2016 Pro Wrestling Thread

I actually liked how Charlotte seemed to tacitly acknowledge it. Ruins it for me when the wrestlers/announcers pretend they cant hear it.

So whos the 4th? Vince would pick Cena. I'd pick Finn. Maybe Shane will pick Samoa Joe?

 

Anyone who wins this match is fine by me.

 

Cesaro!

I'm OK with Jericho winning, and I have a feeling he will, but I'd rather it be one of the other three.

 

Styles wins. Excellent.

Although he sure as shit ain't beating Reigns. Maybe they're just going to quietly turn Reigns heel by having him fight faces, instead of one big turn

 

Wow! AJ styles vs Roman Reigns....main eventing a ppv? Talk about maj. Its a perfect way to run us vs them with the marks/fans and turn Roman heel. If its done right. Sweet.

 

The Bullet/Balor Club debuts to help AJ win? Cause him to lose?

 

I'm guessing, more likely to cause him to lose. Then he feuds with the Club, while Reigns moves on to Trips rematch, Lesnar, returning Rollins, returning Cena and returning Orton.

 

Raw After Mania isn't much fun sometimes. I was cringing at some of the stupid shit being chanted. It was mostly one section, then the rest thought it was funny and allowed it to be a thing. A minority of us tried to boo it down to no luck. But these are the guys like the ones I was stuck on the bus with coming back from Arlington: they chanted the entire time, annoying manh other people who were exhausted from being up all day and being carted like cattle through security and ticket lines, etc. It's great to chant during a show, but it was well after midnight and time to give it up. After the fourth time of doing New Day's entrance in less than an hour, it got fucking old.

The worst was the gahddamn beach ball. Chanting Ninja Turtles and Rocksteady at Sheamus at least is acknowledging a heel performer in an attempt to jeer him. I was ok with stuff like that. But the beach ball shit was repug because the crowd would not let it die. One beach ball confiscated, which really got the uber smarks going. Beach Ball City. A lot more I couldn't remember. The was worse than the wave. Wonder why the Corbin/Ziggler match might have came off as shit? Because I think that neck hold went too long while they maybe thought the chanting would die a little. I don't know. Seemed like a few guys were thrown off.

Then, and this is a shoot, bro, another gahddamn beach ball came out. Un fucking believable.

Firsthand I can tell you that there is a sizable portion who want to get themselves over, and it's awful.

Anyway, since my live Raw thoughts are shorter I'll go with those first. I'll wait to write about WrestleMania when I get home to a keyboard, because there are so many cool things to tell, not what I thought about matches, but to explain how they came across live. Plus, just a few more neat stories on my experience with everything surrounding the show.

I missed Superstars tapings because I was trying to find somewhere to have dinner and avoid another concession stand hot dog or pizza. I tried House of Blues, a few blocks from American Airlines Arena, but the wait would have put me past the start of Raw.

So I went to Hooters. It was meh. I haven't had fried food like that in a month, so big mistake. My stomach didn't like me breaking my newfound habit of eating a little healthier by eating wings. But that key lime pie is to die for. And my waitress was a gahddamn smoke show, and that's a shoot, bro.

My seats to Raw were the best of anything I attended. I was within spitting distance of Rene Young when she was at the pre-show table with Booger T and Gorey Craves.

Everybody was buzzing about how, if they had turned out to be correct, anybody who's worked NXT in the past two years including the janitor, was about to debut.

As I type this, I can hear the people in the next room fucking. Makin' dem little Rocks and Rockettes! That's a shoot, bro.

Anyway, crowd was really disinterested in the ewrly part of the New Day match while waiting for Big E to get the hot tag. It's cool that everybody wants to do singalong with the Roc...er New Day, but I hope it doesn't hurt them. Seems like a lot of folks just want to do that and lose interest in the matches. If New Day is stuck doing spots to keep the crowd entertained during that rasslin stuff, they become the Usos: spots with lousy psychology.

New Day v. Enzo and Big Cass won't have so much as a wristlock. It'll just be a promo contest.

And Enzo. He's like a little Scrappy Do out there, ain't he?

No Cena appearance. How much longer until his appearance this WM is the norm, and he's like the other legends, trotted out to do a promo, a little physical spot, and disappear again? Could his WM streak just be a streak of appearances, not matches?

Crowd really killed the flow of Charlotte's promo. At any other Raw, any other time, it works better.

And will Becky will be relegated to Main Event and Superstars when Bailey debuts? Charlotte's role is the legacy talent, Sasha is the talented and glam one with famous non-wrestling family, and Becky was the underdog with none of those and a long history in the indies. But when Bailey shows up, there won't be room for two underdogs. The fans want Bailey and Sasha, and The E is all in with Charlotte as the face of women's wrestling. Even Sasha isn't over enough to rate being hailed as the first new women's champion and trotted out un front of any and all media.

So Becky is shit outta luck unless someone goes out for whatever reason. Then she'll be like Ambrose: popular and can be trusted when plugged in as a feud to kill a few months between major PPVs.

Speaking of which, Ambrose wasn't on the show. Not sure if it was explained on TV, but it's dumb, inconsistent storytelling on The E's part if so. Check this out: Ambrose says as a matternof pride that he's indestructible in the lead up to Lesnar, and he's held off Raw to sell injuries from a severely tame street fight that only featured a kendo stick and a chair. It was a Raw-level match in terms of violence. Last year, he went through the gimmicked ladder and shoot busted his head open. Next night he was on Raw fighting Cena for the US title. This makes no sense.

