Raw & Smackdown Thoughts & More - March 23, 2009

Welcome to the “well, that sure didn’t feel much like a 2 weeks till WrestleMania episode of Raw” edition of The Wrestling List. It just didn’t feel like WWE did much of anything new to build to WrestleMania tonight. We just mostly saw the same stuff that we’ve been seeing on Raw and Smackdown for the last couple of weeks. The last segment was worth watching as it was interesting to watch to see how they are going to keep pushing the Triple H/Orton storyline.

News for the week. WWE News: WWE finally announced what has been known for a long time now and that is the Von Erich’s will be inducted as a family. WWE will be airing one hour of the Hall Of Fame Ceremony on USA on Saturday, April 4 at 9pm central time. Expect it to be a VERY condensed version of the happenings. I just hope that it doesn’t make the ceremony sped along like last year when they rushed Flair cause of needing to get footage edited for the USA special. Ratings continue to fall across the board for WWE. The Raw rating was a 3.6 down from the previous week’s 3.7. The March 13 edition of Smackdown was a 1.9. The ECW rating for last week was a 1.3.

Friday night was the 500th episode of Smackdown and the big celebration for it. I thought the show was solid but kind of weak for such a big milestone for the show. No retro footage or major happenings. They did have all three brands represented on the show but the show would have likely had all three brands on it anyway this close to WrestleMania. I thought the show was fine but I just expected more from it. The show closed with the segment with Big Show, Edge, and Cena. The basic idea of it was that Show and Edge were ready to go at it but Vickie broke up their arguing before it escalated. She wanted a truce until WrestleMania while also adding that either Show or Edge would also win Vickie at WrestleMania as well. The two shook hands but Cena made his way to the stage. He stirred them up by continuing to escalate their problems. Eventually, they got physical shoving each other. Edge slapped Show and then Show grabbed Edge for a chokeslam. Vickie was trying to break them up and got shoved down. Show went to help up Vickie. Edge went for a spear but Show moved with him catching the spear on Vickie. Both looked stunned and Edge went to help her up. Show threw Edge off of her. They then battled over who was going to carry her out. Show got his leg clipped from behind and Show fell along with sending Vickie crashing to the mat. Show chokeslammed Edge and then carried Vickie off. The segment really seemed a lot like the Triple H/Stephanie/Kurt Angle triangle from years back as far as the comedy. Shawn Michaels defeated Kane when Kane went for the chokeslam and walked into a superkick from Shawn leading to the pin. Undertaker got a win on JBL following a tap out from the choke. Undertaker talked before the match saying that Shawn would feel the wrath of him when he least expected it. A new US champion was crowned as MVP defeated Shelton Benjamin. MVP’s push is definitely going while one push is definitely over as Kozlov was pinned again. Triple H defeated him with the pedigree in the opening bout. Yeah, not complaining on who is on their way up and who is on their way down. Jeff Hardy took on Kendrick in an extreme rules match. Hardy took out Zeke early in the match as he just nailed him with a chair over and over. Hardy then sent more messages to Matt when he hit the twist of fate on to Kendrick on a sitting chair. Hardy followed with the swanton to win the match. WWE announced the Von Erich family’s induction into the Hall Of Fame. It was announced on WWE.com as an exclusive on Tuesday. I’m sure that the reason for it not being announced on Raw was because of media attention due to Test. However, the media hasn’t really jumped on it and I don’t know why you put it on Smackdown later in the week while not on Raw.

