WWE had another new Raw on Monday, what did the Pulse Wrestling crew think of the show?
Darren Paltrowitz
I don’t care for Sheamus as a wrestler, but I think he’s a good heel. But Roman Reigns is still boring to me. Although not as awful as The Authority.
And Rusev is now aligned with The Authority? Okay, interesting.
I had thought that The Wyatt Family was stale, but then I heard Luke Harper — entirely out of character — on Jericho’s podcast and I’m a fan now. Although it doesn’t make sense that the Dudley Boyz are now on the bottom end of the tag division. Or that the Wyatt Family is supposed to look strong after losing to two of the oldest people on the roster.
Sasha Banks is great, and deserves much better. Ditto Paige. The main roster’s Divas division is back in shambles, while NXT’s Divas are still thriving.
The New Day stole the show as always. They have more catch phrases and trademarks than anyone on the roster (e.g. “Ohhhhhh no,” “Booty,” “Shame,” “New Day Rocks,” “Power Of Positivity,” unicorns, the trombone) to the point that everyone else could learn from them. If you don’t find The New Day entertaining, then you must really enjoy Roman Reigns. Or tractors.
I like The Lucha Dragons as high-energy wrestlers and kid-friendly characters, but man, keep the microphones away from those two.
Mark Henry is still jobbing, and that still irks me. Remember that fake retirement speech promo from a few years back? Even if he’s not a main eventer, he is one of the legitimate tough people on the roster beyond being great on the mic. So having him lose to a much smaller guy and then later act in a commercial with JBL and El Torito is fairly-insulting to his legacy.
Titus O’Neil is funny, but still being misused. As is Stardust. That six-man tag match should have been on “Smackdown,” where six-man tag matches without proper storylines belong. But it’s great to see Goldust back.
Alberto Del Rio doesn’t belong with Zeb Coulter, obviously. ADR is officially the anti-American heel, I guess. Even though his manager was behind “The Real Americans?”
Jack Swagger, like Mark Henry, shouldn’t be jobbing — or at least this ADR feud is setting him up to look like a jobber. Swagger is a former champion, he was a decorated collegiate athlete, and he has a (lame) catch phrase that connects well with most WWE audiences.
The tag match with Dean Ambrose, Dolph Ziggler, Tyler Breeze and Kevin Owens was arguably the best match of the night. Or at least it got the best crowd reaction of the evening. This should have been the main event, or the opening segment.
Heath Slater, we missed you. (Shame on you, Ryback.)
Damien Sandow, you’re still missed.
Check out my full 10 Thoughts on Raw!!
JT
– full disclosure: I watched about 90% of this episode at 30x speed, because I just picked up WW2K16 and it’s more fun to play WWE than watch WWE at the moment
– hey, Sasha Banks finally gets a match… and they give her three whole minutes! Both she and Becky Lynch put on a good show in the short time they’re give , but once again the trios BS detracted from what could have been a great match.
– those are some horrible shirts the Lucha Dragons have there.
– Neville squashes Mark Henry in two minutes. Sure, why not. Makes as much sense as anything else happening on Raw
– Brother vs Brother is always a good story, and the team of Golddust and the Prime Time Players makes sense, but there is a lot of dead wood in this match in the form of The Ascension
– Paige and Charlotte were at least given the time to tell a story, but the match itself wasn’t really anything to write home about up until the DQ finish on the announce table
– Owens and Breeze is an odd pairing, but they put on a decent match against A to Z.
– so the enforcers of The Authority are now Sheamus, Barrett and Rusev? Yawn…
