BRM Reviews the 1/7/2019 Raw (bad, but...)

[Big Red Machine]

OPENING SEGMENT- interesting
After the Mean Gene “in memory of” graphic, we opened with a brawl in a narrow hallway that undercarders were already in the process of trying to break up. It actually took me a few moments to realize that Curt Hawkins, No Way Jose, & co. were trying to break up a brawl rather than being involved in one, and bit longer than that to realize that one of the combatants in the actual brawl was Bobby Lashley, and quite a while to be able to confirm that the identity of the other combatant was Seth Rollins (I was pretty sure it was either him or The Drifter, but the camera was rarely able to get a clear shot so I couldn’t tell for sure. This was done as a one-camera thing until they spilled onto the stage and felt very (pardon the pun) raw.
They eventually spilled out the entranceway, and we got a stage dive, some other big stuff, and a legion of people coming out to break it up. Said breaking up of the brawl did not result in someone getting in the ring and cutting a promo or an authority figure coming out and booking a match, but rather with the two wrestlers being restrained and dragged backstage. Throughout this whole thing, the announcers were silent. It felt quite different from the vast majority of what WWE has done for the past few years. Off to a good start.

OPENING SEGMENT #2- didn’t like it
After the fracas had died down, John Cena then came out. They also have a brand new chyron that takes up about 40% of the screen and is rather obnoxious. It feels like one of those banner ads for medication you don’t need that pops up on the bottom of a YouTube video. WWE is advertising Brock and Strowman going face to face, Ronda Rousey as the guest of Alexa Bliss!’s new talk show segment, and “Hulk Hogan celebrates the life of Mean Gene Okerlund.” Oh boy.
Cena proceeded to kill any goodwill that the opening segment had built up by giving one of his grand speeches. I can deal with the “we’re on the road to WrestleMania” stuff, but I really didn’t need Cena explaining to me that “that’s why Seth Rollins is fighting for his life.” I thought he and Lashley were fighting because they hate each other, not because it’s the time of the year where we all have to fight harder so we can make sure we get booked on the show with the big payday. I guess I was mistaken.
Cena continued his speechifying, talking about how “on the road to WrestleMania there is one match” in which “any Superstar™ can grab his golden ticket to the main event” blah blah blah. Is it that f*cking hard to just say that you want to be in the Royal Rumble so that you can earn a world title shot at WrestleMania? Do we really need this “every Superstar™ knows” and fancy, flowery language bullsh*t?
Cena, too, has decided that he needs to lecture us all about “earning” opportunities. He says he is going to earn his spot at WrestleMania by winning the Royal Rumble, which he is now officially entering himself in. Here’s an idea for WWE: if opportunities have to be earned, then why doesn’t anyone have to earn his/her way into the Royal Rumble? This actually applies to the men more than the women because there actually aren’t 30 women on the main roster so everyone gets a spot no matter what, but there are more than 40 men on the roster and I assume they all want to be in the Royal Rumble so why aren’t they made to compete over the spots?
Mercifully, Drew McIntyre came out to interrupt Cena. Drew said Cena is the best of all time and thus he is going to take Cena out and prove that he is even better than that. Cena asked what made Drew different from everyone else who has said this, and Drew pointed out that he has already taken out Kurt Angle (he also tacked The Shield and Dolph Ziggler on, but Drew didn’t take either of those wrestlers/units out). Cena vs. Drew sounds like an excellent match to use as a main event if you want to establish a new direction for the company and Drew is heading down to the ring for a fight right now… so instead of someone actually booking the match or Cena and Drew starting to fight, we had to have Lio Rush & Bobby Lashley come out and complain about Seth Rollins instead.
Lio claims that if nothing gets done about Rollins, they were going to “get a lawyer.” He then declared the show “cancelled” until somebody did something about Rollins. Rollins, predictably, came out and attacked Lashley from behind, renewing their hostilities from earlier. Kevin Dunn apparently decided that the best way for us to see this brawl would be with the camera constantly zooming in and out. The fact that Kevin Dunn has a job is appalling, and I cannot wait for the day when Hunter and Steph convince Vince to fire his worthless ass.
Seeing as how there was a small army of people who came out to break these two up when they were fighting a mere five minutes ago, you’d think said army would reconvene to break it up again, but apparently not. Instead we got Dean Ambrose running in to help Lashley and John Cena running over from the ring to help Rollins. McIntyre then attacked Cena… and now, with this even bigger fight, the army of people was nowhere to be seen. Balor came out and took Drew out, then took out everyone with a dive. For some reason Lio Rush was not involved in this at all, despite himself being a wrestler on 205 Live. We went to a commercial, and when we returned we were in the middle of…

