RAW 8-8-16

Lithium93_

After Randy Orton sneakily RKO'd Brock Lesnar last Monday, and Lesnar rolling into Smackdown to kindly repay Randy by way of an F5.. Mick Foley has invited Daniel Bryan to RAW for a meeting, what will unfold, let's see what's on tap this week as the countdown to Summerslam continues.

What does Mick Foley have in store for Daniel Bryan?
After Randy Orton’s Raw invasion to ambush Brock Lesnar prompted The Beast Incarnate to launch a shocking counterattack during SmackDown Live, Raw General Manager has invited SmackDown Live General Manager Daniel Bryan to visit Team Red this Monday night.

What will The Hardcore Legend have to say to The “Yes!” Man now that the rivalry between The Viper and The Anomaly brought chaos to both brands? You won’t want to miss what’s sure to be an eventful face-to-face meeting between Team Red and Team Blue’s General Managers, two weeks before The Biggest Event of the Summer.

What does Sean 'Puff Daddy' Combs have in store for Raw?
A Bad Boy is coming to Raw!

As first reported by RollingStone.com, international recording star Sean "Puff Daddy" Combs will be a guest star on Raw! Combs is not unfamiliar to the WWE Universe, performing a memorable set at WrestleMania 29 in 2013.

What will Puff Daddy have to say when he shows up to Raw? Find out Monday night on the longest running episodic show in TV history!

Is Sasha Banks’ dream coming to an end?
On Raw’s first Mixed Tag Team Match of The New Era, Charlotte scored a pinfall victory over WWE Women’s Champion Sasha Banks by way of Natural Selection, an ill omen for The Boss as she prepares to defend her title against the brazen second-generation Superstar at SummerSlam.

Charlotte would take great pleasure in continuing to humiliate Sasha in the weeks leading up to The Biggest Event of the Summer, but The Boss never stays down when she’s beaten. Given what’s at stake at SummerSlam, don’t be surprised if Sasha is looking for some comeuppance to shift momentum back in her favor.

Will Seth Rollins need to rethink his strategy?
Seth Rollins tried to use mind games to get under Finn Bálor’s skin this past Monday night, claiming that his WWE Universal Championship opponent at SummerSlam was nothing more than a cheap imitation of The Architect. However, Rollins wasn’t necessarily feeling like “The Man” moments later, when Bálor responded with swift kicks to the stomach and the skull that forced the former WWE World Champion to retreat up the ramp.

Rollins made a statement later in the night when he defeated Sami Zayn with a Pedigree, but something tells us that The Architect’s most recent encounter with Bálor left more of a lasting impression than Rollins is willing to admit.

Is Big E out of action?
After Big E & Kofi Kingston picked up a victory over Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson last Monday night, the self-ascribed “Good Brothers” were anything but, attacking all three members of The New Day and injuring Big E worst of all, sending the powerhouse out of the arena on a stretcher.

It remains to be seen whether the WWE Tag Team Champions are officially down a member, as little is known about Big E’s condition at this time, but Anderson & Gallows certainly evened the odds as they continue to eye The New Day’s titles.

Does Kevin Owens truly have Chris Jericho’s back?
OK, so Chris Jericho’s pal Jimmin Marvinluder might not actually be a real person, but Kevin Owens certainly seems to have struck up an alliance with the first Undisputed Champion based on their conversation Monday night. Now that “The Best in the World at What He Does” has acquired some backup against Enzo Amore & Big Cass, how will “The Realest Guys in the Room” respond? Considering Jericho’s decorated history as a tag team competitor, Enzo & Big Cass might have their hands full against these haters.

SKY SPORT 5 - 01:00

CastorTroy

So 2 titles there I didn't recognise: "The Anomaly" and "The Good Brothers".

How long has Brock been The Anomaly?

DM_7

Anderson and Gallows called themselves the good brothers when they arrived in WWE. Its been on their ring/entrance gear as well (#GB-4Life). WWE never made a big deal out of it though.

Loughc

CastorTroy wrote: »

How long has Brock been The Anomaly?

Ever since his drug test results showed an anomaly :pac:

ERG89

DM_7 wrote: »

Anderson and Gallows called themselves the good brothers when they arrived in WWE. Its been on their ring/entrance gear as well (#GB-4Life). WWE never made a big deal out of it though.

All they ever say about them is they dominated Japan, they miss AJ imo.
Looking forward to seeing Enzo & Cass trading back and forth with Owens & Jericho. Interested in seeing what the they'll do with Balor & Rollins too, last week was a miss for me so they need something to light up the feud a bit.

Insect Overlord

Enzo getting intense on the mic!

So many rock'n'roll references.

