Tuesday, June 12, 2012

6/11/12 RAW (3 hrs; Vince)

Ratings:
Sheamus vs. Tensai: *3/4

Santino Marella & Layla vs. Ricardo Rodriguez & Beth Phoenix: 1/2*

Dolph Ziggler vs. Christian vs. Jack Swagger vs. Great Khali (Elimination): ***

Ryback vs. Willard Fillmore & Rutherford Hayes: N/A (squash)

Big Show vs. Kofi Kingston (Cage): *

Sin Cara vs. Curt Hawkins: *1/4

Vader vs. Heath Slater: 3/4*

CM Punk & AJ vs. Daniel Bryan & Kane: *1/4
_________________

Reviews/Thoughts:
Hartford, CT, hosts this 3-hour RAW. Laurinaitis and Vince basically kick the show off. Johnny's no longer officially VP of Talent Relations, for the record. Vince gets a huge pop. Johnny initially flubs and says "100th" RAW episode coming up, when it's 1000th. "Fire Johnny!" chants throughout the arena. Man, Vince is all over Big Show and makes fun of Johnny. Sheamus gets a pop. Nice time to take shots at Laurinaitis. #FireJohnny trending #1 on Twitter! Vince basically says if Johnny doesn't impress him tonight, Johnny's fired. Johnny now must pick Sheamus' opponent next. Vince leaves on that Hoveround, but runs it off the stage. Awesome.

They are making Khali responsible for ADR's concussion. Alberto will miss No Way Out, so a new #1 contender will be crowned tonight.

Sheamus faces Tensai. Tensai shoves Sakamoto. "Albert" chants from the crowd. This is not the most technically sound match, but was it ever physical. Tensai with a Vader Bomb for two. Two-handed chokeslam from Tensai only got two. So much for that move's effectiveness. Brogue Kick out of nowhere gets three. Again, Tensai seemingly de-pushed and virtually getting buried.

Vince wants to know how Johnny determines the new #1 contender. Vickie wants Swagger and Ziggler to both face Sheamus at NWO. Vince seeks a better idea, if any. Johnny's flustered. Teddy Long gets a say. Fatal Four Way between four former world champs: Ziggler, Swagger, Khali, and Christian. Johnny basically takes credit for that and tells Teddy to go get coffee. Can I have a cup as well? Fist bump? Vince says Johnny's got small hands. ROFL.

Tensai attacks Sakamoto. He shouts at Sakamoto in Japanese. Crowd doesn't really buy it.

RAW moment: Seth Green. WTF. Remember that 6-man tag? I don't. A bitchslap to Cody Rhodes. How fun.

Poor R-Truth has a broken foot. And then he gets WMD'd by Show. Sucks.

Vintage Santino power walk. Mixed tag match here, and Layla's his tag partner. Lucky guy. Beth basically drags Ricardo to the ring. I must say, Ricardo's hilarious...does his job very well. Ricardo wins simply for screaming like a girl and "embracing" Beth for security in the corner. Santino goes for the Cobra on the outside. Ricardo runs into the post. Classic. Meanwhile, in the part of the match that matters, Beth takes care of Layla. Hey, Ricardo wins!

Ricardo gets his dress shirt stripped off. JUSTIN BIEBER. OH GOD. Most of the fans probably didn't care anyway. But that was great.

Kofi finally shows a little attitude. He wants Big Show. Johnny gives him Show in a cage. Sounds good. oh, and Vince hates lawyers. Yeah Otunga, he hates us, but sucks more to be you.

Time for Daniel "YESYESYES" Bryan. Both Punk and Kane have AJ as a weakness. YES AJ, you had a shot to be with all of that. Probably the most hilarious DB promo in a while. Enter Punk. War of words. Calls DB a goat-faced moron. Wow. Vintage Kane pyros scared the hell out of DB. Who can ever forget electrocuting Shane McMahon's testicles? Hey, it's AJ! She sees Kane has a heart. Gotta love crazy chicks! YES! #GoatFace trending on Twitter! YES!

Johnny makes a tag match. DB and Kane vs. Punk...and AJ. Interesting. That'll be the main event, I guess.

