With the recent loss of both Chris Jericho’s Highlight Reel and Christian’s Peep Show, and with Carlito vowing to focus more on his in-ring career by quitting Carlito’s Cabana, the decision to give Edge a talk show segment to fill that void on RAW made perfect sense.
Even so, I never expected the debut edition of The Cutting Edge to take the direction it did. The surprise was a welcome one indeed.
TODAY’S ISSUE: The Cutting Edge
Wow. I thought it was just going to be another dead-end segment on RAW, and another bait-and-switch. Ric Flair’s appearance as a guest on the first-ever edition of Edge’s new talk segment was not going to happen, even after Joey Styles and Jerry Lawler had promised it would. I started thinking that since HHH failed to appear on what should have been the debut of The Cutting Edge one week prior, perhaps the new storyline was that Edge wants a talk show segment, but he can’t seem to make it happen. How wrong I was.
Since they didn’t get to talk with the Nature Boy in person, Edge and Lita decided to verbally run him down anyway, to the noticeable dissatisfaction of the crowd. They attempted to humiliate the former 16-time world heavyweight champion, and even went as far as to inform the South Carolina crowd that they were now in “Edge Country”, when we all know that area is and always will be Flair Country.
Just as Edge and Lita started to get really nasty, out came pro wrestling legends and current road agents Michael “P.S.” Hayes and Sgt. Slaughter, seemingly on orders from Vince McMahon himself, to put an end to the offensive segment. That’s when the fun began.
“What do we have here? Bartles and James!” started Edge. He and Lita refused to shut up, and it only got worse. Lita claimed that Slaughter and Hayes were “two legends that currently make a living kissing Vince McMahon’s ass.” Ouch. This segment was rolling, and it would only get hotter from there, as Edge and Lita continued to taunt the two elder statesmen of the pro wrestling industry.
Edge’s next disgusting line to Hayes was, “Somebody told you I had a bottle of Jack Daniels and an 8-ball down here, didn’t they?” Well, that was all the Freebird was going to take. He ripped the stick out of Edge’s hand.
Hayes tried one more time to insist that Edge cut this segment and head to the backstage area, but Edge would have none of it. Hayes lost his temper and began his own tirade. He proceeded to virtually call out this entire generation of pro wrestlers about how easy they have things nowadays, and how they don’t respect men like himself, Sgt. Slaughter and Ric Flair, whose blood, sweat and tears helped pave the way for the younger guys’ very careers. It certainly seemed like those were close to being shoot comments. This segment was the most interesting thing I’d seen on WWE programming in weeks.
Hayes told Edge that while Ric Flair may not be Hayes’ best friend, he respects him, and he’ll give Flair the benefit of the doubt regarding his current well-publicized legal and personal issues.
Next, Hayes pulled Edge’s punk card. “How many times have you been in the main event? How many times have you sold out the arena and turned them away?” I was screaming for P.S. to testify! Damn, this was a fun segment. But the best was yet to come. “How many times have you been world champion? Let me do the math for you, because it won’t take long. Zero!” Hayes was on fire; he was absolutely brilliant in this segment.
Edge freaked out, and tried to get the tech folks to cut off Hayes’ mic since it was, in fact, Edge’s show. Having put the young man in his place, Hayes was now insistent that it was time to go.
But then Edge went too damn far. He taunted Michael Hayes about how there was nothing he could do to Edge without his usual backup, referring to the late Freebird Terry “Bam Bam” Gordy, and Edge got sickeningly personal. “You don’t have your best friend Terry Gordy. Where is he? Oh, that’s right Michael. Terry Gordy’s dead!”
That horrible (and horribly timed, considering Eddie Guerrero’s recent passing) comment was enough to send Hayes into a rage. He called Edge a son-of-a-bitch, and told him, “The only reason you’ve got this show is because you’re banging Matt Hardy’s ex-girlfriend!” It goes with out saying that at this point, it was on.
Sadly but as expected, Slaughter and Hayes were no physical match for Edge and Lita. Edge hit a low blow on Slaughter, and he finally did something smart with that money-in-the-bank briefcase of his when he clocked the Freebird with it to end Hayes’ short offensive burst. Within seconds the legends were left lying in the ring. Quite pleased with themselves, Edge and Lita left the ring, ending a super-hot and very entertaining segment.
I am quite optimistic that this was the beginning of something special rather than another one-shot, meaningless, dead-end angle. I’m not saying a Hayes vs. Edge feud will sell tickets, since P.S. is obviously past his prime. However, if enough old-timers were to gang up on Edge all at once, or spread out several attacks from different angles at different times, Edge might not know what hit him. Or, Hayes could find some younger men who respect the business to lead into war against Edge. I’m partial to that choice, as I marked out when he lead the Hardy Boyz to their first WWF world tag-team championship reign.
Either way, if this goes anywhere, it’s bound to be worth watching. Hayes was fantastic on the mic in the segment, and he really made me want to see him tear Edge up. If they allow Adam Copeland to continue to show this “edge”, I’ll look forward to seeing his talk show segment week after week. Who knows? This might finally be the gimmick that gets him over…
Unfortunately, there was hardly any follow-up one week later on last night’s edition of RAW. Edge and Lita “bumped into” Ric Flair following his match with Kurt Angle, and they made a few tasteless comments. Other than that exchange, The Rated R Superstar and his gal-pal were nowhere to be found in Boston.
Inside Pulse’s own Matt Gardner posted some comments by Michael P.S. Hayes on the WWE’s web show “Byte This!” a few days after his run-in with Edge:
Michael PS Hayes calls in after the break.
Caller asks Hayes if he’s going to get Edge next Monday. He says no but that he won’t stand idly by if Edge continues his prickish ways.
Hayes talks shit about the tag division and how the teams don’t ride together and this generation really is too entitled and f*cked up.
Caller asks Michael what the best part of his career was. He says “the part where I end up at a bar after the show.”
Todd asks Hayes if he thinks Edge will ever be the world champion. Michael says Edge has the physical presence but doesn’t have the mental toughness. He thinks Edge’s whole career will be defined as “I screwed my ex-best friend’s chick while he was rehabbing.”
They can’t let this tasty stuff just go to waste, can they? What am I saying, of course they can! But I certainly hope they follow through on this angle and take it somewhere.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled reality.
p.s. – It’s no accident that in a medical care situation you’re referred to as a “patient”. You’d better be patient on that day, because you’re going to be waiting a long time. Especially since the room is called the “waiting room”. There’s no chance of NOT waiting.
