Every week I pray that someone in Stamford will grow a brain; I pray that someone will finally realize that for the Heat introduction, they just have orange lines circling the screen. How hard is to ask for some wrestling clips in a wrestling show opener? It may seem petty, it may seem trivial, it may seem downright childish of me to keep on, but what kind of tone does it send to new viewers of the show if you don’t even show any wrestling clips?
The Ladies’ Men Vs. Brad Bradley & Jaymin Oliveris
This was easily the best Ladies’ Men match I have seen yet which may not be much considering they have just had squashes on Heat, but they have had some fun matches with other teams on Raw. This one blows all their past tag team work out of the water though and it’s mostly because of the skill of the other team. The heel work done by Bradley and Oliveris was spectacular for such an infinitesimal match. You could tell each man really wanted to impress the audience and backstage gang and I think they did just that. They were using great heel tendencies like the thumb to the eye, going for the ropes, yelling obscenities, using the ref’s four-count for choking, and so much more. From there, the face-in-peril spot was great with Venis selling amazingly and Bradley/Oliveris cutting the ring in half and zooming in on choking Venis. The hot tag that followed was one of the better Viscera hot spots I’ve seen in a while, but I think it might be due largely to the fact that there was no Vis-agra which may just be the worst move today. To follow that up, Venis and Viscera did a nice splash spot that I enjoyed where they lined up both heels in the corner, shot Venis into them, and then Venis held them in the corner by standing in front of them until Viscera came crashing down in all his glory. Some definite good work in this match. In the end, Venis hit the Money Drop as Viscera followed it up by giving Bradley a dose of VD and not the disease.
Winners: Val Venis & Viscera
Star Wrestler: Jayman Oliveris
The heel team was amazing tonight and it was mostly because of this guy. I think I would give the guy the award for simply stopping the Vis-agra, but as it fell, he had a lot of other great traits as well. He was getting the crowd riled up, using the coward gimmick well which is just characteristic of a good heel, and he followed it up with some great offense and cheating. Don’t get me wrong; Venis is a phenomenal worker, but in these type of matches, all he does is sell to set up for Viscera. Good stuff, but not enough to warrant the star wrestler unless the opposition sucks (which they normally do). This week though, Oliveris didn’t suck, not even close. He was on fire and definitely someone who should be in WWE soon.
Afterwards, the advertisement for the Shawn Michaels’ book comes on again. I got a chance to read a chapter of the book at the mall the other day and it pissed me off insurmountably. I love Shawn Michaels in the ring more than anyone, but the guy takes credit for practically every big idea WWF had in 1997. Where do you draw the line?
Lance Cade Vs. Tajiri
This was horrid. Man, I was bored out of my mind the whole time during it and as much as I hate to admit it, it’s solely because of Lance Cade. Lance Cade is someone I think is a very solid worker normally as are all the graduates of Shawn Michaels’s school (even Bio-Hazard), but here, he was just strictly dreadful. The offense was lacking, the heel mannerisms were way off-base, and the overall package and pace he tried to dictate were sleep-inducing. Now that Cade is out of the tag team with Murdoch, he’s got to be on WWE’s list for the next cuts and if he keeps having matches like these, I think it will make that decision come that much quicker and easier. The only good thing about the match was really Tajiri’s first comeback which just had some quick offense, placing, and timing. In a ten minute match, that’s all that was good. How sad is that? In the end, which was as drawn out as could be, Tajiri hit the Buzzsaw Kick to Cade to knock him out for the win.
Winner: Tajiri
Star Wrestler: Tajiri
Like I said, Cade was absolutely horrible. It was almost like he was trying to make it a comedy match, but was failing like Orton’s reign as champ last year. It was just a completely revolting effort by the normally solid worker. Tajiri was the one who picked up the match, even if for a minute. His offense was a breath of fresh air to break the slow/failed comedic pace that Cade was trying to get across and I just feel bad that one Tajiri’s last matches in WWE was literally that bad.
