BRM Reviews the 8/31/2015 Raw (infuriating)

[Big Red Machine]

STING PROMO- bad.
When I heard that bird cawing, the first thought in my mind was “what the hell is Raven doing here?”
Sting’s promo would have worked a lot better if he had actually beaten Triple H at WrestleMania. If he had that whole Seth Rollins “is no Triple H” comment becomes a declaration that Sting knows he can beat Rollins. Because he lost to Hunter, though, that comment comes across a lot more like “well… Rollins isn’t as good as Hunter, so maybe I’ll have a better chance against him.” Also, the whole thing positioned Hunter OVER the WWE Champion.
I didn’t like the way Sting’s promo went. It started off by saying that Seth doesn’t deserve to be the champion, but then he went off in a completely different direction with the whole “I want to win the only world title I’ve never won before I retire” angle.
I think it would have been a lot better if they had kept up with the first part of that promo and had set it up last week by having Sting disappear with the title belt at the end of the night and come out this week and says that if Seth wants to hold this prestigious, sacred belt, he needs to prove himself worthy, first.

SETH & STEPH BACKSTAGE- bad
Seth’s comments were okay, but would have worked better as a promo by Seth to the camera. The part where Steph said that Rollins’ isn’t anywhere near as good was Triple H was pretty terrible. It almost seems like they want to turn Triple H babyface and do Seth vs. Triple H which would be a TERRIBLE idea.

They showed some promos of Dolph & Lana on Instigram going to nice places. Do they really think that anyone gives a sh*t about these pictures?

DOLPH ZIGGLER (w/Lana) vs. RUSEV (w/Summer Rae)- 6.75/10
Byron was telling us about how, after Rusev injured Dolph’s throat, Dolph was in a lot of pain and couldn’t even do simple things we all take for granted like talk or swallow. Here’s an idea… how about HAVE DOLPH CUT A PROMO TALKING ABOUT THAT WHEN HE CAME BACK! That’s the sort of promo that would actually get people interested in their Summer Slam match. Instead they just give us the same exact crap week after week after week.
They had a very good match that ended when Dolph had Rusev pinned but Summer ran in for the DQ. This would have been a lot better if we hadn’t just seen Dolph pin Rusev on Smackdown. This resulted in a cat-fight until Dolph randomly decided to pull Lana off of Summer even though Lana was kicking Summer’s ass.

They’re really pushing Instigram hard tonight (the DYK fact was that the Divas all have a bunch of followers on Instigram).

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS DOLPH ZIGGLER- Dolph cut a promo saying that DQ isn’t the way he wants to win. Once again, this would have been a lot better if Dolph hadn’t pinned Rusev on Smackdown. This is shaping up to be one of those nights where there are a lot of new holes in the wall of BRM’s house.

RENEE RUNS DOWN THE CARD- and while this was happening, in the background, Summer Rae snuck into Dolph’s dressing room. You see… THIS is how you do a backstage segment. You COME UP WITH AN EXCUSE FOR WHY THE CAMERA IS THERE!

TEAM BELLA SEGMENT- Nikki Bella, the heel champion, does a totally heel thing by setting up a giant countdown clock to count down to the exact moment that she will pass AJ’s record for longest-reigning Divas Champion… and the crowd responds with polite applause.

BECKY LYNCH PROMO- good.

BEAT THE CLOCK CHALLENGE: Becky Lynch (w/Paige & Charlotte) vs. Alicia Fox (w/The Bella Twins)- 2.75/10
So both Charlotte and Sasha have pinned the Divas Champion. Neither Becky nor Paige have done so. And yet somehow, Charlotte must compete in a Beat The Clock Challenge against two girls who did not pin the champion in the hopes of earning a title shot, while Sasha is not been given any title opportunity at all. This company makes me want to throw things.
Cole tells us that PCB is getting this opportunity for winning the match at Summer Slam. Fine. But that shouldn’t discount Sasha’s victory over the champion!
I popped for Becky’s single-armed Cattle Mutilation. They did a very good job for the mere 3:21 they were given. This, of course, means that we will have- AT MOST- TEN MINUTES AND THREE SECONDS OF WOMEN’S WRESTLING ON THIS SHOW. So much for giving Divas a chance.

RYBACK PROMO- good.

LANA STEALS DOLPH’S CLOTHES- okay…
Well at least I like the way they had the camera set up (t was around for the Ryback interview).

WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE MATCH: Ryback(c) vs. Big Show- 6.25/10
So WWE sets up for this match at Summer Slam by having the finish be Ryback steal the pi on Miz after Show KOs him with a WMD… but instead of spending the past week using that fact to build this match up, they use it having Big Show lose a bunch of tag team matches. This company can be so frustrating!
Miz is on commentary for this match because apparently he still needs to be involved in this feud, even though he got beaten cleanly at the PPV.
This was one of those matches where it really stood out to me that they were so focused on hooking the leg that they didn’t actually put any weight on the shoulders for the pins. Other than that and the terrible finish, they had a fun big-man match. The finish in question was that babyface Ryback only won because Miz decided to stick his nose into the match and distracted the Big Show. There is NO F*CKING REASON FOR THIS TO HAVE HAPPENED! If you want to create a reason for Big Show to get a title shot a Night of Champions, JUST DON’T BOOK THIS MATCH FOR TONIGHT AND BOOK IT FOR NIGHT OF CHAMPIONS INSTEAD!

