[CaptainCrunch]

Just some thoughts on Raw tonight.


The opening was gut wrenching, I might not like Roman Reigns the wrestling character, or the booking decisions behind him. But as a person, I wish him the absolute best and hope that he comes back to drive us to boo him with an over push because it means he's ok.


I don't know what the survival rate is on Leukemia in terms of people who have relapsed, which it sounds like Roman has. Just doing some looking, its significantly less then the first time around and the treatment is much more sucky. But here's hoping that he regains his health.


The announcement was so massive and heart wrenching that you saw the Shield pose with Seth Rollins barely able to keep it together. Renee and Corey Graves were breaking down. The announcement also sucked the life out of the crowd for most of the night.


With that emotional bomb they promptly roll out Bobby Lashley and his annoying manager Slick, no wait its Lio Rush. They put him up against the pretty much forgotten Finn Balor. While it was nice that Finn got the win, it further sucked the energy out of the building, and was just a bad decision after the opening.


Is there any doubt at all that Drew McIntyre is going to be pushed to the top of the card. The fact that he's the one man that doesn't fear the Monster among men and is going looking for him is kind of proof of that.


Ruby Riot vs Sasha Banks


Has any team been booked more into oblivion then the Riot Squad. Sadly Ruby and Sarah are extremely talented and Liv has the personality to be successful, but when you lose to the Bella's frankly you should retire, but more on that later. Amazingly they once again blathered on about Logan being a viking but this was a pretty flat match, and I get that the locker room is probably shaken. But the WWE when they bailed on the Sasha vs Bayley feud and put them back together it made Sasha flat and boring. I used to be a big fan of Banks and Bayley, but now they're just meh, and Sasha has major Flair disease in that everyone of her matches is the same.



A big solid who cares both of these groups are irrelevant.


Oh good DX comes out. You know when your dad hits his late mid life crisis and he decides to try to be cool. Maybe he grows a pony tail, and starts wearing jeans that look ridiculous and trades in his botton down shirt and starts calling your friends dog while doing awkward fist bumps. Well frankly that's DX, the gimmick doesn't work because they're middle aged dads and it feels like a mid life crisis thing. Even their quips come across as bad verbal fist bumps (don't leave me hangin son). Then it gets worse as the brothers of destruction roll out the same old line, we'll kill you and bury you here and you'll rest in peace. After watching UT and Triple H tip toe around in their last match, this is just one match that I'm not interested in. I also have to wonder how the voters feel about their mayor spending this much time wrestling.


Again after the emotional start to the show the WWE has really struggled to recapture a audience who's had the enthusiasm sucked out of them.


Is there anyone better on the Mic then Heyman? I'd say nope. You could see the emotion on Heyman's face as he talked about his respect for Reigns, then he positioned Lesnar as the obvious choice for carrying on that legacy. Then Braun comes down and puts over Roman and promises him a title shot. Then Drew comes out and absolutely murders Braun with a Claymore. As much as people believe that Braun is winning the belt. I'd say that there is a title run for Drew coming very quickly.


Are we seeing an Elias face turn? His confrontation with Baron was great, the match against Crews was kind of bland. But I like that they're Maggie Simpsoning Elias and not letting him get his songs out. I actually think that Elias is tremendously talented and the segment with him and KO was the segment of the year.


Holy crap Angle starts talking, I go outside for a smoke and come back in and he's still talking. Boring.


Ok, I get that they're trying to do the flip the switch Rhonda Rousey thing where she's all smiles and then a switch flips and she goes nuts. However you'd think the writers would be smart enough to have her come out angry over the betrayal by the Bellas. Speaking of which, I know that they're heels but heels don't have to be annoying and Nikki's promo work isn't good, its annoying and its the wrong kind of heat. Frankly putting Rhonda in the ring with Nikki is a massive mistake unless its a 50 second match. If Nikki keeps up with Rhonda after Rhonda destroyed Alexa its bad for her character. Another match that I don't want to see. I get that Rhonda is in training but Nikki isn't an opponent that can bail out Rhonda's mistakes. Can we move on to a Becky Lynch vs Rhonda arm bar vs Disarmer matchup please.



Female fatal four way. Ember Moon wins. I mean she's great technically but she has the personality of a brick, but this was pretty much a forgotten Nia Jax, Dana Brooks and Taminia Snuka (She still has a job why?) match that would have been better served on Main Event.



Trish Stratus, Lita segment. Poor Alexa is fighting a bunch of different injuries and the rumor is that Rhonda accidentally busted her nose and gave her a concussion during the live shows this weekend. I know a lot of people don't like Alexa, but I'm a fan of hers, but there's no one in the woman's division except for Becky that can keep up with a heel Alexa. They subbed Foxy in who looked like a monster compared to Trish and Lita and the brand of crazy just didn't work, in the end the heels took a beat down, and this suddenly became a less interesting match for me.


Dean Ambros and Seth vs Drew and Dolph.



This was actually a good little match and one final chance to energize the crowd and they did it with a win for Seth and Dean. This was supposed to be a feel good moment. But what happened next to me was a brilliant piece of booking. Some people are going to hate this opinion, but this is the first time in a long time that Vince showed an incredible piece of brilliant shock booking that made him so successful during the Attitude era. Just the look on the crowds face as Dean turned on Seth and destroyed him was brilliant and unexpected. How dare he some people will scream. The show must go on I say. Everything was brilliant right down to the kid screaming at Dean "Why Why Why" to the camera work in the crowd of the shocked faces, to the Dirty Deeds on the Concrete floor. The only problem I had with it was they took it too far in terms of showing Dean walking through the crowd and some fans giving him a thumbs up or a pat on the back. If they had ended it with some of the shocked faces and Dean staring down at Seth's corpse it would have been perfect.


As it is through some brilliant booking they instantly added a incredibly hot heel to the main event, and on top of it elevated Seth back to the main event where he belonged.


Out of a often emotionally drained and listless for a reason Raw, this sent the fans home entertained, angry and anxious to see what happened next.