Last night at MetLife Stadium, WWE put on its biggest show of the year with over 80,000 fans in attendance for a very polished presentation that ultimately came off as hollow for most of the night.
But tonight on Monday Night Raw, 16,000 crazy f****** fans in a sold out IZOD Center turned the WWE Universe over on its head and collectively made this show much more compelling than it had any right to be.
When Daniel Bryan came out both times tonight, he was the most over guy in the company.
When Wade Barrett wrestled The Miz in a WrestleMania rematch, the crowd SCREAMED “Let’s Go Barrett”
When Dolph Ziggler cashed in, the crowd went BONZO GONZO as Scott Keith would say.
They even HUMMED Fandango’s theme song.
And of course, they LOVED Ryback’s Shell Shock on John Cena to close the night.
But aside from all of that fun, in the highlight of all highlights, this crowd absolutely made Sheamus vs. Randy Orton into a MUST-WATCH experience. Instead of sitting on their hands, they simply rejected the product they didn’t care to see by IGNORING everything going on in the ring and starting up the best consecutive series of chants I’ve heard in a long, long time.
“RVD!”
“JBL!”
“JERRY!”
“MICHAEL COLE!”
They did the freakin’ WAVE.
“RANDY SAVAGE!”
And of course: “WE ARE AWESOME!”
Hell, commercial breaks couldn’t even stop this crowd, and it was just, well, awesome indeed.
After what looked to be a very lackluster audience for WrestleMania 29 — at least that’s how it came off on the PPV broadcast — WWE needed an infusion of LIFE anyway they could find it.
Now if only they could take this post-Mania Raw crowd with them to every town, maybe then they would be able to keep things interesting.
But hey, I’ll take it for tonight, especially after last night.
That’s all from me — CB.
