[derfsucks]

Is anyone other than me watching tonight?

Preview from WWE.com:

The anticipation for the WWE Championship Fatal Four Way Match at Backlash can’t be contained by America’s shores, as the Superstars battle in merry old England when Raw airs from London’s O2 Arena.

With both Triple H and John Cena interjecting themselves into the WWE Title foray last Monday, the one-fall WWE Championship contest between Randy Orton, John “Bradshaw” Layfield, The Game and Cena looks to be a chaotic matchup. Who will make the first move to get a leg up on their competition, either physically or psychologically, in this battle of four current and former WWE Champions.

General Manager William Regal announced that he'll face the Legend Killer in the ring Monday night, in an attempt to teach the WWE Champion "some respect." In front of his countrymen, will Regal and his formidable "Power of the Punch" be able to derail the champion? We’ll find out in Londontown as Raw airs live.

Also, Women's Champion Beth Phoenix will put her title on the line as Mickie James earned an opportunity for the gold last week with her tag team victory. Despite holding the Women's Title once herself, Mickie has never recorded a win against The Glamazon. Can she carry the momentum from last week into tonight and snap her losing streak to Beth?

As the buildup to the battle between two of WWE’s top Superstars continues to boil, Shawn Michaels and Batista will both be in the O2 Arena Monday night. Will they be able to keep things civil until they step inside the ring at Backlash? Or will the tension be broken with fisticuffs as The Animal continues to blame HBK for the retirement of his mentor, Ric Flair? London “bobbies” might want to be on their toes while providing security.

And the heat continues to be turned up in the tag team division, as contenders jostle for position. With Paul London & Brian Kendrick and Carlito & Santino Marella earning wins on Raw, plus the return of the dangerous Cryme Tyme, should World Tag Team Champions Cody Rhodes & Hardcore Holly be watching their backs?

We’ll find out all the answers to these questions and more as Monday Night Raw airs live from London, England at 9/8 CT, only on USA Network.

And for Raw's return from England on April 21, WWE invites Democratic Presidential nominee hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to settle their differences inside the ring.

That last paragraph makes me groan. They offer up a link to the 'video invite' to Obama and Clinton - www.wwe.com/content/media/video/vms/none/2008/april8-14/6835006.

Oh yeah -- forgot to mention, at some point tonight this preview turns back into a pumpkin, and then the recap appears.

[derfsucks]

RAW - Quick and Dirty:

Taped a few hours ago from London, England:

Cold open to JBL talking smack to Regal about how he should be allowed to leave England. Regal says instead, he should stick around and fight HHH in the main event tonight.

RAW theme.

HBK's out to talk about all of this Flair/Batista nonsense - he's serious 'cause he calls the guy DAVE a few more times. Y2J comes out to appeal to the heel in HBK, saying that sure, DAVE's being sort of a dick, but that HBK's lying if he says he didn't enjoy retiring Flair at least a little bit. Doesn't take long for Y2J to eat a superkick. HBK has to admit that he DID enjoy that.

NEXT WEEK: King of the Ring on a special THREE HOUR RAW.

Santino Marella and Carlito BEAT London/Kendrick to become #1 contenders for the tag belts. Even in defeat, Londrick are fucking awesome. Post match interview sees Santino talk about how he and Carlito are 'weiners,' corrected by Carlito as 'winners.'

WWE KIDS magazine on newstands this week.

Mickie James BEATS The Glamazon Beth Phoenix with a rollup to become the WWE Women's Champion. Match was slick - not great, but certainly better than most RAW fare. Mickie goes NUTS post match - her celebration stretches through a commercial break and includes Ashley and Maria, concluding with Mickie kissing Todd Grisham.

Regal warms up in the back for his match tonight. Y2J bitches about both DAVE and HBK and wants to get into it with them. Regal says he can, as the guest ref when they fight at Backlash. Y2J says he's not a ref, he wants to fight - so Regal says he can defend the IC belt against Umanga tonight.

