Twenty-four hours removed from the WWE’s biggest card of the year and the main topic of conversation is Batista’s World Championship win over HHH. It’s all anyone can talk about. Well, almost everyone.
I find it unusual that, at a time when Vince needs to be taking that which makes his product look the best and shine the brightest light on it, the current main event circle in WWE is being overshadowed by two other areas. Firstly the semi-final spots, currently occupied by HBK in his feud with Smackdown’s Kurt Angle and a mini-tussle with Mohammed Hassan, and Randy Orton in recent battles with the Undertaker and his own ego. The second group to outshine the main eventers is one that unfortunately has to carry the name ‘mid-card’ though that doesn’t do the talent on show any justice at all. Benoit, Edge, Christian, Benjamin, Jericho are the nexus of this middle section and produce the best wrestling and the most entertainment on WWE television. Week after week the opening match/segment or the end of the first hour is given to these guys and they’ve delivered on every occasion. I’ve said this before and I don’t mind repeating myself (in the hope that it’s seen by someone at the WWE – maybe a tea-boy or a diva who’s learning how to read), Shelton Benjamin is the brightest star on Raw right now. He’ll never make an impact like Batista and he’ll never be as charismatic as Cena is over on Smackdown, but show after show after show he puts in flawless performances and demonstrates more natural ability than the whole under-card combined.
Any of you ‘Edge-heads’ out there that think Edge’s ‘Money in the bank’ victory at Wrestlemania is his ticket out of the pack and his elevation into the main title matches is guaranteed need to wake up. No amount of title shots or big-chinned complaining is going to make Edge seem like a genuine threat to the big game players. The only way to elevate new talent to the top comes in three simple steps; associate them with the main event scene, incorporate them into the main storyline and then have the main guys put them over both verbally and in terms of wins/losses. None of these look like happening anytime soon to Edge and his prized title match now looks like it will be used as a job to Batista as and when he needs it. The only person who gets a decent rub from the pack above is still Benoit and the reasons why he’ll never be up there and stay up there again are evident from his last run with the gold.
Jericho and Christian are the ones who suffer the most from the ‘mid-card’ label and it’s no coincidence that they also happen to be the non-wrestling leaders of the group. For me, Jericho always seems too soft as a face, too unmotivated. Notice on last week’s Raw he described Benjamin and Benoit as his ‘friends’? If he became any less nasty he’d be baking everyone cookies and writing in his journal who his ‘bestest buddies’ are. What happened to evil Y2J? What happened to the Jericho who runs over dogs and breaks women’s thumbs? I don’t mean he has to turn heel anytime soon but at least give him a bloody backbone. As for Christian, they’ve toned down the ‘clown’ persona lately but his wins are still mostly presented as flukes or opportunistic and the fact that he turns to Tomko for assistance just weakens his image. I can promise you this, without clean one-on-one victories and appearing to be in control of his destiny, he will continue to be the victim of his own joke.
What was I talking about? Oh yeah, Raw.
First up from the mid-card was a ‘triple threat’ between Benjamin/Jericho/Christian. Awesome start to the match and good use of the ‘two in/one out’ style of three-way match. It was also nice to see some ‘one-on-two’ moves thrown in with the usual ‘two-on-one’ moves, something that’s normally reserved for when two smaller guys team up against someone the size of Kane or Big Show. Lawler commented that he’d not seen a move like the suplex/powerbomb combination before – my advice to him is to watch more ‘Rings of Honor’ tapes. A great match and the right result. Hopefully the scene will settle down at some point and Shelton can benefit from a long, well-written feud with any of his fellow mid-carders. They’ll have to start pairing them off soon or these five wrestlers will appear directionless and content to stay a tier or two below the main event.
The other match from these guys came much later in the form of Edge against Chris Benoit. Another good match this time written around the chair-shot induced injury suffered by Benoit the night before and he played the wounded animal very well, showing a depth of psychological performance he often hides under his technical abilities. Edge was animated throughout and I’m glad that his aggressive side was allowed to come through at the end.
And what of our new champion? I think it was right to give the opening segment to HHH. The crowd reaction to Batista would have been loud but once he was in the ring it would have been against his reserved ‘cool’ to gloat and HHH wouldn’t have been able to retort because they were keeping them apart to use Batista as a construct to send Orton off for his surgery. Before the world title match, Orton got the ‘glove puppet’ treatment from Kane again. I’ve no idea where this Kane/Orton thing is going but when it does happen I hope the door is locked and they wipe up afterwards. The Batista/Orton match was far too short to compare it favourably to Batista’s win the night before but the action seemed sharper, thanks mainly to Orton’s lighter, faster offence, and it also appeared to benefit from a lack of pressure on the performers. HHH came out after the victory and a brief pointing competition ensued which was won by neither man. Common sense would dictate that Batista/HHH II (Revenge of the nose) is coming up sooner rather than later and they’ve got some serious booking issues to sort out if they want a satisfactory PPV finale.
Austin returned, again, and carried on his one man liver-shrinking tour. To be honest, Austin is the worst kind of wrestling dinosaur, he’s ‘over like the end of school’ but he offers so little in the ring or on the mic that it’s more like a visit to a museum. If there’s any justice in the world he’ll be gunned down by a tee-total wild deer with a semi-automatic. Still, it beats being run-through with a steak knife by one of your mental ex-girlfriends, eh Stevie boy?
I’m glad that the rematch between Trish and Christy was replaced by a decent angle focussing more on the animosity between Trish and Lita. Not because I don’t think Christy can handle a second match, she did what she was asked at Wrestlemania and was only let down by the booking, but because it would have been too much too soon and the attention of the fans needed to be adjusted slightly. I hope that Christy keeps up her training and I think she’d benefit from a heel turn once the publicity from her Playboy cover has died down completely.
HBK came out dressed like a history teacher and cut a nice promo. Although the brash egomaniac is probably nearer the mark, Michaels plays contrite and humble very well and always comes across as genuine. I’m glad Hassan was allowed to beat on HBK without Hogan’s intervention, he’s got a lot of good points but needs time to develop and will only get that with decent feuds and good opponents.
During Orton’s promo, he said that something he saw on a monitor after his Wrestlemania match made him sick to his stomach. I know exactly how he feels, I was eating when Show and Akebono took their robes off. That’s one pair of shoes I’ll never get clean.
Props to the writers this week. HHH, HBK and Orton were all afforded tight promos that got to the point and weren’t repetitive.
RAW AWARDS
Match of the night – Benjamin v Jericho v Christian.
Worst match – Batista v Orton.
Star(s) of the show – Benjamin/Jericho/Christian/Edge/Benoit.
Moment of the show – Suplex/powerbomb combination.
Best sign – “I (LOVE) EVIL TRISH”.
Best quote – “I think LA stands for lard asses” (Maven).
Just a reminder that I’ll be having a Wrestlemania chat with Linda Robin (of ‘Linda’s Thoughts’) during the week and posting it at or before the weekend. So if you’re looking for an in-depth, metaphysical conversation between two of wrestling journalism’s finest brains, unfortunately you’ll have to make do with us.
Lee
