RAW Workrate Report
What Worked
PAS: People are always talking about how the WWE needs to make house shows more important. I think by hyping that you might get to see a tubby backyarder injure someone is a smart way to do it.
TKG: Scott Steiner vs. RVD was inexplicably good. Maybe better than anything but the main from last week.
PAS: I liked Scott Steiner v. Rob Van Damn. Stuff looked tight, there was some nice spots. Steiner has a nice elbow drop. Perfectly acceptable wrestling.
TKG: I liked Jerry Lawler’s jacket with no shirt. That’s a great wrestling look. The set up to the Born again Christian vs the Jew feud appealed to me. I was disappointed that Shawn didn’t start talking about the Stations of the Cross and point out how a Jew once speared Jesus on the side too. I liked the motif, I just thought it should have been emphasized more in the mic work.
What Didn’t Work
PAS: I enjoyed them trying to turn Austin’s drunken wifebeating into a amusing face thing. Couldn’t they at least have him beat up a heel? And why would you rebury Scott Steiner as a set up to Austin’s face domestic abuse?
TKG: That whole thing was inexplicable.
PAS: There was parts of that endless 8 man tables thing which were watchable in a really pedestrian mediocre way, but most of the match just stunk. They build the first sections of the match on long heat segments on Shane, then all of a sudden they have guys using garbage cans and Spike run-ins. If the match was no-DQ then why would everyone bother with tags? They did a really shitty ROH scramble everyone hits a move section including Dupree and Booker horribly blowing a spinebuster. Man Shane is useless and shitty, he may have the worst clotheslines in a promotion full of guys with shitty clotheslines.
TKG: Phil forgot the long section of extended beat down on D-Von. Yeah there were two long heat sections on different guys. I didn’t mind the pedestrian-ness of the first one with D-Von and Booker knows how to take a hot tag but damn this match needed Goldust. D-Von is no Tommy Rogers as face in peril. Hell he’s not even face in peril Bobby Fulton. Shane-O isn’t even Jackie. The everyone hits their big spots spot train finish was really underwhelming too. Ross calling it a ladder match ruled.
TKG: Hey its Chad Collyer. Everytime I see Chad Collyer in the indies, I’m struck by how much he facially resembles Shane McMahon. The WWE really doesn’t have enough wrestling McMahon’s at this point. They desperately need more. They realIy need to bring in some worked McMahon relatives. Collyer is actually trained and sells almost as well as Shane. Instead he’s doing this silly Dr. segment. This is why they’re loosing money. Mike Samples and Chad Collyer would have a fun Bizarro Vince and Shane team. They already have Tom Pritchard to play Steph.
PAS: Setting up the Jew v. Evangelical Christian feud. Is Mel Gibson booking now?
TKG: Maven’s needs a different finisher as his finisher really has the look of blown spot. For a guy working exactly like Jerry Flynn, Rico sure isn’t as good as Jerry Flynn. Man am I looking forward to the Rico vs. Cat matches.
PAS: The Joshi trios match really killed my energy level. They did the exact same scramble match finish too. That match really needed Miss Texas.
TKG: It also had the exact same build/set up with the same type of pedestrian face in peril heat stuff, before finish train. If sets up Jericho vs. Richards that could possibly be best match the RAW roster can give me.
PAS: I enjoyed Flair in the tag main event, but it really buried Mark Henry who they were starting to do something interesting with. I assumed Flair was there to eat the pin, isn’t that is what he is there for?