Cryme Time out to pander to the masses ("Euros, Euros, Yeah, Yeah!") as JTG BEATS Trevor Murdoch after rolling through a top rope cross body attempt by Murdoch. Pre match interview shows Lance Cade trying to 'have faith' in Murdoch. Match is plodding - lots of Murdoch clubbering, very little JTG offense. Post match, Murdoch looks confused while Cade steams.

Randy Orton BEATS William Regal with an RKO out of nowhere. Regal stiffs the living shit out of Orton towards the end of the match ... in one GLORIOUS 45 second segment, Regal drops the champ on his head (earning a small dreaded 'X' from the ref on the floor), then pounds him with a few exploder suplexes and a rather brutal running kneelift to the head. Regal still eats the RKO for a pin, though. Crowd was pretty rabid for the 'hometown' boy. The head bump Orton took, planned or not, was cringe-worthy.

Umanga 'talks' for a bit.

Y2J BEATS Umanga with foot-on-the-ropes assisted rollup. Match was plodding - lots of Umanga wear-down offense. Y2J sold HBK's earlier superkick through the match and even a bit afterwards, god bless him. This one went through a commercial break. Lacking, but not terrible - the visual of Y2J trying to put the Walls of Jericho on Umanga was pretty absurd.

Paul Burchill SQUASHES Hacksaw Jim Duggan. Nice reaction for Duggan - I was expecting Bulldog the 2nd, not Burchill. Katie Lea is my new fantasy, and possibly my wife's, too. Duggan doesn't last 60 seconds.

HHH and JBL have a nice 'intense', slow, boring brawl that goes into a slugfest up the ramp where Randy Orton hops in and pummels HHH to cause a DQ. Orton gets HHH back in the ring for an RKO, then 'teams up' with JBL to hold Helmsley up for a brutal head kick. Orton takes a running start and becomes Charlie Brown, only JBL's Lucy drops HHH the football and hits the blockhead with a Clothesline from Hell. JBL poses with the belt, and JR sounds absurd plugging a fatal four way match with arguably the 'biggest' 1/4th of the match not even heard from on the show.

Wrap.

[jetskid48]

So um, Raw was pretty good tonight.


Mickie's champ.

[derfsucks]

**crickets chirp**

jets, I think we're the only folks who watched tonight.

[jetskid48]

pretty big chat tonight...guess everyone had enough of talking about it...im sure King of the Ring will get people going.

[Lucky]

RAW was enjoyable enough that I really never looked to stop watching and actually was surprised by how quick it went.

I'm not sure there's anything I care to talk about from it.

Except that I'm not a fan of Jericho seemingly being shoehorned into a very simple story that was working amazingly well. But I'll reserve judgment for now. Suffice it to say I am NOT someone who is just happy that Jericho was added because he's Jericho and if he was as great as we like to say I prefer he be working his own program and re-establishing the once prestigious title he has.

[Angle]

I am really not looking forward to next week.

Hillary vs Obama *shudder*

[derfsucks]

Apr 14, 2008 22:55:00 GMT -5 Lucky said:

Except that I'm not a fan of Jericho seemingly being shoehorned into a very simple story that was working amazingly well. But I'll reserve judgment for now. Suffice it to say I am NOT someone who is just happy that Jericho was added because he's Jericho and if he was as great as we like to say I prefer he be working his own program and re-establishing the once prestigious title he has.

Agreed. Still, I really like the fact that he's spent one week getting on Batista's case and one week getting on HBK's case, and now he's just thrown his hands up and said they both need beatings, heh.

Also, the "holy shit, I just beat you!" look on Jericho's face post-match was brilliant.

[Lucky]

Apr 14, 2008 23:05:05 GMT -5 Angle said:

I am really not looking forward to next week.

Hillary vs Obama *shudder*

And King of the Ring. I'm a sucker for tournaments.