JOHN CENA, FINN BALOR, & SETH ROLLINS vs. DREW MCINTYRE, DEAN AMBROSE, & BOBBY LASHLEY (w/Lio Rush)- 6.75/10
Cole told us that all of these guys would be in the Royal Rumble which means that Ambrose will not be defending his WWE Intercontinental Title at the PPV. For those keeping score at home, that now makes five of the past six WWE PPVs (excluding the all-women’s PPV) on which the “prestigious” WWE Intercontinental Title will not be defended.
The heels got the heat on Cena which lasted for a very long time. Making matters even worse, when Cena finally did make a hot tag, it was done in a painfully anticlimactic way.
Stuff happened and guys hit their big moves for a bit until Rollins pinned Ambrose. This will presumably earn Seth that rematch he’s been wanting. That’s good and all, but that opens up its own can of booking worms that I’m sure we’ll get around to later.

Cole explained to us that part of the reason that Rollins attacked Lashley tonight was that last week Triple H told Rollins to do something to earn a rematch against Ambrose. Okay… why did Seth think that attacking Bobby Lashley would earn him a title shot? Beating Lashley in a match? Sure. But jumping a dude backstage? That’s the sort of thing that- if management even responds to it at all- usually leads to the attacking wrestler getting yelled at by the people in charge.
When Rollins started running wild after getting a hot tag, Cole shouted that “IN 2019, SETH ROLLINS PROMISED THAT HE’S GONNA BURN IT DOWN!” Burn what down? If you can’t answer that question then don’t repeat the phrase like it means something!

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- hated it
For no discernable reason, the TitanTron suddenly displayed a video of Triple H talking to Sasha & Bayley. There was no sound for this (in fact, Rollins’ music kept playing while it was on) so there was nothing for us to hear and none of them seemed to acknowledge the camera’s presence, never mind the fact that it was on, so why did the people in the production truck decide to put this imagine on the TitanTron?
So Rollins could know where Hunter was, of course! Seth stomped to the back. Then they showed up Cena and Balor high-fiving fans at ringside for A LOT longer than they usually would. Then they showed us Rollins walking up to Hunter as Sasha & Bayley were leaving, and Seth immediately slapped Hunter’s coffee cup out of his hand. Dude… I understand you’re upset that Hunter didn’t watch your match, but you got a pin on the champion. He’ll find out that did something to earn your title shot. Slapping his cup out of his hand like an asshole only makes it less likely that he’s going to give you what you want.
Seth demands an IC Title shot tonight. Hunter books the match as a Falls Count Anywhere Match for absolutely no reason. Time to open the promised can of worms. So pinning the champion is enough to earn a title shot? Well then why haven’t Mustafa Ali and Jey Uso gotten shots at the WWE World Heavyweight Championship? They both have outstanding pins over the champion (Uso on AJ back in mid-October and Ali on Bryan a few weeks ago).
My other big problem with this was the way this whole segment was done. It was definitely different from how WWE usually does things, but unfortunately they seem to be heading in the same direction that TNA so often erred in from about mid-2010 to the time I gave up watching it last year, and it is a problem I find EXTREMELY frustrating. Comparing this to the way WWE has done things for most of the past ten years, it seems like WWE had the following thought: “It makes no sense for Seth to just know where Hunter is, so we need to come up with a way to show why he knows in order to make it more realistic.” The problem is that the method they have chosen to rectify this creates a similar realism problem because it doesn’t make any sense for the video of Hunter talking to Sasha & Bayley to pop up on the TitanTron, either.
I find this so frustrating because the fact that you have acknowledged that the first scenario is flawed means that you should inherently understand that your solution has a similar flaw. If you realize that your segment doesn’t make sense and so you change it, you’d think an obvious thing to do would be to apply a similar scrutiny to your fix to make sure the fix really fixes the problem. Instead, what WWE has done here is like someone getting a flat front left tire and trying to solve this problem by replacing the front left tire with the front right one and patting themselves on the back and saying “I no longer have a flat front left tire. Problem solved!”

MEAN GENE TRIBUTE- We got a ten-bell salute, then Hogan coming out and everyone chanting for Hogan. He immediately talks about how he came out here “in character,” because apparently we’ve got to break kayfabe for this.
Hogan was actually good here, as was the tribute video they aired. Hogan talked about a lot of the legends who have died. On the one hand this was good for what it was, but on the other hand this was so clearly a test-run for them bringing Hogan back that it annoyed me that they were using Gene’s death as an excuse to do this.

