I’ve made a few changes to how I’m doing the recaps of Raw (from early on just recapping the Road to WrestleMania shows to just hitting the big points to trying to recap the entire show, but based on importance) and I think in order to be able to continue writing about Raw, I have to eliminate the unimportant. Because these days, Raw is about 2 1/2 hours of unimportant and who likes writing about things that don’t matter?
I’ll eliminate the bulleted points portion at the end and just focus on the things that matter, or are at the very least, interesting.
The Shield Vs. The Wyatt Family?
Via WWE.com
In fact, after last night’s main event angle which featured Daniel Bryan and CM Punk facing the Shield in a handicap match featuring run-ins by the Wyatts and Cody Rhodes, Goldust, and the Usos, the Survivor Series match is still scheduled to be just Luke Harper and Rowan vs. Daniel Bryan and CM Punk.
From Dave Meltzer:
Despite the finish of Raw leading you to believe they had changed directions, the No. 3 match behind Randy Orton vs. Big Show and John Cena vs. Alberto Del Rio, on the 11/24 Survivor Series show is still a tag match with Daniel Bryan & C.M. Punk vs. Erick Rowan & Luke Harper.
By booking a very hot angle which sets up something that might actually sell some PPVs, instead they go back to a regular old tag? This is kind of like stunting Daniel Bryan’s push and making sure the audience was conditioned to see him as nothing special. It’s kind of like being handed Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker, but instead, forcing us to have to watch Triple H get his win back against a legitimate ass kicker.
Right now, the only program on Survivor Series that intrigues me is Punk and Bryan vs. The Wyatts and they made it better by adding the Shield and the rest. Yet, they don’t want to move forward with that. I bet we’ll get the Shield and someone vs. Cody, Goldust, and the Usos instead as an elimination tag match, which isn’t nearly as hot as a possible 6 on 6 match that it looked like they were setting up.
The booking of Big E and Ryback
Big E looked great in his loss to Randy Orton recently and got the rub even more by saving his buddy John Cena from an attack by Alberto Del Rio after Cena beat the Real Americans in a handicap match. Libertarian Kane then put Del Rio in a match with Langston later in the show. I thought they were going to make Langston look good again, possibly running Del Rio away or getting DQ’d or maybe even having Del Rio get DQ’d. Nope. He just took his cross-arm breaker and enjoyed it.
On the other hand, Ryback, who I find much less talented than Langston was also given a bit of raw treatment. He lost to a rapping R-Truth via roll-up. I don’t know if Ryback is in the doghouse or maybe he failed a test of some sort, but after facing Punk in one of the co-mains at the last PPV, how can you lose to Truth? If the idea is that Ryback is going to lose because he’s coming back babyface, why doesn’t Langston beat him? Or Cody? Or someone, you know, who is getting over and could use the win?
Which leads us to the next segment in which Paul Heyman said that Ryback is not a Paul Heyman guy. Does this mean we get a bunch of Ryback vs. Curtis Axel matches?
Heyman is still fascinated by CM Punk and their feud must continue. However, Punk beat him up inside the ring after Heyman’s promo. Maybe Heyman becomes affiliated with the Wyatts’ somehow and helps them beat Punk at Survivor Series?
Randy Orton is dead as champion
Without Triple H and Stephanie on the show (which was told several times), you’d think the WWE Champ, the guy who is their chosen A+ player would get the Triple H role of immortality on this show. But that didn’t happen. Instead, Orton was put in a handicap match himself against the tag team champions, lost by count out, and then chokeslammed all to hell through a table by the Big Show who ran in. The Big Show then left and was never seen again.
For the rest of the show, he was A) ordered around by Libertarian Kane, B) was talked down to by the Shield, C) was looked at by the doctor for what seemed like 2 hours, D) and was then never seen again.
Maybe Daniel Bryan lucked out?
Here’s what we have for the Survivor Series so far:
Randy Orton vs. The Big Show
John Cena vs. Alberto Del Rio
CM Punk and Daniel Bryan vs. Erick Rowan and Luke Harper