BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

Post by Big Red Machine » Mar 7th, '17, 21:26

OPENING SEGMENT- great
Jericho calls out Owens for an explanation. Owens says Jericho was never really his best friend, just “a tool” that he used to help him keep the title (and to trick into not coming after the title himself). Owens says that the moment Jericho accepted the match against Goldberg on Owens’ behalf he ceased to be a tool and became a burden, so he had to go. He also says that he would have beaten Goldberg if not for Jericho, and that he could have ended Jericho’s career during the Festival of Friendship but made the mistake of showing mercy and now it came back to bite him so he’ll never make that mistake again.
Owens was awesome here, but I didn’t like a good chunk of what Jericho did. I’m not disputing that he is far enough removed from the betrayal to not be overcome by anger, but I thought he pandered to the crowd a bit too much for the situation.
Jericho wants a match with Owens at WrestleMania. Owens says he wants to get revenge on Jericho by taking Jericho’s title away from him, so Jericho agrees to put the US Title on the line at WrestleMania. Jericho wants to fight now as well and holy sh*t they didn’t do that obnoxiously predictable spot where the heel backs off at the last second.
Instead we got a brawl that lasted for a few seconds before Samoa Joe ran in from the crowd to make it two-on-one. Sami Zayn came out with a chair to save Jericho. He eventually got overwhelmed but Jericho then got the chair and chased the heels off.

KEVIN OWENS vs. SAMI ZAYN- 4/10
Apparently Foley came out and booked this during the break. Owens spent most of the match beating the sh*t out of Zayn and won in dominant fashion. Also, we’re getting Joe vs. Jericho later tonight. Also, Rich Swann is getting a Cruiserweight Title shot for some reason.

WWE CRUISERWEIGHT TITLE MATCH: Neville(c) vs. Rich Swann- 7/10
Apparently Swann is cashing in his contractually obligated rematch. This seems like the sort of thing he should have been cutting promos about on TV. You could argue that this would have tipped WWE’s hand as to the result of last night’s Neville vs. Gallagher title match and I don’t think you’d be wrong… but if you’re concerned about that then you should either 1) do some stuff to make Swann vs. Gallagher seem like it was a real possibility or 2) hold off on doing this match until you’ve let Swann cut his promos and built up to this match.
Rich Swann is about to challenge PAC for a championship on Raw, and the smarky Chicago crowd is totally ignoring them, chanting “CM PUNK!” If you want to chant “CM PUNK!” I’m not going to tell you not to, but I am going to suggest that you save it for matches involving the likes of Nia Jax or the Shining Stars or Goldust or someone like that rather than two guys (and a whole division) you really should be getting behind if you want future CM Punks to have a better chance of succeeding.
Well… at least the match was pretty darn great.

AUSTIN ARIES INTERVIEWS NEVILLE- FANTASTIC segment.
Neville was pretty great here but Aries was utterly tremendous. I also really liked the way they set this up with the normally heel Aries still being himself but being made to come off like a babyface in this situation. Austin Aries really, truly is one of those special talents in the vein of a Rock or Austin who have the right mix of personality, irreverence, and dangerous edge to them that, with a competent push, can easily make them a true superstar in the industry
(For the record, the others under WWE contract that I’d put there at the moment are Nakamura, Sasha Owens, Sasha Banks, and maybe Roode or Charlotte [those last two suffer a little bit from coming off as “pro wrestling villains,” but it’s possible I might be misreading how they would come off to the general public]. There are also other guys who I think have that huge megastar potential but fell into it under a bit of a different category are Joe as a mean guy/tough guy totally believably legit dangerous type and Zayn [and maybe Bayley] as an ultra-popular Ricky Steamboat perennial underdog type.)

ENZO & CASS BACKSTAGE WITH CESARMUS- very good
Enzo is kind of annoying so Sheamus and Cesaro make fun of them for losing last night. Cass points out that they didn’t lose clean and have been granted a rematch tonight. Banter and pointed comments are exchanged, with Enzo actually being amusing tonight and Cesaro and Sheamus pressing home the fact that Enzo & Cass “choked” last night. Enzo insists that “the only thing that we’ll be choking on tonight is bubbly because we’re popping champagne like we won a championship game ‘cause we’re gonna,” so I guess we know that neither Enzo nor Cass are hooking up with Tom Phillips tonight.

