Well, what do you know, a Wrestling List being sent out. LOL. I have a special occasion for this one though. A live report. I attended WWE Raw in Nashville on Monday night and thought I would give some live thoughts on it. It was a full day of fun in Nashville including an autograph session, a visit to the Country Music Hall of Fame, and then over to Bridgestone Arena for Raw.
Let’s start in the earlier part of the day. AJ and Dolph Ziggler were signing autographs over at AutoMasters in Nashville. I actually found out about this the night before via AJ on Twitter. So, when I heard about this, I had to move the leave time up to make sure to not miss this. I’m a big AJ fan so I knew this was a must attend happening. The line went out of the doors and into the parking lot. I did get to meet AJ and Dolph and get my picture taken with them. Most of my conversation was directed at AJ of course. LOL. I thanked her for posting the appearance on Twitter saying I would have had no idea about it if she hadn’t posted anything about it. She immediately let out a big celebratory yay and was thrilled about it. She was joking too that she was glad that her posts were getting read. LOL. She was sweet as she could be and just a really fun meet and greet.
So, let’s move on to Raw. Pre-show notes. I love that WWE has their merchandise trailer outside now along with a TV playing WWE promotional pieces. It just helps fill the time. It also helps them sell merchandise obviously but watching those clips made the time go by faster. It felt like a tailgate party of sorts out there. Fun atmosphere. They taped two matches for Superstars which was Darren Young defeating Titus O’Neil. The second match was Divas champion, Kaitlyn defeating Natalya. We did the live teaser going on the air for the preview for Raw.
Then, it was time to go on the air. After the lights went out, the promo video ran for the night. I looked down and saw someone coming down the ramp in the dark and I knew that walk seeing that it was Paul Heyman. The lights came up a few seconds later and Paul Heyman was standing in the ring with a mic. Really good promo from him and the crowd was really eating it up. Even more so when CM Punk got out there. I really laughed at the line of “these people admire you” from Punk to Heyman and the crowd just booing their minds out. LOL. It cracked me up. Those two really had the crowd feeding out of their hands. The hug was hilarious especially with how long that it lasted. The basic idea of it was that Heyman was going to quit cause McMahon disliking Heyman was costing Punk. Later, there was a really funny moment as Heyman and Vickie were on the phone with Vince McMahon backstage. The added stipulation was made for the Elimination Chamber match between Rock and Punk. Heyman went on to try and make nice with Vince but then you just heard the dial tone. This got a big laugh in the arena. Next match was Great Khali with Hornswoggle and Natalya taking on Mark Henry. My first thought was what is Natalya doing with Khali cause I guess I assumed she was a heel taking on Kaitlyn earlier. Oh well. My next thought was how much do I zone out during Khali matches that I didn’t even know Natalya was hanging around him. I don’t watch Smackdown so that could be a problem in my knowledge of this too. LOL. I love watching the production crew such as them getting set to get that intimidating shot of Henry’s walk to the ring. Just little production things that I notice that probably no one else does. Henry wins and then destroys Hornswoggle too. Looks like they are building up Henry as a monster again. Next was the Chris Jericho/Booker T segment backstage and this got a lot of laughs including Jericho calling Bryan, “Daniel Beard” and also doing the seven time gimmick playing off of Booker T’s five time. So, we get Daniel Bryan and Chris Jericho in an awesome match. I haven’t watched the show so I don’t know what was cut out and left in cause of commercial breaks. Great back and forth. It cracks me up watching Bryan walk out and just look to the crowd and immediately say “noooo”. LOL. Lots of reversals between the walls of Jericho and the no lock. Jericho ends up pinning Bryan with a great looking codebreaker qualifying for the Elimination Chamber. Going into hour two was a squash set up if there ever was one. When they put the graphic up for Cena, Ryback, and Sheamus against 3MB, my first thought was 3MB are about to get fed big time. Big reaction to Sheamus, Ryback, and Cena. Just felt like a big time feel to the match with the crowd getting louder for everyone. The reaction to Cena was very positive. The boos were at a minimum all night. I expected a mixed crowd but it really was about 90% cheers for Cena from what I could tell. It was a squash as expected and the finish was cool with all three hitting finishers to win the