second appearance. Another fantastic segment by Jericho. You know he has mapped this out and he’s thought it through, which is more than we can say for alot of the rest of this show
•The use of Eve. I don’t necessarily care for the story, but I like when they use the female talent in meaningful segments as oppose to one minute throw away matches. BTW do we think Eve can choke out Kane the way she did Matt Hardy?
The Bad
•Lack of Royal Rumble hype. The Bubble that is WWE upper management just doesn’t get it. They have done very little to promote this show and they have so much wasted time on Raw that they dedicate to nonsense
•Ryder is the US Champ, but is treated no better than Eugene
•Kofi Kingston is one half of the tag champs, yet he loses in 30 seconds
•They do a recap of the Sheamus-Jinder program from Smackdown, yet don’t bother to mention they have a match this week on Smackdown. In addition to that Mahal gets beaten by Santino on Raw to build him up for his match with Sheamus on Smackdown.
•Punk-Ziggler-Laurinaitis got really lost in the shuffle here with two HOF announcements, Jericho’s story and the ongoing Cena-Zack –Kane saga
•Brodus Clay’s debut. I’m sure the bubble is chuckling backstage at the fat guy doing a dancing gimmick, but this can’t work long term, WWE once again drops the ball, but what else is new
•Miz-Truth storyline. Truth’s character is not a babyface, even though I think that’s what the WWE writers are going for. Truth came off like a total fool this week, as he fell into Miz’s trap and then Miz comes off as an even bigger loser when Truth recovers and Miz has to run
•Bella Twins arguing. Can this go somewhere? Or is this just like the Michael Cole heel character where were just supposed to accept it as part of the show
•So nobody told Zack that Kane was stalking him? That mirror bit was right out of Hogan-Warrior, WCW garbage
What needs to be accomplished on next week’s Raw?
•What a bad show this week. WWE needs to really tighten up their storylines. It’s very rare when Michael Cole isn’t the worst part of Raw and this week he wasn’t. Royal Rumble promotion is a must. WWE needs to take a second away from being Creative and dedicate a segment of the show to telling us Royal Rumble participants.
•Chris Jericho. I’m not exactly sure, but I think two weeks was enough time and Jericho should probably talk next week.
•Kane-Cena, just announce this match for the Rumble or announce them as participants in the Rumble and get on with it.
•Punk-Ziggler needs some front burner time and major heat behind it. I’d like to see a promo battle between the two.
•Miz-Truth – Get away from the comedy. All WWE Creative seems to know is comedy and they do comedy poorly to say the least.
F: revinsamuel@rogers.com