WWE RAW
June 22, 2009
Green Bay, WI
Commentators: Michael Cole & Jerry ?The King? Lawler
Reported By: Hunter Golden of WrestleView.com
Raw Owner Donald Trump’s music hit and he came out to the ramp. He put over the fact that this was the fan’s show and that unlike Vince, Trump said he was a giver.. not a taker. He’s giving all of the fans in attendance tonight a total refund for the purchase of their tickets.
John Cena came out to the ring after Trump was done and talked a little bit about the Miz and showed a highlight video of the Miz running his mouth. The Miz came out and said he did everything he could and Cena did absolutely nothing about it because he was a coward. Cena called him a coward for standing all the way up at the ramp. Miz came down to the ring, got in Cena’s face and called him a coward. Cena said he wouldn’t sock him in the face, but instead, he’d give him what he wanted, a pay per view match at the Bash pay per view on Sunday. Cena ran down Miz on the mic and said he wasn’t a reality star has-been, he was a WWE never-was. Miz cheap shotted him and ran off.
Vince McMahon was outside having limo problems just outside the arena. The limo driver suggested they drive to the arena. Vince was furious and made his driver carry him piggy back.
Jeff Hardy, The Great Khali & Rey Mysterio vs Edge, Chris Jericho & Dolph Ziggler
Khali began clubbing away at Ziggler in the corner, chopping away at him before Chris Jericho tagged in. Khali picked up Jericho and threw him across the ring and then clotheslined him to the outside of the ring before Edge and Ziggler tried to topple Khali in succession, but got thrown out themselves. Hardy launched himself into the crowd of heels on the outside before Rey used Khali to launch himself.
Khali actually attempted a dive of his own, but got cut off by Edge before he got the chance. Rey tagged in and set up Jericho for a 619, but Edge caught his feet. The heels worked over Rey briefly before Ziggler tagged in and Rey was able to wiggle away and tag Jeff Hardy. Jeff hit a face buster only before Edge cut him off with a spear. All hell broke loose before Rey hit an asai moonsault to the outside on Jericho and Edge & Khali cleared out to the floor. Hardy was left in the ring with Ziggler and he hit a twist of fate for the win.
Winners: Jeff Hardy, Great Khali and Rey Mysterio via pin fall
CM Punk entered the ring to raise Hardy’s hand. Hardy didn’t take to Punk trying to upstage him.
Vince is in the back. He’s trying to get into Donald’s office. Donald comes out and points out to Vince he owns the show and he and Vince have separate offices. He points to it down the hall. Santina Marella is there and Donald is disgusted. He says she’s fired. Santino (yup) chases after her then ponders how she had a good run.
Primo & Carlito Colon are in the ring making fun of Cody Rhodes & Ted Dibiase.
Primo Colon v. Cody Rhodes
Cody and Primo locked up and Primo grabbed a head scissors. Primo grabbed an arm bar before Cody fought him back with right hands. Primo slapped on a hammer lock and leveraged it enough to toss Cody into the corner. Rhodes fired back and eventually hit a bulldog for a two count.
Rhodes stomped away on Primo’s back and dropped a knee on his face before ejecting him over the top rope. Primo went to skin the cat, but Cody hit his hands and he fell to the outside. Rhodes slapped on a rear chin lock on Primo in the middle of the ring, before the crowd rallied Primo to his feet.
After some elbows, Primo hit a hurricanranna and a drop kick before hitting a clothesline and a back elbow for a two count. Primo looked for a jackknife cover but Cody kicked out and hit a huge boot to the face. Cody hit a side Russian leg sweep for a two count before Primo attempted roll up. Primo hit a high cross body but Rhodes rolled through with a handful of tights for the win.
Winner: Cody Rhodes via pin fall
Vince is walking through the locker room. He runs across Goldust and Hornswoggle, who put a whig on him to see if he thinks Donald would think this would be cool. Vince flipped and told them to get lost. He made his way back to the bathroom and saw it said ‘office’ on one of the stalls. Festus flushed the toilet and wlaked out and passed off a Wall Street Journal to Vince as he left.
