Falls Count Anywhere

12-16-03

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Welcome to Falls Count Anywhere! My name is Chris and I was a Mathlete Until I Met Margo Maris.

RAW
Evolution comes out to show off their gold. Well, I really expected it. The fact is, they are about to embark on a long voyage to try and convince us that these four are the new Horsemen. Good luck with it.

This was a lot shorter than I expected. There was a sweet shot of the four of them raising their belts to end the pre-opening segment that I imagine we will see replayed a lot over the next few months.

Battle of the Sexes II was the first match with Lita and Trish taking on Christian and Jericho. I really like Lita's new entrance. She is also mad hot. Just wanted to note that for the record. Christian got some great heel heat by shoving Trish around. There was serious heel heat right from the beginning. Lita got a great chant when she floated over to gouge Christian's eyes. However, she blew a moonsault spot where she may have seriously compacted her neck. It looked real bad. The Jericho turn may in fact be a good thing, since he got a good pop for his facing up to Bischoff. The match wasn't good, but it was a solid storyline advancing match.

The Foley segment looked to be setting up a really interesting scenario, but the way it worked out really bothered me. I liked the use of the Foley music video, but the segment moved very weird. Foley was good, as always, and Bischoff came off evil as well. The pop they got for a possible Mick Foley vs. Eric Bischoff match wasn't what they were hoping for, but I am salivating at the thought of it. They set up Foley vs. Randy Orton for the Main Event. It's a shame that they ruined it at the end.

Just where are they going?

Booker T and Maven took on Matt Hardy and Mark Henry. This was not a good idea, as they should be giving Matt something real and important on the card and they are mixing him in with lame short programs. This is just another example of bad booking for RAW, which had been really good of late.

Nice to see them beat on Coach, even if it happened behind closed doors.

Well, Goldberg was really over when he came out to destroy La Resistance. He got a huge pop, helped by the fact that the French were inflammatory in their pre-beating tirade. He then broke the French flagstaff and raised the colors and waved it around in the ring. Bisch came out and "deactivated" Goldberg for 30 days. WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY THINKING?!?!?!

The only way to rebuild the damage done to Goldberg is to keep him around and destroying people. They may be going for an Austin thing, where he's suspended but still around beatin' on people, but it would have been better to keep him having real matches and getting real wins over real, top-notch wrestlers. Actually, the best idea would have been to keep the belt on him, but you know who has to be satisfied.

They did a nice segment with Mick Foley talking to Michaels, showing where they are going with the whole Foley thing. The announcing is pushing the anti-Bischoff angle. HBK and Foley have a nice talk about how, in wrestling, you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave. It was a nice segment, which should have led to Mick actually having a match.

The six man match was changed to a handicap match with Goldberg being announced as on the "inactive" list. The match was slow to get started, but I liked it. Not a super match, but strong enough to make me happy for the time they gave it. Watching HHH and HBK work brought some life to the crowd. They didn't seem to react to Bautista, but that was mostly expected. RVD and Flair worked well together, as did the Nature Boy and HBK. RVD had some sloppiness towards the end, but hit a gorgeous Frog Splash. There was a nice false finish where HHH pedigreed RVD and revived the ref, but that led to the figure four by Flair that led us to the commercial. HHH did an awesome knee to RVD's leg that was draped on the middle rope. This slowed and the crowd didn't seem into it as much as they must have been hoping with all the gold in the ring.

I liked Flair's role and I dug HHH's work, and the fact that he did the job for HBK was a nice touch, but it would have helped RVD so much to have let him get a pin on him. HBK is his friend, but they need to get RVD, or somebody, over to the next level. I will say that it was a sweet pop for HBK getting the pin.

John Heidenreich took on the Flamin' Rico. I mean, this was exceptionally Queer Eye. Adorable Adrian Adonis is lookin' down on him going "Man, that sure was gay." The match wasn't good, save for that HUGE backbody drop. Rico hit a cool kick where he ran up the ropes. Rico is talented. There were some boring chants, but Jackie Gayda was really hot.

