Falls Count Anywhere

06-07-05

Call me High Octane.

RAW
Well, they certainly opened up big on this one. Bischoff was talking about his big coup. The problem is, if it’s just a lottery, shouldn’t he be talking about his great paper grabbing power? This led into The Highlight Reel, where Chris Jericho was joined by John Cena and his GIGANTIC pop. The crowd went ape for the guy and he and Jericho had a little chat where Jericho pointed out that he’s slowly turning heel using his ‘I’m more than wrestling’ gimmick. Cena said he was there for the fans. This led to Christian and Tomko coming in. Cena dropped an Old Skool rap on his ass. This one was funny, featuring more references to oral gratification than The Starr Report.

Christian later attacked, which led Cena to use his World’s Worst Punches on Christian and the FU on Tomko. At one point, he missed a punch by at least a foot and a half and Tomko sold it. Wow, that part was bad, but the pop and energy was great.

The first match was a Two on One for the IC title. Muhammad Hassan and Daivari took on Shelton Benjamin in a match that I thought was fun, but bad. With guys like Muhammad, Benjamin’s athleticism isn’t able to come through. Hassan hit the Downward Spiral for a pin, but Shelton got his foot on the rope and the match was restarted with the guys working over Shelton’s arm. This was dull, but it ended with Shelton throwing Hassan out of the ring and pinning Daivari with the T-Bone.

Tajiri and William Regal chatted about Tajiri being all ECW. Benoit said that he was proud of his time in ECW and Tajiri started chanting ECW, which got a few folks to chant along with him.

Daivari and Hassan went to Bisch to file a grievance about the IC title match. Eric said that he’s appointing a one man committee to look into the events surrounding the match and give Hassan the report in the ring. Hassan thought it was gonna be McMahon, but no, it’s gonna be Stone Cold. That’ll be fun.

Playing off the first Lockerroom Masterlock Challenge, Val Venis beat the hell out of Chris Masterson for a while before Masterson got the Masterlock and won the match. Val looked good here, but he was working with dead weight.

Boring contract signing for Hell in the Cell. They did say that no matter what happens with the draft, they’ll still have the match. It almost 100% guarantees that Batista is picked soonish and ends up on SD!. Either that, or HHH is picked and wins the title. Having both belts on one show completely devalues the other, so they either have to make the move now or watch irreparable damage be done to SmackDown!, which may be what they want to do as a way to punish UPN for the move. I hope not, because two major champs on one show is a bad idea.

Victoria and The HeartThrobs beat Christy and Rosie and Hurricane by DQ. Basically, it was a lame match that did no one any good. Christy ended up choking Victoria for a while and getting the DQ. Why not build Victoria up by having her punt that pretty little redhead into the stands? Because they aren’t paying Victoria anywhere near the same money there are paying Christy.

Bischoff tried to get John Cena to join the anti-ECW army. Cena said no. Bisch made Jericho and Cena against Christian and Tomko for next week. That’ll be an interesting match.

Edge and Lita taunted Kane, who was supposed to have a match. They basically said when they roll into Vegas, it’s a quickie marriage (like the two that Edge had before getting divorced) and sex all night long. They were way over as heels, and Matt Hardy must be plenty angry over the fact that they’ve made it off of the real pain he suffered.

ECW stands for sophistication...

Chris Benoit beat Gene Snitsky in an ECW Rules match. There are a lot of people who are complaining that ECW’s name is being used as a code for garbage wrestling and brawling and not for what it was when they were doing those great matches like Benoit vs. Snow or Guerrero-Malenko.

The truth is, it’s the garbage stuff that sold ECW and not the mat classics. The vampire crowd is the one that has faded away, and by associating the ECW name with that brawling, which has certainly been tamed down over the last year or so (Cena-JBL not withstanding), it may lure some of them back. Eventually The Dudleys, complete with ECW gimmick, came back and gave Snitsky a 3D through a table. That got a huge pop, probably as big as Cena’s. This led to a commercial where Benoit got the pin after a flying headbutt.

This led to a great stand-off segment. Heyman and The Dudleys were in the ring and Heyman cut a good promo. Bischoff brought out his guys and even more from the back. This led to Heyman saying that ECW never backed down from a fight and this brought Sandman, Axl Rotter, Rhynno (which was a surprise), Tommy Dreamer, and Balls Mahoney, who may have been wearing a Candido armband, I’m not sure. They cleaned house and stood tall with chairs and kendo sticks. My favourite moment was Rhynno getting a big pop for his spear on Edge. Good stuff to go into the ECW PPV.

Not a great show, but the Cena thing will keep people tuning in for a while at least. I just wonder how they’ll fix SmackDown! now.

NEWS
Well, there’s not much good news. The WWF’s ratings continue to be erratic, with shows that are expected to do big numbers slipping and completely unremarkable shows doing OK. With the UPN move coming in September and the USA RAW move a week or so later, the WWE is bracing itself for some rough times. Sadly, there are rumblings that they’ll be letting about 10 people go, though they’ve said that the Development Program will likely remain untouched.

There’s a lot of recruiting going on. CM Punk, who had a great feud with Raven in 2003 and another great one with Samoa Joe in 2004, has been offered a WWE Developmental deal. He’s not sure he’s gonna take it yet. I kinda think that he’ll take it. He makes OK money doing all the indies and Ring of Honor, but though the WWE deal is likely less money, it's more stable.

Former long-term Ring of Honor Champ Samoa Joe is considering offers from TNA and Japanese promotions (rumored to be Pro Wrestling NOAH and New Japan, though there are likely more) as well as negotiating with the WWE. He’d been complaining about the way his career was going for a while and I’m one to bet that he’ll take the WWE gig if it’s offered, and if not, he’ll take Japan since TNA’s future isn’t exactly bright at the moment.

Joey Styles will be announcing the ECW PPV, but his co-host may be the man we all love, Mick Foley. I wish they’d bring Don Callis, aka Cyrus the Virus, back as he and Joey had some fun on the old ECW TNN show.

He's so ECW.

The other major ECW reunion show, Shane Douglas’ Hardcore Homecoming, has released a card. The main event is a rematch from The Night The Line was crossed with Douglas vs. Sabu vs. Terry Funk. This has to go to a draw, but then again, Funk can’t go like he did in 1994 (or for that matter the time they did the rematch in 1998). I don’t expect much from this match. They also announced Jerry Lynn vs. Justin Credible, which should be OK if Credible is in shape, Raven vs. Sandman, which will be interesting, Kid Kash vs. 2 Cold Scorpio (Kash was always good and Scorpio is one of my all-time faves), J.T. Smith & Tommy Rich & Tracy Smothers vs. Ian & Axl Rotten & Chris Chetti, which is weird since I thought that Chetti was going to work the WWE ECW PPV since he’s Tazz’s nephew.

There’s also going to be a Eliminators vs. a mystery team, which may be The Gangstas or perhaps New Jack with another partner. Interesting line-up, and I’m surprised that Mike Awesome isn’t on the show, nor Amish Roadkill. Francine will be managing Douglas in the main event. I’ve also heard that they’ll be doing a ten bell for the fallen ECW alums Chris Candito, the Pitbull, and a few others.

The ECW PPV hasn’t announced any matches, just the Bischoff’s Army vs. ECW storyline. I’d figure on 8 or so matches with a main event being a ten man match or something like it between ECW and RAW guys. There are rumors that we’ll see Taz vs. Angle, which has been built up and I’d love to see, though there are others who want to see Tazz vs. Sabu, which would also be great. RVD will be there, though not wrestling.

That’s all for today.

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Chris Garcia