We had a RAW show from Montreal, which was a totally nothing happening show that was headlined by a pretty awesome Sami Zayn vs. Shorty G match, followed by a dispicable act on the part of that sore loser, Shorty G. You sorry bastard couldn’t get the job done beating GUNTHER and now you couldn’t even beat the guy who beat GUNTHER and on top of that, he’s the same guy you HELPED TRAINED to beat GUNTHER and you still couldn’t beat him. And now I’m supposed to feel sorry for you and say that you deserve it? Fuck off, man. You suck. You’re a loser. You don’t deserve shit!
Now… in all seriousness, I like Sami’s entrance for this one. It started with Jey Uso running outside from his own match and running into Sami, who cuts this great speech about how he stood in the front door of the Bell Center years ago to attend his first show and now he was going to walk through those same doors as champion. This leads to Sami walking through the concourse of Bell Center, knocking over a trash bin and somehow not inciting a riot as a result, before making his way to the arena, through the adoring crowd cheering him on, singing his song… hey, you know what? This was a pretty good piece of camera work. Obviously, not something you’d expect out of the old WWE camp, but now that we’ve got someone behind the production wheel who isn’t a lazy hack producer, we’re getting these more dynamic shots, which I like.
Now, I say that this is a largely nothing happening show, but stuff did happen on this show. For instance, as a result of Liv Morgan’s cowardly attack, Rhea Ripley suffered an injury and is forced to relinquish her Women’s World Title after a year-long reign, which sucks, of course. Wishing her all the best, but honestly, it kills the question of who’s going to beat Rhea for this title because she is getting so hot right now… and the answer is “Abayence.” The other thing that popped to mind is that this is basically the 2006-2007 John Cena WWE title reign, which also lasted close to a year before Cena got hurt and he was forced to give up the title, but when he came back months later, he was a hotter act than ever… until people remembered that they hated him and proceeded to boo him again. So yeah, this sucks for Rhea now, but when she comes back, her stock is going to be higher than ever and no doubt the journey back to the top is going to be hotter than her title run.
Hell, it sucks now… but maybe this was the kick into overdrive that Rhea needed. That level of sympathy of sorts after a freak injury… and with Liv Morgan pretty much cast as the villain… hey, you know what this is? This is Steve Austin getting spiked on his head via Owen Hart piledriver and then look what happened afterwards. Obviously, this isn’t on that same level and Rhea might not be back any time soon, but if they play their cards right, they might have a similar situation play out on television. Rhea can do what she needs to do to heal, then she can “come back” sooner than expect, she can do the Stone Cold thing where she wants back in despite not being cleared or whatever… I don’t know. It’s an idea that could go for. See? There’s plenty of ways you can go with this. This could work out just fine.
They’re also replacing the nickle and dime color co-ordinated tag belts with proper belts. So now the RAW tag titles are now the World Tag Team Titles while I’m guessing the Smackdown tag belts will become the WWE Tag Titles, much like the old brand split ages ago. Well, good. Fantastic. Finally, we’re done with this brand-specific bullshit that made no sense. No more of this silly belt-swapping bullshit because they’re on the wrong shows or something. They can keep the belts they have and not have to worry about swapping anything. Thank fuck for that.
Other than that… eh, Sheamus made his comeback from injury and defeated Ivar. I won’t give the man grief over not looking quite as “fit” as he usually does; maybe this was a last-minute thing and they needed a body. Maybe Sheamus gets better after a while. Either way, good to see him back after so long. (And yes, it hasn’t escaped me that Sheamus’ last match was against Edge in Toronto last year, which happened to be Edge’s last match before he jumped ship to AEW.)
Oh and there was a Cody promo where he talked about stuff and pretty much confirmed that he’s stuck on Smackdown… so I guess there’s no reason for anyone to watch RAW now… sounds good to me.
Sorry, Sami. But I ain’t sitting through three hours of RAW on a weekly basis, especially if your next challenger ends up being fucking SHORTY G.
dtm666 