Bell2Bell
WWE Raw and WWE Smackdown Live
Mike Miceli – Staff Writer
mike@thetwocentscorp.com
Welcome to another edition of Bell2Bell where we recap both WWE Raw and WWE Smackdown LIVE every Sunday right here on TwoCentsTV!
The Royal Rumble is tonight! So lets quickly get through our Raw and Smackdown recaps so we can get to my predictions for one of the most unpredictable pay-per-views in recent memory!
WWE Raw 1/23/17
Raw begins with (surprise!) a talking segment featuring all the usual suspects. The shark cage is in the ring and Roman Reigns is out first to cut a pretty bad promo (Honestly, not his fault. His writers are awful.) Owens and Jericho are out quickly thereafter to interrupt. Jericho calls reigns a “stupid idiot” and Reigns demands a US Title rematch for tonight. Owens jumps the gun and accepts before Jericho can say anything. Y2J does not look happy. Reigns says he’ll take the US Title tonight and the Universal Title on Sunday.
Luke Gallows faces Cesaro next with both Sheamus and Anderson at ringside. Cesaro and Gallows go back and forth a bit. Cesaro hits a pretty sweet looking tornado DDT from the corner. Gallows is eventually sent out to ringside where he shoves Sheamus. Sheamus stops just short of hitting Gallows to avoid a DQ.
Cesaro is eventually able to lock Gallows into the “Sharpshooter”. Anderson and Sheamus then get into it at ringside causing the ref to become distracted. Cesaro breaks the hold and this allowed Gallows to attack from behind with a big boot and a face buster. Gallows then gets the pin. Relatively short match, but it was entertaining and it advanced the story between the two teams.
Mick Foley is backstage talking to Stephanie McMahon on speaker phone when Sami Zayn enters to talk about the Royal Rumble. Sami wants to know what he has to do to enter the Rumble match. He asks if there’s paperwork involved which I actually found pretty funny. Stephanie, still on speaker phone, tells Zayn that if he beats Seth Rollins tonight, he can have Rollins’ spot in the Rumble.
During the night There were a pair of pretty good interview segments with Charlotte Flair and Bayley. In hers, Bayley said she’s proud to be a fan that made it in wrestling. Bayley says the WWE universe makes her feel like she can do anything and she’s going to win the title at the Rumble. In Charlotte’s interview, she says Flairs dominate Rumble matches and discusses her father’s epic win at the 1992 Rumble. Charlotte says she will continue to dominate and beat Bayley.
Rollins against Zayn was easily match of the night and it’s up next. This was truly a really great match. I could have watched them go at it for an hour easily. There’s some good back and forth action to start with a slow build. Each wrestler hit some of their highlight moves while also mixing it up a bit. Rollins hit a pretty sweet running knee into Zayn who was played out on the ring apron. Zayn hit numerous flying body splashes. There were some close near falls and high impact moves as well.
Rollins is eventually able to hit Zayn with a “Pedigree” on the corner of the ring apron. Before he can go for a pin, Triple H’s music hits, distracting Rollins. Zayn is able to roll up Rollins for the three count.
Despite this being the second “distraction” finish of the night (WWE… keeping it creative), I really enjoyed this match. There’s a lot of history between these two guys, all the way back to ROH, of which the commentators barely scratched the surface. It was good to see these two guys get some time and it was great to see Sami pick up a needed win here.
Seth already has his program with HHH. So, from a non-kayfabe stand point, there’s really no need to have him take up a spot in the rumble, when Sami would be much better served in that position.
Backstage, Rollins is yelling at Foley about HHH’s music playing during the match. Foley claims innocence, but Rollins is sure Stephanie is to blame.
Cruiserweight 6-man tag action is next with Jack Gallagher, TJ Perkins, and Mustafa Ali facing Drew Gulak, Ariya Daivari, and Tony Nese. This was insultingly short. There are a few quick tags before a brawl breaks out between all the wrestlers. Ali is eventually able to hit a 450 splash for the win. I feel bad for these guys. They’re doing the best they can with what they’re given but what they’re given isn’t much… at all.
An 8-man tag match is next with Braun Strowman, Titus O’Neil, Rusev and Jinder Mahal taking on Kofi Kingston, Big E, Enzo, and Cass. Before the match started, each man came out to talk about how they’ll be winning the Rumble. (I love Enzo, but does anyone really believe he’ll be winning?)
