Cody Rhodes Unmasked

The last year has been a big one for Cody Rhodes. He had been performing quite well as a singles wrestler and I was quite enjoying his “Dashing” gimmick, although it took a while for it to get over with the fans.

That all changed when Rhodes faced Rey Mysterio on Smackdown at the beginning of the year. Mysterio hit the 619 and broke Rhode’s nose, resulting in Rhodes missing the Royal Rumble and requiring reconstructive surgery. When he returned a few weeks later, Rhodes was a different man, being reluctant to show his face to the crowd and wearing a protective mask. Understandably, Rhodes blamed it on Mysterio and it led to a really good feud between the two, with a brilliant segment on Smackdown with the American Dream Dusty Rhodes acting as peacemaker then turning on Mysterio (one of my favourite moments of the year); then having matches at Wrestlemania and Extreme Rules.

I thought it was a big risk for Rhodes to change his gimmick so dramatically when he was just getting over with the “Dashing” persona. However, Rhodes pulled it off brilliantly, making it one of my favourite gimmicks ever. So much was put into it which I loved: the newspaper headlines saying “Grotesque!” and “Disfigured!” as part of his titantron; his coat with the hood, inspired by the computer game Assassin’s Creed; the way he would push away the camera as he made his way to the ring so that they couldn’t show his face; his theme tune being changed slightly to make it more darker; and the paper baggers. It helped that Rhodes had taken acting classes before he became a professional wrestler as he made it seem so real. You knew that there was nothing wrong with him, but he made you see his viewpoint.

Over the year, he had various mini feuds, resulting in Rhodes becoming Intercontinental Champion in August. He had a feud with the “Million Dollar Failure” Ted DiBiase and got into a feud with his former Legacy partner Randy Orton, which resulted in a thoroughly enjoyable street fight on Smackdown two weeks ago, with Orton defeating Rhodes and damaging his face mask. I thought that Rhodes would simply get a new one. However, last night on RAW, Rhodes came out to new music, new titantron, no paper baggers and acting as if his whole masked gimmick had never happened.

It really disappointed me that Rhodes had got rid of his masked gimmick so quickly. I was expecting a transition period between the two with perhaps Rhodes wearing one of his paper bags over his head in order to not show his face; or, like Beauty and the Beast, have a Diva show him that he doesn’t need the mask, as he is fine without it.

This shows to me some of the creative problems that I think is going on with the WWE. Over the last few months, they have made creative decisions but don’t seem to have put much thought into them. It’s like they have decided to go from one city to another, but instead of showing us how they get there, we are instantly teleported there instead. Another example is the anonymous RAW GM, who we had not heard from since July and then suddenly dismissed with John Laurinaitis (did you know that he’s Executive Vice President of Talent Relations?) becoming interim RAW GM.

I don’t know if the creative decisions over the last few months have resulted in TV ratings and PPV buy rates declining, but I wouldn’t be surprised. They need to put more thought with their storylines, especially on RAW, in order for things to improve.

TNA Problems Personified

 I know that I haven’t written about the WWE for a while, but the way TNA has been going recently has been very interesting, so I’ve been writing about it.

I wrote about how TNA seemed to have completely screwed Bobby Roode over by giving him a four month build up and then changing their mind (thanks to Hulk Hogan) and giving his tag team partner James Storm the title four days after Roode’s defeat to Kurt Angle at Bound for Glory. Roode defeated Samoa “Sore Loser” Joe the next week to become the No.1 contender. I thought that it would take place at the next PPV, Turning Point; however, it was decided to have the match on Impact this week. I heard what had happened so, instead of waiting til Sunday to see the match on Challenge TV, I trawled the internet to see it (thanks You Tube).

I really enjoyed the match. I had some doubt about whether Storm would be a good champion but I was glad to be proven wrong and he and Roode worked well together. The ending had Roode irish whip Storm into the corner, who stopped before he ran into the referee, Brian Hebner. Hebner had to dive out of the ring in order to stop Roode ramming Storm into him but he got injured landing on the floor. Roode in the process went out of the ring as well and spent a good 30-45 seconds debating whether to use Storm’s beer bottle or not. Storm attempts to bring Roode back into the ring, Roode smashes him with the bottle and promptly pins Storm to win the TNA World Heavyweight Championship.

While I’m happy that Roode has won the Championship, unfortunately, it does seem to personify a lot of what is wrong with TNA. First of all, I was surprised that this match took place on Impact instead of on Turning Point. TNA, like WCW as it approached its end, seem to have all their big title changes and matches more on TV then on PPV. WWE right now will have The Rock having his first wrestling match since Wrestlemania XX at Survivor Series. Would the WWE have that match on RAW or Smackdown instead of a PPV event? Of course they wouldn’t! I know it’s unfair comparing one of the popular wrestlers of all time to a TNA Championship match but the point I’m making is that, if Vince McMahon was in charge of TNA, to help generate more money for the company, he would have had that match at Turning Point, hopefully getting more buy rates for the PPV.