After a commercial we got some Royal Rumble hype. They’ve got a Brady Bunch style graphic with the Rumble logo in the middle and the women on the outside kept changing, but someone of them were swapping out with others while others just moved to a different place on the grid so I couldn’t keep track of who was going to be in the match. Cole said “there is the announced field” and then proceeded to name zero people.

LUMBERJACK MATCH FOR THE WWE RAW TAG TEAM TITLES: Bobby Roode & Chad Gable(c) vs. The Revival- 6.5/10
Why is this a Lumberjack Match? Also, why are the only lumberjacks other people in the tag team division? If keeping the wrestlers in the ring is so important then shouldn’t be sending everyone out there to do it?
Cole told us that we’re having this rematch from a tag title match two weeks ago because the member of The Revival who got pinned was not the legal competitor. Okay, that explains why The Revival are getting another title shot, but why is it a Lumberjack Match? If the issue that made the previous finish invalid was that there was confusion over who was the legal wrestler then shouldn’t this be a Tornado Tag Team Match where no such concerns exist? Are the wrestlers on the outside actually supposed to be referee’s helpers and keep track of who is legal?
The Revival cut an inset promo which leads me to believe that they think the lumberjacks aren’t going to interfere in the match… which makes me think that The Revival are dumb because that happens in every single Lumberjack Match.
Also, if the idea is that wrestlers leaving the ring here is wrong then maybe don’t do a spot where the babyfaces clothesline the heels over the top rope, and especially don’t do it right after you did the first lumberjack spot where the heels rolled out of the ring and immediately got tossed back in. Also, don’t follow it up with a spot where a babyface then dives out of the ring onto the two heels.
After that point they had a pretty good match without the eponymous lumberjacks getting involved in any way. Then they did a finish that required Roode to be outside of the ring on the side with the ramp and reach in and push a small package over so that Gable was on top. WHY WEREN’T ANY LUMBERJACKS THERE TO THROW HIM BACK IN?! So not only did this stipulation come out of nowhere and have no effect on the outcome of the match (or really on any spots in the match), but the random stipulation they picked wound up turning an otherwise reasonable finish into a completely stupid one!
Also, Dawson’s foot was on the ropes at the time of the count, so once again the heels get screwed and nothing changes. On commentary Renee Young was calling for the referee to check the instant replay. How did no one tell her that we don’t use instant replay in pro wrestling and that bringing it up just opens up a can of worms you don’t want opened up?

NXT CALL-UPS VIDEO PACKAGE- yup, it’s the same thing we’ve been seeing for nearly a month now, while we still don’t have any sort of timetable for when they will cease to be “on their way to WWE” and actually f*cking GET HERE.

THE DRIFTER SINGS- inoffensive
It was only at this point that I realized that we have a male ring announcer. Where is JoJo?
The Drifter is going to be in the Royal Rumble. He also told us he had a song to sing that was making fun of Baron Corbin so Corbin came out to preempt him.
Corbin cut a promo saying that no one understands how hard and stressful it is to run Raw and that everyone should be thanking him for everything he has done for them, not criticizing him like they do. He says he thinks everyone wishes he would just go away, but he’s not going to do that. That promo must have been very cathartic for Vince to write.
Corbin says he, not The Drifter, will win the Royal Rumble and go on to main event WrestleMania. The Drifter told him to shut up so they could have…

BARON CORBIN vs. “THE DRIFTER” ELIAS SAMPSON- 3.25/10
Corbin won clean in a boring match.

DEAN AMBROSE PROMO- very good. I just hope he’s telling the truth when he says that his feud with Seth Rollins will end tonight.

STROWMAN-LESNAR CONFRONTATION- waste of time
That was what was advertised, but after Braun came out, Brock and Heyman appeared on the TitanTron from backstage. Heyman told us that we weren’t getting a confrontation tonight (for Braun’s safety) and that we all had to deal with it because “card subject to change.” Braun called Brock out but Brock just stood there. Eventually Brock seemed to give in and head to the ring but he predictably didn’t actually get into the ring. Braun said he’d win the Universal Title at Royal Rumble. This whole thing was a waste of time.