GOLDBERG & HEYMAN SEGMENT- no rating, good segment.
Goldberg comes out and starts to cut a promo about winning the Universal Title. He’s getting booed quite a bit. Good. Unfortunately, the fans are chanting for CM Punk when they should be chanting for Kevin Owens.
Paul Heyman quickly interrupts Goldberg to build up to Brock coming out. Brock offered Goldberg a congratulatory handshake which Goldberg for some reason didn’t accept. He kind of came off like a jerk for that. Heyman then cut a very good promo to build up the match, saying that Brock would make Goldberg his bitch at WrestleMania, at which point Brock laid Goldberg out with an F-5.

ENZO AMORE PROMO- good babyface cheap-pop stuff.

WWE TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Karl Anderson & Luke Gallows(c) vs. Colin Cassady & Enzo Amore- 4.25/10
Stuff happens for a while. Cesaro & Sheamus come out just before the commercial break. Did you ever notice how wrestlers always come out to ringside right before a commercial break? I guess WWE thinks that these guys coming out to ringside is like some sort of cliffhanger where we don’t all know pretty much exactly what is going to happen. In this case it’s pretty obvious that some altercation between Cesarmus and one of the teams in the match will lead to Cesarmus costing the babyfaces the match (maybe intentionally, maybe not, but the end result is the same and the end direction is the same). And look! That’s exactly what happened (Enzo’s goofy firing himself up caused him to bump into Cesaro, spilling his coffee onto Cesaro and Sheamus, so Cesaro tried to attack Enzo but accidentally hit Anderson causing a DQ and a schmoz, that ended with Cesarmus standing tall).

FOLEY YELLS AT CESARO, SHEAMUS, ENZO & CASS BACKSTAGE- apparently they were about to fight so Mick scolds them and instead tells them that they will settle their issues next week with the winners going on to face Gallows & Anderson at WrestleMania.
Umm… Mick? I have a question: If Enzo and Cass lost their match tonight because of a DQ that clearly wasn’t their fault, then isn’t it kind of heelish for you to go make them earn a title shot all over again when they should pretty much be entitled to one already? I mean… isn’t this situation basically analogous to that of Owens and Reigns after Roadblock: End of the Line where someone else came in and attacked the champion, causing the challenger to be DQed even though it was clearly against the challenger’s wishes?
And speaking of DQs, didn’t Enzo & Cass to this exact same thing to Sheamus and Cesaro in a title match on Raw last month, so shouldn’t they be entitled to another title match as well? To be fair what happened in that case was the same thing Foley is doing here, which is putting the guys who got screwed against the guys who screwed them in a #1 contendership match, but as I said above, that doesn’t seem very fair. If you want to do a three-way for the belts at Mania, why can’t we just use the fact that each team is owed a title shot to justify them getting their Mania title shots rather than creating a situation where the babyface GM is basically planning on one team being screwed out of a title shot they deserve (I’m sure next week’s match will go to some sort of f*ck finish and they’ll both be given title shots)? Wouldn’t it be better to spend the next two weeks with Enzo & Cass and Cesarmus each picking up wins over that can afford the losses right now (New Day, Shining Stars) and cutting promos arguing that they deserve to be the #1 contenders at WrestleMania and prove they can beat Anderson & Gallows and saying that the other team can’t before Foley or Steph eventually tell them they’ll have the chance to put their money where their mouths are on both counts in a Triple Threat match at WrestleMania?

STEPH SHOWS UP TO YELL AT FOLEY- I swear to G-d that if this doesn’t end in Foley being fired I’m going to be extremely annoyed.