Another thing is that James Storm has just become the TNA version of Christian. In May, Christian finally won the World Heavyweight Championship at Extreme Rules only to lose it two days later to Randy Orton on Smackdown. Storm, while having a slightly longer reign than Christian, has lost in his very first title defence. Also, if the plan was to have Roode become the champion anyway, why didn’t he win it at Bound for Glory, especially since Kurt Angle was carrying an injury?

However, my main problem is they seemed to have crammed an angle that could lasted 2-3 months into 2 weeks. The reason for this seem thanks to, once again, Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff.  Rumours are going that Hogan wants his face turn to be the main focus at the minute so, to do that, they need a heel champion. Based on what I saw from last week’s Impact, TNA seem to want the main angle to be between a man who has never wrestled regularly (Eric Bischoff), a 62 year old wrestling legend who shouldn’t be wrestling anymore due to heart problems (Ric Flair), and a referee (Jackson James Garrett Bischoff). Rumours are going round that Hogan might be involved to back up Garrett, so TNA are adding a man who is 57 years old who retired due to numerous injuries but wants to get back in the ring.

I seriously believe that Dixie Carter want to make TNA a better wrestling company, they need to get rid of Hogan and Bischoff. They are stuck in past glories and are unwilling to step aside and let the young talent like AJ Styles, Roode and Austin Aries shine. Add Vince Russo to the mix and you have a company that a lot of people view as a joke. Bruce Pritchard has been promoted to head the writing. However, Bischoff and Hogan have too much creative control. Unfortunately, professional wrestling is at times a selfish business, especially when you have main event wrestlers in charge of the booking. When that happens and it starts to damage the company, you know you have a problem. The question is, does Dixie Carter know that, and if she does, what will she do about it?

A Slap to the Face

In an earlier article, I wrote about what TNA will do with Bobby Roode after his Bound for Glory match with Kurt Angle for the TNA World Championship. If you haven’t read it (and you should because, not being biased, it’s a great article), the two options that I gave were for either Roode to continue on his quest and eventually become World Champion; or for Roode to go back to tag team wrestling with Beer Money Inc.

On the following Impact after Bound for Glory, TNA decided to go with a third option: completely fuck Bobby Roode over. I heard about this on Friday afternoon but I had to wait until Sunday to see how it went down.  With the company now back under the control of Dixie Carter, she appointed Sting to run the day to day operations of Impact. Kurt Angle came out to boast about cheating beating Roode, prompting Roode to come out. Sting made a match between Angle and Roode for later on that match. Unfortunately, that match was shot down almost instantly, as Angle pointed out that the contract for the match at Bound for Glory said that Roode could not get a rematch if he lost. James Storm came out and promptly challenged Angle instead, which Sting agreed to.

The match itself was a joke. It consisted of Angle continually beating the crap out of Storm in the corner and arguing with the referee. Angle put his arms in celebration, turns round and walks into a Last Call by Storm and he gets the pin becoming TNA Champion. It lasted less than 90 seconds. Understandably, the match couldn’t last long due to Angle’s injury, but I hate matches in which one man would be completely dominant and then have his opponent do just one move to win the match.

This makes no sense to me and I feel really sorry for Bobby Roode. The Bound for Glory Series took place over 3 months and when Roode won that, TNA had videos of him speaking about his family, his background and the match with Angle. I thought it would be crazy for TNA to do all that and then let Roode lose. Apparently, it was all set for Roode to become the TNA World Champion, but Hulk Hogan thought otherwise and it was changed at the last minute.

If I was Bobby Roode, who has been with the company for years, I would feel that it was a slap to the face. TNA had plenty of time to decide who was going to win the Bound for Glory Series and to see if that person would win the TNA World Championship. More importantly, Hulk Hogan had plenty of time to decide if Roode was ready or not. If Hogan thought Roode wasn’t ready, he should have told TNA a long time ago, and that way they could have arranged for someone else to win the Series. For that to happen to Roode, and then have his partner win the title a couple of days later, must be heartbreaking.

There’s no doubt that this will result in a feud between Roode and Storm. This could go one of two ways with one of them turning heel. You could have Roode slowly turning heel as he gets jealous over Storm being the champion; or you could have Storm turning heel by him becoming arrogant and saying that he doesn’t need Roode or his Fortune teammates any longer, perhaps developing his character away from the cowboy persona.

It might seem as if I’m shitting all over James Storm and I’m not. I’m interested to see how he will do as champion. However, the fact remains that Roode has been completely screwed over by one man. I don’t even get why Hogan did it as he didn’t do it in order to benefit him. Hogan, due to his success, has a massively overinflated ego, which has been damaging to other people (WCW being a prime example). If TNA want to become anywhere near as successful as WWE, they need to start building new stars and take risks. Hogan needs to realise that, otherwise TNA could end up like WCW.