There’s some back and forth action and decent spots. Enzo and Cass hit the “Bada Boom” on Jinder Mahal. Kofi nailed a suicide dive on his opponents at ringside and a nice twisting splash onto Rusev.
Eventually Strowman tags in and cleans house before hitting his running powerslam onto poor Enzo for the win. As Strowman is celebrating, Big Show (still looking in his best shape ever) comes down to the ring. The two have a stare down VERY SUBTLY foreshadowing a showdown at the Rumble. The two stare a hole through each other before Strowman slowly backs off and retreats.
While mostly entertaining, this was some pretty mediocre booking. They just mish-mashed stars together for no reason to advance stories in the most lazy way possible. I also find it interesting that for weeks, Strowman was involved in main event storylines and now he’s suddenly shoved into the mid card. Perhaps he’s no longer a McMahon favorite to win the rumble? It seems like most of the focus has shifted to Goldberg, Lesnar and Taker… more on that later.
SIDE NOTE: Strowman is supposed to be the unstoppable heel, who is constantly looking for “real competition”. So, why do they have him back down from Big Show? It just doesn’t make sense for his character at all and kind of hurts him a bit.
Chris Jericho took on Roman Reigns next in a pretty good, but overbooked match. Anytime a shark cage is involved, I immediately feel compelled to type “overbooked”. There were some decent but familiar spots with both Reigns and Jericho looking pretty solid. Owens on commentary is always a plus.
The two went back and forth for a while, with Roman mostly looking dominant. Jericho blocks a “Superman Punch” attempt, but then eats a powerbomb shortly after. Reigns sets up for another “Superman Punch” but Owens interferes and the two beat Roman down.
Owens tries to put Roman in the shark cage, but Reigns eventually fights back, tossing Owens in instead. After locking the door, the cage starts to raise up in the air. (Who is controlling that and who thought it’d be a good idea to use raise it!?) Jericho ties to hold on to the cage, but he can’t. Reigns hits Jericho with a “Superman Punch” followed by a spear as Owens watches from above.
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After a commercial break, Jericho gets Owens out of the shark cage and they’re approached by an interviewer who tells them that the Universal Title match at the Royal Rumble is now no DQ. Because this match wasn’t overbooked to hell as it is…
Nia Jax squashed a jobber in what’s becoming a pretty unimpressive and repetitive event. After the mach Jax then cuts another truly awful promo. Thankfully, Sasha Banks comes out to interrupt. She beats Jax with her crutch as it seems her ankle is fully healed. Banks knocks Nia to the outside. She then hits a diving knee drop from the apron onto Jax. Sasha then heads back up the ramp looking confident.
Rich Swann and Noam Dar have a blink and you miss it match with Swann picking up the easy win after a stiff kick to the head. After the match, Swann calls out Neville. Neville comes out and teases getting in the ring, but changes his mind and starts to walk away. Swann then dives out of the ring onto Neville. Swann tries to get Neville in the ring, but Neville gets away and heads up the ramp.
Golderberg headbutts his locker room door (old school!) before heading to there ring. He’s bleeding from his forehead as he cuts a promo on the Royal Rumble. Goldberg must have knocked himself a little loopy because he flubbed his words a few times here. But eventually he gets back on track.
Paul Heyman and Brock Lesnar eventually come out to the stage to interrupt. Heyman says Brock is going to conquer the Rumble. Goldberg asks if Brock is going to come down to the ring or “sit there like a dumbass.” Lesnar comes down the ring and stares down Goldberg before the lights go out. When the lights come back, Undertaker is standing in the ring between Lesnar and Goldberg. It was, honestly, pretty awesome to see these three men together in the ring. The three stare each other down as the show goes off the air.
As far as “go-home” shows go, this was a pretty lackluster Raw. While Rollins vs Zayn was really, very good, and the final stare down was interesting, most of the matches had no-contest finishes and incredibly short match times. There was some (minimal) story progression, nothing in this show was particularly entertaining nor did it excited me any more for the Rumble. I guess my major problem with Raw this week is that it just didn’t have any sense of direction going into the PPV. And maybe this vagueness was intentional, to create speculation and promote unpredictability. Or maybe it seems directionless because at this point, even they don’t know what they’re going to do.
Click here to head on over to page 2 for the WWE Smackdown recap!
The post Bell2Bell – WWE Recap and Review – Week of 1/23/17 appeared first on TwoCentsTV.