WWE Championship
Last Man Standing
Triple H v. Randy Orton
Triple H went right after Orton and pounded him down in the corner before going over to the ring table and smashing his head off of it. Orton fled into the ring and tried to charge him but ended up eating a spine buster. Triple H loaded up a pedigree only for Orton to counter out and expel Triple H to the outside.
Triple H came up ginger on the leg and Orton zeroed in, but Triple H fought him off. The Game dropped him ribs-first on the guardrails and dumped him into the crowd. He pursued Orton in the crowd and began to slam him off the walls of the arena. He pounded Orton back down the aisle before Orton grabbed him and flipped him over the barricade, as Triple H has come up lame again. Orton began to attack the leg and kicked the stairs into it. He picked up the stairs and smashed Triple H in the head, and the referee started the count.
Orton kept pressure on the leg, and posted it before gathering a chair. Triple H ended up kicking the chair back into Orton’s face, giving himself some breathing room. As he gathered his wits and went to pursue Orton, Randy surprised him by charging him and the champion cold-cocked him with the chair. Triple H barely made it to his feet before Orton pounded him to his back. He cleared the announce table and placed Triple H on the table before setting him up for an RKO. Triple H countered with a low blow. The two traded blows before Orton finally hit the RKO.
Triple H BARELY made the ten count and Orton in disbelief charged him only to eat a back body drop and bounce off the table. Both men were down and fought to their feet before Triple H procured a TV monitor and smashed Orton in the head with it. Triple H fought Orton down the entrance ramp and threw him into the guardrails on the way down. Triple H was heavily favoring his leg as he walked up the ramp but was able to hit a spine buster. He hit a back body drop on the champion, who again, barely beat the count.
They fought on their knees around the ring entrance ramp and duked it out. Orton looked for an RKO but Triple H sent him into the crowd. He picked up a ladder and charged Orton but his leg gave out and he collided with a camera man. Orton zeroed in on the leg and began pelting it with stomps. He dragged Triple H onto the stage and put his leg in the ladder and kept on stomping away on it. Orton went to RKO Triple H off the ladder but Triple H pushed him off and hit a pedigree. Neither man answered the count of 10.
Winner: DRAW
Doctors assisted both men after the match..
The Miz is hitting on Maryse again. She says he’s going to have to do something worthwhile before she buys into it..
Donald Trump comes out to the ring to cut a promo. He’s starting to talk about a free Wrestlemania and having commercial free programming every week. Vince comes out and interrupts him and says he loses a lot of money out of all this. Trump tells him to shut it and said he can do whatever he wants, its his show now. Donald said he could double his money any time he wants to. Vince figures it out that he’s been screwed and tries desperately to give him some deals to buy the show back. Eventually Vince struck a deal and got slapped in the face. Eh.
Maryse, Rosa Mendez & Beth Phoenix v. Mickie James and The Bella Twins
Rosa and Mickie locked up as Rosa grabbed an arm wringer and exchanged some blows with Mickie before tagging in Nikki. Nikki hit a monkey flip and then Brie hit an elbow drop but, the heels were able to effectively distract the ref and isolate Brie.
Maryse tagged in and hit a tilt a whirl back breaker before slamming her face first to the mat. After mugging for the crowd a bit, she slapped on a camel clutch before tagging in Rosa. Rosa hit a snap mare before slapping on a rear chin lock of her own before Brie fought out of the hold and was able to sneak her way to a hot tag.
Mickie got the tag and cleaned house on the heels before covering Mickie for a two count. The Bellas hit a double drop kick before Rosa mugged Mickie from behind only to eat a Mick Kick. Three seconds later this is over.
Winners: Mickie James & The Bella Twins via pin fall
Big Show v. John Cena
The two exchanged blows that ended up in Big Show tumbling from the ring. He followed Big Show to the outside and the fought back into the ring before Show hit a spear to cut the oncoming Cena off. He stood on Cena and worked him around the ring until missing a frying pan chop. Cena tried to mount a comeback with some punches, but Show quickly put a stop to that and hit a front suplex on Cena, which sent him bouncing off the mat and under the bottom ropes.