WWE Vengeance 2011 Review

Sunday night was Vengeance, making its return after 3 years. The card looked good but was the event itself? Let’s take a look

Opening the event was for the Tag Team Championship with Dolph Ziggler and Jack Swagger challenging Air Boom. Their match at Hell in a Cell was pretty good so I’m hoping for a repeat performance. Kingston and Bourne were completely destroying Ziggler at the beginning. Swagger and Ziggler started to get some momentum when Swagger caught Kingston coming off the top turnbuckle and then slammed him onto the mat. A bit of back and forth between the teams and Ziggler thought he won it with a roll up while holding Kingston’s tights. However, in the end Kingston hit the Trouble in Paradise on Ziggler followed by Air Bourne to get the win.

Winners: Air Boom                             Predictions: 0 for 1

The night could get a lot worse for Dolph Ziggler is immediately challenged by Zack Ryder for the US Championship. I didn’t know about this match until the day of the PPV so I was unable to make a prediction on it (same for the Sheamus/Christian match). Can someone explain to me when Smackdown General Manager Teddy Long made this match even though both wrestlers and the belt are on RAW? Anyway, I was expecting this to be a squash match and for Ryder to win as the tag team went on for a good 15 minutes. It was actually quite a good match with Ryder trying to get the win as quickly as possible. Ziggler decided to leave the match early but he was thrown back in by Air Boom, who had stayed behind to watch the match. The referee didn’t take that too well and sent Air Boom back to the locker room. Over time, Ziggler started to get the upper hand. Ryder had a brief comeback and stopped Swagger from interfering. Unfortunately, he then walked right into a superkick and Ziggler got the win. Fair play to Ziggler for wrestling two matches back to back. You rarely get to see that and I thought he performed well in both of them.

Winner: Dolph Ziggler                        Predictions: N/A

The Divas were next as Eve Torres challenged Beth Phoenix for the Divas Championship.  Due to an backstage fight between Beth, Natalya, Kelly Kelly and Eve; both Kelly Kelly and Natalya were barred from ringside by John Laurinatis (did you know that he’s the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations?) I would like to say that Beth doesn’t need help to beat Eve but she needed Natalya’s help to win the title so I’m not so sure. Eve had Beth on the ropes and used her own belt to tie her to the middle rope which I thought was a nice spot. I was loving the taunting between the two of them, which really showed how much they don’t like each other. I thought that Eve won it when she reversed an attempt at a glam slam to bounce Beth off the ropes and into a roll up. The end was when Eve misses a moonsault and Beth takes advantage to hit the glam slam to retain the Divas Championship.

Winner: Beth Phoenix             Predictions: 1 for 2

After a backstage interview with the Big Show, Christian took on Sheamus, which is another match that I didn’t predict (sorry!)Like at Hell in a Cell, it was a good match and it had lot of back and forth between the two. Christian came close to winning with a spear but Sheamus gets the win when Christian attempts another spear and receives a brogue kick instead.

Winner: Sheamus                    Predictions: N/A

Next was the tag team match with R-Truth and The Miz taking CM Punk and Triple H and, due to the fact that it involved 3 of my favourite wrestlers (sorry, Truth), I was looking forward to this.  Considering it was their first tag team match together, Punk and HHH were working well. They were completely dominating Truth and Miz in the early going and cheating like fuck as well. Eventually, Truth got the upper hand and started to work on HHH. HHH got the tag to Punk who cleaned house and hit the Macho Man elbow drop while HHH was beating up Truth at the timekeeper’s table. Suddenly, Kevin Nash turns up and hits HHH. The commentary here showed once again why they suck as Michael Cole didn’t seem to know that it was Kevin Nash, even though they’re right near him. Booker T knew who it was and it led Lawler to go, almost annoyingly at Cole: “It’s Kevin Nash”. With HHH out of the way, Truth stopped Punk doing the GTS on Miz and hit the “Lil Jimmy’s Finale”, which is basically both their finishing moves done at the same time, to get the win.  Afterwards, Kevin Nash decides to destroy HHH, ending with a jack knife powerbomb.

Winners: R-Truth and The Miz            Predictions: 2 for 3

Randy Orton faced the wrestler formerly known as “Dashing” Cody Rhodes next in a non-title match. Rhodes had the early momentum but attempted a moonsault and missed giving momentum to Orton. Thanks to some attempted interference by one of his paper bag carriers, Rhodes almost won it with a Cross Rhodes. Another paper bag carrier attempted to help Rhodes but Rhodes ran into him and then got hit with a RKO, giving Orton the victory.

Winner: Randy Orton                          Predictions: 3 for 4

The penultimate match was a battle of the super heavyweights as Mark Henry and the Big Show clashed for the World Heavyweight Championship.  Show was all over Henry at the beginning prompting Henry to get out of the ring. Henry decides that he had enough and attempts to leave with the title but Show had other ideas and attacks him outside the ring. The momentum shifts to Henry for a while, with Henry focusing on Show’s leg. Show came back and hit a choke slam for a count of 2 followed by Henry hitting the World’s Strongest Slam for a count of 2. They both decide to attempt aerial moves, which is not advisable when you’re over 400lbs.  The end had Show going onto the top turnbuckle then being hit by Henry, who then hit a superplex, collapsing the ring. Sound familiar? Yes, it’s the same ending that Show had with Brock Lesnar on Smackdown several years ago. The referee decides to stop the match and both wrestlers get medical attention. I find it funny that the ring can cope with a 41-man battle royal on Smackdown a couple of weeks ago, yet can’t cope with an 850lb superplex. It looks to me as if we’ll have a rematch at Survivor Series, hopefully with a reinforced ring (they could use adamantium). I have never predicted a match that ended in a no contest before so I’m not sure whether to count this as a loss or void it. I need a second opinion. I’ll get back to you on that. Going back to the PPV, the question is what’s going to happen with the Cena/Del Rio match?

