Well, that was a scorcher of a main-event wasn’t it? As much as we criticize Randy Orton most of the time, dude can really bring it when he wants to. It seems like Daniel Bryan is the guy that really brings it out of him. As a matter of fact, most, if not all, of his best matches in 2013 were with Bryan. And tonight was no different. More on that later though.
As a whole, the rest of Raw was pretty much a stinker for the most part though…
Whats That Randy? I Can’t Hear You Over All The AWKWARD!
I think we all expected this to happen. A rabid CM Punk chant broke out, causing Randy Orton to shout louder than usual through his promo. It didn’t last all night, but it won’t be as easy as WWE thinks to just erase CM Punk from everyone’s minds – although they did remove him from the opening title thingy!
Triple H and Stephanie came out and did their usual Triple H and Stephanie thing, but they also announced that Orton would be facing each of his Elimination Chamber opponents in singles match, starting with Daniel Bryan on Raw! Great news, but even greater was Triple H’s pathetic attempt to do the “YES!” arms in a suit!
“Maybe this will get me as over as Bryan”, H thought. But alas, he remained insignificant to all but himself.
Insignificant 6-Man Match Number 1
The Shield took on Big E Langston (how far the mighty seem to be falling), Kofi Kingston and Rey Mysterio in a throwaway 6-man match. But while it was throwaway, it was still very good! It couldn’t be bad when a moment like this happened:
Couldn’t find a gif, i cried!
Christian vs Jack Swagger in “Who Do We Care Less About?”
I admire Christian for putting up with the all the crap that he gets. He’s constantly kept down in spite of being a top-tier talent, creative never has anything for him and last week, I read that he’s only in the Elimination Chamber as a placeholder, to be removed at a moment’s notice in favour “of someone better”.
Despite all that, I just can’t seem to care about him. His move set is more predictable than Cena’s, he has the worst finisher in the history of finishers and his moves never look convincing to me. He’s a poor man’s Edge, and you should never settle for second best. Jack Swagger is just a hoss with an entertaining manager, and it looks like that’s coming to an end. The match was worth watching for the obvious teased dissension between the Real Americans. This GIF says it all:
Rage In A Cage
I’ll be honest. I’ve never been a fan of the New Age Outlaws, and I never will be. Their shtick is tired and irrelevant, and the nostalgia factor wears thin after one night. And I just can’t get past the fact that HHH’s elderly friends are the tag champs.
I do have to mention the awesomeness that is Cody Rhodes. The moonsault from the top of the cage was something awesome that we haven’t seen in a while. I love Cody and want him to make that organic leap into the main-event scene this year, but I say that every year and it never happens, so who knows what’s gonna happen or where he’ll end up?
Also, check out this awesome mini-promo Cody posted on Tout (*shudder*) the other day: http://www.tout.com/m/y4daek
No More PTP? What Happens to the Millions Of Dollars?
I don’t watch SmackDown, so this was the first I’d heard of Titus turning on Darren Youn to break up the Prime-Time Players. I don’t know what to think about Titus. He’s big, he’s funny sometimes, but he’s still rough as hell and he’s a bit too much of a football guy. That’s OK when he’s in a tag-team, but if he wants to be a singles guy and win championships, he needs to work on his ability and endurance before he’ll make it anywhere.
The real story of this match, other than Zack Ryder getting TV time, was The Miz coming down to hijack commentary and complain that he wasn’t in a match on Raw. Was that done on purpose? Was this Miz’s way of pulling a CM Punk now that Punk’s gone? Either way, it’s interesting and I hope it doesn’t end up being the beginning of nothing. Or a Miz/Titus feud.
Sheamus beat Curtis Axel in a non-shock
Not much to see here. Sheamus is in a holding pattern until Elimination Chamber, so this was just a way to get him on TV.
Bootista vs Albooto Del Rio??
Hey, hey, hold on, where am I?
Batista’s return has been lukewarm at best. And what better way to turn lukewarm into ice-cold than a feud with the Mexibore 5000 – Alberto Del Rio. Nothing will make me interested in this feud, but at least ADR is capable of pulling a decent match out of crappy opponents.
Insignificant 6-Man Match Number 2
Dat dropkick!
The rag tag group of Dolph Ziggler, Xavier Woods, and R-Truth took on the Wyatt Family. Again, this was good but it didn’t mean anything. It was really just a time filler until they got to the post-match Shield promo on the Titantron, which was exactly what the Wyatts did after The Shield’s match earlier on.
A New Face?
And here we are. The main event. The real meat of Raw this week. Going in to it, I was 100% sure that there would be a screwy finish with no decisive winner, or that Daniel Bryan would get screwed over.
As the match went on, apart from thinking how awesome it was, I had a creeping thought that maybe things could change. The match was split right down the middle, with both men gaining the upper hand at numerous points. It was hard to gauge. Either man could’ve won.
When Kane came down, I thought “welp, that was nice while it lasted. Here comes the DQ victory” etc etc. But Bryan fought him off, took both men out on the outside and the match continued. Then Orton got up and looked primed for the RKO and again, I thought it was over. But Bryan reversed it, ducked, ran post to post and hit the running knee to get the 1…2…3!
I was shocked. My wife was sitting next to me and she got a fright because I jumped up. I was genuinely, truly surprised. I shouldn’t have been though. It’s not the first time that Bryan’s pinned Orton clean in a match, so I started asking why I was so shocked. Do I truly believe that Bryan will make it to the main-event? I thought about it, quite a bit in fact, and thankfully, I came to the conclusion that YES, I do think Bryan will make it to the main-event.
The E have conditioned me to believe that only big men will make it. It took me a while to believe that CM Punk would make it to the level he had, but he did. Sure, the trajectory of Bryan’s career has been rockier than a dangerous mountain trail (or Vince McMahon’s testicles), but there have been bright spots here and there.
The old adage “the end justifies the means” comes to mind. When all this is said and done, Daniel Bryan will not be floating in the mid-card. He will not be jobbing on Superstars. He will be involved in top feuds, occasionally for the title. He will get his title run and he will be a main-event superstar for many years to come.
The time of WWE ignoring its fanbase is over. Even if it did take CM Punk leaving to finally break the retarded deaf camel’s back!
The post match stuff with Kane “destroying” Daniel Bryan doesn’t really make much sense, unless they’re going to have Bryan assume Punk’s role where he faces off against Kane before heading on to face Triple H at Mania? It’s hard to say at this point, but we can’t forget that Daniel Bryan beat Randy Orton clean on Raw, against all the odds.
And that’s why we all continue to chant YES! YES! YES!
No Raw Revisited next week because of real life responsibilities, so see y’all in 2 weeks.
***To hear more about what happened on Raw, tune in to MFX – The Raw Edition, which will be up on the site later this week***
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