The SmarK RAW Rant – August 12 2002

The SmarK RAW Rant – August 12, 2002

– Man, I’m totally addicted to “Beat the Geeks”. It’s on right before RAW up here, so it makes a great lead-in.

– Note to Tony Hawk junkies: We may have a new champion of the X-Games genre in the videogame world: I picked up Aggressive Inline for the ‘Cube, and it ROCKS, with huge levels, intuitive controls, and a really cool RPG-style system for building up your stats in each area – rather than buying points, you pump up your various attributes by actually SKATING. Who’da thunk it? Definitely check out this badboy if you were disappointed with Tony Hawk 3 and are looking for a little bit of a deeper game.

– Heyman and Lesnar do the old “buy a ticket” gimmick and end up sitting front row for the show. Split? What split?

– Live from Seattle, WA, home of unkempt beatniks everywhere!

– Your hosts are JR & King.

– Opening interview: HHH lets us know that he and Shawn were never friends, and they just used each other. For SEX. Oh, sorry, I’m just putting words in his mouth there. He blames the fans for his loss to Hulk Hogan. Blah blah blah-UH, and Rock finally interrupts the boredom to have words with Brock. HHH is hurt at being ignored, and lets us know. Rock gets the ultimate retort: “The Rock is something you’re not, Undisputed champion, so SHUT UP, BITCH.” Tell ‘em, dude. HHH wants a piece of the Rock, and he’s game for the Game. This of course ends with HHH getting a Pedigree on Rock.

– Meanwhile, Rock wants Bischoff to make the match.

– Intergender match: Trish Stratus & Spike Dudley v. Chris Harvard & Molly Holly. Harvard pounds on Spike and gets a suplex combo. Molly comes in and covers for two. Spike catapults her into Chris’s Ivy Leagues, and Trish comes in with an armdrag and a dropkick. Canadian Violence, but she walks into a boot from Nowinski. Molly gets two. Trish comes back with a kick, but Nowinski cuts off the tag and slams her. Trish comes back with a bulldog on Chris, hot tag Spike. Spike gets his own bulldog, but Chris blocks a bodypress attempt. They go up and Spike stomps him off the top for two. Trish completely misses a Kawada kick and Molly bails in shame, I guess. Nowinski gets his double-underhook slam thing on Spike for the pin at 3:06. Whatever happened to using a good old DDT instead of a move with three different changes of direction? And Trish – baby – it’s called MAKING CONTACT, look into it. Ѕ*

– Meanwhile, Goldust asks Bischoff for a shot at the tag belts at Summerslam. Bischoff gets his leg humped by Minidust as a bonus. Charming.

– The Fink lays the badmouth on Lillian in the ring, but Kane’s music interrupts him. No Kane, though. The upshot of Fink’s speech: Lillian was a bad announcer who sucked dick to get her job. Well, he’s at least half-right.

– Meanwhile, Bischoff gives RVD a shot at Benoit at Summerslam, but the Hardy Boyz butt in. The upshot is Jeff v. RVD for that shot tonight.

– Lance Storm v. Booker T. This is for a shot at the tag titles at Summerslam. Booker works the arm, but Storm pounds him in the corner. Booker comes back with a hiptoss and a clothesline, but crotches himself on the top rope and gets dumped. Storm uses the UnAmerican Violence and pounds away in the corner, but Booker slugs back. Booker cradle gets two. Storm clotheslines him down again and gets a vertical suplex for two. He goes with a neck-vice as the resthold of choice, as the crowd starts to get serious into it. Booker destroys him with a forearm and fires back with a dropkick (0.5 Watts), and that’s enough to cue up the Spinaroonie. Axe Kick, but Christian trips him up and Storm rolls him up for two. Goldust takes care of bidness, and Booker finishes him with the axe kick at 4:41. Good, fun, stuff – I’m looking forward to the tag title match. **

– Back in the ring, Bischoff and MiniDust have a pow-wow, man to midget. He makes tonight’s main event HHH & UnAmericans v. Booker T, Goldust, Undertaker and Rock. I smell a beatdown for the midget. Bischoff gives him his usual 3 minutes, and then you know the rest. Well, we’ve had jobbers, old women, ring announcers and midgets getting beaten up – we’ve pretty much run the gauntlet of people that the samoans can squash without getting into actual teams. Beating up midgets was stupid on NWA-TNA, and it’s stupid here. We on TSN get to see it, because midgets are apparently fair game for abuse. Bischoff then brings out Stacy. What a shock. She dances on the announce table while the poor midget gets taken out on a stretcher. That is truly the strangest visual I’ve seen in like a month. I mean, talk about appealing to the freakshow mentality – what’s the point of even doing the midget-splatter angle if you’re just immediately going to trivialize it by focusing attention on Stacy?

– Chris Jericho & Big Show v. Ric Flair & Bubba Dudley. Holy style clash, Batman! Jericho and Flair showboat at each other to start, and Jericho starts with the CANADIAN VIOLENCE and a backdrop out of the corner. Flair walks into an elbow, but Jericho walks into a chop. Bubba comes in and hits him with a lariat, but misses a charge in dramatic fashion and ends up on the floor. Show comes in and pounds away, whipping Bubba around and completely killing the flow of the match. Flair comes in, but gets slammed off the top on the way in and tossed around by Show as well. Suplex and Show MERCIFULLY lets Jericho back in, and he shucks and jives his way through a slugfest and some elbowdrops. That gets two. He crotches himself on a charge, however, and Flair makes the hot tag to Bubba, who splats Jericho in the corner, but gets rolled up for two. Bubba sideslams him and Show saves. It’s BONZO GONZO and Show gets dumped by Bubba, who then hits Jericho with a samoan drop for two. Flip Flop and Fly and Bubba gets the tables, but walks into a chokeslam from Show. Lionsault hits knees, however. Show gets tossed into the crowd by Flair, but Jericho blocks a Bubbabomb and gets the Walls for the submission at 7:27. Super hot match when anyone but Big Show was in. Flair de-pantses Jericho, but then his own strategy backfires when he can’t get a figure-four on him due to the pants blocking the move. See, Jericho is TRULY the smartest man in wrestling. **3/4

– Meanwhile, Jericho announces a match with Flair and a Fozzy concert – one for RAW, one for Summerslam. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to guess which is which.