ARIYA DAIVARI vs. AKIRA TOZAWA- 1/10 (but good for the time it got)
Aries isn’t on commentary for this match like he usually is because… um…
Anyway, Aries isn’t on commentary, but they still made Byron Saxton leave and had just Cole and Graves call the match (by which I of course mean “talk about Aries and Neville”), which begs the question of why they even need a third man in the booth at all?
The crowd didn’t care much about this. Considering how they’ve been having all night you’d think they’d at least be chanting “CM PUNK!,” especially with Daivari using Punk’s Pepsi Twist. Tozawa now has this goofy bird-call “battle cry” that he does all the time and that fans are starting to do. I predict that this will become very annoying very quickly.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good.
Tozawa calls Kendrick out to fight him, right here right now. This was very good until he did that stupid battle cry at the end. Kendrick comes out and says that he will let Tozawa know if he wants to fight tomorrow on 205 Live… except that Toazwa’s question was if Kendrick wants to fight right now, so isn’t that just a “no,” then?
Kendrick then cut a promo about a dog catching and biting his own tail. Corey Graves called this a “cryptic lesson,” which would have been fine if Kendrick hadn’t ended his promo by saying “be careful what you wish for,” which basically explains the whole thing, so I guess it’s only cryptic if you’re an idiot, which Graves apparently is.

NEW DAY PROMO- boring
Byron Saxton, a grown man, is being told to act excited because New Day have a f*cking ice cream cart. Even worse, Corey Graves immediately points out that there isn’t even any ice cream in it yet.
The slogan for New Day Ice Cream Pops is “A mouthful of magic; I gotta have it,” which, rumor has it, is one of Tom Phillis’ favorite sales pitches.
New Day tell us that “if you keep making your voices heard, your dream will come true.” Roman Reigns seems to completely disprove that theory.
They finally get around to cutting a promo on the Shining Stars, who they are not only apparently going to wrestle tonight, but who have apparently been standing in the ring the whole time this was going on. Would it really be so hard to have New Day come out and cut their promo first and then have the Shining Stars come out so they could actually get their entrance shown and not come off like completely pathetic jobbers?

THE SHINING STARS vs. THE NEW DAY (w/Xavier Woods)- 0.25/10
Kofi was nice enough to let the Shining Stars hit one or two cool moves on him before they were summarily disposed of.

Corey Graves suggests that if the Shining Stars were the hosts of WrestleMania, they would relocate the show to Puerto Rico. Byron Saxton responds by saying “that would be depressing.” A babyface announcer just insulted an entire island’s worth of people, and one that has quite a lot of wrestling fans as well. Somehow, it is merely debatable whether or not this was the dumbest thing Byron said in this segment alone.

WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH SEGMENT HONORING STEPHANIE MCMAHON- okay, not really, but you’d totally believe it, wouldn’t you?

WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH SEGMENT HONORING TRISH STRATUS & LITA- I have two emotions fighting for control of me right now. Pleasant surprise that they actually picked some f*cking wrestlers this time (although this stuff was a lot less in depth than anything package like this they have done in the past few years), and annoyance that they couldn’t even give these two each their own video package.
Oh. And also some annoyance that they had to make sure to put a derivative of the word “revolution” right at the beginning. Hey, here’s a question for you: if Trish & Lita “revolutionized” women’s wresting a mere “decade ago” then what was the big hullabaloo about this supposed “Divas/Women’s Revolution” WWE has spent a good chunk of the past two years trying to beat everyone over the head with? You’ve got to love it when WWE’s single-sighted focus on branding winds up logically prompting people to ask questions that expose the bullsh*t of the very narratives that branding is designed to push.

