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411’s Instant Analysis 08.27.12: WWE Monday Night Raw

August 28, 2012 | Posted by Sat

Welcome to this week’s Instant Analysis of Monday Night Raw. I’m your humble reviewer, Chad Nevett and it’s another week, another three-hour Raw. So far, they haven’t been as bad as we all expected/feared. But, I’m still looking forward to the return to two hours. When they do return, they should continue to book the show as three hours, then cut out an hour’s worth of fat, and put on what I would hope would be a pretty solid two hours of television. Looking back at the last few episodes, if you cut out the worst hour, Raw would have been quite good. Not that that has anything to do with anything, of course. Let’s get to it (and hope my cable keeps working as it was touch and go up through the recap video)…

SEGMENT ONE: CM Punk Apologizes to Jerry Lawler

I may hate the matches, but the builds to the matches in Jerry Lawler feuds tend to be pretty good. There’s always lots of effort put in to make us care about him standing up to the latest challenger who will, eventually, put him down. Imagine if the same effort were put in to other feuds. I mean, CM Punk just laid down a verbal beating in a heavy way. I guess he’s helped by having a lot of material to work with. But Lawler’s somewhat surprised, somewhat saddened face did a lot of the heavy lifting, too. I don’t want to see the match itself, but this sort of promo almost makes me want to in spite of myself.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

SEGMENT TWO: Jack Swagger vs. Ryback
Match Result: Ryback pinned Jack Swagger
Match Length: A bit over two minutes

Goddamn, that was an ugly match. I guess that’s the WWE giving everyone who bitched and moaned about Saturday Morning Slam’s ‘avoid neck/head moves’ what they wanted: someone getting dropped on their head as much as possible in a two-minute period. This is the sort of wrestling people want, right? Ugly, unentertaining, cringe-inducing fare? Forget art or skill, let’s just drop a dude on his head. If the rumors of people not wanting to work with Ryback weren’t true before, there’s a much better chance now…

Rating: 1.0 out of 10

SEGMENT THREE: Natalya vs. Layla
Match Result: Layla pinned Natalya
Match Length: Around two minutes, 45 seconds

I liked some of the ideas behind what Natalya and Layla were doing. Natalya using the ring apron was a nice bit of work and fits her character. But, it was executed in a sloppy manner. Layla’s kick out where Natalya landed on her ass was ugly. If the execution of this match was tightened up and made smoother, it could have been good.

The Vickie/AJ bit was lacking. Up until now, they’ve been doing a decent job of AJ being a little off, but making solid decisions. This seemed like a wrong step in establishing her as GM. The longer she maintained a sense of balance, the more it would have meant for her to go off like this.

Rating: 4.0 out of 10

SEGMENT FOUR: Anger Management / Lawler Accepts

The less said about Daniel Bryan in anger management classes the better.

Lawler’s speech was good. Not quite the match of Punk’s opening promo speech, but it had the fire that you’d want in a situation like this. Lawler also set him up in a good position where, even in loss, he would get points for simply accepting the challenge. There was even a sense of him recognizing that he will lose, but that being a secondary concern.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10

SEGMENT FIVE: John Cena vs. the Miz
Match Result: John Cena pinned the Miz
Match Length: Just under ten and a half minutes

This was a little different than the standard John Cena match. Normally, Cena gets in a bit more offense. Here, it was SO one-sided that the ending was laughable. The pattern of Cena getting his ass whipped and coming back to win isn’t new; it’s just that he usually throws in some more offense as the match goes. Here, aside from that short STF, it was all Miz. Even the finish was the quickest, laziest version of the Cena wrap-up you can find: dodge, two shoulder blocks, Five-Knuckle Shuffle, and Attitude Adjustment. I don’t mind the Intercontinental Champion losing, but is it so hard to make the part where he loses not look so simple and pathetic? Put up a bit more of a fight at the end? Show some ability to absorb damage without crumbling? This match reminded me more of a Rey Mysterio World Heavyweight Championship defense than a typical Cena match. The difference is subtle, but noticeable.

Rating: 6.0 out of 10

SEGMENT SIX: Heath Slater vs. Santino Marella
Match Result: Santino Marella pinned Heath Slater
Match Length: A bit over three minutes

And Heath Slater’s winning streak ends at a career best: one win. Beyond that, I’m struggling to find a reason to care about anything that happened in this match.

Rating: 4.5 out of 10

SEGMENT SEVEN: Brodus Clay & Sin Cara vs. Cody Rhodes & Damien Sandow
Match Result: Brodus Clay pinned Cody Rhodes
Match Length: A little over two and a half minutes (shown)

What a waste. We got more of Santino/Slater than we saw of this match. And there was some potential here with Rhodes and Sin Cara anchoring things while giving Clay and Sandow some chances to showcase their skills. Instead, it was a brief, unfulfilling tease.

Daniel Bryan in anger management: lame. Kane in anger management: comedy gold. His brief rundown of his history was hilarious. Why couldn’t those skits simply be us returning every 30 minutes or so to see Kane detailing some different part of his history? I could have watched a whole lot more of that.