– Shawn Michaels video, which may be a mistake because showing all his crazy bumps and hot matches is setting up the audience for a huge disappointment at Summerslam.

– Tommy Dreamer v. Steven Richards. This is a special one-object-each Hardcore match, as Richards uses a chair and Dreamer uses a cane. They duel with them and Tommy gets a legsweep with it and hammers away, so Steven takes a powder. Back in, Dreamer gets a neckbreaker and pounds away with the cane, but Steven drops him knee-first onto the chair. Ouch. He works the knee over (psychology – in a HARDCORE match?) with the cane, but charges and crotches himself in the corner. They slug it out and Tommy gets a Main Event Spinebuster for two. Steviekick puts Tommy down again, and Richards heads up, but gets crotched. Ah, this would be the Kevin Sullivan theory of hardcore matches, where more shots to the balls equals a better match. In theory. But then, communism works in theory, too. Steven DDTs him on a chair for two. Dreamer chairshots him for the pin at 3:32. Good enough for government work. *

– Jeff Hardy v. Rob Van Dam. Interesting note: Jeff Hardy now his own personalized Titantron video. Winner here gets the shot at Benoit at Summerslam. Jeff’s face looks like a Smurf puked all over him. Jeff quickly gets a legdrop for two and pounds away in the corner, but Rob blocks a dropkick and catapults him into the corner. Missile dropkick gets two. They slug it out and Rob misses an enzuigiri and bails off a Hardy mulekick. Railrunner is blocked with a kick by RVD, however. Man, poor Jeff never hits that move anymore. Rob suplexes him onto the railing and guillotines him. Back in, Rob gets another missile dropkick to set up Rolling Thunder, which gets two. Rob grabs a headscissors and stretches Jeff (it’s like Pride, but with more pointless gymnastics and freaky facepaint!), but Jeff comes back with a corkscrew for two. Jeff gets a DDT and goes up, but takes longer than a HHH interview and gets stopped by RVD. Ref is bumped and Jeff comes down with the swanton, but misses. Matt (with 2 T’s) runs in, turns on Jeff yet again, and Rob finishes with the frog splash at 5:04. Well, I guess they’re trying that storyline again. *1/2

– Meanwhile, the UnAmericans announce that Test v. Undertaker will be at Summerslam. One guess who wins that one.

– Meanwhile, Bischoff invades the production truck to complain about a Smackdown promo that apparently just aired. Um, what Smackdown promo? Either TSN didn’t air it, or someone goofed. Anyway, he’s so upset that he books Rock v. HHH for next week.

– The Biggest Eight-Man Tag Team Match In The History of RAW: HHH, Lance Storm, Christian and Test v. The Rock, Booker T, Goldust and Undertaker. Undertaker is apparently an American Badass again, as I guess “Big Evil” wasn’t conducive enough to babyface merchandise. Goldust and Christian slug it out to start, and Goldust gets the butt-butt for two. Storm comes in and gets caught in the babyface corner and pounded by Booker. Sidekick and superkick get two. Rock goes next and lays the smackdown, and dumps Storm. Storm clubs him from behind, however, and stomps away. Rock DDTs him and cleans house, but HHH lays him out from behind. HHH comes in and stomps a mudhole, and they mess up a cheapshot spot as HHH’s high knee misses when Rock goes down too soon from a shot on the apron by Test. Booker comes in and gets slugged by Christian, and choked by Storm. Booker hits him with a spinkick and goes after Christian, but walks into a Stormkick. In JR-Speak, Michaels invented the superkick and anyone who uses it “idolized” Shawn as a young man and is thus paying tribute to his greatness. That’s just funny on so many levels. Test pounds away on Booker, and HHH does likewise. Suplex gets two. Christian hits the chinlock, giving the fans a chance to remind themselves of which country they live in. Booker makes the comeback, and walks into a dropkick. Test stomps away and gets a sideslam for two. HHH grabs a Main Event Sleeper, and Booker comes back with a sidekick. Hot tag Taker (and the roof nearly blows off), and truly there a house in flames somewhere. HHH ends that run, however, and it’s BONZO GONZO. Test and HHH get clotheslined by Taker, and Test looks to be chokeslammed, but HHH saves with a low blow. Test goes for the pumphandle, but Booker hits him out of nowhere with a sidekick to break. HHH goes for the Pedigree, but Rock breaks that up and spit-punches him out of the ring, and hits Rock Bottom on Test for two. Undertaker chokeslams the tag champions and goes for the powerbomb on Christian, but Test lays him out with the big boot for the clean pin at 11:37. Whew, that was quite the finish! ***1/2 The right guy went over the right guy there, but there’s no chance in hell that Taker puts him over on the PPV.

The Bottom Line:

Good, solid, fun show from start to finish (well, discounting the awful mixed tag match and the midget stuff) with the quality wrestling making up for the sucky sportz entertainment that floats on the surface like so much scum on the top of chicken soup. Plus I now have a match to look forward to at the PPV.

Much better than last week. Give me these kind of shows every week, and it’s all gravy.

Peace out.