ALICIA FOX & JINDER MAHAL ACT LIKE GOOFBALLS IN THE RING- pointless waste of time

MIXED TAG TEAM MATCH: Ember Moon & Apollo Crews vs. Alicia Fox & Jinder Mahal (w/the Singh Brothers)- 0.5/10
This was almost a squash. Especially the Fox vs. Moon part.
Corey Graves tried to tell me that Apollo’s win in last week’s random battle royale for an IC Title shot which Crews lost was somehow a “career-defining victory.”

A MOMENT OF BLISS WITH SPECIAL GUEST RONDA ROUSEY- bad
Alexa’s talk show set is on the stage instead of in the ring for some reason. They have her stagehands to yell at, just in case anyone couldn’t figure out that she was a heel based on her burying the city they were in. She then played a highlight video of Ronda Rousey’s 2018, of which about 95% of it was Ronda appearing on various talk shows and other non-WWE-related programming. Call me old fashioned, but my definition of success in professional wrestling is based on winning a lot of matches and championships, now how many appearances you put in on Good morning America, Stephen Colbert, and random guest spots on some show USA wants to convince wrestling to try watching.
Ronda wants to “be a champion you guys can all be proud of” and thus she has to “chase my limits with a vengeance.” Has Ronda done one single interview since winning the belt where she didn’t tell us what it means to be a champion? Can we please just give her some heels to be angry at and then have her talk about how she wants to kick their asses?
Anyway, Ronda says that there is one woman in the locker room who has taken everyone to their limit: Sasha Banks. WHAT?! When was the last time Sasha did anything that we would normally describe as taking someone to the limit? Thanks to WWE’s atrocious booking, Sasha has spent the past year as nothing but a midcarder, and not even a glorified one, either. What has been the difference this year between Sasha Banks and Bayley? Or Sasha and Ember moon? NOTHING. And for Ronda to say that Sasha has been more of a Cinderella story than Becky Lynch can only be explained by Ronda being either delusional or petty, and neither is a very good thing for your top babyface to be.
Nia Jax apparently found this assertion as ridiculous as Alexa and I did (Alexa’s response was “Sasha Banks? I thought you were talking about me”) so she came out and made gagging noises. Nia tried to do standup comedy and failed miserably. 2009 John Cena wasn’t this bad. Nia insists that she should get a rematch for some reason. Instead of a McMahon coming out here to tell her that we don’t do that anymore, Sasha Banks comes out and says that she accepts Ronda’s challenge to a title match and says that she’ll beat Ronda. Nia gets annoyed at the presumption that Sasha will get a title match and gets in Sasha’s face. Nia described herself as a “300.5 ounce Samoan.” 300.5 ounces. I’m not going to speculate on Nia’s actual weight because that would be rude, but merely based on the fact that she’s a grown adult, I can assure you that she weighs more than 18lbs.
Nia told Sasha to go to the back of the line or she would get her face broken. Sasha responded by calling Nia a bitch and challenged her to a #1 contendership match. I’m sorry. Is this whole title shot thing official? Sasha was going to get a title shot just because Ronda thought she “took everyone to their limit” (which, by the way, is a fancy term for “losing in a hard-fought match”)? Sasha headed down the ring but Nia stayed on the stage. Once Sasha was all the way down in the ring did Nia think up what she thought was a clever quip to respond to Sasha calling her a bitch with. We then went to a commercial and when we returned we got a…

#1 CONTENDERSHIP MATCH: Sasha Banks (w/Bayley) vs. Nia Jax (w/Tamina)- 5.75/10
Sasha almost fell on her head several times, not all of which were necessarily Nia’s fault. The scariest of them was her trying to do a rana off the apron where Nia didn’t fall and Sasha just barely managed to make it over in time or else she would have landed right on the top of her head. This caused me to have BJ Whitmer Final Battle 2012 flashbacks and I had to watch this in slow motion several times before I was convinced that only Sasha’s hair touched the floor while she was upside-down. Then again, they went to the finish immediately after that spot, which looked very awkward, so who knows.
The story here was that Nia was big and strong while Sasha was small and quick. Sasha won with the Banks Statement. The match dragged a bit. Tamina and Bayley were given multiple spots to brawl on the outside.

FALLS COUNT ANYWHERE MATCH FOR THE WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE: Dean Ambrose(c) vs. Seth Rollins- 6.75/10
The match started off with Rollins jumping Ambrose from behind during his entrance. Are we sure Seth is the babyface here?
They had a great brawl that ended when Bobby Lashley ran in and cost Rollins the match. It’s the first show of the year… and we’ve got a f*ck finish in our main event championship match. Lashley put Rollins through a table after the match, because apparently beating him up and costing him a title match wasn’t enough.