Winner: No Contest                 Predictions: 3 for 5 (under dispute)

The main event, luckily, doesn’t necessarily need a ring as it’s a last man standing match between John Cena(yawn) and Alberto Del Rio for the WWE Championship. John Laurinatis (did you know he’s the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations?) said the match will still take place, so it was interesting to see how it would play out in a badly damaged ring. The beginning had Del Rio throwing Ricardo Rodriguez into Cena, who attempted to AA him and Del Rio hit Cena in the stomach to gain some momentum. After a while, Cena was about to hit Del Rio with the AA but Rodriguez stopped him, allowing Del Rio to hit a sleeper, giving him a count of 7. Cena then threw Del Rio from the ring into the barricade, giving Cena a count of 7. The match continued backstage and Del Rio had a good chance to win it when he threw the interview set on top of Cena, which resulted in a count of 8. The action then moved to the titantron where Del Rio threw Cena into the giant ‘V’ that was part of the set, which the referee didn’t count for some reason. Del Rio put Cena onto a table and started to climb the set in order to splash Cena. However, Cena got up and pulled Del Rio off the set, sending him through the table, which gave Cena a count of 8. The action returned to ringside, where Del Rio threw Cena into the English announcers, resulting temporarily in no commentary (not always a bad thing!) Del Rio tried to kick Cena in the head but missed and hit the ring post instead. Cena then did the AA, sending Del Rio through the Spanish announcers’ table. The match looked like it was over but, before the referee had a chance to start the 10 count, The Miz and R-Truth came out and beat the crap out of Cena. The referee then started to count both men; Del Rio, who was out for a good 30 seconds, managed to get his feet by the time the referee counted to 4 and Cena got up just before the ref counted to 10. Del Rio immediately hit Cena with the WWE Title belt and gets the win in the end. It was a better match than I thought it was going to be. Yes, you can argue that, once again, Cena didn’t lose cleanly but there are no rules so, do I care? Not really, no.

Winner: Alberto Del Rio                                 Predictions: 4 for 6 (possibly)

Overall, I thought it was a decent PPV. After the last two PPVs and possibly one of the worst RAWs ever, they needed Vengeance to deliver and I think it did. It was weird that no titles changed hands and it would have been nice if Zack Ryder won the US Championship but I enjoyed this PPV and I’m now looking forward to Survivor Series and seeing the Rock in action.

WWE Vengeance 2011 Preview

Vengeance returns after a 3 year hiatus this Sunday. While I’ve been critical of the booking, the wrestling has been quite solid over the last 2 PPVs. While Vengeance be better or, god forbid, worse this time? Let’s look at the card

Air Boom will be defending their Tag Team Championship against Jack Swagger and Dolph Ziggler. Air Boom have been good champions but it might be time for a change and have the potential feud between Ziggler and Swagger brewing for a bit longer. I’m going for them to become the new Tag Team Champions

Prediction: Jack Swagger and Dolph Ziggler

Cody Rhodes will face his former Legacy partner Randy Orton in a non-title match (assumingly). I have been enjoying Rhodes as Intercontinental Champion and Randy Orton at the minute needs someone to take him away from the title picture. Orton has lost the last two PPV matches so I think he will win this one.

Prediction: Randy Orton

Beth Phoenix will defend the Divas Championship against Eve Torres. It took 3 fucking PPVs for Beth to finally win the title from Kelly Kelly. Beth has to win this match otherwise you might as well disband the Legion Divas of Doom, because they would have been a complete fucking failure.

Prediction: Beth Phoenix

The Miz and R-Truth will face CM Punk and Triple H in a tag team match. Can anyone remember the last time we have had two tag team matches in a PPV? No, me neither. Anyway, putting aside the bizarre logic of Punk and HHH teaming up, it should be a good match. Miz and Truth have the ear of John Laurinatis (did you know that he’s the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations?) right now so my shenanigans sense is tingling at this match. Therefore, I think that the Awesome Truth will win.

Prediction: The Miz and R-Truth

Mark Henry will be defending the World Heavyweight Championship against the Big Show. This is quite a tough one and I can see Big Show winning this as revenge for being inducted into the Hall of Pain. However, I have been enjoying Mark Henry as champion. I think that Show will be back into the Hall of Pain.

Prediction: Mark Henry

Alberto Del Rio is challenged (once again) by John Cena for the WWE Title in a last man standing match.  Even this would qualify as a “Super Cena” type match, Del Rio has to win this match otherwise he would have two really shitty title reigns. Cena doesn’t need the title and he will be involved in a tag match with the Rock at Survivor Series anyway. I’m going for Del Rio to win this although I would be very intrigued to see what he will do to keep Cena down for 10 seconds. Perhaps he could run Cena over with his expensive super car?