CHARLOTTE IN-SET PROMO- much better than we usually get from her on the main roster

BEAT THE CLOCK CHALLENGE: Charlotte (w/Becky Lynch & Paige) vs. Brie Bella (w/Nikki Bella & Alicia Fox)- 2/10
They did a good job telling their story. The problem is that they only went a minute and a half.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS THE DUDLEY BOYS- they are looking for their tenths WWE Tag Team Title reign. Bubba was good, but I don’t understand why we are supposed to support the Dudleys cheating by using tables.

KEVIN OWENS vs. CESARO- 7.5/10
Yeah. Because this isn’t something you’d want to hype up. They had a great match, as you would expect.

DOLPH & LANA BACKSTAGE- so Dolph has his clothes on now. Apparently Lana is so paranoid that she suspects that Dolph angrily chasing Summer out of his locker room before was actually a post-coital angry chasing out of the locker room.
OH MY G-D COULD THEY POSSIBLY MAKE LANA ANY MORE UNLIKEABLE?!
So Dolph has had his privacy violated, and Lana is upset because another woman saw her boyfriend in the nude. Now I understand why Rusev dumped her. She is so self-centered!

WYATT FAMILY PROMO- bad. It was boring. Bray talked about the end of the world. Strowman said “this isn’t the beginning… this is the end. The apocalypse.” Then he made a face that probably wasn’t supposed to be funny but actually was.

DEAN AMBROSE (w/Roman Reigns) vs. BRAUN STROWMAN (w/the Wyatt Family)- no rating. Okay segment.
Strowman beats Dean up all match. Roman attacks for the DQ but gets beat up two. They definitely put Strowman over HUGE, but that doesn’t change the fact that it was boring to watch for a quite a while. Strowman REALLY needs a new finisher, though.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS SETH ROLLINS- yup. They’re definitely building to Triple H vs. Seth Rollins for some reason.
Did anyone else barely notice the US Title around Seth’s waist?

PAIGE IN-SET PROMO- once again, better than what we’ve been getting since this “Divas’ Revolution” crap started. Actually, now that I think about it, I don’t think they’ve said that words “Divas’ Revolution” or “era of the female athlete” or an other such PR tagline crap at all tonight.

BEAT THE CLOCK CHALLENGE: Paige (w/Becky Lynch & Charlotte) vs. Sasha Banks (w/Tamina & Naomi)- DUD!
So we finally get to see Sasha vs. Paige… and it has a ninety-second time limit. And they effectively BEAT SASHA BANKS in just seventy (she got saved by Naomi and Tamina pulling her out of the ring. They could have put basically ANY woman in the company in this position, but they chose to job out Sasha. It would have made SO MUCH MORE SENSE to do this same match but with Nikki in Sasha’s role because then not only was Paige screwed out of a title shot, but she proved he could beat the champ at the exact same time.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS SUMMER RAE- she lies like a good heel. Summer has awesome facials, too. She claims that Dolph invited her into his locker room so they could bury the hatchet… but he really wanted to… um… bury the hatchet… if you know what I mean. Summer was totally awesome here.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS LANA ABOUT HER INTERVIEW WITH SUMMER- For some unexplained reason, Lana believes a noted liar who has a grudge against her.

NEW DAY PROMO- idiotic. They are going to protect the last table in the building because of dumb sh*t. I hate this company right now. They should have come out with their signs from Smackdown. It would have been so much better.

THE DUDLEY BOYS vs. THE NEW DAY (w/Xavier Woods)- 5.25/10
PTP are on commentary again because they haven’t actually done anything for the past week. At least they talked about a rematch clause, so at least that isn’t being forgotten.
It would have been nice if they actually gave this the time to be a real main event. The Dudleys win and want to put Big E. through a table after the match but thankfully Big E’s pals pull him to safety before those sore winners can get to him.

SETH ROLLINS CALLS OUT STING- ranging from bad to dull.
Rollins wants Sting to return his statue an also take back his comments that Hunter is better than Rollins. STEPH then comes out to tell Rollins to stop disputing the claim that he isn’t better than Triple H. So now the feud for the WWE World Heavyweight Title between Sting and Seth Rollins is about whether or not Rollins is better than Triple H?! THIS IS SOOOOOOOOOOOO F*CKING DUMB!
Rollins makes a sensible point to refute Steph. Steph tells him he is dumb and being fooled by Sting. Rollins refocuses and calls out Sting again, but this time he gets Cena. Cena wants his rematch at Night of Champions, so I guess Rollins will defend both titles at the PPV, which is exactly what Jay Lethal is doing in ROH two nights earlier, just a month after WWE copied ROH’s Title vs. Title storyline at ROH’s last major PPV less than two months after ROH did it.
Seth and Steph yelled at each other as Cena went back up the ramp. Then Sting showed up to stand there with Cena.

A F*CKING TERRIBLE episode of Raw. I really hate this company right now.

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. JBL refers to Sting as “the man who put Starrcade on the map.”
He really said that.
Normally when a WWE announcer says something this outrageous, you get the feeling that are just saying what they are ordered to, but this felt like a Matt Striker-esque moment of saying something completely false completely of your own volition.

[Big Red Machine]

It just occurred to me that neither Orton nor Sheamus appeared on this show.