RAW 6/11
Wow. That is about all I can say about last night's RAW, which changed the face of the company for what could be some time. They finally listened to the masses and got rid of the Mr.McMahon character, but of course did it in such an extreme way that I am sure we will see it again down the road. They also did the draft, and we ended up with 10 wrestlers changing brands, and other than Bobby Lashley coming back to RAW, the rest were mostly wrestlers that we could easily see move brands.
Let's start with the draft. The premise was that each match on the show was between two wrestlers from different brands, and whatever wrestler won the match, their brand would get a draft choice. The wrestlers that moved are as follows:
Khali from RAW to SmackDown
Boogeyman from SmackDown to ECW
King Booker from SmackDown to RAW
Chris Benoit from SmackDown to ECW
Torrie Wilson from RAW to SmackDown
Chris Masters from RAW to SmackDown
Bobby Lashley from ECW to RAW
Ric Flair from RAW to SmackDown
Snitsky from ECW to RAW
Mr.Kennedy from SmackDown to RAW
Most of the above picks were not exactly earth shattering, with just Booker, Benoit, Lashley, and Kennedy in my opinion being anything more than mid-card wrestlers. On the surface, to me SmackDown gets weaker, losing Boogeyman, Booker, Benoit, and Kenndy and adding Khali, Wilson, Masters and Flair. No question they will do some tweaking with that to make SmackDown better in some fashion in the next week or two. There is already word that more draft picks will come about Wednesday, however they do that is unknown.
As for RAW, the rich get richer if you will, as the premiere show on WWE gets better with Booker, Lashley, Snitsky and Kennedy. They lose Khali, Flair, Masters and Wilson, none of which are going to be missed all that much. As for ECW, they will need a new champion (Benoit?) since Lashley is leaving, and they also lose Snitsky to RAW, while gaining Benoit and Boogeyman.
The matches on the show were pretty good, with a hot start with Edge and Cena going at it, with Edge winning via countout to earn the right for the first pick, which was Khali. They also had a solid short match later in the night with Benoit and Lashley, and many thought it was a sign of things to come as Benoit then was drafted to ECW. Little did we know that would be Lashley's last ECW match, as he then was drafted later on to RAW.
The night also revolved around the Mr.McMahon Appreciation night, which saw tons of old wrestlers, announcers and managers talk about Vince. Just about everyone outside Bobby Heenen slammed Vince, including the shocking return of Bret Hart. Funny though in a way that Hart, along with Jesse Ventura looked like they either had aged a TON since we last saw them, or their interviews were done the moment they rolled out of bed.
Roddy Piper did a solid cut up on Vince, and it was good to see that he appears to be in good health. The other shock of the night is the wrestling return for Mick Foley, who will be a in "Championship Challenge" match for the WWE Title at Vengence with Cena, Booker, Orton, and Lashley. More tributes came from Dusty Rhodes, Gene Okerlund, Iron Shiek, Jimmy Snuka, Bob Costas, Donald Trump, Mark Cuban, and Snoop Dogg.
The 3-hour show ended with what I have been begging for recently, as a wacked out Vince came to the ring, and simply said - "Thank you." He then walked in the back, past tons of wrestlers and then even old ring announcer Howard Finkel and then old stooges Pat Patterson and Gerald Brisco. McMahon then strolled into his limo, which was waiting outside, only for it to blow up - therefore putting a fitting end to a character that has dominated WWE television for about the last 10 years.
Of course keeping with the storyline, WWE.com is acting as if the incident it real, and even quoting firefighters at the scene. Fret not, as all it is was a great way to write off a character that has been getting way too long in the tooth for too long. Hopefully the company will move on, and we won't have weeks upon weeks of Mr.McMahon tributes and updates on who bombed the limo. Frankly, who cares who did it, it was just a solid way to end the character.