Prediction: Alberto Del Rio

So that’s the card. There might be one or two matches added at the last minute but the WWE have been keeping to either 6 or 7 matches at PPVs, so that’s quite unlikely. Hope you enjoy the show and you’ll get my review during the week.

What Will TNA Do With Bobby Roode?

On Wednesday night, I got to see the TNA’s flagship event Bound for Glory. TNA is shown on Challenge TV in the UK, and they show Impact on a Sunday night (repeated on Tuesday), Xplosion (which is crap) on a Wednesday and the PPVs on a Wednesday (Xplosion gets moved to Tuesday when that happens).

I thought the event was pretty solid with some good wrestling, although I really can’t explain Hulk Hogan suddenly turning face and being best friends with Sting. The main event had Kurt Angle defending his TNA World Championship against Bobby Roode. Roode had won the Bound for Glory Series against 11 other wrestlers to become the No. 1 contender. After Roode won the series at No Surrender, there were a few videos really building him up. Angle, taking advantage of his new position in Immortal, had Roode facing his fellow members of Fortune, AJ Styles, Kazarian and James Storm; followed by a handicap against Gunner and Jeff Jarrett in the weeks before Bound for Glory.

I wasn’t sure who was going to win this match. With Angle being part of Immortal, my shenanigans sense was going wildly (which happens constantly with any match involving Immortal), so I can see Angle retaining. However, the way that they built Bobby Roode, especially over the last month, made me think that TNA wouldn’t waste all that time doing this build up for him to just lose.

Some of the highlights were Roode reversing Angle’s attempt at a moonsault into a throwaway back suplex, sending Angle halfway across the ring; Angle managing to reverse a crossface into an ankle lock; and Roode getting out of another ankle lock and then hitting a Spinebuster. The end had its typical TNA screwjob with Angle hitting an Angle Slam and getting the pin despite referee Brian Hebner missing not only Roode’s arm under the bottom rope, but Angle holding onto the middle rope for leverage. The match wasn’t the best of the night although I was impressed with Angle’s performance, especially since he was carrying a leg injury. My main criticism of the match is that Roode went for the crossface submission manoeuvre way too often for me (it was least 5 or 6 times).

There’re reports on the internet stating that the plan was to Roode to become TNA World Champion. However, Hulk Hogan thought that Roode wasn’t ready to become a main eventer and carry the company. This seemed to be supported by the fact that Hogan criticised Roode in a radio interview before Bound for Glory, prompting AJ Styles to defend Roode. Therefore, the TNA writers decided to have Angle retain. This doesn’t make sense to me as Angle was carrying an injury going into this match so Roode could have won it even if it’s just for a few days.

The question is now what to do with Bobby Roode. They could continue with the build and have him win the World Championship.  If TNA do that, they have two (maybe 3 feuds) built in. Obviously, he would have a feud with Kurt Angle; but he could have a slow building feud with his Beer Money Inc. partner James Storm with Storm slowly getting jealous of Roode and turning heel. Maybe even one with AJ Styles in the future as Styles is the only one in Fortune who has been a World Champion and Styles could grow increasingly unhappy with the way Roode has been acting as champion. Roode could turn heel with this. However, except for Sting, the last few champions have been associated with Immortal and it would be nice to have more faces as potential Champions.

The other is for Roode to go back to tag team wrestling with Beer Money. At the minute, there seems to be only 3 other tag teams (Ink Inc, British Invasion and current champions Mexican America) and TNA don’t really seem that interested in that division. With the way that both members have been performing in single matches, it would be crazy to effectively put them back there. It would be slightly similar to what happened to R-Truth in the WWE. Over the Spring, R-Truth was becoming one of the hottest heels in the company and had a WWE title shot against John Cena at Capitol Punishment. Even though he lost, I thought that he would get another chance at Money in the Bank. However, WWE went with CM Punk and his “leaving the company with the title” angle, which was vastly superior to anything that they would have done with Truth and he ended up teaming up with The Miz.

Personally, I’m not quite sure yet if Bobby Roode is ready to be a TNA World Champion. However, they can’t depend on people like Sting and Angle carrying the company for ever and it may be time to build a new star. I think that TNA has some good wrestlers (especially Austin Aries and Bully Ray) and a decent women’s division. I just think that with Vince Russo, it has been a creative mess. Hopefully, with Bruce Pritchard becoming head writer and Dave Laguna joining the company, it will start to get better. For that to happen they need to create some new main eventers and Bobby Roode may be that man.

Worst RAW Ever?

Last week’s RAW ended in 55 wrestlers, referees, cameramen and announcers walking out in a vote of no confidence in the COO Triple H. It made for good television, although it seems that they didn’t get the fact that Triple H is in charge of the company and not RAW. Despite that, I was interested to see how this week’s RAW would pan out.