Jericho is doing the repentant heel thing nicely. The match with Kane was mostly Kane dominating, which can work. Jericho bumped huge, but the crowd wasn't too into it. Jericho took a big tossing over the top to the outside. Jericho lost by DQ due to the use of a chair, but Kane kept beating on him. Christian helped Jericho up, only to shove him down, which I think helps the possible turn. I'm not sure, but a Jericho vs. Christian "Jericho atoning for his sins" might make a good storyline for a couple of months.

Nice touch showing the WWE superstars with the military boys. It's things like that that work to fix some of the huge PR problems that the WWE has.

Bischoff goes over strategy with Randy Orton, which leads to Randy Orton going off about not being able to get to the next level.

The segment before the Main Event was so misleading, as it made it seem like he was going through with the event, and he made Michaels' match for San Antonio, so I guess that makes the ending of the Handicap match make a little more sense.

Foley walks out on the match with Orton. They might have killed Foley forever. They need to fix this ending, even though I understand what they are going for on this one, where he doesn't want to come back because it's like an addiction, but it's not the way to make it work. This was a huge misstep. Listening to the crowd's reaction, you could tell they really wanted to see him, and having him walk out is the type of thing that kills cities.

I will say that Mick did it well, that he played the role perfectly, that the announcing sold the fact that they had no idea what was going on like champs. You can do the wrong thing the right way and it's still the wrong thing. The crowd was obviously deflated, even though they started chanting his name pretty loud. Randy Orton was coky, but didn't come off as real at all until he started talking about Mick not being a legend. The boos came loud after Mick walked away.

A poorly booked show that ended a streak of good shows. They took a bunch of backwards steps, especially in regards to Mick Foley. The Goldberg deactivation was not a good idea either. They have a lot of work to do to make this work.

News
Goldberg was a little banged up after the Pay-Per-View, but there were no serious injuries. Buhbuh Dudley was hurt slightly, but nothing serious.

Armageddon
Well, that was a sub-par pay-per-view. I understand what they are trying to do, build Evolution into a Horsemen like unit that holds a ton of gold that they build strong chases against, but they did so at a high cost, including the likely destruction of the Goldberg myth once and for all.

Booker got the win in the opener that wasn't good, but Booker did his best with what he has. In fact, there were a couple of moments that Mark Henry looked like he might be worth something. Not a good opener.

Too much backstage stuff. My issue is that they should do everything possible to separate the PPVs from the weekly TV, and doing a lot of standard backstage stuff does not help that. It's my same problem with NWA-TNA. It just feels like free TV, so why would I pay for it?

RVD and Randy Orton had a match that was better than either has been having of late. Orton looked really good and RVD didn't miss moves, which is what he needs to do about now to make it work. This flowed OK, but had some problems in the later moments. RVD does tend to bring his best game to Pay-Pre-View, and this was no exception. Not a match of the year candidate, but a solid effort from the two.

I'm so sorry for what I'm about to do...

Jericho and Christian vs. Lita and Trish Stratus was a match I did not expect. The girls did some offense that worked, didn't make the guys look weak, and got the crowd into it. Jericho was very good in his role as Freddy Prinze, Jr. from She's All That, as I almost bought that he was being penitent. The finish was nice and shows that this really isn't a dead angle after all.

Michaels vs. Bautista was an OK match, far better than I expected out of Bautista. Bautista did some great power moves, like tossing Michaels to the outside, and HBK looked like a champ selling for him. A sudden finish also helped out this match and story. The sad thing is, Bautista has already been pushed wrong for so long that a win would have helped him get back on track. A singles win over a strong name like Michaels is better than Tag Team gold. They've missed the boat so far, but perhaps they will get back on track with him and Flair.

