WWE RAW Kicked off the week of TV from Hampton, VA on Monday night, and the focus that the show has had for quite sometime simply didn’t seem to be there, making this one of the weaker shows that we’ve seen for awhile. Consider as well that this was the “go-home” show for Sunday’s Judgement Day PPV, and this was a show that lacked direction and didn’t deliver on many scales. We had a rag-tag main event of Edge, wrestling his last RAW match, vs Shawn Michaels, who they harped had post-concussion syndrome from last week’s beating by Khali.
For some reason, instead of having the new world champ on SmackDown look strong, they buried him with a loss to HBK, and then Randy Orton, Shawn’s Judgement Day opponent, ambushed him to end the show. The Orton-Michales match for the PPV is a total waste, as they are doing it with zero build, other than a backstage go around the two had prior to the match with Edge last night. Again, you can tell when things are thrown together, and this seemed like that type of show from the start to the end.
John Cena started the show with a verbal assault on Khali, who for some reason is now allowed to walk around with the WWE title belt. Better hold on tight big guy, it’s the closest you’ll ever get to having it for real. Khali also has a new translator, which was sort of odd, but for this spot it actually worked. The two traded verbal jabs until Khali called Cena out, and then after John showed up backstage, Khali beat him down again. All this does is ensure that Cena will find a way to overcome the big man on Sunday.
The first actual wrestling match was Jeff Hardy vs Trevor Murdoch, which was not bad but had a rather chep roll-up ending that was kind of weak. As has been the storyline the last few weeks, the heel team of Cade and Murdoch then seemed all respectful and shook the hands of the two champs. Looks too late for these two to have another match on Sunday, so I think we’ll wait till the June PPV to have the eventual rematch.
Santino Marella then beat Chris Masters with a very weak sunset flip. The story here is that Marella is the underdog in just about every match, and yet he finds a way to win based on guts and heart. I already have a disliking of this type of champion, and personally think long term that Marella is going to be a major bust. But for now they seem content to waste a major title and TV time on him, so we’ll see where it all leads.
Candice beat Victoria in a womens match that may lead to Candice vs Melina for Sunday’s PPV. The former playmate has been winning the last few weeks, as I guess they are convinced to let someone other than Mickie take a shot at Melina. I think a Candice vs Melina PPV match would be pretty bad, but then again, most of Sunday’s card is already 10 times worse than the last two PPV’s.
They also did Coach vs Bobby Lashley, with Bobby winning and then beating down Shane and Umaga, who came in and hit him first at the end. Lashely chased Shane out to his limo, but then was blindsided by Vince with the ECW belt. I still hope that Sunday’s 3-on-1 rematch puts an end to this way overdone feud. The other bout was Carlito beating Val Venis. They now have Carlito playing heel again, and they announced the match with he and Ric Flair for Sunday. Flair ran out and Carlito ran into the crowd.
Again, this was a rather lackluster show, and I thought the focus, which should have been on Cena and Khali, was too short. They open the show with it, and then that is the last you hear of it. The PPV on Sunday could be a disaster. Khali and Cena is not going to be the main, as that will go to Edge and Batista, another match with no push, but that’s another story. RAW will hopefully start to refocus next week as their next true brand PPV is about a month away.
