Raw was in Greensboro this week which means I forked over the money for tickets and attended with my college roommate Jason (who enjoys being called J-Roll, regardless of what he may tell you). All of this means that my experiences from the show will hijack most of the column this week. It could be worse, I could be spouting off a bunch of things that I’m thankful for.
First off, J-Roll and myself went to the coliseum to get our tickets. Originally it was suppose to be 3 of us (joined by me @CRAttire co-host Joel) but we were cut down to 2 and so we decided to splurge a little and get closer to the ring. The chart made it seem like we were gonna be halfway down the ramp in the lower section. However, when we got there, we were right on-top of the stage with no ability to see the tron. It wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought, though, we were a lot closer than previously and we ended up being a section away from Sheild’s “skybox.”
The night began with the Superstars taping. The first match was sure to get the entire crowd on their feet seeing as how it was Ryder vs Tensai (I probably should inject more sarcasm in that statement). And to make sure the crowd was nice and dead, Tensai won.
The second Superstars match seemed like it was simply an excuse to get as many people in the ring or ringside as possible. Here’s the count:
As special guest timekeeper, Hornswaggle.
As special guest commentator, Natalya.
As special guest referee, The Great Khali
Match participant, David Otunga.
Match participant #2, Brodus Clay.
Match participant arm candy, Funkadactyls
Interrupting party, Rosa Mendes.
That’s right a total of 8 people for a 2-man 6 minute match. Although the one thing of note is that Mr. Glass Knees, Khali, found a way to count the pin without leaving his feet. Not sure if that’s impressive or sad.
That brings us to the start of the actual show. As mentioned earlier, we were pretty close to the Shield box and I was highly tempted to be all “Dean…Dean…DEAN! Hi.” And after seeing him pretty up-close, Roman is a pretty huge dude, I was impressed. Also, during the match and while The Shield slowly made their way down, you might have noticed the crowd going insane for a short time and a slew of “Cena” chants. This is because some guy decided to be a Cena impersonator and make his way down the far side of the arena, essentially looking like he was going to stop Shield (or at least that’s what the kiddies were cheering for).
I got to see AJ from a closer distance and TV doesn’t do her justice, color me smitten.
It was about this time that I began to notice the gentlemen seated behind me, a trio of law students who are also quite fond of earlier wrestling generations. During the Divas match, they debated about transparency of commerce (or at least that’s what I was able to make out of what was coming out of their heads) and when any topic was changed back to wrestling, the guy right behind me always began it with “Did you guys watch back in the day when (insert attitude era wrestler) did (insert famous moment)? Why can’t it be like that?” And this sparked a discussion about how great the new Attitude Era and NWO dvds are. Now, I have yet to see either dvd but according to several colleagues and reviews, Attitude Era was “okay” and the NWO dvd was horrendous…just saying.
I will say it was fun to have those guys during the first Punk and Miz promo where they tried their hardest to start a chant about how polygraph tests are inadmissible in court (I don’t think it took because of too many syllables).
During the big 8:30 tag team is when I first really noticed all the kids, namely the lad seating to my right. Yes, the unwritten fan code dictates that during any match, everybody sits down and this kid obviously was unaware and stood throughout the entire match and he was big enough to completely block my view of the ring. Of course, I didn’t say anything or get mad about that because he’s just a kid and he’s seeing his two heroes and it’s cool to see young fans get into the product, even if their choice of heroes is terrible. He was a cool kid, though, he liked my CM Pony poster and we exchanged jokes and a couple high fives.
I gotta admire Sandow for having this apprentice gimmick thrown on him and still making it tolerable. That being said, I was never a big Keats fan and I had guess Whitman. Why? Because he said everything worth repeating and if there was anything that he didn’t say, it was said by Samuel Johnson. It’s a fact, look it up.
The only thing of note about the Del Rio/Cara match is when Cara was thrown into the barrier upside-down, Cara’s boot totally tagged a large lady in the front row. This caused an entertaining reaction out of myself and J-Roll. The law students behind us apparently didn’t catch what happened and asked us. We told them and that caused the guy behind me to ask me “Hey, did you ever watch ECW back in like, 95? blah blah blah.” I smile, shook my head and pretended to be caring about his diatribe, which essentially recapped a story I overheard him tell about 15 mins prior. Not to mention that I was 7 years old in 95.
I lost my head when Vince came out. Apparently, the commentators had been talking about him showing up but the audience had no idea until we saw the backstage footage. That’s really the extent of my excitement about that promo because the rest of it was essentially Vince sticking his hand up Vickie and working her like a puppet.
Braddox had a match, the ensuing Shield attack lasted longer.
They cut to commercial and promptly did the entrances for Barrett, Cesaro and Truth then aired the circus clown of people walking into Vickie’s office (which explained why you heard R-Truth chants during the Vickie segment, if you were wondering). Finally, we got Kofi’s entrance and then Teddy’s announcement, another commercial, the reveal and finally got the match started. That’s right, 3 of the match participants were essentially twiddling their thumbs in the ring for about 20 minutes.
As for the match itself, it was clearly the in-ring highlight of the night and worked pretty well to establish Cesaro as a credible opponent.
And then we got to the incredibly cheesy lie detector test. Just a few tidbits:
Miz, it’s “Guilford County” not “Golford County”
When Punk asked Greensboro to apologize, I apologized.
Apparently, the gentleman that administered the test was legitimately qualified and works for a local agency that one of the law students currently works for as well. Who knew? Would’ve been better if Sheriff BJ Barnes came out and did it…mostly to see him book it out of the ring when things broke down.
After the two promos we got out of these two, I’m really interested in seeing a Miz and Punk feud. It seems like they respect each other but still have a good deal of angst between them. But I was to see this mostly because I was hear mic work like that for a month straight.
I’ve witnessed it in-person and I’m willing to go out on a limb as say we just might have a new “Cena” with Ryback. The crowd was chanting for him the entire night and when he finally came out, the entire place came unglued. Nobody else got a reaction anywhere in the ballpark. As for the man himself, it’s still the same Ryback I saw beating up jobbers back in May.
The cameras cut off and the trainers was gingerly sliding Punk out of the ring which we originally thought was a work but after the news we got today, maybe not so much.
As announced here on Pulse, Punk had to undergo emergency knee surgery today (Tuesday). Surgery apparently went well but Vince announced that he is out of TLC. Instead, we are getting a 6-man Tag Team TLC match. Hold your excitement and Wrestlemania 17 references because it’s not for the Tag Team titles…or any title for that matter. It will be a 3-on-3 match that will result in either pinfall of submission match between Team Friendship and Ryback vs The Shield. First off, they booked a no DQ match and called it TLC. Secondly, they could’ve easily paired Ryback up with somebody and pulled in a few more tag teams. Thirdly, we’re essentially going to see The Shield experience the entire Nexus-like run in about a week and get completely squashed at TLC. No bueno, WWE.
Also, I’m pissed about this MitB match between Ziggler and Cena. UNLESS, they actually put Ziggler over and build him up more. But it’s Cena and that won’t happen. Cena will either take the briefcase or Ziggler will find a skeezy way of winning it. Just boo all around.
Well that was my live experience, a pretty enjoyable night and I’m glad I squeezed out the duckets for the tickets.
Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do twice,
Chris
The Answer: In the world of bizarre yet awesome news, just found out that mastodon is writing a song for the new monsters inc movie…is this real life?