Fatal Four Way Elimination match next to determine that #1 contender. Christian's back from Dallas after making that TNA appearance at Slammiversary. A zillion Khali chest slaps. Boring. Thankfully, Khali was gone in about two minutes. Ziggler and Swagger take out Christian. Good sequence from Swagger and Christian. Loved Ziggler pinning Swagger after Christian hit that Killswitch. Every man for himself! Vickie is pissed. Best two technically sound guys left. Ziggler with a great job on Christian's ankle. Near fall after near fall. Vickie with distraction, Zigzag for three. If Christian and Ziggler just had a singles match, that woulda been 10x better. Showdown between Sheamus and Ziggler on the stage.

Natalya with the reference to the Hart family nuking Vince at WM a couple years back. Random Vince dancing with Naomi and Cameron. Classic Zack Ryder stunned look. Out of the blue enough for a good chuckle.

Ryback time. He faces two jobbers who practically got their names from former U.S. presidents. Jobbers came out second this time to talk trash. End result doesn't matter.Crowd seemed to frown upon this one. Should be very clear this act got horribly old eons ago.

Vince and Hornswoggle. Vince mocks Jim Ross. Vince doesn't like other guys who kiss ass. Perfect cut shot to William Regal. Awesome again.

Cage match. You can escape to win if you can. Show clubs Kofi for a while. Trouble in Paradise, but Show with one of the biggest kickouts ever. Nice hangtime, Kofi. Kofi can't escape the cage. WMD shot and it's over. Ref actually waved the match off, but Show walks out of the cage for the official win via escape.

No Way Out pre-show on YouTube, Facebook, and wwe.com. Brodus Clay will face David Otunga. Hey, it's something.

Sin Cara faces Curt Hawkins. Hawkins doesn't get an on-screen intro. Vintage Sin Cara lights. Not many guys here can smoothly work that lucha style. Hunico was probably Sin Cara's best bet for an opponent. Or maybe the guys like Epico and Primo. Where are those Puerto Rican guys anyway? Fans were largely silent. Tough crowd.

Ziggler looks back at the debut RAW episode. I guess Ziggler said he was 13 at the time. Bobby Heenan trying to get in the building was fabulous.

Johnny apparently got a past RAW superstar to face Heath Slater. Slater says it's Slater Time. Perfect entrance for...VADER! YES! IT'S VADER TIME. Nice pop for Vader. Looks like he put on a few more pounds, but he was already a super heavyweight anyway. LET'S GO VADER! I would give him one star just for doing a moonsault again. Didn't get that, but we got a classic Vader Bomb for three.

Aj with a kiss for Punk in the back. Kiss of death? Punk pretty much worked over for a few minutes, although he got a few moves in. Ref apparently sees a tag, so AJ is now the legal combatant. She smiles, skips, circles Kane, jumps into his arms, and lays a HUGE liplock on him. Hell yeah, that easily gets a YESYESYES from me. Damn you Kane. You now are the envy of three billion dudes out there.

Kane tags in DB, Punks tags himself in. Punk tags DB with a kick. Savage elbow drop gets three. Yeah, that was one of the most bizarre things ever. Kane on the stage is flummoxed. Punk is trying to put one and one together...it's clearly three, like in your entrance theme. DB is on the other side, although I'm sure he's just thinking "YESYESYES."

Time for Vince's decision on Laurinaitis. Johnny makes his plea. Vince is ready to fire Johnny, but Big Show comes out to defend Laurinaitis. Vince should be worried about Cena instead. Yeah, that white knight, golden goose, cash cow, etc. Enter Cena. Mighty strong words from Cena to Show. Chaos ensues. Show with the WORST WHIFF OF A WMD EVER to Vince McMahon. Wow. Pathetic. Laurinaitis orders Show out of the ring.

At least on the replay from a different angle, it looks better. And you gotta add the sound effects!

Oh, so Iguess we're led to believe that if Show loses at No Way Out, Laurinaitis is fired. Obviously, Show now should win this. Laurinaitis has been a good heel GM here. Fans really love to hate the guy. Keep it up!

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