WOMEN’S TITLE SEGMENT- Watching this video package and listening to the announcers squabble over it has just blown my mind all over again with how ass-backwards the booking at Fastlane was.
Foley congratulates Bayley on her victory last night as if nothing was amiss. Should I just assume that the Women’s Title feud is taking place on Earth 3 from now on?
Ah. Here comes Bayley and she doesn’t feel like a champion now because Sasha interfered on her behalf. Well… at least SOMEONE has figured out that there is a big problem with this.
PSYCHE! Bayley comes close to acknowledging that there is something immoral about the way she retained her title last night but then pivots and says that she needs to look towards the future and to defending her title at WrestleMania. This really took the edge off of what was supposed to be a big babyface promo. She starts to feel bad again, but then Mick Foley said the following:
“I know how you’re feeling, but just trust me: At this time of the year, it does not matter how you get there. It only matters where you’re going, and you are going to WrestleMania.”
You know, I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure that I just sat through four months’ worth of Foley scolding Owens for retaining his title by having his friend interfere in matches against Rollins and Roman. And even if that “time of year” qualifier wasn’t an abhorrently stupid excuse, it wouldn’t vindicate Mick’s comments here because I don’t even once remember him punishing New Day for all of their cheating during their tag title reign.
Actually, when taken all together, I’m not entirely sure that Mick Foley hasn’t essentially been a heel trying to ease the WWE Universe into thinking that cheating is okay, and the reason he constantly picked on Owens and Jericho is that they were correct in their assessment that he has a vendetta against them. And this right here… this is Mick’s final play. If he can corrupt innocent young Bayley, then that is proof that there is no one his evil can’t corrupt (aside from John Cena, of course, but that’s why Foley made sure that Raw didn’t draft Cena: so Cena’s influence of goodness couldn’t spoil his evil plans)!
Foley asks who should be Bayley’s opponent at WrestleMania and cue Sasha Banks coming out. She tries to justify her actions by claiming that “just because Charlotte sent Dana back to the locker room doesn’t mean that Dana was going to stay in the locker room.” Fair enough… but that just means that you should be extra vigilant in your efforts to thwart Dana’s interference. It doesn’t give you license to go interfere in the match preemptively. If two wrongs don’t make a right then surely “I’m going to commit my wrong before you have a chance to commit one so that the only wrong that is committed is mine” is even more wrong than that.
But Sasha quickly pivots away from that and says that she and Bayley should totally wrestle each other at WrestleMania because they’ve always wanted to “tear down the house at WrestleMania.” Foley now works his cheap pop in by saying that he wants to ask the crowd if he should make this match. There is a "yes!" chant, but not a strong one.
Then Charlotte (& Dana) comes out to a huge pop with lots of WOOOOing. Once again… she’s supposed to be the heel. Charlotte says that the reason Sasha interfered to cost her the title is because Sasha couldn’t get another title match so long as Charlotte was champion, as per their stipulation at Roadblock: End of the Line, a stipulation that I had completely forgotten about because the way they transitioned into the Sasha vs. Nia Jax feud made it totally irrelevant and they never brought it up again.
Charlotte claims there is a conspiracy against her (you know… what heels do)… except that she seems to be completely right about this. She says that Mick doesn’t care that she got screwed out of the title so long as his favorites get to headline WrestleMania together. Foley tries to defend himself by saying that he does care but she lost her rematch. Has he not been listening? Everyone acknowledges that Charlotte lost her rematch last night. The problem is HOW she lost it: i.e. SHE GOT SCREWED BY SASHA’S INTERFERENCE!
So Charlotte is in the ring, telling the absolute truth about being screwed out of her title, while the babyface GM tries to bullsh*t her and the two babyfaces stand there mocking her. Then Steph’s music hit and I said “oh thank G-d Stephanie McMahon is here to straighten this all out,” which I don’t think I’ve said since some time in 2014.
Steph immediately made me regret that thought by starting her promo off by saying “let me make one thing perfectly clear: Mick Foley is not the boss, and neither is Sasha Banks for that matter: I am.” Well then why don’t you just save your breath and get “I’M THE BOSS” tattooed across your f*cking forehead if you’re that G-d damn insecure about it that you feel the need to remind everyone that you’re the boss in every single segment you’re in?
Having not learned their lesson from last time, the Chicago crowd immediately starts to chant “CM PUNK!” at Steph. This time Steph said “all of you Chicagoans are alike right? You’re all just like CM Punk?” and the fans all cheered and my jaw dropped at how utterly stupid they were to not see exactly where this was going (“that’s right. You’re all losers”). And I thought Chicago had a reputation for being a smart crowd.
Steph is out here to basically corroborate Charlotte’s story. The fans are STILL chanting “CM PUNK!” and it’s even more fervent than before and Steph is simply just completely ignoring them and trying to get over this (admittedly atrociously-booked) angle for the WWE Women’s Title and OH MY G-D GET OVER YOURSELVES ALREADY! HE’S NOT COMING BACK, AND HUNTER & STEPH DON’T GIVE A SH*T!” You might as well be chanting for Jim Cornette because your chances of seeing Cornette wrestle- and yes, I do mean wrestle for WWE are just about as good as your chances of seeing CM Punk do it. He’s moved on, and so should you.
