Raw3/16/15 Review

You know it's an episode of Raw when we get an Authority opening talking segment. Instead of Triple H and Stephanie though, it's Seth Rolling leading things with Big Show, Kane and J&J Security. He complains about what Randy Orton did last week, and the other guys say sorry. We nearly get Big Show in tears again! Hell, Joey Mercury even cried in Show's arms. It was very sweet. Rollins accepted Orton's challenge for WrestleMania, but only if Orton faces him tonight. Why? What's the point? Can we not give away WrestleMania matches please? Orton comes out to accept and we have our main event. Look, I know we've seen a trillion handicap and tag matches, but to just give away a PPV match, let alone a WrestleMania match is stupid even though there won't be a clean finish. Anyway, the opening contest is AJ Lee vs. Nikki Bella in a non-title match. I appreciate the girls not only getting the first match but they got a good amount of time. Not only did they work through a commercial break, but it was about eleven minutes. While I enjoyed the match, I had to note something about Nikki. She tends to work the arm in matches and does a good job with it, but her finisher is a backbreaker. She should work the back or get an arm related finisher. They also abandoned the arm work so that sucked. Nikki won after Brie took out Paige outside and she hit the forearm/Rack Attack combination. Easily their best match together and barely any CM Punk chants!

After a ton of recaps, Big Show and Kane get into an argument during a Renee Young interview. Seth interrupts, just leading to Kane and Show yelling at him for being spoiled. Then, one of our weekly Smackdown rematches happens as Ryback beats The Miz. Ryback wins because he's probably the favorite in the battle royal. Post match, Miz lays out Damien Mizdow with a Skull Crushing Finale. Fine build for the battle royal. We move to a contract signing for John Cena vs. Rusev. Cena comes out first, cuts a stomach turning patriotic promo and signs. Rusev comes out in a suit and with his lawyer, but no Lana. Big "We Want Lana" chants start. Rusev's lawyer has a terrible fake accent and rightfully brings up the fact that Rusev never accepted the match. However, he will if he can talk without Cena interrupting. Seriously? That's it? Why would he rightfully give Cena the shot? Not only that, but the lawyer was awful. However, to make matters worse, JBL spends the entire time talking over him about how bad he is. Why would the company hire him then? Whatever. Terrible segment. Needed more Lana for sure.

Last week on Raw, New Day defeated Tyson Kidd and Cesaro, so it's rematch time. Despite my love for Kidd and Cesaro this was a largely forgettable match except for the pre-match promo. Los Matadores was out at ringside to see Kidd and Cesaro win. They then got physical with the champs to build towards our eventual multi-team clusterfuck. The fact that Cesaro had to sell for El Torito makes me sad. Backstage, J&J Security get pissy at Seth and quit! You know where this is all going. A Brock Lesnar video package follows and it is the usual fantastic stuff. In front of the live crowd, Brock shouldn't talk. In these things, he's golden. He discussed sending Rock to Hollywood, suplexed Cena out of the title picture and ending the Streak. It's great stuff and he says that Roman Reigns can dream all he wants because this isn't a fairy tale. He ends with a good old fashioned "I'm gonna fuck up Roman Reigns." Goddammit I want Brock to retain.

Big Show comes out to take on Erick Rowan. Show attacks before the bell and just destroys Rowan. Rowan needs Bray Wyatt badly to succeed. Larry Zbyszko is the next Hall of Fame inductee. Ho hum. When we come back, a bunch of the Andre the Giant Battle Royal participants are in the ring. They all go at it and Mark Henry is the last one standing. So...I just got a diet version of what I get at WrestleMania. Paul Heyman is out next to cut one of his fantastic promos. He kills again, until Roman interrupts. That face in the GIF I posted is exactly my face when I have to hear Roman instead of Heyman. They play the "Roman can't beat Brock" thing even though that's not what everybody is saying. They're saying he doesn't deserve to be there. We all know he will. Reigns turns to the camera to address Brock. Why didn't he do that when Brock was there last week? At least it was a straight to the point promo and no comedy nonsense. There was a "Daniel Bryan" chant during his promo. The only real problem with this was the irritating "I can, I will" catchphrase that he now has a shirt of.

In a continuing theme of rematches, we get the Smackdown main event once again. Daniel Bryan, Dean Ambrose and Dolph Ziggler (or the three most popular guys on the roster) took on Bad News Barrett, Stardust and Luke Harper. R-Truth, the seventh man in their Intercontinental Title ladder match, was at ringside. This was the longest and best match of the night. All six guys can flat out go, so this was fun. Truth has the IC Title clipped to his back. The faces win as Ambrose pins Barrett. He couldn't pin Stardust or something? Or have the heels win here since they lost on Smackdown? Post match we get the whole stealing the title bit, with nearly everyone getting a hold of it at different times. While I'm not a big fan of the title stealing stuff, the crowd seems to enjoy it and having three super popular guys means that will be the case. Barrett finally is able to get his belt back after laying out everyone with Bull Hammers. If only he didn't lose so often, he could be in good shape.

Backstage, Seth Rollins complains to Stephanie and Triple H and they get pissed at him too. It was funny to hear Seth call out Triple H for playing "Hide and seek" with Sting. Bray Wyatt cuts a backstage promo on Undertaker. It's good but this feud needs more from Taker. Randy Orton is out for the conclusion of our show. Seth Rollins comes out and says he fooled Orton. His big master plan was that all of the Authority turning on him tonight was a trick. Not really that masterful. They all come out and help him surround Orton, who gets a chair. As things look bleak, the lights go out and STING is in the ring! They take out the Authority in a very cool moment and we even get to see the Stinger Splash and Scoropion Death Drop! Really cool moment to close the broadcast though Michael Cole's commentary hurt this.

I feel like this was a slight below average episode of Raw. The only things I felt were really bad was the Rusev/Cena segment and the Andre the Giant battle royal build. The Divas got good time, the six man tag was fun and the Sting stuff was not only really cool but the pop he got was great. Mediocre Raw highlighted by some cool stuff. MVPs were Sting and whoever put together the Brock Lesnar video package. 5/10.