Promo City – A Raw Recap

You are cordially invited to the most verbose place on Earth.  Welcome to Promo City.

Raw comes to you live tonight from Anaheim, California with Jeremy and Michele in the audience.

Superstars Taping

Since I’ve got the inside track via two people actually in the audience, your two matches for WWE Superstars recorded prior to the start of Raw were:

Jack Swagger vs Jinder Mahal: So they made the whole thing of having Jinder screw Heath Slater out of his contract babay, but now he’s in a match on Superstars against that real American hero that you often forget still works for WWE.  He also lost.  Jack Swagger with the Patriot Lock

Sami Zayn vs Curtis Axel:  Another confusing one, as last week Sami was in the main event of Raw (unless you consider the Brock Lesnar appearance the main event, I don’t).  Now he’s facing the former Social Outcast and hits one hell of a kick, literally.  Sami Zayn via the Helluva Kick

Of Course the Realest Guys in the Room are Quoting Sublime

Enzo and Cass kick off the show talking trash about Jericho, so Jericho comes out to introduce everyone to his new partner, as Y2JeriKO is born.  Kevin Owens and Jericho are awesome.  This leads to a one on one between Jericho and Enzo with the partners at ringside.  KO gets a little handsy when the ref isn’t looking, and Cass has had enough, so he slides in and lays a big boot on Jericho to get the DQ for Enzo.  But the whole point of this was to set up the match between these two teams at Summerslam, so they can prove once and for all that there’s only one word to describe Y2JeriKO, and they spelled it, but I can’t intentionally misspell a word even for the sake of a joke.  That’s like LSU fans spelling the word “go” with five letters.  It just doesn’t make sense.

What in the hell is the point of this?

Let’s keep this quick.  There isn’t enough substance here to do anything but.  Braun Strowman destroyed some random jobber.  Best part of this segment is that when he won and threw the jobber out of the ring, he shouted to the crowd that, “With or without my family, all shall fall.”  At least he spoke.  Gave him a purpose, even if a very small one.  He should join The Club.

I’m sure I will have an identical segment shortly about Nia Jaxx.

I swear we saw this last week, and I didn’t even drink during the show

There are not millions of dollars here.  This is boring.  I’d rather see Titus against Bob Backlund.  I’m going to give you the finish in a minute, but since this is as boring as Ryback vs Kalisto Volume 36, I’m going to give you what you really want in the mean time:

Darren Young basically did the exact same thing Titus O’Neal did last week and used the tights on the roll up.  Who cares?

Have I mentioned yet how excited I am for the rematch between Bayley and Asuka?  This could be a match of the year, but the Nakamura match against Samoa Joe may give it a run for its money.  Going to be a fantastic show, and if I wasn’t so excited to see the main roster version of the Demon entrance at Summerslam, I might be more excited for TakeOver.

Another Shameless Plug (that I don’t get paid for)

If you didn’t watch last week’s Cruiserweight Classic broadcast with Ciampa taking on his partner Gargano, you missed an absolutely amazing 20 minutes of wrestling television.  Just fantastic.

Meltzer and a lot of other insiders have indicated that there is actually a big push to give the Universal Championship (dumb name) to Finn Balor at Summerslam.  In any event, the idea of Balor against Rollins is absolutely amazing.  These two are going to put on a cardio clinic, filled with all the high flying excitement and big spot moments you’d expect from these two.

For a guy named Colby Lopez that goes by the name of Seth Rollins, its an odd promo to cut about the fact that Finn Balor isn’t actually Finn Balor’s real name.  I mean, Fergal Devitt is still sort of bad ass sounding, but Colby Lopez isn’t.  When he pointed out that Balor is Demon King, they sort of set up for a demon entrance, but it never happened.  Typical Seth Rollins promo touting himself as The Myth, The Legend, The Man.  But he did end up calling out The Demon for next Monday night, so we will see if they spoil the reveal to the main audience or if they save it for a 10 minute entrance in Brooklyn.  Finn Balor’s Demon is the new Undertaker.

Has anyone else noticed when it does the animation of the Raw logo with the triangle of the A that it looks a hell of a lot like the opening of The Ascension’s entrance video?  Just me?  Ok.

They don’t actually put lights on Sheamus

He legitimately has the ability to glow in the dark.  Ok, that’s not true at all, but it’s funny.  And it’s not cool to poke fun at people who have trouble getting color on their pasty skin.  I apologize to all of you who look like Powder…. from the movie Powder, not that you look like actual powder, the dusty substance.  Did I mention I barely slept last night?  Yeah, this could get a bit weird in the third hour.

I love this dude.  He was running around in the crowd during the commercial break last week taking selfies with the audience.  It was awesome.  I’m going to go ahead and assume these two have a preshow match at Summerslam, not that either deserves to be in the preshow but because there’s not really anything on the line in this one, its just wrestling.  Great wrestling, but its the kind of match that goes in the preshow.

We got a commercial break during the action, but rather than finding a heartburn commercial with Larry the Cable Guy so you can really experience the break I’m sitting through here, I randomly came across this gif and couldn’t resist.  Tell me you aren’t trying to do this dance.  You know you are.  You’re also trying to figure out what song you can set it to.  I just went with Shake it Off because I’m having a hard time finding a dancing video that doesn’t go well with Shake it Off.

Sheamus and Cesaro exchanged a number of reversals, which was quite well performed.  Cesaro slid under a Brogue Kick and turned it into a roll up.  You are absolutely correct Anaheim Crowd, this is awesome.

While we’re talking about people’s real name, how sweet is Cesaro’s real name of Claudio Castagnoli?