It started interestingly enough with Triple H coming out and condemning the walkout and the wrestlers currently in the parking lot. He was supported by John Cena, who was remaining loyal to the company; Sheamus, who respects Triple H after their feud last year; and CM Punk. Wait, what? The same CM Punk who tried to get Triple H fired last month? Punk coming out to support Triple H didn’t make a lot of sense to me as he is supposed to be the anti-authority figure like Stone Cold but he doesn’t seem to be like that anymore. More on Punk later.

There was a fun little bit with the 4 of them creating the show with Cena and Sheamus wrestling, Triple H the referee and Punk doing commentary and timekeeping. Then Vince McMahon returns and announces that Triple H is no longer in charge of RAW and John Laurinatis (did you know that he’s the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations?) is now the interim General Manager. Ok, isn’t Triple H is charge of the company and not just RAW? Also, what the fuck happened to the anonymous General Manager? Who was he and why have we not heard from him in almost 4 months?

Later on, Laurinatis comes out and announces that John Cena will challenge Del Rio for the WWE Championship at Vengeance. Wow, who didn’t see that coming? Laurinatis then fires Jim Ross, in his home state, for walking out on Triple H after being given his job back. Why did they do that? What about the other guys? I take it that they’re not getting punished? Now, we have to deal with Jerry Lawler and the annoying Michael Cole? Nothing against Lawler, but after Hell in a Cell, I’m not looking forward to him trying to save the commentary while he’s with Cole and Booker T at Vengeance.

The main event had CM Punk facing Alberto Del Rio. No, sorry, my mistake. That was changed during the match into a tag team match with Punk and Del Rio facing a returning Miz and R-Truth. Er, why? It would be better if Punk and Del Rio had their match and then had Miz and Truth interfere in the match. That would have made for a better return for the Awesome Truth. The match was decent enough but it ended with Triple H and Punk joining forces to attack Miz and R-Truth. Hang on; aren’t they supposed to be enemies? I take it they’re doing the “enemy of my enemy is my friend” thing? I don’t know anymore.

So, is it the worst RAW ever? It’s hard to say seeing that I have not seen every single RAW episode. However, it is most probably the worst one that I have ever seen. After possibly two of the best months ever on WWE Television with Punk, Cena and Triple H, we now get this creative clusterfuck. I have to admit that I knew that the summer wouldn’t last forever and it did seem to get steadily worse; but RAW this week seemed to have dropped off a cliff into a sea of crap. I feel that they have dropped the ball with CM Punk and having Cena in the title picture again is just boring.

I know that the WWE will have to perform something amazing to please everybody and they will be always those who will never be happy. However, this week’s RAW managed to piss a lot of people off, including myself. I honestly don’t know if I want to watch this week’s Smackdown and next week’s RAW. I probably will because a part of me wants to see them sort out the mess that they have created for themselves, but don’t be surprised if a lot of people won’t be.

Hell in a Cell Review

Night of Champions, whilst a decent event, managed to piss off a substantial portion of the internet wrestling community with some of the results, especially John Cena’s title victory. Will Hell in a Cell be in that vein? Let’s take a look.
At the beginning of the PPV, you see The Miz and R-Truth, having bought tickets, taking their seats. John Laurinatis thought otherwise and, with a security team, had them escorted from the premises. You will get to see the Awesome Truth return later on.

The opening match was Sheamus vs Christian which was a surprise as I didn’t think that it would open the PPV. It was a good match with both Sheamus and Christian blocking each other moves. Christian hit the spear twice but it wasn’t enough. Sheamus gets the win after hitting a brogue kick.

Predictions: 0 for 1

Sin Cara vs Falso Cara was next and the match, unfortunately, had the annoying yellow light on during it. The crowd didn’t seem to get into it with some of them chanting “boring”. Sin Cara managed to get out of an attempted powerbomb and rolled up Falso Cara giving Sin Cara the victory.

Predictions: 1 for 2

The Tag Team Championship was on the line Air Boom defended their titles against Dolph Ziggler and Jack Swagger. Lots of back and forth action between the two teams and it was a good match. Eventually, Air Boom get the win thanks to Evan Bourne reversing a powerbomb from the top turnbuckle by Swagger into a huracanrana for the pin.

Predictions: N/A

Next up was the first Hell in a Cell match as Randy Orton challenged Mark Henry for the World Heavyweight Championship.  A little bit and forth throughout the match with Mark Henry retaining the title after kicking out of a RKO and then stopping a punt and hitting a World’s Strongest Slam. Afterwards, Henry hit another World’s Strongest Slam and attempted to induct Orton into the “Hall of Pain”. However, Orton moved out of the way and attacked Henry with a chair. However, Henry managed to get away.
Predictions: 2 for 3

Cody Rhodes comes out and announces that he’s replacing the Intercontinental Championship belt. However, instead of debuting a new design, we get the return of the belt that was used throughout the 80’s and 90’s. I love that design of the belt as it was the belt that they had when I first started watching wrestling. So many Hall of Famers have had that belt at some point such as Mr Perfect, Bret Hart, Roddy Piper, Stone Cold Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels. I liked the oval shaped one but the original one looks so much better so well done to WWE for that decision.

