Alright, so where were we? The Rock and John Cena still hate each other (but Cena totally respects him)? CM Punk is champion, much to Laurinaitis & Del Rio’s chagrin? Zack Ryder’s trying to get as many petition signatures as possible for a US title shot even though Ziggler…

Michael Cole: Hey, did you know that’s the largest online petition ever signed!

 Wait what!? Michael Cole? Where did you come from?

 Cole: WWE is on Twitter!! Did you know that!?

 
Uh yeah actually I…

 Cole: Social media!!!

Ok let’s move on.

As a boyhood fan of Mr. Piper, I’m always pleased to see that Canadian-who’s-sort-of-Scottish. Piper starts the show off by asking the audience how someone like him, who’s never been a champion, could become a Hall of Famer (I’m pretty sure it has something to do with that mic you’re holding, Roddy). He attributes this to the fans, whose energy controls him, much like the energy of Cheetos controls me. Naturally, though this is Piper’s Pit, so he’s bound to pick on someone. And that someone happens to be…

 Cole: You mean @JohnCena !!!

Cena, being his oblivious self, isn’t sure what Piper’s talking about. So, Piper decides to play a name game. “Stone Cold”. Cheer! “Bret Hart”. Less cheer (shoulda gone Shawn Michaels, Pipes)! “The Rock”. Huge cheers (and some silly people booing…don’t do that). “John Cena”. Huge cheers! Wait…huge cheers!?

That’s right, of all times, the crowd has decided that they almost unilaterally love John Cena right now (even Cena seems taken aback, and a little giddy). From then on, Cena tries to work the crowd for the mixed reaction they’re looking for, but to no avail…they love him. The best he gets is a “Boots to Asses” chant. Cena and Piper decide this is good enough, and move forward with the bit where Piper tries to convince Cena to let the fans have it. At first, Cena talks this off (he’s dealt with it his whole career), but Piper remains persistent. Slappingly persistent. And the segment ends with a pissed-off Cena shaking his head and leaving.

Last week, I brought up the idea of a Cena heel turn, and the challenges it would present. I also dismissed it as unnecessary. But at the same time, as a fan, I can’t help but feel interested in the fact that the WWE seems to be teasing us here. It’s not like they haven’t teased us with it before, but most of the time that’s been more fan speculation/wishful thinking than purposeful booking. Now they’re dedicating entire segments to it. Something’s going on.

As for my concern about the fans starting to cheer him? I forgot to factor in that they’re not going to cheer him over The Rock. But until then? If they do go through with this turn, I would hope that the fans would be fan enough to just play along.

 Cole: “Just play along” is now trending on Twitter!!

STOP IT!!!

During JoMo’s entrance, Miz starts this tilt off with an attack from behind with a steel pipe (in slow motion at that…I somehow imagine it wouldn’t hurt as much in slo mo). After Miz pulls off his best Jeff Gillooly impersonation, Morrison tries to finish the match one-legged, but soon learns that only Zach Gowan can do that.

A ceremonial burial for JoMo in what may be his final appearance with the WWE.

Beth & Natalya randomly jogged through this match wearing jogging outfits. Yeah. That’s where we’re at with this division.

We catch Laurinaitis talking on his cell phone (it can do that!?), telling Brodus that he’s not debuting this week in an effort to make him angry. Because that’s the first thing I would do if I were dealing with Brodus. Piss him the fuck off.

Laurinaitis then chews out Del Rio for losing at SummerSlam, and oh-so-inadvertently asks him to win tonight. Punk shows up, drops some Google metrics, and ensures the duo that the title isn’t going anywhere. Otunga seems to interpret this to mean that Punk’s going to intentionally disqualify himself, so Laurinaitis makes this a TAG-TEAM…no sorry…that’s Teddy….Laurinaitis makes this a lose-the-title-with-an-intentional-disqualification-match (which is admittedly a much less catchy title than TAG-TEAM)

 Cole: Gatorade is trending on Twitter right now!!!

What!?

This bout starts off at a slow and methodical Orton-esque pace, which is disadvantageous for Ziggler right off the bat. And, holy hell, we actually get an “RKO” chant…with Dolph Ziggler in the ring, proving this to be the faciest crowd of all time (and I love it, by the way).

 Cole: In user chat, someone just said John Laurinaitis should be fired! LOL!

OH COME ON, reading off pointless user chat comments!? Seriously? What is this, MTV circa 2007!?

 Cole: 4 years ago is trending on Facebook!!

How is that even possible? Anyway, this match continues for awhile with no one taking a clear advantage, until Orton starts hitting his signature moves of doom, and we know the end is near. One missed RKO and Barrett interference later, Ziggler nails Orton with the ZigZag from behind, and does a headstand.