This was a pretty bad show from WWE. A lot of the talking segments sucked, most of our babyfaces who got talking time came off as unlikable or awkward (the two who came off the best here were Crews and Moon, who went in there, were babyfaces in their match, won cleanly and decisively, and then left), the logic was often poor, and we got a f*ck finish in our title match main event. And yet… I am tempted to give WWE some credit here, as there were, for the first time, several segments which made me feel like they are actually trying to change (the stuff I mentioned in the first hour, plus the Moment of Bliss segment (although more specifically it was some of the stuff Sasha was allowed to say). Unfortunately, that stuff mostly sucked, but maybe they’re more willing to listen to feedback and they’ll get better? (I mean... probably not, but it’s a new year so why not try to be naively optimistic?)

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. Renee Young tried to call a Rollins superkick on McIntyre by saying “like a quiver in his arrow.” Graves “corrected” her by saying “an arrow in his quiver,” but really neither of them are right because that would be the equivalent of Seth loading up for a superkick. Hitting on precisely would be an arrow in the target.

[Serujuunin]

OPENING SEGMENT- interesting
WWE is advertising Brock and Strowman going face to face, Ronda Rousey as the guest of Alexa Bliss!’s new talk show segment, and “Hulk Hogan celebrates the life of Mean Gene Okerlund.” Oh boy.

Interesting that there wasn't a single match advertised at the beginning of the night, despite the fact that John Cena was wrestling for the first time in I think 8 months? (That's what Corey said anyway), but who knows how long it's been since he was on RAW, AND a Falls Count Anywhere match for the IC Title... So much for giving us change, and the things we want.

Mercifully, Drew McIntyre came out to interrupt Cena. Drew said Cena is the best of all time and thus he is going to take Cena out and prove that he is even better than that. Cena asked what made Drew different from everyone else who has said this, and Drew pointed out that he has already taken out Kurt Angle (he also tacked The Shield and Dolph Ziggler on, but Drew didn’t take either of those wrestlers/units out).

I wasn't super fond of this promo, even if I did like the energy, and the delivery. I noticed too that he didn't "single-handedly" take out the Shield, and as much as I like Dolph, I don't think the average viewer would count him as belonging on a list of the all time best. The only one who really fit was Angle. I think this would have been better if he was talking about how he was beginning to build a reputation as taking out the best, so he could be the best, and what better way to do that, then to go after the man who's been the face of the company for the better part of 12 years? It made him seem kind of... delusional, I guess? I couldn't take him as seriously after as I did before.

JOHN CENA, FINN BALOR, & SETH ROLLINS vs. DREW MCINTYRE, DEAN AMBROSE, & BOBBY LASHLEY (w/Lio Rush)- 6.75/10
Cole told us that all of these guys would be in the Royal Rumble which means that Ambrose will not be defending his WWE Intercontinental Title at the PPV. For those keeping score at home, that now makes five of the past six WWE PPVs (excluding the all-women’s PPV) on which the “prestigious” WWE Intercontinental Title will not be defended.
The heels got the heat on Cena which lasted for a very long time. Making matters even worse, when Cena finally did make a hot tag, it was done in a painfully anticlimactic way.

This match actually gave me a little glimmer of hope, because it's the first time I've noticed (and trust me, I look) the crowd really getting behind Finn like they were before the whole debacle with Kane. Hopefully Vince will see this and this little push he's been getting actually goes somewhere. Fingers crossed?

I'll be honest, I'm not super hopeful that things are going to go where they promised us... But as long as they push Finn and don't ruin Drew too much, I will count my lucky stars!

[XIV]

Drew has that star power look, promo ability and that Claymore kick looks like it would genuinely knock guys out cold, so it’s a believable out of nowhere finish.

Star Look.
Great on the mic.
Great in the ring.
Out of nowhere finisher.

All the necessary components.

[KILLdozer]

I'm pretty sure this upcoming next women's title match is the next step and TRUE, ULTIMATE piece in really setting the "Horsewomen v Horsewomen" thing up, headed towards Wrestlemania.

Maybe even ending with Ronda being cost the match by the other 3.

[XIV]

I'm pretty sure this upcoming next women's title match is the next step and TRUE, ULTIMATE piece in really setting the "Horsewomen v Horsewomen" thing up, headed towards Wrestlemania.

Maybe even ending with Ronda being cost the match by the other 3.