Then John Laurinatis comes out and announces that Rhodes has to defend the title against John “parkour” Morrison. Er...ok. Why? It doesn’t make sense as Morrison is a RAW superstar and I don’t see why he deserved a title shot. Anyway, the match between the two was really good. Cody Rhodes gets the victory after countering a Flash Kick by Morrison into a roll up.

Predictions: N/A

After the match, the Awesome Truth had managed to sneak in and beat up Air Boom. Triple H gets the security to throw them out again and is not happy with Laurinatis for not calling the police on Miz and Truth. Triple H, it’s obvious that Laurinatis is fucking you around, get him sorted.

Beth Phoenix is going for third time lucky as she challenged Kelly Kelly for the Divas Championship. This was a decent match although it had a weird ending. Beth had Kelly in a submission move and then lets go. Natalya hits Kelly with a microphone and Beth hits a glam slam, making her the new Divas Champion. I’m not happy that the strongest woman in the division couldn’t beat Kelly cleanly and had to resort to cheating. You know what, fuck it. Well done Beth Phoenix on winning the match.

Predictions: 3 for 4

The main event was for the WWE Championship in the first ever triple threat Hell in a Cell match between champion John Cena, CM Punk and Alberto Del Rio. This was a decent match and a highlight of it was Punk standing on the steps about to attack Cena when Del Rio pushed him off into the cage. The ending had Ricardo Rodriguez managing to get the key to the cell door from the referee outside, go in and attack Cena with a steel pipe. Cena hits the AA on Rodriguez sending him out of the cell. Del Rio takes advantage and hits Cena out of the cell then locks the door, keeping Cena out. It’s now between Del Rio and Punk. Del Rio hits Punk with the steel pipe and pins him for the victory. It was a really good match. However, I was a bit pissed off with the ending as once again, due to the fact that he wasn’t pinned to lose the title, Cena didn’t lose cleanly. Anyway, congratulations to Alberto Del Rio on regaining the WWE title.

Predictions: 3 for 5

But the event is not over yet. The cell is lifted to allow Cena back in and then the Miz and R-Truth return yet again, the cell goes back down and they destroy everyone. I recommend that Triple H demands a refund for the event security because they haven’t been doing a good job. The whole roster comes out and tries to get into the cell, and eventually the cops get in and arrest The Miz and Truth, yet they don’t arrest Triple H after he attacks them whilst handcuffed. I thought that it would have been funny if they all had to spend the night in a cell.

Overall, it was an ok event. Some of the matches were good and entertaining and some were ok. I liked the ending with The Miz and R-Truth destroying everyone in the cell. However, I don’t get Del Rio winning back the WWE title from Cena. He should have held the belt at Night of Champions and it means that, since Punk announced that he was planning on leaving the company with the WWE title, we have had 7 title changes since then. It feels that Cena’s 12^th title reign was pointless with it being only 2 weeks. The worst bit is that we will probably have Cena, again, challenging for the title at Vengeance. I really hope not but I can see it happening.

Hell in a Cell Preview

Instead of having about 3-4 weeks between Pay-Per-Views, we are only having 2 weeks between Night of Champions and Hell in a Cell. It might not have seemed it from my review but I thought Night of Champions was a decent event, I just wasn’t happy with some of the results, especially Cena winning the WWE title. Hopefully, Hell in a Cell will have more agreeable results.

Sin Cara versus Falso Cara will undoubtedly be a brilliant high flying encounter. I would like to thank Falso Cara for debuting a new costume because I’ll be damned if I can tell them apart. I don’t know about this one as I can see both winning but I’m going for Sin Cara to win this and the feud can continue from there.

Christian will take some time off from demanding “one more match” for the World Heavyweight Championship to take on Sheamus. This is quite a tough one to call as I can see both winning. I’m going to take a punt and go with Christian to win this one.

Beth Phoenix is going for third time lucky challenging Kelly Kelly for the Divas Championship. I believe that Kelly’s time as champion will end on Sunday and Beth has to win it, otherwise the Legion Divas of Doom would have been a giant waste of time. I’m going for Beth Phoenix to become Divas Champion for the first time.

Mark Henry defends his World Heavyweight Championship against Randy Orton in a hell in a cell. Mark Henry has been continually destroying people since he became champion, meaning that I believe that he will have a decent run. I can’t see the WWE giving the title back to Orton, although I wouldn’t be surprised if he regains it. Henry needs to take the momentum of being a monster heel into being a monster champion; therefore, I’m going for Mark Henry to win here.

The WWE Championship is on the line in a triple threat match with John Cena defending the title against Alberto Del Rio and CM Punk. It was weird Triple H just throwing Punk into this match but I assume it’s an attempt to prolong the feud between the two by giving Punk a title match. The way that Cena’s matches have been on PPV this year, I can’t see him losing. Therefore, John Cena will retain.

Once again, not many matches have been announced for this one. Expect a couple of bonus matches but hopefully Hell in a Cell will be a good show and I get to do well in my predictions.