Sheamus knocks down the official and goes for the pin, but when he got up to figure out why the ref didn’t count the pinfall, Cesaro got the roll up for the victory two weeks in a row.  Give this man a championship belt.

The Dudleyz are still trying to remain relevant

When the Dudleyz were brought back, it made so much sense.  They were going to be a great opponent for The New Day to really amp up the credibility of The New Day by taking out the sturdy veterans.  But how long was that luster and shine going to last?  They’re significantly older than they used to be and they don’t quite move as fast as they used to.  Their promos lack some luster in the PG Era as well.  In any event, now they’ll have their hands full with the airborne attack of their opponents, as The Dudleyz take on Neville and Sin Cara.

Sin Cara takes a beating for a while, but when Neville finally comes in on the hot tag, he cleans house.  Red Arrow for the win.

Because it always goes well when there is a cake in a WWE Ring

Lana and Rusev want us to take a journey down the aisle with them, so the ring is decked out in red carpet with a number of cakes on a table.  Roman is going to put him through those cakes.  This is going to be funny to watch, and sort of like Chris Jericho, I do not support any of these guys wearing a vest with no shirt, so I’m going to appreciate this a lot.

The photos from their wedding were quite beautiful.  As Daisy just pointed out, why does she have on this Vegas hooker wedding dress in the ring instead of the absolutely beautiful dress she got married in?  I responded that Vince McMahon doesn’t write her a check to dress reservedly, but them’s the breaks.

Roman’s beard game is on freaking point.  This really is the perfect way to get Roman out of the main event scene for a bit and let him start to get over lower on the card before making another run of any kind.  I am confused though, is he wearing dark contacts?  Those baby blues were the only thing keeping him over with the female audience.

And they’re finally letting Roman just be Roman.  I’ve been making this case for so long now.  He’s really funny when they just let him be a normal dude.  He’s not that other thing.  He can turn on the brutality when its necessary, like when he came after HHH almost a year ago.  We were both calling for a powerbomb through the cake table, but he shoved Rusev into Lana, who went face first into the bright red icing.  She took it like a champ, but she definitely sounded like she was straight out of Gainesville, Florida when she started yelling afterwards.  Amazing how quickly that accent stopped for a woman from the home of the Gators.

In any event, you can pretty well bank on Roman against Rusev at Summerslam for the United States Championship.

I didn’t expect the announcement right back from commercial, but Rusev was pleading for Mick Foley to punish Roman for embarrassing his wife, but Foley just made the Summerslam match.

Sasha Banks vs Dana Brooke to determine whether Dana is banned from Ringside at Summerslam

I like Dana Brooke’s music.  It sounds like Paramore.  I wish she didn’t always come out to that blasphemous tainting of the Ric Flair original that she always comes out to with Charlotte.

I thought they were actually going to give this match ample screen time, but they didn’t.  Charlotte accidentally slapped Dana, then Sasha drop kicked her and landed double knees on Dana for the victory.

Yeah, you’re not going to convince me that Finn Balor isn’t actually Ra’s Al Ghul

Finn Balor, in a prerecorded promo sitting on some weird throne straight out of an Arrow episode, gives a lesson in Irish Folklore.  It was weird, but essentially he’s telling us he’s coming out as The Demon at Summerslam.

To Lighten the Mood

We meet Dr. Anderson and Dr. Gallows, who tell us about a new epidemic, Ringpostitis.  After about 5 minutes of testicle related puns, we go back to commercial in anticipation of a match involving Kofi Kingston.

For those of you who haven’t checked, you can indeed order Booty-Os on the FYE website.  It’s $12 freaking dollars a box for a cereal.  At least if I get the lunch box it will hold other stuff.  The Booty-Os box is just a cardboard box once the cereal is gone.

So the match kicks off with Kofi taking on Luke Gallows.  Francesca is actually getting some screen time tonight, that’s good to see.

Xavier Woods is never really much help with anything, so the numbers game is definitely against Kofi this evening, who loses a pretty quick match.  I think Kofi is about to get Ringpostitis.  Xavier does save him with a steel chair chasing off the two larger opponents.

And for the second week in a row, it appears Raw will end with a lengthy promo segment.  

Mick Foley has invited Daniel Bryan to Raw to hash out the issues with Lesnar and Orton.

Or maybe not, while the two GMs shot barbs at each other, Rusev came out to suck up to Foley to avoid his match with Roman, only to have Cesaro cash in his title opportunity….tonight!

TWO CESARO MATCHES IN ONE NIGHT!!!!!!

We’re crossing into the 11:00 ET Hour, and now I’m fairly certain I see two Rusevs.  That’s scary.

The Uppercut Train has left the station, and Cesaro is coming out hot in this one.  Rusev starts to take over, focusing heavily on the surgically repaired shoulder, eating three of the four ring posts right into the kinesiology tape and an array of submission moves and attacks aimed at damaging that shoulder.

Cesaro gets the spin on the 300 lb Rusev, then locks in the Sharpshooter.  Sheamus runs down on the interference, Rusev gets the super kick but Cesaro kicks out.  Cesaro shoves Rusev into Sheamus on the apron again only to get the ref caught in the middle.  With the ref still reeling, Sheamus hits a kick on Cesaro and Rusev follows it up with one of his own and gets the pinfall.  Rusev was on the outside with his belt, but Roman flew down the ramp to hit a big spear on the Bulgarian Brute (that Rusev telegraphed for about 10 Roman paces, and Roman was moving pretty quickly but that was a bit much).  This could lead to a Fatal Four Way match at Summerslam, as there isn’t any of the multi-opponent matches that they’re so fond of for the lesser belts.

Until next Monday, enjoy tomorrow’s Smackdown recap/review.