They’ll want Ronda as champ going into wrestle mania, it’ll more likely be her Horsewomen to cost Banks if that was to happen.

[Bob-O]

They’ll want Ronda as champ going into wrestle mania,

If it's about what 'they' want, I'd be more inclined to think they'd want Rhonda chasing going into 'mania so she could have her "moment"...

[Big Red Machine]

They're not doing Horsewomen vs. Horsewomen.

[Big Red Machine]

They’ll want Ronda as champ going into wrestle mania,

If it's about what 'they' want, I'd be more inclined to think they'd want Rhonda chasing going into 'mania so she could have her "moment"...

You'd think that, but their approach in similar situations in recent years was to have the belt on the person going into Mania because they thought that would get more publicity going into the show (Naomi in 2017 particularly springs to mind).

[XIV]

They’ll want Ronda as champ going into wrestle mania,

If it's about what 'they' want, I'd be more inclined to think they'd want Rhonda chasing going into 'mania so she could have her "moment"...

You'd think that, but their approach in similar situations in recent years was to have the belt on the person going into Mania because they thought that would get more publicity going into the show (Naomi in 2017 particularly springs to mind).

For the record, I don’t think they’ll do Horsewomen vs Horsewomen either.

That does seem to be the WWE strategy, if Ronda hadn’t have already won the belt, then sure she could have her moment at WM, but she has already won the belt, there’s no point dropping it before, just to pick it back at WM because the moment will be diluted.

She will probably retain at WM, just because I think they’ll begin to paint her as unbeatable and try and get some of that “baddest woman on the planet” edge from her UFC run into her WWE run.

[Big Red Machine]

She will probably retain at WM, just because I think they’ll begin to paint her as unbeatable and try and get some of that “baddest woman on the planet” edge from her UFC run into her WWE run.

I think they think she still has that edge now. I think they think this Ronda is best Ronda and that everyone sees her as the unbeatable UFC badass instead of this slightly out of touch woman who is obsessed with talking about being a champion and said weird things about Millennial men and their shoes and their avocado toast.

[XIV]

She will probably retain at WM, just because I think they’ll begin to paint her as unbeatable and try and get some of that “baddest woman on the planet” edge from her UFC run into her WWE run.

I think they think she still has that edge now. I think they think this Ronda is best Ronda and that everyone sees her as the unbeatable UFC badass instead of this slightly out of touch woman who is obsessed with talking about being a champion and said weird things about Millennial men and their shoes and their avocado toast.

Agreed, which is why they’ll give her lengthy title run until the build up someone to challenge her and have it feel legit.

I think they’ll focus a lot on building some women’s tag teams so Bayley and Sasha for example won’t be challenging for the single’s title for a while after RR.

I think the best option for Ronda in future is probably a WM2020 match against Basler.

[Big Red Machine]

She will probably retain at WM, just because I think they’ll begin to paint her as unbeatable and try and get some of that “baddest woman on the planet” edge from her UFC run into her WWE run.

I think they think she still has that edge now. I think they think this Ronda is best Ronda and that everyone sees her as the unbeatable UFC badass instead of this slightly out of touch woman who is obsessed with talking about being a champion and said weird things about Millennial men and their shoes and their avocado toast.

Agreed, which is why they’ll give her lengthy title run until the build up someone to challenge her and have it feel legit.

And the problem is that that is not what Ronda needs to do for this year's Mania. This year's Mania needs to be Ronda putting Becky over clean. It's an unduplicatable chance to make Becky as a mainstream star, and I think having Becky lose to Ronda will turn Ronda into the new Roman Reigns.

I think the best option for Ronda in future is probably a WM2020 match against Basler.

This seems right to me.

[XIV]

I think they think she still has that edge now. I think they think this Ronda is best Ronda and that everyone sees her as the unbeatable UFC badass instead of this slightly out of touch woman who is obsessed with talking about being a champion and said weird things about Millennial men and their shoes and their avocado toast.

Agreed, which is why they’ll give her lengthy title run until the build up someone to challenge her and have it feel legit.

And the problem is that that is not what Ronda needs to do for this year's Mania. This year's Mania needs to be Ronda putting Becky over clean. It's an unduplicatable chance to make Becky as a mainstream star, and I think having Becky lose to Ronda will turn Ronda into the new Roman Reigns.

I think the best option for Ronda in future is probably a WM2020 match against Basler.

This seems right to me.

I agree. Becky going over shoots Becky to the moon.