Next week is most definitely a show to be watched with the FF button handy. Especially since I suspect that the tournament will just be top heavy with results that don't satisfy (me at least).

[gobshite]

Unless they actually have either Clinton or Obama as confirmed for next week, I think they'll ignnore it completely and just go with the KotR. But what exactly do you get for it? The 'king' gimmick? A shot at summerslam?

I'd like to see Kennedy win it. Which means he wont even be in it.

[creepy]

The Obama/Hillary thing will be like Rosie/Donald from last year. Great. And if you think anybody takes that seriously that either will show up, than I'vegot an English bridge in the desert to sell you. (Woops. Did that wrong.)


Is it just me or does it seem like Flair was retired just to open up a Bautista/HBK feud? I can't get into it when it just seems to be:

Dave Bautista - Why did you retire my friend, my mentor?
HBK - Because he asked for a match and that was the stip. Lose and retire.
DB - Then you shoulda layed down. Ric Flair should never have to retire.
HBK - Didn't want to retire him, but I don't lay down for anybody (except Hogan)
DB - Me don't understand {Scratches head}
HBK - I think deep down, Ric wanted it to be me that retired him on the biggest stage of 'em all
DB - blahblahfightin'wordsblahblah
HBK - blahblahhadtoblahblah

Sounds like this could be settled with a private convo over a coupla beers (or Sasparillas). Instead, a month long talkfest to rest HBK and it made the most Iconic of the Icons retirement a quick-feud starter. If they become mortal enemies and become the huge years long feud, then it seems worth it. But this just seems like an off month PPV feud. Ehhhhhhh.......

[Riot Act]

Pretty dull RAW and I fell asleep before the ME, so I only have a few quick thoughts:

- I actually thought Jericho/Umaga was very good.

- Even face Mickie is batshit.

- I'm consistently amazed at how quickly Michaels can hit the Superkick and how legit it looks.

- You would think that WWE would know better than to try something like the Rosie/Trump fiasco again, but it seems they are doing just that with this Obama/Clinton BS. WWE - Not Learning From Our Mistakes Since 1952.


EDIT: Here's the FoxNews article:

That’s the challenge from WWE, which has issued an open invitation to the deadlocked Democrats to settle their differences “the American way — in a wrestling match.”

Seriously.

World Wrestling Entertainment aired the video invitation Tuesday, calling for a bona fide smackdown on Monday night RAW April 21.

“What we’re trying to do is provide both Senator Clinton and Senator Obama an opportunity to speak to more than 8 million viewers of our program … which is the night before the Pennsylvania primary,” WWE spokesman Gary Davis told FOXNews.com.

What exactly the world of professional wrestling expects Clinton and Obama to do in that ring is unclear.

The announcer in the ad, now on the WWE Web site, declares, “Forget about who’s better prepared when the phone rings at 3 a.m., and find out who’s better when the bell rings.”

So what? An arm wrestling match? A very aggressive debate? A cage fighting tournament?

“I think the invitation itself is self-explanatory,” Davis said. “Get into the ring and resolve their differences.”

The professional wrestling sector has been relatively quiet on the political front ever since “Nature Boy” Ric Flair stopped tag teaming with Mike Huckabee. But Davis said all the while WWE has had an aggressive “SmackDown Your Vote” program to get young voters registered.

Davis said WWE is still in talks with both candidates over the proposed match.

So they're actually "in talks" with both camps? Good luck.

[bdbdbd]

So long as you call both sides people and haven't gotten a no yet, you're still in talks.

JR hates FOX news because they're mean.

