Monday Night Roundup: The Awesome Elbow

Last night on Raw, The Miz reminded everyone watching that he’s still the WWE Champion, and that he was still the man main eventing WrestleMania 27 opposite John Cena.  After tweeting that he was “boycotting” Raw, The Miz hit the ring in the final segment of the show, decimating John Cena after Cena issued another rap to The Rock.  The Miz capped off the attack by delivering a People’s Elbow to the fallen Doctor of Thuganomics.  Excellent, excellent, excellent work here by Miz to avoid being lost in the excitement of the ongoing Rock / Cena feud.  It’ll be really interesting to see how things play out between these three guys on the grandest stage in the game, as I’m sure The Rock will involve himself physically in WrestleMania’s main event.  I’d by lying if I said I wanted anybody other than The Miz to end up looking good at the outcome of all this.

On Ring of Honor, Roderick Strong was successful in his fatal 4-way match with Homicide, El Generico, and Jay Briscoe.  Mike Bennett was able to eliminate Andy Ridge from the Top Prospects Tournament, while Kyle O’Reilly advanced past Michael Elgin.  Next week, Bennett and Ridge will collide in the finals of said tournament.  More on Raw, including the return of Dolph Ziggler and the continued downward spiral of Sheamus,  after the jump.  Oh, and Stone Cold Steve Austin.

• WWE has been the land of returning superstars over the past couple of weeks.  First it was Booker T and Diesel.  Then came the Rock.  Trish Stratus was next.  Triple H and The Undertaker followed.  Last night, JBL and Stone Cold Steve Austin joined their ranks.  Michael Cole introduced Bradshaw as the special guest referee for his match with Jerry “The King” Lawler at WrestleMania, but before he could sign on the dotted line, glass shattered and Stone Cold crashed the party.  Austin dropped JBL with a couple of stunners and put his own John Hancock on the contract, meaning that he’ll be refereeing the Cole vs Lawler match at Mania.  I expect Cole being Stunnered to get the loudest reaction of the night.
• Dolph Ziggler was announced as Raw’s newest hire, and he promptly beat John Morrison in his Monday Night debut.  Morrison seems to be being jobbed out of house and home recently, and it really doesn’t sit well with me.  Something else that doesn’t sit well with me is that this match, which has pay-per-view potential, was given about 3 minutes of TV time.  After the match, the anonymous GM chimed in to alert us that although Ziggler was hired, Vickie Guerrero was not.  She will be able to compete for her job once again, though, when she meets Trish Stratus in the ring next week.  Wow.  I don’t know what to make of this.  If Trish Stratus returns to the ring to job to Vickie Guerrero, I might call it quits.
• Speaking of Trish and Vickie, this announcement gives some credence to the rumor of a 6-person tag match at Mania pitting Dolph & LayCool against JoMo, Trish, & Kelly Kelly.  It’s really a shame.  Ziggler and Morrison could tear the house down if they were given the stage and the time, but instead it looks like they’re going to be used in this mixed tag affair.
• Sin Cara vignette is making him look like he’s going to be a big deal.  Thumbs up.
• Daniel Bryan’s music played, and I rejoiced that we may finally see him wrestle on Raw again.  The good news: he wrestled.  The bad news: his match lasted about a minute.  He was able to notch a count out win against Sheamus, and the two will meet again next week, this time with Sheamus’ career on the line.  It seems odd to me that their burning this on free TV, seems more like a Mania feud.
• David Otunga was made to look like the most incompetent wrestler since Gillberg when he lost to Randy Orton after The Viper had been manhandled by Nexus before the match.  Oh well.  Mason Ryan is CM Punk’s last chance at a corner man, and he’ll meet Orton on Raw next week to determine if he’ll be able to fill that role.  My money’s on Ryan.
• Eve successfully retained her Divas Title against one of the Bellas in a throw away match.  Yawn.
• The Undertaker cut a promo to open the show that was a little too similar to the one he cut on Smackdown.  A set of no holds barred, no DQ, no countout stipulations were added to his match with Trips at Mania, but he really had nothing else to say.  HBK spoke out again, and it again did nothing to further the angle.
• Christian returned to the ring, so I guess any speculation about him not being ready can be put to rest.  He gained a victory over Brodus Clay, who is being used as Alberto Del Rio’s henchman, as we predicted here last week.  I had a nagging suspicious Christian was going to job in his first match back, but thankfully I was incorrect.  After the match, Del Rio locked him in the cross arm breaker.
• CM Punk made R-Truth tap out to the Anaconda Vice, and I cannot express how happy I am to see Punk bust this move out.  Total squash, and I’m more than OK with that.
• Snooki is going to host Raw next week, which is confounding.  Why would WWE do this, especially on the heels of TNA having a Jersey Shore cast member on their show?  Boooooooo!
• Sunny is being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame the night before WrestleMania this year.  Kind of funny that she and Shawn are going to be in the same class.  For better or worse, Sunny changed the role of women in the WWE, and she deserves this induction as much as anybody.  Yaaaaayyyy!

So that was Raw.  John Cena’s rap to The Rock wasn’t as good as his first one, but he does continue to validly accuse The Rock of never showing up at WWE events.  The Miz’s use of the Elbow was an awesome thing, and the double return of JBL and Stone Cold was pretty exciting as well.  Hopefully sometime soon Sheamus and Morrison can stop themselves from falling further down the card.  It should be noted that Evan Bourne was nowhere to be seen, so I’d venture that he may not be 100% just yet.  Next week’s Raw has potential to be really bad, what with Vickie wrestling Trish and Snooki hosting the event, but I’m investing some faith into the WWE to not completely botch one of the last show’s before WrestleMania.  Don’t disappoint me, Vinnie Mac!