Have Becky win the women’s rumble and challenge Ronda from Raw. Simple.

And debut Basler at the RR and make her look awesome, then you have a year to build her up on the main roster before starting the Ronda program. Again, simple.

Almost too simple...

[Big Red Machine]

Agreed, which is why they’ll give her lengthy title run until the build up someone to challenge her and have it feel legit.

And the problem is that that is not what Ronda needs to do for this year's Mania. This year's Mania needs to be Ronda putting Becky over clean. It's an unduplicatable chance to make Becky as a mainstream star, and I think having Becky lose to Ronda will turn Ronda into the new Roman Reigns.

I think the best option for Ronda in future is probably a WM2020 match against Basler.

This seems right to me.

I agree. Becky going over shoots Becky to the moon.

Have Becky win the women’s rumble and challenge Ronda from Raw. Simple.

I'd actually do a double-finish in the Rumble with Becky and Nia (and I'd probably do it the way they did at Royal Rumble 2000 where everyone thinks the babyface won on the day of the show and then the heel presents evidence that it was a tie later on), leading to Becky offering to put her title shot up against Ronda at Elimination Chamber and Becky winning there en route to Ronda so that she can get some real revenge on Nia, too.

And debut Basler at the RR and make her look awesome, then you have a year to build her up on the main roster before starting the Ronda program. Again, simple.

Almost too simple...

I don't think you need that long for Baszler, and she feels too involved in NXT to get called up right now. Plus, I think she's the best choice of an experienced partner to help Shafir and Duke develop and be a ring general in their matches. I think all Baszler will need to do to be established on the main roster is grab Ronda from behind and choke her out once.

[XIV]

And the problem is that that is not what Ronda needs to do for this year's Mania. This year's Mania needs to be Ronda putting Becky over clean. It's an unduplicatable chance to make Becky as a mainstream star, and I think having Becky lose to Ronda will turn Ronda into the new Roman Reigns.


This seems right to me.

I agree. Becky going over shoots Becky to the moon.

Have Becky win the women’s rumble and challenge Ronda from Raw. Simple.

I'd actually do a double-finish in the Rumble with Becky and Nia (and I'd probably do it the way they did at Royal Rumble 2000 where everyone thinks the babyface won on the day of the show and then the heel presents evidence that it was a tie later on), leading to Becky offering to put her title shot up against Ronda at Elimination Chamber and Becky winning there en route to Ronda so that she can get some real revenge on Nia, too.

And debut Basler at the RR and make her look awesome, then you have a year to build her up on the main roster before starting the Ronda program. Again, simple.

Almost too simple...

I don't think you need that long for Baszler, and she feels too involved in NXT to get called up right now. Plus, I think she's the best choice of an experienced partner to help Shafir and Duke develop and be a ring general in their matches. I think all Baszler will need to do to be established on the main roster is grab Ronda from behind and choke her out once.

You make valid points, and I’d approve them both to be fair. No arguments from me. I like it!

I’d prefer Basler to do something face to face with Ronda though instead of from behind.

[Big Red Machine]

I agree. Becky going over shoots Becky to the moon.

Have Becky win the women’s rumble and challenge Ronda from Raw. Simple.

I'd actually do a double-finish in the Rumble with Becky and Nia (and I'd probably do it the way they did at Royal Rumble 2000 where everyone thinks the babyface won on the day of the show and then the heel presents evidence that it was a tie later on), leading to Becky offering to put her title shot up against Ronda at Elimination Chamber and Becky winning there en route to Ronda so that she can get some real revenge on Nia, too.

And debut Basler at the RR and make her look awesome, then you have a year to build her up on the main roster before starting the Ronda program. Again, simple.

Almost too simple...

I don't think you need that long for Baszler, and she feels too involved in NXT to get called up right now. Plus, I think she's the best choice of an experienced partner to help Shafir and Duke develop and be a ring general in their matches. I think all Baszler will need to do to be established on the main roster is grab Ronda from behind and choke her out once.

You make valid points, and I’d approve them both to be fair. No arguments from me. I like it!

I’d prefer Basler to do something face to face with Ronda though instead of from behind.

I think she has to turn on Ronda. It's the best payoff to building up Horsewomen camaraderie.

[KILLdozer]

I'd still say it's a possibility though ...regardless of what you've read or not read...think about it:

Becky and Charlotte HAAAATTTTEEEE Rhonda Rousy....you can't blame them, but...

Their partner and running mate...Sasha has a title match coming against her, where Bailey I'm pretty sure, will also be in her corner. What better time to gain revenge and exercise vendettas ALSO while helping out old friends?

