Guest TSMAdmin Report post Posted June 19, 2003 Well folks, I recently managed to finally move the hell away from my old crappy ass apartment and move to a newer one that does not seem to have the same amount of cockroach infestation. And in doing so, I managed to sign myself up for some quality cable television service. Suffice to say, old Goodear now gets to take a look at WWE RAW for the first time in over three years. Now, being the contrary bastard that I am, I thought it might be fun to see the show that has been universally panned for a while now and see just how much the anger against certain WWE superstars with three letters for a name was coloring people’s view of the program. So last night, I sat down to see just what was the happening and made a horrible discovery. It was worse than the people were saying. Worse. Then people were saying. Worse. I was astounded. Now normally, the Internet can be a bit of a ruthless mistress that latches onto their favorites and their villains and goes from there. But looking at TNN last night, I can’t imagine who these favorites could even be on this show. There’s literally not a thing on RAW that’s actually worth watching. Oh sure you can point to Jericho and be all, “Oh wow, watch him call people Junior and mispronounce words!” but that really is not my cup of tea to be honest and hasn’t been for the last five or so years he’s been doing the same act. But I’m not here to complain about Jericho, I’m here to complain about the first thing I saw out of the RAW brand this week. Could that opening interview done anything even remotely more wrong in its execution and focus? Okay, Steve Austin and Eric Bischoff are cast as the co-general managers in an even more convoluted mess of the evil owner gimmick that just will not die. But instead of establishing that they simply have equal power and will be passing edicts against each other all the time, WWE instead institutes an angle where they have to agree with each other in order to make something happen. The problem is that it is already become apparent that Austin is never going to get put into a position where he gets suckered or even remotely shone up by Bischoff in a face-to-face situation. Can you even imagine the possibility of Austin’s jaw dropping at some Bischoff masterstroke or getting intimidated into doing something that he does not want to do? Quite frankly I cannot even consider that an option. This is going to be another one of those one-sided feuds where who is going over is stamped all over it. If for any other reason that Austin’s character has always been written in that manner. Next, Austin brings out the Intercontinental belt out of the mothballs because it was so important to him that he gave it away once because he didn’t want the damn thing. Then, just to tick me off, they highlight just why the belt was killed in the first place by having a battle royal with only former champions that reside on RAW taking part in it. Think about it. The belt was tossed out because it got passed around so much that no one got a lift out of winning the thing. So the first thing they do when it comes back is have a former champions only stipulation that precludes about four people on the roster from getting into the ring. Is seeing Lance Storm in the ring going to make people go man, this title is prestigious or man, who didn’t win this thing? Then to top it all off, the only actual active worker in the ring full of retired guys, general managers, and announcers gets buried. And I’m not one to say Chris Jericho winning a match by putting his feet on the ropes is burying him folks. But when Chief Morley gets beat up by announcer Jerry Lawler from interference from announcer Jim Ross, gets slapped around by Bischoff, and then fired … twice! … He’s a walking corpse looking for a place to die. Push your workers for the love of god! Have they done studies that show Jerry Lawler and Jim Ross are the most over guys in the company? Because they’re booked that strongly! Sure the act is over and all, but its never going to draw a pay-per-view buy rate and is at best, an extreme waste of time. Oh and they announced a main event no one cares about. But I don’t care enough to comment. The whole interview basically decided to stab me in the face repeatedly for deciding to tune into the show. Why did I continue to watch this garbage? Well, I told someone I would actually write an article about RAW so I could actually earn my keep for once on the staff. So I did that. So I guess in conclusion… Don’t watch this show. Read my archives. Send me email. Thank you, Mark Goodhart Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
