And your host for this event, hailing from a dark corner in the North East of England, someone more blunt than a sledgehammer to the bollocks, a guy with the grumpiness of a man three times his age and the only person able to get more hot and bothered than the bastard child of Ric Flair and James E. Cornette, Danny Damage.

The Raw Rant, July 2nd 2012

Kicking off the show is a recap of the Cena/Jericho match being ended by The Big Show last week.  I didn’t really want to be bored with this last week, let alone again this week.  I feel like I’m looking through some old, embarrassing family photographs with friends every time WWE reminds me of one of the shittest parts of their previous shows, that includes some of the “Greatest” Raw Moments they keep showing too.  Moving on.

John Cena heads to the ring and says he’s preparing for MITB.  Daniel Bryan shows up, followed by Y2J, Kane and The Big Show.  DB jumps Cena and everyone goes at it, The Big Show comes out on top overall.

Santino Marella, Christian, R-Truth & Kofi Kingston beat The Prime Time Players, Cody Rhodes & David Otunga.  TPTP leave mid-match and then Cody follows, leaving a 4 on 1 situation.  Brodus Clay decides to make it 5 on 1 and distracts Otunga, Santino hits the Cobra and gets the pin.  After the match, Otunga gets a Kill-switch from Christian and a Splash off the ropes from Clay for good measure.  Remember kids, don’t bully people. Loving me a good old fashioned 8-man tag match though!

The interim GM for this week, Teddy Long is backstage and is approached by Alberto del Rio.  Alberto has been named the #1 Contender for Sheamus’ title and will face him at MITB.  Teddy makes a mystery match for Alberto next.

Holy shit, it’s Shane O’ Mac!  Oh wait, Raw Flashback, sorry, my bad.  Stephanie McMahon (schwing!) talks about Shane training Vince for his Royal Rumble ’99 match against Steve Austin. Loved this then and was fun to look back on it again.

Alberto del Rio incapacitates Sin Cara before the match begins, causing the referee to throw the whole thing out.  The crowd were all over Alberto tonight with an ass-hole chant in the native tongue, nice.

Daniel Bryan tries to creep back onto AJ’s good side backstage with the offering of a rose.  She eats half of it and spits it back at him.

Paul E. Heyman is on the Titantron, live from WWE HQ.  He says Brock will answer Triple H at Raw1000 and that he’s worked out HHH’s game plan.  Short but sweet appearance from Paul E. this week.

Sheamus & AJ defeat Dolph Ziggler & Vicki Guerrero. Sheamus and Ziggler work the whole match until they tag out and AJ hits Vicki with a Shining Wizard. Still needing some kind of ‘Seller Of The Year/Decade/Lifetime” award for Mr. Ziggler though.

AJ runs backstage to find out what CM Punk thought of her match.  Sadly for her,  he was on the phone with his sister the whole time, he didn’t even know AJ had a match.  This displeases AJ, so she puts on her Droopy the dog face and walks away.

–Past Raw Main Eventer Special

Heath Slater pins Doink The Clown after hitting a jumping neck-breaker.  Michael Cole amuses himself reminding Lawler that he used to be a heel and used to feud with Doink and that they both had mini-ons. Before Slater can celebrate too much, DIAMOND DALLAS PAGE heads down the ramp and hits Heath with a Diamond Cutter. BAM!

Video Package Time.

– WWE Films present a ‘No Holds Barred’ film promo, starring Hulk Hogan. Hmm.

– John Cena & Alicia Fox visit injured Troops.

–No Disqualification Match

The Big Show scores a victory vs. Kane.  The Big Red Machine picked up a chair, Big Show hits a spear and then a Choke-slam onto said chair. Another push for Big Show’s unstoppable giant routine, not badly done to be fair.

Eve and Teddy Long backstage, he gives her a giant name badge and sends her on her way.  She bumps into AJ who is stood sulking a mere six feet away.  They bicker over who’s the bigger attention seeker until AJ leaves to show everyone how it’s done.