Why I’m Slowly Becoming a Cena Hater

At Night of Champions last Sunday, one of the things that had the Internet Wrestling Community going insane on Twitter was the WWE Championship between Alberto Del Rio and John Cena. Del Rio, who had been destined to win a World title since January, finally won it after cashing in his MITB contract at Summerslam on CM Punk. With the WWE holding RAW in Mexico in a couple of weeks, a lot of people were expecting Del Rio to retain the title. Unfortunately, Del Rio lost after submitting to the STF and Cena became the WWE Champion. I don’t see why they had to give Cena a 12th(!!) world title reign, 3 this year alone. I have nothing against Cena as I think he’s a good and entertaining wrestler. However, over the last 12 months, his actions have slowly started to turn me into a Cena hater. Let’s look at the evidence:

The Nexus

The Nexus, at the beginning, was an excellent storyline. They did seem to lose a lot of momentum after losing at Summerslam last year and they focused their attentions on Cena, the face of the company. Cena, through stipulations in matches, was forced to join the Nexus and then got fired by them at Survivor Series. I thought it was a good storyline and I honestly believed that it started to turn some of those people who were not diehard Cena haters back into Cena lovers. Unfortunately, that was all ruined soon after Cena gave his farewell speech. He attacked Wade Barrett during his WWE Championship match with Randy Orton. The next week, he was attacking other members of the Nexus virtually provoked, making Cena seem like a dick, especially since he was going back on his word. This resulted in more of a split than ever.

The Royal Rumble

The Royal Rumble had a good start to it with CM Punk and the Nexus entering early and ganging up on the other wrestlers. Occasionally, a wrestler might briefly fight back but the end result would be them getting eliminated and Punk and the Nexus being the dominant force in the Rumble. That all changed when Cena came in. He came in and eliminated all of the Nexus, except for Punk, within 30 seconds and, while I enjoyed bits of the Rumble match, it is unfortunately overshadowed by that moment.

Super Cena

Can you name me one time that Cena has lost a match by quitting or tapping out? You can’t? That’s because he hasn’t or, if he has, it must have been very early in his WWE career. It seems to be one of the cardinal rules in the WWE: John Cena does not quit. Ever. Not occasionally or once in a blue moon; ever. Knowing that rule does make some of his matches a bit predictable because, if he is facing someone like Del Rio or Daniel Bryan, who have submission moves as finishers, there’s a good chance that they might not win. Although, Cena hasn’t mastered the art of winning table matches so, if you’re challenging Cena, don’t go for a match involving you having Cena do any form of giving up, do a table match.

Never Loses Cleanly

In every PPV this calendar year, Cena has been in involved in the WWE Championship picture. He was involved in the Royal Rumble and then was in the Elimination Chamber to determine the No 1 contender at Wrestlemania, which he won. After that, he was been either challenging or defending the WWE title. The PPV matches that Cena has lost have not been clean wins for his opponent. His losses were:

·         The Royal Rumble – Gets eliminated by the Miz who was not taking part in the Rumble.

·         Wrestlemania – Loses to the Miz after getting Rock Bottomed by the Rock.

·         Money in the Bank – Loses the WWE title to CM Punk after stopping Vince McMahon and John Laurinatis from attempting to screw Punk over.

·         Summerslam – Loses again to CM Punk after the referee Triple H misses Cena’s foot on the rope.

Playing by the Hulk Hogan Rules

Hulk Hogan was the face of the WWE throughout the 80s and early 90s. The fans loved him, although they were times where he would behave in a way that a heel would and yet the fans would cheer him for it. Two examples that spring to mind are Wrestlemania IV where he hit The Million Dollar Man with a steel chair to help Macho Man Randy Savage win the WWE title; and the Royal Rumble 1992 where Hogan, after getting eliminated by Sid Justice, help him get eliminated by Ric Flair. Cena this year has been behaving a bit like Hogan this year. Firstly, he was using gay slurs on the Miz and Alex “Virgil” Riley during their feud, to the point of the WWE getting complaints from gay rights charities. Secondly, so far with his feud with Alberto Del Rio, he was practically bullying Del Rio’s personal ring announcer, Ricardo Rodriguez, and then at Night of Champions, robs Del Rio’s car. While the fans loved it, I always believed that Cena is a person who plays by the rules, and he sometimes acts the way that would make a heel proud.

While I’ve listed all the evidence that is making me into a Cena hater, I will give credit where it’s due. He’s had some good matches this year and was the perfect foil to CM Punk in July and August. In that feud, he is the face of the company and therefore, the perfect person to try and stop Punk from leaving with the WWE Championship.

Whilst I’m slowly becoming a Cena hater, I can never see myself being a diehard one. As I have mentioned in an earlier article, Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Ken Shamrock are the only two wrestlers that I hate. The WWE need to realise that Cena doesn’t need to always win and be involved in the WWE title picture and, barring a heel turn of Hogan proportions, will always be cheered by the fans. If you make Cena a bit more human by losing cleanly or, god forbid, him submitting, I think those Cena haters might respect him more and maybe turn some of them away from the Cena hater camp.