Falls Count Anywhere

07-20-04

Friday, July 23, is editor Derek McCaw's birthday, and he's too embarassed to say "me want pwesents."

RAW
RAW was just short of spectacular in the ring and then pretty awful when wrestling was not involved. I think it was the best episode of RAW in ages, except the things that were bad were so awful that it tainted the rest of the great show.

HHH opened the show with an interview that went way too long. He talked about how he hated Eugene and made a fart joke. Honestly, this was his worst interview in a while. I liked the Eugene stuff, as it played itself smartly and didn’t misstep where it was obvious.

Bischoff came out and told HHH that he had talked to Eugene’s Mom and she said that Eugene was no more for the WWE. Bisch then awarded H a 60 Minute Iron Man Match for next week. Regal came out and accused the two of them of being quite proud of themselves. Regal then delivered a beating that got a great reaction from the fans, and said he did it for Eugene. The ending of the segment was strong; the rest was really sub-standard.

Tajiri took on Sylvain Greiner in a match where Tajiri just worked his ass off. At one point, Tajiri missed some sort of cartwheel move and Greiner made it look like it had worked. Tajiri laid in kicks, did all his regular spots, but after Rhyno tried to help him, Conway helped Greiner use a face plant for the pin on Tajiri. Again, a strong match that went short but where both guys worked.

RAW doesn't have any pictuers available yet, so it's pretty much Chris' favorite DIVAs. First -- Carmella.

The Highlight Reel was the worst thing in a while. Yeah, there were hot, hot, hothothot chicks, but the writing was terrible and execution was even worse. Jericho introed the girls (Joy, Amy, and Carmella are my faves), most of whom got some mixed boos. He then said that there was an ‘immunity envelope’ in Bischoff’s office. He led them through the crowd, which gave them some OK heat.

When they got to the office, he told them to tear it apart looking for the envelope. This was so transparent that it was awful, and only the fact that one of the girls dresses just about fell off saved it from worst segment ever. Bischoff came in, and when he asked them to tell him what they were doing, they all were awful trying to be funny or cute or play scared. Terrible stuff that went far too long. Still, if they just made this a short segment every week, it could really work.

Tyson Tomko took on the Hurricane. Hurricane came out with Stacey, basically to call up a little heat and give Trish someone to play off of. The match wasn’t great, but Hurricane pulled a fair amount out of Tyson. Tomko got the win in this short match, but after a post-match attempted beat-down on Stacey, Rosie came out in his new Super Hero garb. It was like his Bar Mitzvah, coming out to the world as a SuperMAN instead of a SuperBOY.

We share because we care.

We get treated to a Batista vs. Benoit match at the start of the second hour. Before the match, HHH gave Batista some instructions to make sure that he would have the drop on Benoit next week during the Iron Man Match. The match itself was Benoit being Benoit and Batista going with everything that Benoit did. He’s athletic, I can’t say that enough, but combine his age with his inability to work a match with anyone short of the geniuses and you’ll see why I think of him as a guy who will have a couple of good years and then fade away. Hercules Hernandez was in the same boat, but he stuck around for a while longer than expected. They had their match, and after a bit, Batista set Benoit up so that he would fall and get his ankle caught in the ropes, leaving him dangling outside the ring. Batista gave him a bunch of boots to the head, then once he was untangled, he gave Benoit a nice Demon Bomb. Good segment. Though it did treat the champ as a bit of a joke, it does set up next week’s match nicely.

There was a fair bit done with Lita and Matt Hardy backstage. They talked, he said he wasn’t sure how to feel and she said she’d made up her mind, she’s keeping her baby. Yeah, she’s gonna keep her baby. This was better than most of their stuff of late because Lita didn’t have to cry. She does anger so well, but not sadness.

Randy Orton did a great interview where he showed off his new shirt. He pointed out that Edge’s first IC title run, I believe it was in 1999 with a win over Jeff Jarrett, was 1 day. Randy’s was 7 months. Nice to point out how much wrestling has devalued titles that a 7 month reign is considered long. That new Legend Killer Shirt is pretty dope. Edge came out and said that Cowboy Bob Orton should have been wearing a condom instead of that arm brace. Funny line.

Kane took on Chris Jericho in a match that wasn’t good, but it wasn’t bad either ...at first. I like Jericho a lot, but they keep putting him in these situations where he has to carry a stiff. For gosh sake, give him a feud with Benoit! Jericho got a win by count-out, but Bischoff came out and said that it was gonna restart as a Falls Count Anywhere match. They brawled around the arena, which they haven’t done in a while. This was the most work they’ve done in the crowd in a while. The match improved a bit and ended when Batista interfered.

Randy Orton and Edge had a match that I thought was every bit as good as their match at Vengeance. The two are just made to wrestle each other. They worked a bunch of submissions, and then went into near-falls. The crowd really popped for near-falls. I thought that the folks were responding to Edge far more as a star than they have been previously. The two got some great stuff going and the subtle turn of Edge continued with him getting the pin with a backslide where he put his feet on the ropes. Orton got some chants of his name, which was odd.

If you got rid of almost all the extracurricular stuff, this would have been a dynamite show.

Amy Webber.

NEWS
The Diva Search girls were chosen and they are a pretty diverse lot. My personal fave is Amy Webber, formerly of Son of the Beach. Joy is super hot, too.

The WWE has released Rikishi. The guy had been with them for more than 10 years. I gotta say, we all saw it coming. He’s gonna be working a Hawaii show with Sting, Muta and a bunch of others.

I love Joe Schmoe 2. I can’t help it. I feel dirty.

Iron Man Matches
With the announcement of a 60 Minute Iron Man Match for next week, I thought I would say a few things about them. Most folks have seen at least one, probably the Angle vs. Brock or Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels match. The play is a strange one, from my point of view, as there are some great pitfalls that they need to avoid.

First thing, this is going to be a live edition of RAW. I don’t know when the last live 60 minute match on TV took place. It would probably be the 2000 Iron Man Match between HHH and The Rock. There is a lot that can go wrong in an Iron Man Match. If one of the guys gets injured early, you’re screwed. You can call an angle right in the middle, but you need to make sure that the play is ready to go down. If you miss a spot or if your timing is off, you can’t edit it out. Time will have to be strictly kept. There are a ton of problems with doing these matches live.

The stamina of the men in question is not at all in question. I can’t remember if Benoit ever did an Iron Man match, but he’s worked plenty of long matches, including his run in the Royal Rumble this year. HHH has at least one, the aforementioned match with the Rock, and has done numerous long matches will all sorts of guys. No matter who you are, you tire somewhere in the middle and need to go to rest holds. Keeping the crowd into it is of utmost importance, and without the possibility of sweetening crowd reactions, they’ll need to work much harder to pull off a good center. Perhaps they should try to do several falls around the 20 and 40 minutes marks.

Joy Giovanni, who unfortunately has yet to do a lot of cheesecake shots.

The other issue is the amount of time that the match will be on the air. 60 minutes means that whatever this show does will be pinned directly put on this match. If it fails to draw an audience, Benoit won’t be getting the belt for a good long while. If it does draw an audience, HHH will get credit. It’s a no-win for Benoit, but that’s what it’s normally like.

I also think that it telegraphs the switch. Just like the Lesnar vs. Angle match, you know that HHH is getting the title. There’s little surprise here. If Benoit wins, or even better, if they tie, that’s the only possible surprise that they can deliver. HHH has so much sway, and now that his movie commitments are no more, there’s no way he doesn’t walk out with the belt. Still, I am expecting a great match, one of the top RAW matches ever.

That’s all for this shortened edition. More on Friday!

Chris Garcia