I’m doing the Raw and Smackdown reviews now… wanna fight about it?
-Live from Tulsa, Oklahoma
-Your hosts are Mr. Vintage and Mr. Puppies
-Money in the Bank witnessed a number of huge happenings on the Raw brand as Sheamus retained the WWE championship after some interference by Nexus, and Miz apparently took the next step towards main event status by winning Money in the Bank. Both the Hart Dynasty and Alicia Fox retained their respective championships. Now we’re on the road to Summerslam. Before I get into Raw, three things. I’m not going to time the television matches because of commercial breaks and brevity. Also, I’m not going to bother with play-by-play since everyone else does that. Instead, you get snarkiness and analysis (sometimes at the same time). Finally, I apologize for no Raw or Smackdown reports last week. It’s my responsibility to insure that all the shows get reviewed eventually despite other people perhaps feeling differently. For the time being, I’ll be handling both Raw and Smackdown. Now on to the show. Read the rest of this entry
Two excellent ladder matches highlight a show where The Nexus look to make an impact.
Opening Match: Money in the Bank Ladder Match: Kofi Kingston vs. Dolph Ziggler vs. Christian vs. Cody Rhodes vs. Matt Hardy vs. Drew McIntyre vs. Kane vs. Big Show
Everyone goes after Kane and Big Show except Rhodes, who tries to climb a ladder to no avail. Big Show tries to climb but a rung breaks. Poor guy. He throws the ladder onto Kane. Everyone attacks Big Show and sends him into the ring steps. McIntyre catapults Christian into a ladder. Hardy stops him from climbing with a few ladder shots. Hardy and Christian start brawling on the outside. Christian hip tosses Ziggler off the top of a ladder. Hardy hits the Side Effect on Kofi and teams up with Christian to DDT Kane. They sandwich Kane with ladders. Christian flapjacks Hardy onto a ladder. Rhodes pushes Christian off a ladder and onto Big Show. Kofi connects with Trouble in Paradise on Kane and Hardy adds the Twist of Fate. Rhodes back suplexes Kofi off a ladder. McIntyre clears the ring but Kane stops him from climbing. Kofi baseball slides a ladder into Kane. He catches McIntyre with Trouble in Paradise. Kofi climbs a ladder on the outside and leg drops McIntyre through an announce table. Big Show impressively catches Ziggler with a chokeslam. He splashes a ladder onto Christian and Hardy. Big Show brings out his reinforced ladder and gets it into the ring after some struggle. Rhodes stops him from climbing with a ladder shot to his ankle. Ziggler drops Rhodes with an electric chair but gets caught with a chop from Big Show. Kofi springboards onto the reinforced ladder. Big Show tries to stop him but falls victim to a tornado DDT. Rhodes missile dropkicks Kofi off the ladder and follows with the Crossrhodes onto another ladder. Ziggler Zig Zags Rhodes into the reinforced ladder. Kane sends Big Show to the floor by pushing over his ladder. Everyone else starts throwing ladders on top of Big Show. Kane clears the ring but Ziggler stops him from climbing by applying a sleeper hold. Kane fights him off and chokeslams him off the apron. He chokeslams Kofi onto a ladder on the outside and throws Rhodes into an entrance prop. Christian and Hardy powerbomb Kane off the reinforced ladder. They battle for the briefcase but both fall off the ladder. McIntyre finally wakes up and starts climbing. Kane throws him off the ladder and grabs the briefcase for the win at 26:17. This was simply a ladder match done right. Twenty-six minutes were appropriately given to these eight men and they made the most of it. The aspect I enjoyed the most was that everyone received a chance to shine. Kofi was involved in the jaw-dropping spot of the match. Big Show had his reinforced ladder story working for him. Christian and Hardy were put over by being portrayed as veterans of the ladder match. Everything came together and this was an excellent contest. I think WWE might have found gold with this pay per view concept. **** Read the rest of this entry
Jerome Cusson is joined by Matt Waters for a discussion on some of the headlines of the last week. They look at TNA’s Victory Road and the subsequent Impact that featured the “ECW Invasion.” They talk about the potential drawing power for “Another Night Stand” before moving on to talking about Tag Wars 2010. They discuss the pros, cons, and potential for the tournament as well as looking ahead to Glory By Honor. They end by talking about WWE as it’s Money in the Bank weekend. Yeah, we almost forgot too. Jerome previews the rest of the week as we’ve got some huge interviews coming up later in the week.
-WWE has released two fantastic collections this year. The first was about Shawn Michaels and served as a nice companion to his retirement. The second was about Bret Hart and the rest of the Hart family. A nice documentary accompanied two solid disks of matches involving family members. Now The Undertaker is getting another collection of his deadliest matches. Emphasis not on his best matches. Judging by the match listing, I’ve got a bad feeling about this one. Let’s dive into this three disk set, and see just how bad this is. Read the rest of this entry
Last week the Nexus unleashed a brutal attack on WWE Legend Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat. Steamboat was later hospitalized after suffering an aneurysm that is speculated to have been directly related to the incident on Raw. Tonight, the Nexus finds out their fate. Read the rest of this entry