Steph says that Charlotte deserves the title shot at WrestleMania. Foley opens his gob to say something that would undoubtedly have been stupid but luckily Steph spared us from having to hear it by cutting him off and using her power as the person who is 100% in charge of everything and don’t anyone ever forget it in order to officially book Bayley vs. Charlotte for the WWE Women’s Title at WrestleMania XXXIII. Foley opened his mouth again, protesting that “you can’t leave ‘The Boss’” out in the cold.” Did he think that provoking Steph by referring to Sasha as “The Boss” was going to make Steph more likely to give him what he wants, or is he just such a moron that he didn’t realize that this would upset Stephanie, despite only about a mere three minutes having passed since Steph came out and ranted on that very subject?
Yup. Steph gets angry. Foley insists on calling Sasha "The Boss" and saying that Sasha totally deserves a title shot, justifying it with vagaries like “after the year she’s had!? After what she did!?” The closest Mick came to being in any way concrete was on his third try when he said “after what Sasha and Charlotte did!?”
Anyone remember what it was that Sasha and Charlotte did? Oh yeah. That’s right. They had a feud where they traded the title back and forth a few times that ended when CHARLOTTE BEAT SASHA CLEAN IN THE MIDDLE OF THE RING, IN A MATCH WITH THE STIPULATION THAT THERE WOULD BE NO FURTHER REMATCHES! So no, Mick, I don’t think that “what Sasha and Charlotte did” entitles her to a title shot because SHE LOST HER LAST TITLE SHOT CLEAN, AND HAS WON A GRAND TOTAL ONE MATCH CLEANLY SINCE THEN!
Foley proposes that Sasha and Charlotte face off in a #1 contendership match next week (so essentially the same thing going on in the tag division), but Steph… puts him over for having part of a good idea? What the f*ck?
Steph tweaks Mick’s idea so that instead of Sasha vs. Charlotte in a #1 contendeship match next week, it is Sasha vs. Bayley and if Sasha wins the Mania match becomes a Triple Threat match, and instead of this week, that match is happening right now (because despite being the one who WWE wants to come off as the heel in this situation, of course they have to set it up so that it’s Steph who gets to get the big babyface pop by telling the crowd they’ll get to see this huge match between top stars live in their home town).
Again… WHAT THE F*CK?! WHERE DOES THIS COME FROM?! Like… what is Steph’s motivation in any of this? The options seem to be as follows:
1. Steph likes Charlotte and she wants her to be the champion, therefore she is trying to keep Sasha out of the match and/or doing things to break up Sasha and Bayley’s friendship
2. Steph doesn’t like Sasha and/or Bayley for some petty reason and is trying to drive a wedge between them because she’s a bitch and any benefit to Charlotte is purely incidental.
(and don’t try to tell me that Steph is doing this because it makes for a better wrestling show because if that was her goal then Raw wouldn’t suck so much on a week-to-week basis, with Steph being totally hands off except when she decides to poke her nose into things at random intervals while letting Foley generally bumble around and book stipulations that even a small child can see will achieve the opposite of what he wants)
I NEED this explained to me because otherwise I really don’t understand why Steph is doing anything she is doing (Steph the character, I mean. Stephanie Marie McMahon-Levesque is clearly doing this so she can compensate for her small… whatever the equivalent Freudian lady-part is… by getting to on TV every week and yell at everyone and assert her dominance in this fictional setting that millions of people around the world get to see).
If Steph’s motivation is #1 then the whole “Sasha can be in the match if she beats Bayley tonight” thing makes no sense because the warning Steph pointedly gave to Bayley about how it being a Triple Threat match means that she can lose the title without even being involved in the decision (I love how Steph felt the need to explain this bit to Bayley as if Bayley doesn’t know the f*cking rules of a Triple Threat match) applies equally to Charlotte, so creating an opening for Sasha to be added in seems to hurt Charlotte’s chances more than help them (especially if Steph’s gambit to destroy Bayley and Sasha’s friendship fails and they decide to take Charlotte out first at WrestleMania and then fight it out between themselves). If this is the case it seems like it would make a lot more sense for Steph to book Bayley vs. Charlotte at Mania with the stipulation that if Sasha even so much sets foot at ringside Bayley will forfeit the title.
If Steph’s motivation is #2, then why would she be trying to keep Sasha out of the match at all? In fact, shouldn’t she be trying to keep Charlotte out of the match so that Sasha and Bayley have no one to focus on but each other? Hell… if her ultimate goal is to ruin their friendship then why doesn’t she book them against each other every week? Or stick them in something like deathmatch where one of them will have to hurt the other very badly?
This has absolutely got to be one of the worst segments I have ever seen, especially when you factor in that most historically bad segments are things WWE intends as comedy that drag on forever and no one finds funny, whereas this segment was intended to be completely serious. We’ve got Foley being a giant f*cking hypocrite and trying to turn Bayley heel, Sasha comes across exactly like the manipulator that Charlotte and Steph accused her of being, while simultaneously being rewarded for doing so darn well in a feud that culminated with her losing cleanly at the end, Steph having to go around and assert her dominance over everyone she comes across seemingly for no reason other than to stroke her own ego, and throughout all of it the woman who has been the top heel in this division for close to a year and a half now is the only one telling the truth or making any sort of valid points. WHAT THE F*CK?!
The only segment that immediately comes to mind for being this bad (that didn’t involve Bray Wyatt doing magic or Randy Orton going on a f*cking scavenger hunt) was that MizTV segment with Charlotte, Becky, and Paige in the early days of the Divas Revolution the night after SummerSlam 2015, and while that one (and, I guess that Orton-Wyatt ones, too) were just one type of stupid with the dial turned up to 1,000, this segment was about four different kinds of stupid with the dial all turned up to “only” about 983, plus we had the idiotic crowd, so I’m going to go declare this segment the worst.