Of course, Fox News had to make sure that their audience knew that none of them were wrestling fans because as we all know we wrestling fans need to be avoided like the plague and that being a fan of wrestling to any degree indicates that we are obviously impaired and in need of serious help. Ironically, Fox News coverage on their morning show covered such newsworthy items of the day including Britney not wearing under garments, Paris Hilton goes to jail, etc will no doubt continue, but for goodness sakes Fox must make sure we distance ourselves from those crazy, wrestling people. The bottom line is that Fox Morning News is trying to be an infotainment show and their making fun of wrestling fans and the wrestling business in general feels predictably arrogant. Perhaps they should studyRaw’s TV ratings over the past 15 years or so on cable, but that most likely wouldn’t change their attitude that has existed in the media since before you and I were ever an after thought in our folk’s minds. And it is not likely to ever change. At least Keith Olbermann and his writers got their wrestling info right when they were addressing the Clinton/Obama publicity stunt. Olbermann strikes me as the kind of guy who has had a beer and watched ‘rasslin in his lifetime at some point, which I applaud.

[punk/core]

They invited Bush and Gore to Smackdown in 2000. When both declined, they just dropped it. I fucking hope that's what happens next Monday as well.

I'm looking forward to next week... I really like one night tournaments. But I'm worried they'll half-ass it and try to replicate the magic of King Booker, which would be no easy task.

Not that I'm complaining, but... no Cena last night? That seemed pretty odd that he didn't show.

Hey, Mickie matters again.

I'm gonna say that I don't like Jericho thrust into the Batista/HBK match. The feud is going very well, and I get the feeling this is going to lead to Jericho fucking over Michaels and starting a feud of their own. Now, don't get me wrong, I wouldn't mind that at all, but if that happens they'd be pulling the trigger on the Batista/HBK dynamic way too quickly.

I think the Backlash theme may be the shittiest PPV theme they've ever used.

[Demko]

Apr 15, 2008 11:55:36 GMT -5 punk/core said:

Not that I'm complaining, but... no Cena last night? That seemed pretty odd that he didn't show.

Skids said he was held over here in the US due to filming of his new movie. So take that for what it's worth.

[Lucky]

I worry that the tournament will feature all established main eventers with no real prize so it will feel like a waste of time. I mean, HHH, HBK, Umaga, Jericho, JBL, Cena, Batista, Edge. Might be sitting there hoping for a Punk star maker but I'll probably just expect the King of Kings or King Jericho or King Edge. I love the idea of tournaments because there's so much potential for upsets and weird matches and that sort. But I am expecting there to be no real surprises in the tourney (except perhaps Punk) and I can't imagine more than 2 or 3 matches will get good time for basic time constraints (especially if they waste time with this parody BS).

But my ideal KotR probably isn't what WWE or most of its audience wants to see. Personally I'd love if they made it RAW exclusive, eliminated the 4 guys in the title match and threw in a bunch of guys who could surprise. HBK, Jericho, Umaga, London/Kendrick, Santino, Carlito, Burchill, and Smith? You could use it to help establish a RAW midcard and if pump up one of those lesser guys who made it to the finals (even if he lost). But that's not gonna be what happens and I'm ok accepting that more people may want to see HHH and Batista and those guys.

As for Obama/Clinton I'm just presuming that Ace Steel is preparing his black face.

[punk/core]

I actually like that it's NOT Raw exclusive.

And I would have put Punk at the top of my list to win the thing, if he hadn't just won Money In The Bank two weeks ago.

On one hand, I agree with you about the main eventers statement. Just like with the Royal Rumble, this tournament should be used to elevate someone on the cusp of the main event. That's what the King of the Ring usually was... Austin, HHH, Angle, Edge, Lesnar... all mid-carders when they won the thing.

On the other hand... Booker was a WELL established main eventer for years... and look what happened after he won it. So I dunno.

[Lucky]

The only reason I kind of want it to be RAW exclusive is to give an excuse to get those non-stars in. Because if its cross brand there's just no logic behind a guy like Burchill making it in. My ideal tournament would be WWE saying "Lets make a new star."

CM Punk, MVP, Kennedy, Burchill, Kofi, Morrisson, London, Santino... or something like that. But I 100% accept that its something I'd be interested in but might not work for the general audience and might not be what WWE wants. I want new guys and I think a tournament like this can help to jump start WWE's midcard and a guy's career.