Show kept up the pressure, hitting a body slam, a shot to the gut and a running bump butt. Cena staggered to his feet and Show looked for the running butt again, but missed and it allowed Cena to get rolling again. Cena began unloading rights and lefts, only to get flat backed with a back elbow. Big Show stood on Cena’s ribs along the apron area, before waiting for Cena to rise to his feet.
Show missed the big right hand only for Cena to fight back and floor Show with a shoulder block. He hit the top rope leg drop and set up for a five knuckle shuffle, only to eat a Big Show choke slam. Show hit a Vader bomb in the corner. He looked to finish things off with the camel clutch, only for Cena to wiggle out through the legs and slap on an STFU. The Miz showed up and Cena broke the hold to tend to him, knocking the youngster off the apron. He turned around in time to load Show up for an FU, but Miz hopped back up on the apron and pushed Show on top of Cena. Show rolled Cena over and pinned him for the win.
Winner: The Big Show via pin fall
Randy Orton was walking to his car, Triple H sneaked up from behind and slammed him in the trunk, telling him this Sunday they were heading to hell.
Show Thoughts— I miss commercial breaks.
Tonight’s show was certainly an enlightening one for me on a lot of levels, actually. On one hand, It makes me appreciate how good a tool the commercial break is artistically. It makes things far easier to soak in and poignant angles can really stick with someone when you want them to. On the other, it shows me how conditioned we become to the usual hum-drum that when its not there, we don’t really know how to react. It made this show interesting to say the least. While we had some pretty good wrestling and some good angles, they felt like they just ran into each other, and thus, dulled the effect they may have had. Overall though, the show ended up being pretty satisfying.
The Randy Orton-Triple H match was far and away their best match together. While I’m not a huge fan of their matches, that may not sound like I’m saying much, but Triple H deserves some sort of Academy Award for his selling tonight, which was beyond awesome. From how he limped, to the expressions on his face, to even not getting up with out something (a ladder, edge of the ramp, table, guard rail, stairs) to help raise him up. It was brilliant and far and away the best baby face performance of his career. Orton was good, but Triple H was brilliant and it certainly carried the day. That being said, this being a lead in match, its going to be hard to follow it up on Sunday, but regardless, we should get something interesting. I’m just glad to hopefully see this end on a somewhat positive note.
The Cena-Miz match is perhaps the best built feud of the entire year, with simple but effective promos from Miz driving things. The match up is a good one as well, as Cena particularly turns heads when he’s got a generational contemporary of sorts to guide towards the promised land so to speak. The good thing here is that the Miz is far better than Lashley, Khali or someone like that. If Cena could do what he did with those guys, be certain he could churn a good match out of Miz here.
The rest of the card was OK-ish enough. The Trump stuff… well, there isn’t a lot to say. It was pretty much a publicity stunt. While I was hoping for more, it didn’t turn out that way, but I really didn’t feel as if it was a waste of time, as its, well, not really my time being wasted and, uh, what we did get was entertaining enough for me. Regardless, there isn’t much to it other than that.
The rest of the card was a lot of fun. Nice to see how much more comfortable Khali looks in the ring these days. He was genuinely the best wrestler in his match tonight. He seems far more comfortable as a baby face and its nice to see guys, you know, actually try and work a match at him, as opposed to trying to make him run around and take bumps for them. The rebound chop spot is sick. He’s not even close to a super worker, probably not even average, but you’ve gotta give a dude credit where its due. On a sad note, there’ll be no more Santina, although its safe to say the gimmick ran its course.
All in all, I enjoyed the show tonight, KFC buckets and all.
Overall Grade: B+
Quick Results
Jeff Hardy, the Great Khali & Rey Mysterio def. Chris Jericho, Edge & Dolph Ziggler
Cody Rhodes def Primo Colon
Randy Orton vs Triple H ended in a DRAW
Mickie James & The Bella Twins def. Beth Phoenix, Rosa Mendez and Maryse
Big Show def. John Cena
Who’s Hot, Who’s Not?