I have to be honest, this was an extremely disappointing match given the names involved. Hopefully they can redeem themself with a feud at some point. That’s another great thing about Ziggler…he faced nothing but Kofi Kingston for a year over on Smackdown, so there’s plenty of great feuds and matches left in him. I couldn’t be more excited.

 Cole: Ziggler is trending!!

You got it wrong, it should be news when he’s NOT trending.

Michael Cole (doofus extraordinarus) introduces Daniel Bryan (submissionus wrestliatorus) as a hypocrite for trying to cash on his Money in the Bank contract over a KO’d Mark Henry. In case you haven’t heard, Bryan promised to do the “honorable” thing and cash it in at WrestleMania, but those plans changed once he realized that Mark Henry could injure the fuck out of him beforehand and render his briefcase useless (along with most of his body). Bryan then goes off on Cole, showing some impressive mic skills, and finishes the promo extremely strong. Wow…I guess that’s one more thing we know he can do.

The aforementioned pain train stumbles out, complaining about being booked in Smackdown’s steel cage title match (tomorrow!) (wait…you’ve seen it already by now…nevermind) with his injured leg. DB responds by walking directly up to him, kicking him in his injured leg, and leaving.

Bryan’s new aggressive attitude is exactly what he needs right now. Imagine that, a face with some exclamation points. And imagine that, people like it!

Swagger dominates the entire match, until Ryder reverses the splash and hits the Rough Ryder.

Ryder’s pulling off this WWE face thing pretty well.

 Cole: Twitter is trending on Twitter!!

What?

 Cole: Anal bleeding!

Foley drops some Cena-esque rhymes hyping tomorrow’s live Holiday Smackdown. Considering that it’s not even November, beating everyone else to that holiday punch is pretty progressive.

 Cole: Like Twitter!! Did you know we use social media Kyle? Do YOU use social media?

Like YouPorn?

 Cole: Yeah like…wait what?

Del Rio, sporting his new shirt that looks like a beer label, battles Punk’s entertaining offense with his arm-focusing-101 offense. Del Rio dominates most of the middle of the match (commanding the very first “Del Ri-o” chant I’ve ever heard…I thought this was a pro-face crowd!?), with Punk selling the arm like a pro. Punk fights back with his legs, but Del Rio keep trying to put him away. Finally, Del Rio tries to untie a turnbuckle in an attempt to distract the ref. With the ref’s back turned, Del Rio throws a chair to Punk, but Punk pulls an Eddie Guerrero (throws the chair back to Del Rio and falls on the floor), framing Del Rio look like the bad guy! Which, I uh, guess he sort of is.

The ref is about to DQ Del Rio, until Punk rolls him up. Del Rio kicks out, hits a Carlito-esque backbreaker on Punk, but Punk kicks out. With both men down and weary, Ricardo jumps on the apron to distract the referee. Del Rio tries to throw Punk into the now-exposed turnbuckle, but Punk reverses and throws Del Rio into it instead. 1-2-fucking3!!

…and I fear that this might lead to some sort of title controversy, considering the cheating-but-no-DQ-finish, and the fact that the commentators brought up Laurinaitis’ stipulation about 10000x throughout the match. That particular controversy would be fine, except we just saw it in the Edge/Ziggler feud on Smackdown a few months ago. While that feud resulted in a 20 second title reign for Ziggler (I’m pretty sure I’ve held the belt for longer), there wasn’t much else that came out of it that was good, especially considering that Ziggler went straight down to the lower mid-card afterward and had to work his way back up (of course, part of that was him cutting his hair and Samsonizing himself).

But hey, we’ll see. I have to give the WWE enough credit that they won’t use the same storyline twice in a year. In the men’s division, anyway. Right, Cole?

 Cole: YouPorn is trending on Twitter!!

YEAH!!

This is the odd Raw that looked much better on paper. No particular match really stood out (okay, Del Rio vs. Punk was fun), but there was some development (Cena’s tease, Ryder’s win, Punk’s potential controversy). For some reason, however, it felt like the entire show went quicker than usual. Even this review took me 3 1/2 minutes to write, instead of the usual 5.

Regardless, I enjoyed it. 7/10.

 Cole: Twitter is a 11/10!! TWITTERTWITTERTWITTERTWITTERSOCIALMEDIAFACEBOOKPAGE!!!

…and you can now follow me at @Kyle_242_

 Cole: On what?

…you can’t be fucking serious.

 Cole: I thought it was great!! You?

…I don’t know actually, I was checking Twitter instead of, y’know, watching the actual show.

 Cole: That’s stupid. Who encouraged you to do that?

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