Mr.Nice Guy

Seems like overly long talking segments are par for the course now in the post-draft era. I thought that segment was painfully poor.

paconnors

Why are they feeding jobbers to Strowman it bad use of a powerful guy. its painful to watch

PTH2009

paconnors wrote: »

Why are they feeding jobbers to Strowman it bad use of a powerful guy. its painful to watch

The big show is going to come out and challenge him sometime I imagine

Mr.Nice Guy

paconnors wrote: »

Why are they feeding jobbers to Strowman it bad use of a powerful guy. its painful to watch

He can't wrestle so having him in a match longer than 3 minutes would expose that; if he has to be used it's better in quick squash matches like this. It's preferable to have him squash a bunch of jobbers than see them treat the active Raw wrestlers like jobbers.

Adiboo

paconnors wrote: »

Why are they feeding jobbers to Strowman it bad use of a powerful guy. its painful to watch

So they don't feed the entire roster to him just yet.

River Song

paconnors wrote: »

Why are they feeding jobbers to Strowman it bad use of a powerful guy. its painful to watch

Biding time until Goldberg's return IMO. Match will go for 4 minutes then Reigns will come out and bury them both, to a huge pop.

Rock Lesnar

River Song wrote: »

Biding time until Goldberg's return IMO.

I reckon there's more chance of Gillberg returning then Goldberg to be honest, but I could be wrong

River Song

Rock Lesnar wrote: »

I reckon there's more chance of Gillberg returning then Goldberg to be honest, but I could be wrong

Oh my bad, meant Gillberg. Failing that I'll take Rico or Bluedust. I'm a man of simple pleasures.

On a serious note, is anyone else sick of the whole Backlund/Young pairing yet? Not doing anything for me, it's nearly making me excited to see what Jinder Mahal does.

Angron

Finally they figure out how to get Roman cheered, just have him face someone who talks about how much the US sucks.

Edit: the New Era, the same old dick jokes.

Agent Coulson

Relegated from being The Guy to being the Best Man and still getting booed out of the building.

Angron

Agent Coulson wrote: »

Relegated from being The Guy to being the Best Man and still getting booed out of the building.

Ah I heard some level of cheering. Still about as interesting as an endoscopy to me though.

Agent Coulson

Angron wrote: »

Ah I heard some level of cheering. Still about as interesting as an endoscopy to me though.

The ringside crowd mic's dropped the minute the booing started you could hear the change straight away.

Piped in cheering.

Angron

Ah, I have the volume fairly low cause the family is asleep so I didn't notice a change.

Saw that ad for the Summerslam concert, and first I was annoyed, but then I thought that if it stops them from wasting time in the show with a pointless music interlude, then they can have all the concerts they like!

Agent Coulson

Protecting Finn with a pre record isn't a good sign.

J. Marston

Christ, they're going balls deep on the Irish stuff.

Angron

Odd to have two pre-recorded ones, one after the other.

Agent Coulson

Gallows and Anderson made me laugh there.


Looks like the WWE are slowly pushing the PG boundaries every week now.

mrkiscool2

J. Marston wrote: »

Christ, they're going balls deep on the Irish stuff.

As long as it's only to explain the demon to the non-NXT watching audience, then it's fine.

Angron

Honestly relieved that we didn't get a second dose of Roman.

Edit: and then we finish on Roman looks strong anyway. Feck sake.

CSF

They're keeping the Raw standards high each week to be fair of them. Very watchable again.

That was the most noticeable the Reigns boos being blanked out was. Stop trying to make face Roman happen. It's not going to be happen. Credit to Rusev who is an excellent legitimate heel.

Angron

After the Dudleys lost, I was expecting Bubba to turn on D-Von, cause he looked pissed and was just staring at him while Neville and Sin Cara were celebrating.

I really want another "Bully Ray" kind of solo run, though that would likely leave D-Von lost in the shuffle a bit.

ERG89

Angron wrote: »

After the Dudleys lost, I was expecting Bubba to turn on D-Von, cause he looked pissed and was just staring at him while Neville and Sin Cara were celebrating.

I really want another "Bully Ray" kind of solo run, though that would likely leave D-Von lost in the shuffle a bit.

Who lost more since returning, them or Del Rio? Jobbing to Neville & Black Panter now.
Poor Raw, just too many misses. Why does Sasha want a handicap match? Why not request the match Mick booked instead. Balor's segment was cheesy, you are about to challenge for a new World Title so I dont want to hear about Fionn mac Cumhaill & Banshees. (Not even the taytos then). Enzo's match with Jericho overran by 10 minutes. Young vs. Titus, Sheamus vs. Cesaro, the lack of capitalising on Sami Zayn beating Owens just show that not everyone has benefit from the brand split yet. Bryan was just there..... & Puff Daddy got to shill his crap to the audience who didn't want to know about it.
The video to promote Orton vs Lesnar was very well done mind. Highlight of the show easily.