Cesaro got the surprise entry into the no. 1 contender's match, but it led to nothing. If he didn't win (and with the reasonable assumption that Owens wouldn't because there's the feud with Sami), having AJ win is the only solution to keeping the smarks from shitting all over the end of Raw. Jericho was 't going to get that reaction.

Major HOFers will no longer be trotted out to Raw After Mania in fear of another situation leading to a memorial show for the Raw After Raw After Mania. In other words, no Sting, not even a video package.

Anyone else see this? During commercial breaks (thank gahd we got to watch all those instead of having a multi-segment match!) there was a preview of a WWE Studios cop movie starring Dolph Ziggler. He's the cop, and the premise is that he's a rogue who can't keep a partner and is always at odds with his captain (shit, this is great writing because I wouldn't have come up with that). He's drawn into a terrorist plot, in which bad guys kidnap a kid, strap a bomb to the kid, and put him at a WWE live event.

WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. FUCK?

Cop Ziggler must rescue a kid, defuse a bomb, and get bad guys while a fucking wrestling event is taking place. And this is not like No Holds Barred where it's a generic name promotion. It's fucking WWE. They show New Day. They show Rusev, WHO PULLS A FUCKING GUN ON ZIGGLER WHILE IN HIS TRUNKS IN THE BACKSTAGE AREA.

Kane is the police captain. Because Big Boss Man is dead. (And Roman is Corporation Boss Man Adjace becaue Fuck You, Roman.)

So, do Ziggler and Kane exist in this world in which this film is set? Could Cop Ziggler run into Dolph Ziggler at the live event and shoot him? Is it explained as a doppleganger? Is Dolph Ziggler going to be played by someone other than Nick Nemeth so Nick Nemeth can play this cop? What about Kane? Is Glen Jacobs playing the police captain and Demon Kane? Or is it Corporate Kane and someone other than Glen Jacobs has to play the role?

This is so meta I forgot other points of Raw live.

 

Forgot :


RUSEV'S GOT A GUN! RUSEV'S GOT A GUN!

 

Most people just boo to show their displeasure with Roman Reigns as champion.

 

Thoughts on Raw:

- It’s like they realized how booty Mania was, and tried to fix it in one friggin’ show! Between Shane getting to book Raw, New Day pinning League of Nations, and then the Wyatts attacking the League after the match. Just a stellar start of the show.

- Sasha vs. Summer Rae was a fun squash match. And of all people from NXT, surprising to see Apollo Crews up! He looked hella good on Raw, although unfortunately, it came at poor Tyler Breeze’s expense. Crews is like if Ahmed Johnson could actually work without hurting everyone he wrestled. Baron Corbin also looked good against Ziggler later in the show, although again, it’s too bad that Ziggler is apparently the new Brooklyn Brawler.

- Amusing to hear the commentary crew explain away the crowd reaction at the top of the hour, and then have Vince acknowledge it, and then, they send Reigns out there by himself anyway. He’s back to being an ass and cocky, so I’m not sure if that means he’s turned heel or something.

Jericho! Interesting that he’s been playing a heel for months now, but he still gets treated like a face when paired against Reigns. And then, they multiply the fun by throwing Styles, Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn out there. Predictable pairing off, but any of the four could make for a decent Reigns opponent.

- As much as the Ryder title win surprised me, the promo was good, and the crowd really did respond to it the next night. I’m a bit more confident it could work, as long as they actually keep the belt on Ryder for a bit to build it back up… and ugh, nevermind, as the Miz wins thanks to a distraction from Maryse. (But hey, she looks great still! Good for Mrs. Miz.)

- Charlotte looked overwhelmed when it came to dealing with the crowd response, which isn’t surprising, since she is pretty green still. But hey, a feud with her and Natayla should be fun!

- Amusing crowd signs: “I’m a Hulk Hogan guy.” “We paid money – Listen to us!” However, unlike some of the past post-Mania crowds, I really thought like this one actively detracted from the show. It's one thing when you have guys like Daniel Bryan and CM Punk who can feed off of it, or even Cena, who knows how to handle it by now. Outside of Shane, Jericho and Owens, everyone else seemed to be overwhelmed by it. (And as usual, Jericho was the master at dealing with it.)

- Smart booking by WWE to load up the show with smark favorites. Like Enzo and Cass! And hey, the Dudleys would be a good initial opponent for them.

It extends to the main event, as Sami Zayn gets knocked out and replaced by Cesaro. Also, Kevin Owens’ ability to sell is incredible, like when he got thrown into the guard rail. Really good Fatal Fourway, and I’m surprised Styles got the pin! They tried so friggin’ hard to get Reigns over as a face, and now, they picked the one opponent that will surely get a face reaction against Reigns. Let the heel turn begin!

 

The crowd was starting to annoy me last night, because it seemed like they were purposely trying to fuck up the show. I'm fine with it in spots, but don't spend the entire show doing it.

The Raw from 3 years ago when Ziggler won was great because the crowd was being spontaneous, and funny. This crowd seemed like they were trying too hard to be snarky. The constant interruption of Charlotte's promo just made me shake my head. Interrupt her once with a Bayley chant, that's fine. But after a while, it's obnoxious.

That said, it's funny to see Reigns get booed out of the building. At least now they're acknowledging it, with Reigns saying he's not good or bad.