IF SASHA WINS, SHE GETS ADDED TO THE WOMEN’S TITLE MATCH AT WRESTLEMANIA: Sasha Banks vs. Bayley- 7.25/10
Charlotte is on commentary for this match. She and Corey Graves push the idea that Sasha is manipulating Bayley while Byron Saxton is steadfast in his belief that no such thing is happening. He claims that (paraphrasing) “Sasha has supported Bayley and the whole way and always been there for Bayley.” My instinctual reaction to this is, of course, to scoff and say something to the effect of “oh. Is that what was happening all of those times on NXT when Sasha was bullying Bayley?” but WWE’s whole presentation of the Four Horsewomen from the moment they started to call them up has been that they’ve all always been best buddies and nothing that you saw on NXT is cannon. I think that’s really stupid, but that is often how WWE does things and at least they’ve been consistent with it. Then Byron Saxton had to open his f*cking mouth and say that he sees no reason to suspect that Sasha has any motive aside from pure friendship, and that he is basing this on “what I’ve seen from these two ladies, all the way from NXT to here on Monday Night Raw.” At this point they have crossed the line from the standard stupid crap that you just kind of have to accept as part of the WWE package into the realm of out and out lying about things that we all saw with our own two eyes (well… either that or the explanation is that Saxton is dumber than a gondola full of bricks who is only on TV because WWE apparently can’t find another non-white person to do their English commentary [hint: LITERALLY ANY ONE OF THEM IN THE COMPANY. The f*cking seamstress from Total Divas would do a better job on commentary than Saxton).