Tonight’s episode of Raw was just eh to me. I just wasn’t really into it. The first segment and the last segment were the ones to watch. The rest of it was mostly just been there seen that stuff that WWE has been doing for weeks now. Like I said, it just didn’t feel like an episode with a 2 weeks to go till WrestleMania kind of build to it. A lot of the show felt like filler that you would see any time of the year much less right before your Super Bowl show. The closing of the show focused on a handicap match with Triple H taking on Randy Orton and Ted Dibiase. Triple H fought the odds but continued to focus his attention on to Orton. As Triple H went for the sledghammer under the ring, he was greeted by Cody Rhodes. That led to a 3 on 1 beating which also had them cuffing Triple H to the ropes. Orton told Triple H that the only way the beating would stop was if “she” stopped it. We all knew who she was and Stephanie made her way to ringside. Triple H yelled at her to go to the back. As she made eye contact with Orton, she turned to realize that she was surrounded by Legacy. Orton grabbed a hold of her and then set her feet on the ropes for his nasty DDT. He hit that as Triple H sat there unable to help. Orton then grabbed the hammer and looked to hit Triple H with it. However, he sat it down and looked at Stephanie. He then leaned down and kissed her as Triple H sat in the corner furious. That didn’t make much sense to me story wise when they had Orton’s “wife” on the show a few weeks ago. Unless, they are planning on bringing the “wife” back into the storyline of this match which I’m hoping they’re not doing. Anyway, back to the segment, Triple H gets to his feet and they stare off. Orton then nails him with the sledgehammer and walks out. Pretty intense segment that definitely added to the story of their feud. Part of me was thinking that Stephanie might turn on Triple H and go with Legacy. The opening segment saw a classic Flair beat down. Flair opened the show accepting Jericho’s challenge speaking for the three legends. Jericho eventually made his way to the ring and they did some trash talking on one another. Jericho ended punching Flair and then beat him up all over ringside. The first punch busted him open and they ended up on the table and the ring steps. Jericho also pulled a lot of his clothes off of him and bashed him with a camera. He just put a convincing nasty looking beating on him. Edge took on The Big Show in a match that just did nothing for me. It’s just becoming the same stuff with them both trying to impress Vickie. Cena has almost become a side note in this feud. He was on the screen and not in the building due to his Tonight Show appearance tonight. He stirred things up before the match. The result had them showing off for Vickie. Eventually, Edge got tied in the ropes and Show went for the knockout punch. Vickie yelled at Show to not do it and ordered Chavo to stop it. Chavo stepped in the ring causing the DQ. Show disposed of Chavo. As Show went for Chavo, Edge went for a spear on Show. Show moved and the spear caught Chavo. Show then nailed the knockout punch on to Edge. Undertaker spoke in the ring about Shawn and then a video appeared on the screen of Shawn talking in a graveyard about how he was going to bury the streak. After the video aired, Undertaker was furious in the ring with Lawler putting over how he had never seen anyone stand up to Taker and get under his skin like Shawn had. Jeff Hardy defeated Dolph Ziggler in an extreme rules match where Hardy destroyed Ziggler with a chair. He hit a reverse twist of fate on the chair followed by a swanton for the win. The team of CM Punk, Christian, MVP, and Kofi defeated Kane, Henry, Finlay, and Shelton when Christian pinned Shelton with the unprettier. Crowd was really into this one at the finish which made the ending fun. Finlay got a ladder and took out both teams with it after the match. Rey Mysterio defeated William Regal with the 619 and splash for the win. Regal and Layla arrived with JBL in his limo and JBL did commentary during the match. After the match, JBL got up and mocked Rey by clapping for him. Rey then ran and dropkicked JBL on to the floor. Santino announced that he was going to enter the 25 Divas battle royal at WrestleMania. After Mickie beat him up last week, he went to Vickie to get a match. If Santino could defeat Mickie with one arm tied behind his back, he could get in the battle royal. Good comedy in this one. Mickie eventually tied up both of Santino’s arms. He then tried to roll through her and kick her for the rest of the match. The finish had Santino climbing to the top turnbuckle. Beth knocked him off the ropes by accident and Mickie kicked him for the win. Melina and Kelly were at ringside with Mickie while Beth and Rosa were with Santino.

Other notes from Raw. I did like Undertaker’s point of countering Shawn’s you’ve never beaten me statement with bringing up how Shawn was recovering at home for five years after their last encounter. That is true. Shawn’s back was never the same after their bout when they wrestled at the Rumble in 1998. Shawn’s low back caught the coffin on the outside of the ring when he was backdropped out. Shawn talks in his book about how he wasn’t feeling that badly during the match but woke up a couple of days later unable to move. He was crawling around the house in pain and didn’t wrestle again till his last match at WrestleMania XIV. If you see the footage of the Rumble, it will make you cringe when his back catches that thing. When you think Ric Flair history, doesn’t part of you think that he could just take a poke in the eye and he’d start bleeding??!! He sure isn’t afraid to do that over the years. Nothing screams bizarre match like having Jeff Hardy take on…..Dolph Ziggler in an extreme rules match. Yeah, I just skip through all the 12 Rounds movie promo stuff with Cena now. WWE has an amazing way of overpromoting their movies where you don’t even want to see them when they’re finally released. ECW being the number one show on Sci-Fi for 25 straight weeks makes me wonder if they are just doing that well or if there is just nothing else on Sci-Fi drawing ratings. Wow, I really did not need to remember that sumo match from WrestleMania 21!!

I watched the new Legends Of Wrestling roundtable from WWE 24/7 over the weekend. The subject was about African Americans in wrestling and the biggest stars over the years including Junk Yard Dog, Ron Simmons, Tony Atlas, and many, many more. The panel included JR, Atlas, Theodore Long, Dusty Rhodes, and Bill Watts. Interesting show and they had a lot of great stories to tell. They showed the footage of Simmons pinning Vader for the WCW title. I still remember seeing that when it happened and how exciting that it was. Great to see the footage cause I can’t even remember the last time that I’ve seen that match. The next Roundtable show is up on WWE 24/7 (except for here where there is some uploading glitch on why we don’t have it yet) and is about Texas Wrestling.

Wishing all of you a great week!! Happy spring!! Take care and God bless!!