[XIV]

I'd actually do a double-finish in the Rumble with Becky and Nia (and I'd probably do it the way they did at Royal Rumble 2000 where everyone thinks the babyface won on the day of the show and then the heel presents evidence that it was a tie later on), leading to Becky offering to put her title shot up against Ronda at Elimination Chamber and Becky winning there en route to Ronda so that she can get some real revenge on Nia, too.

I don't think you need that long for Baszler, and she feels too involved in NXT to get called up right now. Plus, I think she's the best choice of an experienced partner to help Shafir and Duke develop and be a ring general in their matches. I think all Baszler will need to do to be established on the main roster is grab Ronda from behind and choke her out once.

You make valid points, and I’d approve them both to be fair. No arguments from me. I like it!

I’d prefer Basler to do something face to face with Ronda though instead of from behind.

I think she has to turn on Ronda. It's the best payoff to building up Horsewomen camaraderie.

Well with the new Women’s Tag Team titles on the horizon, how would you asses having Basler and Ronda team up for those, and then Basler on Ronda down the line? Would that work?

[Big Red Machine]

You make valid points, and I’d approve them both to be fair. No arguments from me. I like it!

I’d prefer Basler to do something face to face with Ronda though instead of from behind.

I think she has to turn on Ronda. It's the best payoff to building up Horsewomen camaraderie.

Well with the new Women’s Tag Team titles on the horizon, how would you asses having Basler and Ronda team up for those, and then Basler on Ronda down the line? Would that work?

I think the angle works best with the idea being that Ronda is the champ and Baszler wants the belt. I'd let Duke/Shafir be the tag team. I wouldn't put Ronda & Baszler in the tournament because they'd have to lose unless you're putting the belts on them, and they really don't need the belts (whereas Sasha/Bayley or Mandy/Sonya or Duke/Shafir would benefit a lot more from being the first champions, or a Nia/Tamina or Bliss/Mickie team would offer easier narrative possibilities).
I think the way I'd do things is have Becky go over Ronda for the Raw belt after winning the Rumble, then swap those two after Mania (with Nattie also switching shows). I'd have Nattie/Ronda as my team in the tournament so Nattie can eat the pin. I'd put the belt Ronda, then turn Nattie on her and give Nattie a group (Sonya Deville. and two others) so that Ronda can bring in the Horsewomen, blow off that feud around October (I figure they're going to do another all-women's PPV, which works well as a nexus where you can have NXT and the main roster intersect) and keep Baszler up on the main roster afterwards. I'd then have Ronda spend the next few months calling out top names to be her PPV challengers opponents (Charlotte, Asuka), and then have Baszler turn on Ronda after the February PPV because she's angry that Ronda has been offering title shots to other people but not to her.

[XIV]

I think she has to turn on Ronda. It's the best payoff to building up Horsewomen camaraderie.

Well with the new Women’s Tag Team titles on the horizon, how would you asses having Basler and Ronda team up for those, and then Basler on Ronda down the line? Would that work?

I think the angle works best with the idea being that Ronda is the champ and Baszler wants the belt. I'd let Duke/Shafir be the tag team. I wouldn't put Ronda & Baszler in the tournament because they'd have to lose unless you're putting the belts on them, and they really don't need the belts (whereas Sasha/Bayley or Mandy/Sonya or Duke/Shafir would benefit a lot more from being the first champions, or a Nia/Tamina or Bliss/Mickie team would offer easier narrative possibilities).
I think the way I'd do things is have Becky go over Ronda for the Raw belt after winning the Rumble, then swap those two after Mania (with Nattie also switching shows). I'd have Nattie/Ronda as my team in the tournament so Nattie can eat the pin. I'd put the belt Ronda, then turn Nattie on her and give Nattie a group (Sonya Deville. and two others) so that Ronda can bring in the Horsewomen, blow off that feud around October (I figure they're going to do another all-women's PPV, which works well as a nexus where you can have NXT and the main roster intersect) and keep Baszler up on the main roster afterwards. I'd then have Ronda spend the next few months calling out top names to be her PPV challengers opponents (Charlotte, Asuka), and then have Baszler turn on Ronda after the February PPV because she's angry that Ronda has been offering title shots to other people but not to her.

BRM, you’ve done it again. I like that angle. Baszler as the overlooked competitor “I’ll show you”.

BRM definitely standing for (B)ooking the (R)ight (M)atches