Sasha and Bayley had a really great match but of course we couldn’t get a clean finish because that’s something I would actually like. Charlotte got to stand tall at the end by laying out both of her WrestleMania opponents.

I swear if I hear anyone from WWE emphasize the fact that champion can lose the title in the Triple Threat match without being pinned or submitted one more time I’m going to punch another hole in my wall. I understand why they have to do it: the announcers are there to convey the information to the viewers, and that includes people who might be watching the product for the very first time… but as a long-time viewer who internalized this concept (as, I think most fans do) after about the third time I was told how Triple Threat matches work, I find it EXTREMELY grating to hear the exact same information presented in the exact same words and in the exact same tone every single damn time, and it’s even more annoying when the information in question is information that I have long ago internalized and yet it is constantly being presented to me as if it was some sort of intriguing new wrinkle in the plot.

I think the big issue here is in the presentation. The way they always say it comes off like they’re trying WAY too hard to make me interested. If they just kind of said it in passing in a normal tone of voice like they were explaining the rules to a sporting contest (which is what this is supposed to kayfabe be) I think it would be a lot more tolerable.

CHARLY CARUSO INTERVIEWS ROMAN REIGNS- snore. I have no interest in seeing this feud anymore, and Roman’s dull delivery and “back to square one” message only increased my disinterest.

SETH ROLLINS RECOVERY VIDEO PACKAGE- well… at least they’ve learned from their screw-up last time around with him. This was awesome.
In an interesting(?) note, Seth didn’t have his usual partially blond dye-job, so his hair was back to being entirely its natural black, and as a result, every time I saw him my mind started to process him as “Tyler Black” again.

TRIPLE H PROMO- GREAT. To be honest, it was a little too great, because I came out of this with the sense that Hunter was kind of right in everything he said.

EMMALINA IS BECOMING EMMA AGAIN VIDEO PACKAGE- they say she’s “coming soon,” so the odds she’s here by SummerSlam are 50-50.

SAMOA JOE vs. CHRIS JERICHO- 4/10
They had a nice little mini-match until the asinine finish in which Joe choked Jericho out on the outside and got the count-out win, but then immediately went to go beat Jericho up some more only to be laid out with a Codebreaker and sent backing.


BRAUN STROWMAN CALLS OUT ROMAN REIGNS-
Of course Roman Reigns gets the main event spot. It’s not like they had a first time ever match-up between an up-and-coming undefeated heel and a beloved former multi-time world champion (who also happens to be the current US Champion) or anything. But there was an Undertaker return? So what. Everyone expected it anyway because he usually returns on the Raw after the last PPV before Mania, and if you were going to bring Taker back to go after Roman it would have made SOOOO much more sense to do it last night at the PPV so that you didn’t have to kill Strowman’s undefeated streak on a guy who the fans have made clear they will not accept as a babyface no matter who you have him beat and so you could just have Roman cut a promo on Taker tonight and let the Jericho vs. Joe match be the real, full main event like it should have.

There. Now that I’ve got that out of my system…
Braun calls out Roman, but instead we get Taker’s dong and effects show, and two thoughts were running through my head:
1. Can you imagine the heat it would get if Roman came out right now in Taker’s gear?
2. How loud do you think the pop would be if Taker came out carrying, like, a severed Roman Reigns head (a fake one, obviously)?
Taker and Braun have a stare-down but Braun leaves because he doesn’t want to fight the scary Undertaker even though he has never showed any sort of fear of anyone ever before. This felt obnoxiously out of character. It also doesn’t feel like it should be the end of this feud based on Braun’s comments earlier, but of course it will be because that’s how WWE does things, which is really frustrating because the only reason WWE decided that this feud had to “continue” tonight in the first place was so they could do this pointless bait-and-switch with Braun and Taker just to get a pop that they would have gotten anyway for a Taker appearance.
Roman comes out and complains that Braun called him out here and not Taker. Roman says “this is my yard now.” Taker gazes at the WrestleMania sign. Roman follows his gaze. The people are chanting “ROMAN SUCKS!” the whole time. Taker then goozles Roman and chokeslams him and the people go nuts because everyone hates Roman so OH MY G-D WHY DO THEY INSIST ON PUSHING HIM AS A BABYFACE. It occurs to me that if just two men, Vince McMahon and Delirious, actually understood how to listen to a crowd and we had Roman Reigns as a heel and the Young Bucks had stayed babyface, that wrestling on this continent would be infinitely more enjoyable.