Tyson Kidd upsets Tensai with a roll-up around the one minute mark. Tensai beats the snot out of Sakamoto afterwards, gutted.

Y2J and Daniel Bryan are backstage comparing jackets and catchphrases while CM Punk and John Cena prepare for the match.  Tyson Kidd is about to be interviewed in the locker room, but Tensai back-attacks him and smashes his head into the lockers a few times instead.

Daniel Bryan & Chris Jericho vs. CM Punk & John Cena ends in a no contest. Jericho and Cena take their fight to the back while Punk and Bryan battle it out. AJ comes out and skips around the ring, getting no attention from either guy, she sets up a table and begins to climb the ring post.  Before she has the chance to jump, Daniel Bryan stands in front of the table and tells her not to, CM Punk climbs the post to stop her and is given a kiss, followed by a shove off the top, onto Bryan and through the table. Now the needy bitch is happy!

Afterthoughts.

Not a bad Raw this week.  MITB and Raw1000 are obviously the main focuses at the moment, teasing with past moments and getting psyched up for the big three hour show in a few weeks.  MITB is building nicely with three matches set in stone and a fourth awaiting a more entrants.

Money In The Bank Card (so far)

-WWE Title

CM Punk vs. Daniel Bryan

(AJ as guest referee)

-World Title

Sheamus vs. Alberto del Rio

-WWE Title MITB

Chris Jericho vs. John Cena vs. Big Show vs. Kane

-World Title MITB

Santino Marella vs. Christian vs. Tensai vs. Tyson Kidd vs. Damien Sandow

(more to be added, hopefully Ziggler)

AJ’s involvement in the WWE Title match has evolved into something more interesting than just her having a crush on anything with a pulse, I’ve got a feeling it’s all heading towards her going back to DB and handing him the belt, but we’ll see where it goes.

The Big Show is looking good as a heel still. They managed to find a way to keep him on this path and still have him lose to Cena at No Way Out.  A lot of people (including myself) thought he’d be back where he was two months ago by now, or lower on the card.

Both ladder matches are set up to be entertaining, the World Title match having more potential for greatness, in my opinion.  Waiting for Smackdown to find out who the remaining participants are going to be.

WWE are gloating that they’ve got the rights to a Hulk Hogan film, which tickles me greatly.  Lawler smugly set the ‘No Holds Barred’ promo up by saying it wasn’t meant to be a funny film, but it ended up that way anyway, watch your claws Jerry.   I think Scott Steiner’s going to be the icing on the cake for this bear-poking session, very interested to see what happens there.

Something that’s been bothering me a while are remixed entrances. Not the music (although in some instances I do prefer some older songs), I’m talking about the direction and choreography of the entrances themselves.

–Chris Jericho’s entrance should be lights off, countdown on Titantron, clock reaches 00:00, pitch black darkness (bar idiots with camera phones) and then Y2J’s jacket should light up (him stood in Y pose) and then BOOM, fireworks and lights as he throws his arms/turns around. I’m being lenient with my request, I like the jacket and how it’s incorporated in his entrance so this is mixing a little new with the old.

–I have similar beef with Kane’s entrance also.  Again, I don’t like how, or know why it’s been reshuffled.  The lights should fade and leave the Titantron on, music starts, pauses, Titantron off, full darkness (bar dick heads with camera phones), pause for effect, BOOM + Flames, guitar riff and music continues and Kane heads out through the smoke gathering.

I know it’s not the end of the world because of this and I know it’s 2012 now and things do change, but playing an old record again isn’t always a bad idea, especially if your attempt at improving something is to do it all backwards and the record was rather good in the first place.

Digest and discuss!  Thanks for reading, take care and I’ll see you next week.

Danny Damage

@BluntDamage (twitter)

And of course, here’s Raw In Five Minutes!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_iycHzEC7Y&feature=plcp