Biggest Pops
1. Jeff Hardy
2. Triple H
3. John Cena
4. Rey Mysterio
Most Heat
1. Randy Orton
2. Big Show
3. The Miz
4. Edge
Match of the Night: Triple H v. Randy Orton, Last Man Standing ***1/2
Points
4 Points= World Title defense/win
3 Points= Singles PPV Win
2 Points= Tag PPV Win
2 Points= TV Singles Win
1 Point= TV Tag Win
0 Points= Loss
1. WWE Champion: Randy Orton 8-7-4, 21 pts. (Last Week: 1)— Decent enough tonight. Randy’s really yet to find consistency but the good has outweighed the bad by a lot more recently. The Triple H feud needs to be put to rest though, as at this point, its more than run its course.
United States Champion: Kofi Kingston 13-3, 24 points (Last Week: US Champion)— Not in action.
1. John Cena 13-9-3, 30 points. (Last Week: 1)— I’m looking more forward to the Sunday night match with the Miz than I have been any program he’s been in all year. Cena shines in matches where he’s given the responsibility of making the other dude look good and has pulled off some doozies in the past. The Miz is better already than half the loafs Cena’s had to drag in the past, so I’m remaining optimistic.
2. The Miz 1-2-2, 1 Points (Last Week: 3)–He stands to get a huge boost from this Cena match so long as it goes ok, which I think it will. His mic work has been phenominal, and having a guy like John Cena protect him in the ring will make him look that much more ready.
3. Triple H 2-3-1, 3 Point (Last Week: 5)— Tonight might have been his best performance in forever. His leg selling was absolutely phenomenal, from how he showed pain to how he even tried to get up. It was all there. I don’t buy that this guy is as good or as bad as people say he is, but tonight, he was really ‘on’.
4. MVP 4-3-1, 7 Points (Last Week: 2)— Not in action.
5. Big Show 3-5-0, 5 Points (Last Week: 8)— Show needed the win big time here and I’m really intrigued to see where they head with him from here on out…
6. Cody Rhodes 9-5-1, 12 points (Last Week: 6) — Cody’s offense looks a million times better these days. Decent little lead in match and hopefully we’ll see something interesting once Ted and Cody get going with their tag title run.
7.Ted Dibiase, Jr. 8-3-2, 9 Points (Last Week: 7)— Not in action.
8. Batista 8-4, 16 Points (Last Week: 4)— Injured
9. Matt Hardy 3-8-0, 4 Points (Last Week: 9) – – Not in action.
10. Santino Marella 4-2, 9 points (Last Week: 10)— Cute promo to put the kibosh on Santina, but other than that, a really quiet night for Santino.
OTHERS
Shawn Michaels 6-3, 10 pts. (Last Week: NR)
Carlito Colon 4-2-1, 5 Points (Last Week: NR)
Primo Colon 3-2-1, 3 Points (Last Week: NR)
William Regal, 3-10, 4 points (Last Week: NR )
Brian Kendrick 1-4-0, 2 Points (Last Week: NR)
Sim Snuka 1-0, 1 Point (Last Week: NR)
Hornswaggle 1-0-0, 1 Points (Last Week: NR)
Jerry Lawler 1-0, 1 points (Last Week: NR)
Goldust 2-1-0, 2 Points (Last Week: NR)
Festus 1-1-0, 1 Points (Last Week: NR)
Chavo Guererro 1-5-0, 1 Points (Last Week: NR)
Jamie Noble 0-3, 0 Points (Last Week: NR)
Jim Duggan 0-0, 0 points (Last Week: NR)
Kane 7-7, 12 Points DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN
Mike Knox 3-3 4 points (Last Week: DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN)
JTG 2-4, 2 points (Last Week: DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN)
Big Shaad 2-3 2 points (Last Week: DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN)
Charlie Haas 0-0, 0 points (Last Week: DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN)
Dolph Ziggler 0-3, 0 Points (Last Week: DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN)
CM Punk 9-7, 17 Points DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN
Rey Mysterio 11-6, 22 Points DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN
Chris Jericho 6-6 13 pts. DRAFTED TO SMACKDOWN
JBL 1-6, 4 points (Last Week: 7) RETIRED
Mr. Kennedy 1-0-0, 1 Points (Last Week: RELEASED)