Rating: 6.0 out of 10

SEGMENT EIGHT: Daniel Bryan vs. R-Truth
Match Result: R-Truth won via countout
Match Length: Around three minutes

More story than wrestling and it worked nicely. Daniel Bryan doing his best to keep calm and focused despite R-Truth taking advantage of any chance to unhinge him — making him fist bump Little Jimmy and starting a “Yes!” chant. This was more effective than the anger management segments at showing Bryan struggling with his anger issues. And it was also a reminder that faces tend to be real jerks.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10

SEGMENT NINE: Is Triple H Done?

Triple H is one of the most interesting — and unique — characters that the WWE has right now. Ever since Sheamus took him out in the summer of 2010, the character has returned a few times to confront the idea that he’s not the main event guy anymore. He’s not the top dog in the company, that he’s on the downward side of his career. He’s lost to the Undertaker twice at WrestleMania, struggled with maintaining a corporate/authority role despite the lure of the ring, fought against his buddy Kevin Nash, and, most recently, lost to Brock Lesnar. We’ve seen a lot of guys who were too old, who were past their prime — when Triple H was talking about the broken down wrestler he didn’t want to be, a lot of names flashed before me without much effort — but we haven’t seen many wrestlers where that struggle between hanging on and hanging it up has played out in an extended manner. This story has been told, slowly, over the past couple of years and it’s made for something pretty damn compelling. Sure, there’s something masturbatory about Triple H coming out to basically say that he may or he may not be done with his in-ring career and going into a “Thank you” speech. It’s part of the story, though. A man facing his mortality and trying to convince himself that it all meant something, that he can walk away and be satisfied with what he’s done — and also needing to bask in the glory a little longer. I have no doubt that his words were sincere, especially when he thanked the fans, but it fits so well with the larger story. And, what’s more, there’s still a lot of mileage in a story like this. I’m looking forward to that whenever it picks up again.

Rating: 9.0 out of 10

SEGMENT TEN: Sheamus & Randy Orton vs. Alberto Del Rio & Dolph Ziggler
Match Result: Sheamus pinned Dolph Ziggler
Match Length: Around eight minutes

Ziggler’s entrance was a great heel move — it was a Jericho sort of move. The match was an entertaining one. Nothing special with the heels dominating for the most part and losing because they suck at cheating. The World Champion got the pin on the guy who isn’t the number one contender, which seems about right to me. No real complaints, but no real big compliments either. Solid stuff.

Rating: 7.0 out of 10

SEGMENT ELEVEN: Zack Ryder vs. David Otunga
Match Result: Zack Ryder pinned David Otunga
Match Length: Around two and a half minutes

I’m a little disappointed that we didn’t get any commentary from Kane. Any time he’s done press, he’s always come across as well-spoken and intelligent. I’d love to see what Mr. Jacobs has to say during a match. But, surprisingly, Michael Cole’s nervous questions were entertaining in their own way. The match was what it was. I was more focused on Cole and Kane, honestly — which probably says something about Ryder and Otunga’s work, actually.

Rating: 5.5 out of 10

SEGMENT TWELVE: Steel Cage Match – CM Punk vs. Jerry Lawler
Match Result: CM Punk made Jerry Lawler tap out
Match Length: Around seven and a half minutes

A fairly one-sided match with enough offense from Lawler to add some necessary drama. Punk was cruel in the way that he picked apart Lawler for most of the match. Some would say he was a bully, but Lawler willingly accepted this match, so that word doesn’t seem to apply. Maybe for what happened after the match, but the match itself was Lawler having put himself in a position where he was allowing Punk to be a cruel son of a bitch. And he gave a bit of that back to Punk. The post-match stuff was pure bully behavior, in case you didn’t realize that Punk has become a full-on heel now. The arrogant champion who claims to be the best in the world and has every fact on his side. Good stuff.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10

FINAL THOUGHTS

Segment of the Night: Triple H Struggles with Mortality

Trash Segment of the Night: Ryback Tries to Crack Open Jack Swagger’s Skull

Final Analysis: I’m trying to imagine what this overlong episode would have been like if you cut out an hour’s worth of crap and it would have been a pretty good show. However, it had that hour’s worth of crap dragging it down, not just in content but in time. As Triple H said, you can’t beat time and three hours is just too goddamn long every week. There were some very good things in tonight’s episode, like the Punk/Lawler mini-feud, Triple H’s not-quite-retirement speech, Kane giving a quick summation of his life… But there were also an ugly squash match, a sloppy and disjointed Divas match, and a few more pieces of filler that I think we could have all done without. So, I guess we split the difference…

Verdict: 6.5

411 RATINGS SCALE:
0 – 0.9: Torture
1 – 1.9: Extremely Horrendous
2 – 2.9: Very Bad
3 – 3.9: Bad
4 – 4.9: Poor
5 – 5.9: Not So Good
6 – 6.9: Average
7 – 7.9: Good
8 – 8.9: Very Good
9 – 9.9: Amazing
10: Virtually Perfect