Last week’s RAW had the memorable Shawn Michaels versus Shelton Benjamin show stealer as well as the closing Triple H tapping out to Benoit’s Crippler Crossface as Batista mocks and laughs at him. This week’s RAW however, put the momentum back a notch.
I really am not as annoyed as some are by how conscious the backstage crew is of what colors look good on their top guys, however, why not give them a catch phrase? The fans are chanting “You Tapped Out!” though the irony of all of this is, Batista did not make Triple H tap out, Chris Benoit did. Yes, Triple H tapped out, but it wasn’t to the World Champion. This makes Triple H look bad in any circle, losing the belt and losing a match against Benoit — but it puts Chris Benoit in this state of “he’s main event but not main event enough to get another run or a title shot against Batista by default.” I understand this is a “Gold Rush” tournament to have the tournament winner to face Batista but Benoit was World Champion once upon a time, Benoit versus Batista would be a compelling match. Batista is getting better with his promos, when he’s himself despite getting caught on camera looking at HHH with eyes during the crowd’s reaction like they are friends and not in a feud with each other. I think Batista could really punch up the “what do I fear exactly? YOU FEAR ME.” Batista has to take better control of the promos. He’s the Champion, he should control the flow of the promo otherwise we all still have to buy into that Triple H controls everything by default. I’m a fan of the silent thumbs down, but it has to eventually find a balance–you have to remember, he hasn’t wrestled since the PPV on TV. Triple H has the right idea, in going up to the fans, but he needs to really lay it on them – it’s already established that they love to hate him, but make them really hate you. I’ve been reading Ric Flair’s book and he discusses how he used to call guys in the audience “fat boys” — Triple H should follow his lead and find something to say where people can one day put up a sign that says the insult he called them.
Ric Flair not being his own man continues to be insulting to anyone who has followed Flair’s career over the years. He’s been reduced to being Triple H’s cheerleader and this is not how I want Flair to one day go down in the audience’s memories. There are two things that the RAW writers are either choosing to ignore or prolong: 1) the Ric Flair we know and love would not associate with someone who isn’t a champion (last I checked, HHH’s been without gold for two months now) and 2) the Ric Flair we know and love would not associate with someone who is on a losing streak. The fans are rubbing two sticks together and are hoping for the Ric Flair spark to come back. Christian brings out the best in Ric Flair and I was happier at the thought of that match then most of the material on RAW this week. The reason why Christian is coming into his own is he controls the direction of his segments. He has yet in recent memory to be put in his place. Christian is the refreshing and breakout star waiting to happen and be nothing but a benefit to either show he is on.
The strangest thing on RAW, even stranger than Viscera’s Sexual Chocolate II Sexual Harassment was Khosrow Daivari’s sudden loss of Arabian accent into perfect, “American” English! That completely took me out of the promo entirely to the point of complete distraction that he didn’t stay in character. With Jericho as his opponent, it’s clear that Shelton would somehow be involved but it’s disturbing that Jericho has been reduced to the “go to” guy as a “out” for a storyline that has nothing to do with him- and not in a dominant storyline of his own. The storyline he’s in with Shelton Benjamin isn’t as exciting for the simple reason that Shelton had the show stealer of last with Michaels and nothing has been that exciting since Wrestlemania. Storylines do not work unless fans care, fans want to boo Hassan and Daivari but not for any reason other than their hatred for America. On the surface it seems like enough but it does the one thing that in wrestling shouldn’t be done – limiting the life of a character. You can’t pepper Hassan and Daivari in any segment like you can Simon Dean and Maven for instance. The solution I can offer is either hire the Iron Sheik for nostalgia purposes and to further get heat for the two characters or divide them up and make Daivari the face, but so far, Daivari has very limited wrestling ability. It is days like this that I miss “Classy” Freddie Blassie.
The absence of Trish Stratus is obvious and missed when we’re stuck with Christy Hemme who has been pushed into the shortest segment possible with Eric Bischoff and Maria being the resident village idiot. I want to be fair and always give new talent a shot, but has she ever watched WWE programming in her life? THE Edge? Way to go in using articles in a sentence completely inappropriately, Maria. Let’s not forget how she giggled like a little girl for Shawn Michaels, so much for professionalism.
Another issue burning in my mind is you have relatively new tag team champions in The Hurricane and Rosey – and you don’t have them defend their belts and you have La Resistance fighting with themselves so you can have filler matches? What happened to building up the division with the new talent? You can’t get them over if you don’t put them on television.
The biggest problem I had with this week’s RAW was knowing deep down that Benoit nor Shawn were going to advance, setting up Kane versus Edge next week, with Lita in Kane’s corner. So the WWE is finally going to have Lita involved in the same match that she has real life drama with. If the WWE wants to get real life heel heat in a match, this is definitely the way to embrace it but there was no surprise in the outcome of this week’s programming. If Lita ends up doing a full fledged heel turn and joins Edge next week, what then? All the lack of explaining the chants at her and Edge in the last month, will still go unexplained or will she have to address it on national television? Once this happens, there’s no going back – it is just ashame we can’t get Matt Hardy Version 2.0 to really get things over. We all know how blurry the line of reality and storyline can be in the wrestling world. Will the twisted Lita help Edge by hobbling and whacking Batista with a crutch to assist in defeating Batista for the belt? Clearly won’t happen. Regardless, next week is more about where Lita will stand – will she be a full fledged heel or will she hit Edge to get her back to a theoretical babyface chant? Will the fans care? I know I don’t care who wins next week because the title is staying Batista – neither Edge or Kane would be able to elevate the company in any way right now. Edge only has heat because of his real life situation, not because he’s a good heel on his own merit. Kane has this semi-handicap by having Lita with him, because we have to assume Lita is sick enough to be affectionate toward him despite carrying the child she didn’t want with him – on his own, it’s not the same because his feud should be with her at any turn, not anyone else.
I felt last week that the Gold Rush tournament was strong in every match and there just wasn’t enough time to tell good and compelling stories this week within the matches. With or without Hunter involved, you still have to build the guys to believable main event. He’s going to end up proving his point unless something changes that no one can get over and be taken seriously without him on television at the beginning of RAW. This tournament should be elevating talent, and this week’s bracket did nothing but completely distracting the audience from the purpose of preparing for storylines without Hunter involved. It’s a sad reality that we wouldn’t be seeing this match at the semi-final level if it hadn’t been for the drama with Matt Hardy, Lita and Edge spiraling into the arenas. Lita and Edge’s real life decision has given them a twisted push, this has nothing to do with Edge’s Money In the Bank, Brick in the Suitcase gimmick. The easiest solve would have been to not be placed in this situation by putting Lita or Edge to Smackdown to cool this situation off. Kane has the ability to work without Lita in the future but Edge needs to find his edge without his real life lover’s heel heat and that’s putting it in perspective. Thank you for reading and you can always drop me a line at Bam@4sternstaging.com.