Bounty Hunter

Rusev really is awesome. He hasn't set a foot wrong in as long as I can remember. Even when he was stuck in that terrible love triangle situation with Ziggler he was killing it with his "Cold Fish" business and now he is genuinely one of the best things on Raw every week.


I was worried watching the Irish stuff for Finn but them using it to explain The Demon to the non NXT viewing audience was ok in my eyes as was them using him in a taped segment this week as although you could argue it is done because of his mic skills etc I think they really need to do a few segments like this until the audience are acquanted with him or else they might not react that much to his promos anyway (due to the fact that they don't know who he is or why he is saying what he's saying as a result).

Where was Sami Zayn?? Guess they have no plan for him at Summerslam and we won't be seeing him in anything important until after that.

A placeholder / filler Raw but better than that title would suggest for me

Mr.Nice Guy

This was a thumbs down show for me. To paraphrase that guy from Father Ted:

"Father, that sermon Raw show today, frankly it bored the arse off me."

The opening segment was like last week and it would seem because there are 3 hours to fill and a thin roster we are now going to be subjected to these long, loooonnngggg, talking segments and I thought this one was unfunny and just dull. Four guys standing there for twenty minutes taking turns insulting one another and a fight doesn't even break out - they just calmly wait for the match to begin. This was so lame imo.

There were some good moments on Raw: I liked Rollins's promo, and Cesaro's matches were enjoyable. My favourite bit was the Brock/Orton build; Lesnar is just fantastic and so unlike anyone else. I really hope they don't have him job to Orton as I don't see any benefit to that.

The Rusev/Lana thing though - yet another talking segment - was painfully long and drawn out as the boring chants showed. Then Reigns comes out and makes such a slow ramble to the ring that I honestly think Taker might have been faster. It's so obvious they are trying to drag everything out to fill the 3 hours.

The Balor thing I just had to mute: the cringe overload for me was too much. I am interested in Irish mythology so perhaps seeing it used in a Raw angle was the reason I just couldn't bear it.

The main event of course was prefaced by another talking segment and then leads to a match featuring two guys we've already seen plenty of tonight, one of whom was already in a match. Did I mention the thin roster?

I really think they badly need to make some more signings. Where was Jinder after they signed him up last week? I'm not sure I can take Raw is Stall every week.

Angron

I thought, overall, it wasn't a terrible Raw, but it wasn't particularly good either. Middle of the road, "stuff happened" sort of a show.

I agree with MNG about Cesaro being in two matches, while he was as good as ever in both matches, it did just highlight how thin the roster tends to look now. Hopefully when they start the Cruiserweight stuff properly that'll help alleviate that issue.

Neil3030

Well the show was in LA, so no surprise that they filled a few minutes with guests who live out that way (P. Diddy, Bryan, Scooby Doo), and no surprise that a few people seemed to have the night off (Zayn, Finn, Stephanie, Big E). This is probably why it felt more stretched than previous weeks.

I am surprised by the generally negative response to the show; there were a number of positives for me:
- I thought the Lensar/Orton promo was great
- I liked the segment with Balor and think the overlaying Game-of-Thronesy graphics added in a way that wouldn't have been possible with a live segment
- they finally made Gallows look strong by borrowing from CM Punk's advice and having him win a match
- if Jericho and Owens working together don't bring a smile to your face I don't know what can be done with you

CastorTroy

Rusev's reaction to Reigns' spear at the end reminded me of the steam roller coming towards the henchman scene from Austin Powers. He had so much time to move.

And that ending to the Sasha/Dana match was pretty badly done. Dunno if Charlotte went early or Sasha moved too late.

Wonder if Bryan's line to Cesaro was improvised. Seemed that way.

Loughc

Two things about that Raw what was the point of having Bryan there? That looked like it was going nowhere.

Also looks like we're going to see Bubba turn on DVon. Yay.

Neil3030

Loughc wrote: »

Also looks like we're going to see Bubba turn on DVon. Yay.

Bully Ray in Bullet Club - yes, yes, yes!

sky88

Tbh it looked like a show were the wrestlers were getting ready for a long trip

Lithium93_

sky88 wrote: »

Tbh it looked like a show were the wrestlers were getting ready for a long trip

It was, they are in New Zealand, going by Jericho's Instagram account.

Chain Smoker

Terrifying that they still think it's a good idea to let Reigns do snarky promos and the like... While he can be pretty good at getting heel heat, that kind of **** veers far closer to cringe inducing xpac heat for me. Really exposes him, don't get it.