The destruction of Maven and Matt Hardy getting the "win" wasn't good for PPV, but maybe it will show management that people want to support Version 1, as when he made the cover of the Bautista-destroyed Maven, the crowd counted along with him. They can do some great things with Matt if they just give him a shot.

I am usually not a fan of these gauntlet matches, but this was pretty fun at times. Hurricane coming off of Rosie's shoulders was a sweet spot, and a nice finisher for the future. Cade and Jindraik do the sneaky win to help them get over as the new "bad guys". Their segment with Val and Lance Storm was good, and they got boring chants, but not when Lance was in, so it was more than likely a sign that the crowd would not appreciate good wrestling even if given a chance. The crowd wasn't into it until the Dudleys came in, and then it was solid the rest of the way. Test and Steiner were better than usual, and when Bischoff came out to set up Flair and Bautista, you knew where the rest of the night was going. They did manage to make a good story, as the Dudleys were playing up the exhaustion and that allowed for the Evolution win.

Molly and Ivory had a match that was the definition of Free TV. Seriously, this was exactly the type of match you'd get on Velocity, no time for set-ups or build. It wasn't a bad match, just rushed and pretty normal.

The main event didn't help the show at all. HHH tried his best, but this match was slow and thought filled with interesting storyline, you could see what was happening and it didn't help that Goldberg didn't overcome the odds to win and cement his recent resurgence. Kane got all the good monster spots, HHH worked as well as he could with these two, and Goldberg tried to bring the crowd, but failed. It was so obvious where this was going that I tuned out fast.

It wasn't a good show, I'd say just a little south of average.

FlashBack!
One of my favorite matches in Royal Rumble history was the Rumble from 1992. The story going in was pretty messed up. They had done a controversial ending at the Rumble 1991 where Undertaker had supposedly won the World Title. They did a holding up and did a rematch at Tuesday Night in Texas which did not settle things, so the World Title was put up in the Rumble, with the winner walking out with the belt. It started off with great importance, since the belt still had a sense of majesty about it back then.

The match opened with the British Bulldog and The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase in the ring, which might have been two of the top five workers in North America at the time. The two worked really well, and there was even a couple of low blows, which popped the heavily male crowd. Flair came in third (or fourth) and that's when the storyline for the entire Rumble got really good. The announcing really sold that everyone HATED Flair and wanted to tak ehim out, and when guys entered, they almost all went for Flair. Tito Santana, who had worked with Flair a few times in the past, took it to him like a house on fire. Shawn Michaels and Flair worked together a little and they took turns selling chops. Shawn also did a few "Over the Top, but not to the Floor" throws that started his streak of great Rumble performances.

There were so many people with history against Flair that they hung the whole match around it. Kerry Von Erich, then called the Texas Tornado, went right after Flair and they did the classic "Flair Flop" right after he nailed him. Greg Valentine, former tag partner and opponent for Flair, came in and the two traded vicious chops before The Hammer took a long ring to elimination. When Piper came in, the crowd went nuts and they got to see Piper and Flair go at it for the first time in years. Piper knocked him all across the ring and the crowd loved it. Duggan went after Flair for all the times they met while Hacksaw was in Mid-South. Flair was the target and played the role so well.

When Hogan came in, you could tell that the show was about to get good, but you could also see that Flair was going to win. Hogan got a huge pop and eliminated Undertaker, resolving their storyline. Piper also eliminated Irwin R. Shyster by pulling out with his tie, which was sweet. Sid came in, and you knew that there was going to be big things, but Flair was obviously going to win, you could see it in everyone's reactions and the way the announcing was slanted. Sid eliminated Hogan, but Hogan held on to Sid, allowing Flair to come from behind and dump him out. The crowd was against Hogan, definitely siding with Sid on the issue of the elimination, and Flair winning got a nice response.

This one match really saved an awful show from a period where the WWF was really good with a ton of great workers in and Flair on top. I highly recommend this match.

That's all for today. More on Friday.

Chris Garcia