This started out as a really good episode of Raw, but by the end WWE’s frustrating booking decisions totally killed my enjoyment of it.

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. Byron Saxton- “I would actually consider going to the Shining Star Resort if they had New Day Ice Cream.”
Correct me if I’m wrong, but hasn’t Byron spent every single Shining Stars segment arguing with Corey Graves and claiming that the Shining Star Resort is a scam and/or doesn’t even exist? So isn’t Byron now saying he would willingly allow himself to be scammed in order to get a product that he could likely get in many other places that would be both cheaper and closer to wherever he happens to be? WHAT A F*CKING MORON!
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NWK2000
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Re: BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

Post by NWK2000 » Mar 8th, '17, 00:30

Corey Graves suggests that if the Shining Stars were the hosts of WrestleMania, they would relocate the show to Puerto Rico. Byron Saxton responds by saying “that would be depressing.” A babyface announcer just insulted an entire island’s worth of people, and one that has quite a lot of wrestling fans as well. Somehow, it is merely debatable whether or not this was the dumbest thing Byron said in this segment alone.


As someone who has (loose) family ties to Puerto Rico, I can confirm that Byron's statements are entirely true.
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Re: BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

Post by cero2k » Mar 8th, '17, 10:07

NWK2000 wrote:
Corey Graves suggests that if the Shining Stars were the hosts of WrestleMania, they would relocate the show to Puerto Rico. Byron Saxton responds by saying “that would be depressing.” A babyface announcer just insulted an entire island’s worth of people, and one that has quite a lot of wrestling fans as well. Somehow, it is merely debatable whether or not this was the dumbest thing Byron said in this segment alone.


As someone who has (loose) family ties to Puerto Rico, I can confirm that Byron's statements are entirely true.

that IS a terrible thing for Saxton to say, even if true. Just looked it up, PR's biggest stadium is 22,000 capacity, but it's a soccer stadium, so the seating wouldn't work for a WM type of show. Having said that, an outdors WM at Viejo San Juan would look beautiful.
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Re: BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

Post by NWK2000 » Mar 8th, '17, 12:17

cero2k wrote:
NWK2000 wrote:
Corey Graves suggests that if the Shining Stars were the hosts of WrestleMania, they would relocate the show to Puerto Rico. Byron Saxton responds by saying “that would be depressing.” A babyface announcer just insulted an entire island’s worth of people, and one that has quite a lot of wrestling fans as well. Somehow, it is merely debatable whether or not this was the dumbest thing Byron said in this segment alone.


As someone who has (loose) family ties to Puerto Rico, I can confirm that Byron's statements are entirely true.

that IS a terrible thing for Saxton to say, even if true. Just looked it up, PR's biggest stadium is 22,000 capacity, but it's a soccer stadium, so the seating wouldn't work for a WM type of show. Having said that, an outdors WM at Viejo San Juan would look beautiful.

Was that the same place they had the first New Years Revolution?
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Re: BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

Post by cero2k » Mar 8th, '17, 13:11

NWK2000 wrote:
cero2k wrote:
NWK2000 wrote:
As someone who has (loose) family ties to Puerto Rico, I can confirm that Byron's statements are entirely true.

that IS a terrible thing for Saxton to say, even if true. Just looked it up, PR's biggest stadium is 22,000 capacity, but it's a soccer stadium, so the seating wouldn't work for a WM type of show. Having said that, an outdors WM at Viejo San Juan would look beautiful.

Was that the same place they had the first New Years Revolution?

no, NYR was in the Jose Agrelot Coliseum, which isn't that much small actually, hosts 18000~ people
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Re: BRM Reviews the 3/6/2017 Raw (frustrating)

Post by KILLdozer » Mar 8th, '17, 18:25

Stephanie is just doing it, Because just heels, that's why. I'm so tired of her overly contrived over the top act. She ain't Vince and needs to do a LOT of studying.

I keep saying the same thing every RAW, that's not going to work.
When they come, they'll come at what you love.

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