Raw Roundup: Truth Rising

Last night’s Raw opened with Jerry “The King” Lawler introducing Bret Hart to the Portland crowd.  Upon taking the microphone, Bret said “Hello Portland,” but it sounded an awful lot like “Al Borland.”  At any rate, Bret was in the middle of running down Michael Cole when he was interrupted by R-Truth.  Truth made his way down to the ring and berated Bret for caring about the fans.  With the help of Bret’s sunglasses, Truth demonstrated that he wasn’t capable of playing nice with the members of the WWE Universe, and said that all the mattered was winning and losing.  He demanded a title shot, which brought John Cena out to the ring.  There was some banter between Truth and Cena, including Truth’s proclamation that “Used to is a rooster from Brewster” and his yelling “I want my son back!” with no explanation whatsoever.  Mmm hmm.  The Raw GM beeped in with an announcement of the evening’s main event, R-Truth & CM Punk vs John Cena & Rey Mysterio with Bret Hart as the referee.

The main event didn’t do much in terms of story progression, but it did provide a feel good moment when John Cena and Rey Mysterio stood tall in the ring alongside Bret Hart following their victory.  Well, I guess it would be a feel good moment anyway, if I wasn’t so firmly entrenched in my support of CM Punk.  One night after delivering a big flying elbow as a tribute to Randy Savage, Punk rocked a very Randy ring attire on Raw.  He even hid behind the referee at one point, an homage to Savage’s classic hiding behind Miss Elizabeth.  He ended up locked in the Sharpshooter for his troubles, but there’s no denying that CM Punk carried the main event last night.  He spit some comedic gold at The Hitman during the bout as well; “Where’d you learn to count? Canada?” The rest of Raw, including the write off of the Cole Mine, Kharma’s breakdown, attempted vehicular homicide, and Drew McIntyre finally showing up, after the jump. 

• Praise and hallelujah, the Michael Cole era is over!  At about the midpoint of the show, Michael Cole made his way to ringside and apologized to Lawler for everything that’s transpired over the past few months.  He then had a seat at the table and called the action on Raw in a mostly unbiased fashion.  He showed some slight heel tendencies (pointing out how lovely Vickie Guerrero looked, rooting for Punk), but he was not his full-blown heel self.  Thank goodness it’s over.
• There are new Tag Team Champions in town, as David Otunga & Michael McGillicutty defeated Kane & The Big Show to win the titles with a little help from CM Punk.  The match was sufficient, Punk did some great commentary during it, and the Nexus have picked up wins in two consecutive weeks now.  Thumbs up on the titles changing on free TV, although it probably would have made more sense to have it occur at Over the Limit.
• Sandwiching the Tag Title match were segments featuring Kane, The Big Show, and Alberto Del Rio.  Before the match, Kane & Show were leaning on Alberto’s car backstage, which enraged the Mexican superstar.  After the match ended, Alberto Del Rio approached a frustrated Big Show backstage and slapped the taste out of his mouth.  An irate Show gave chase, and found himself with his leg pinned under Del Rio’s car.  The camera didn’t pick up what exactly happened, but Del Rio later claimed that he was not responsible for the accident.  He said that the Big Show deserved what he got, but it was all the fault of Ricardo Rodriguez.  I tip my hat to Show, who did an excellent job at selling the injuries.  It looks like Alberto will be entering into a feud with Kane prior to beginning his inevitable program with John Cena.
• The Miz cut a truly awesome promo blaming Alex Riley for all of his problems.  After he was denied a WWE Title rematch by the Raw General manager, his verbal lashing of Riley increased in intensity.  This was, in my opinion, one of the Miz’s best promos to date, and that is saying a lot.  He pushed Riley to his limit, and A-Ry eventually snapped, firing back with a flurry of punches to the Awesome One.  Riley took the Miz to task, beating him all over the ringside area.  Ripping the Miz’s suit to shreds, throwing him into the barricades, and eventually leaving him downed in the center of the ring, Alex Riley has officially put an end to the duo’s working relationship.  I’ll be interested to see if Riley gets a full-fledged feud with the Miz or if he just quietly transitions over to Smackdown.  Despite being uber-hated just minutes before, as soon as he launched his attack on The Miz, Alex Riley’s name began to be chanted by the Portland crowd.
• An 8-divas tag team match pitting Eve, Kelly Kelly, Gail Kim, & Beth Phoenix against The Bellas, Melina, and Maryse lasted all of a minute before Kharma’s music hit.  When the big newcomer plodded her way to the ring, the divas (both face and heel) formed a circle around her, readying their attack.  Kharma, rather than trying to make a victim of any of the divas, dropped to her knees in the center of the ring and began to weep.  She was talking to herself, and they’re obviously playing up an insanity angle.  So long as this is just to establish her as unstable and isn’t intended to portray her as some kind of tortured soul, I’m cool with this.  She’s got a feud with Kelly Kelly to wrap up first, but I’m looking forward to her eventual program with Beth Phoenix.
• Jack Swagger made short work of Evan Bourne, controlling him from bell to bell before scoring the pin after a Dominator.  Swagger took his victory laps after the bell, but Bourne kicked him in the head and ran off during his celebration.  Swagger works really well as a big, imposing heel, although to use him as such, he’s limited to facing a handful of guys small enough to make it work.  It was good seeing Bourne do something other than get beat on this week, even if he did so after being, well, beat on.
• Kofi Kingston retained his US Title against Drew McIntyre, who was making his first appearance since the draft brought him to Raw.  McIntyre dominated most of the match, and an apparent knee injury had Kofi in peril for the duration.  Having Kofi win despite the injury made McIntyre look weak, but hey, at least he was on TV.  Dolph Ziggler, sporting bleached blonde hair once again, was watching on a monitor backstage.  Ziggler might have finally found the right look with his short, platinum cut.  I guess he’ll be challenging Kingston for the United States Title sooner than later.
• There was a really, really, really dumb fake press conference with President Obama about Capitol Punishment.  It was pretty much a complete lift from the Coors Light commercials that feature post game footage of NFL coaches, except with poor editing.
• Lastly, Raw featured a really nice tribute video to Randy Savage.  Check it out when you can, it’s pretty good.

All in all, I really enjoyed this week’s Raw.  The main event was flat, but seeing Punk in his Macho Man tights made up for it.  Some stories, such as the Cole and Lawler feud, came to a much needed end, while others are just at their inception.  The Big Show / Alberto Del Rio debacle is an interesting conversation point, and I’m really curious to see where that goes, if anywhere.  Evan Bourne and Jack Swagger look to be starting a program, as do Kofi Kingston and Dolph Ziggler.  R-Truth continues to improve, and he’s quickly become one of WWE’s best heels.  If he’s not the next to challenge Cena, I’d be hard pressed to say who might be.  Kharma gained some depth last night, and we have new Tag Team Champions as well.  In addition to all of this, The Miz and Alex Riley were involved in a very impressive segment that will serve to kick off new chapters for both men.  This was one of the most eventful Raws in a long while.