Presuming its existing players I'd hope they take out the title contenders and champs. HBK, Batista, Jericho, CM Punk, MVP, Matt Hardy, Kennedy, and Umaga/Morrisson? I could live with that. Wouldn't be my ideal but as long as it doesn't come down to HBK vs Batista I could get behind it. There's no real winner in there that would excite me, but its a tournament I could enjoy.

If it ends up just being HHH, JBL, Cena, HBK, Batista, Jericho, Edge, and Umaga just seems like a waste of time and a cheap way to make a special RAW. I guess I just see it less likely that a guy like Booker would get a career revival than that they could make a new star (or a couple), or at least start the fans' interest on the guys. I'm interested either way, and I fully acknowledge that I'm talking about my personal tastes and they may not mesh with the general audience's.

[Riot Act]

Apr 15, 2008 11:55:36 GMT -5 punk/core said:

I think the Backlash theme may be the shittiest PPV theme they've ever used.

That was the other point I was going to mention and forgot. It sounds like a rip-off of "Sweet Home Alabama", which was previously ripped off by "Werewolves Of London". All three songs use the same chord progression and it sounds like this Backlash theme uses the same key, as well.

[jetskid48]

According to WWE.com, its some new Kid Rock song, which would explain how something that doesn't sound right showed up as a ppv theme since they like to use certain bands that that have done themes for them in the past or superstar music in the past. Songs terrible.


I actually didn't think that they were gonna be using main eventers in the tournament at all, so I was pretty shocked when that's what people assumed automatically. King Edge would seem to take away from his title match, King Jericho seems like it would take away from his ref spot at the ppv, same pretty much goes for JBL or Orton. Punk would be an annoying King unless they made him heel, but I actually see him in the tournament now that he's in ECW flux. This seems almost as obvious as the Joe championship win, I think its a makeup for last year and Kennedy's getting his push finally. He doesn't have any sort of set feud, he hasn't been on tv while filming his movie, and he a douchebag heel that could use this rub and pull it off.

It's a shame, though, that no matter who wins will automatically be compared to Booker, but I guess that's what happens when this isn't a yearly competition anymore.

[Stu]

Cryme Time out to pander to the masses ("Euros, Euros, Yeah, Yeah!")

Which is pretty dumb anyway, since we don't even use the Euro.
Pretty good show overall. Most of the matches were decent, up to good. Glad to see Mickie get the win (aside: has she gotten a boob reduction job?). Cade and Murdock though...they seem to have suddenly been given London and Kendrick's storyline, doesn't it seem? Great to see some Face Regal, and what happened to Jericho at the start of the show had me worried, but he did look good up against Umaga.

[bdbdbd]

Times in the past WWE has cared about factual accuracy:

[madiq]

If the King of the Ring tournament winner ISN'T going to be Kennedy, I'd love to see Carlito win the whole thing, and Santino seethe with jealousy.

In addition, I'd like to see it cross-branded, featuring MVP, Kennedy, Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy, CM Punk, John Morrison, Carlito, and Shelton, if it's an 8-man thing, and Miz, Santino, Cody Rhodes, Kofi, Elijah Burke, Umaga, Burchill, and Val Venis if we get the full 16. A good mix of young guys, upper midcarders one big win away, and vets who could be the next King Booker...

[wickedfrost]

King Umaga. Comic gold if we've got Regal giving Umaga lessons on how to drink tea properly.

We'll probably get King Khali.

[Batman]

Just watched Raw; Regal vs. Orton was freaking awesome. Regal has some of the most beautiful offense on earth. Freaking brilliant.

This is me talking during the match: "Look how Regal is lifting Orton's one leg up, I think he's trying to counter the side headlock into a Fisherman's sup---HOLY FUCK ORTON'S DEAD!!"