match. Crowd was very into the match. The three called out The Shield. Big Show made it to the ring next and was set to be interviewed by Matt Striker. Instead of talking, Show just used his anger and knocked out Striker. The moment after with Show just standing there was really long in the arena making me wonder that surely Cole and Lawler were talking over this whole thing. Either that or they had went to commercial. They ran the Bruno Hall of Fame video up on the screen which got a lot of cheers from the crowd. Give all kudos to Triple H cause he got that thing done. He played peace maker and got it done. Those scars ran deep between Bruno and Vince so Triple H stepped up saying he wanted this to happen and got it all done. Zack Ryder was up next and you just tend to always know he is going to get fed to someone. It was to Jack Swagger who came out with a new manager, Zeb Coulter. I did not catch who Zeb was until some fans started yelling over in the next section about it being Dutch Mantell. Well, this will be interesting. Zeb is basically playing the character of someone who hates what this country has become. Swagger won the match and then Zeb got on the mic for a while. It will be interesting to see if this works. When Swagger suddenly showed up last week and got this dominating win and them talking about how this was a new Swagger, my eyes rolled immediately. Another one of those, let’s squash this guy for years and now let’s push him again. You can’t just have a guy get destroyed forever and then suddenly make him believable. Fans aren’t going to buy it and they have yet to figure that out. So, maybe putting Zeb with him will fix that problem and give him something fresh. We shall see. You could tell who the long time fans were in Nashville recognizing him and making comments. Next is Cody Rhodes against The Miz. Good reaction for the Miz and he was really playing up to the crowd putting his hand to his ear and all as he got in the ring. Antonio Cesaro was at ringside doing commentary. To the shock of no one, he got involved but it was awesome. Miz planted a good shot on him the first time that looked good from my seat. However, it ended in a DQ and then finished with Cesaro grabbing Miz by his legs and then just swinging him head first into the barrier over and over. One side to the other. It looked awesome live and had everyone groaning. I was thinking that this is the best thing Cesaro has done yet in WWE. Great stuff. Next was Brodus Clay and Tensai taking on Primo and Epico along with Rosa. I will say that I am not into the Brodus Clay gimmick but that entrance is fun live. The disco ball is lighting up the whole arena and it just looks awesome. Match finishes and then you have Naomi and Cameron getting involved with Rosa. My thought was maybe they want to have them do something here to possibly get them involved in the divas division in the future. Might as well cause they have barely anything going on there with the divas that keep leaving after their contracts are up wanting to do other things. The next segment was awesome. The Shield’s music hits. I was on an aisle seat in a good section wondering if they were about to walk down my aisle. They walked down one section over. Fun to watch all of us looking all over the arena seeing where they were coming from. The woman in our row came back from the concession stand and said they walked right by her out there. They call out Cena, Ryback, and Sheamus. So again, we are all looking all over the place. I was almost even with the walkway into the lobby area so I could see right at the curtain. I was looking back every five seconds to see if I saw security moving to get a clear line down for the three. It was really fun to watch everyone again looking everywhere seeing where they were going to come from. The lights go out and then come back on. All three are in the ring and the brawl is on. When they ended up brawling into the crowd, the fans lit up. It got loud in there and it was awesome to watch. They ended up brawling into the aisle one section over again. It was hard to see what was going on over there except for seeing it on the screen. The fans over there were going crazy as the faces all celebrated among them. It was a ton of fun. Next was World Champion, Alberto Del Rio defeating Damien Sandow. He did a promo afterwards. Fun to hear Rodriquez do the big announcement. Next was that pyro moment where you forget it is happening. You often forget some of the pyro routines when you are live even though you know them by heart on TV. Kofi Kingston comes out and I have my ears plugged for his pyro. First round goes off and I uncover my ears saying “I remembered that one”. Then, comes his second round on the stomp followed by me jumping saying “I forgot about that one”. LOL. Intercontinental Champion, Wade Barrett got the win on Kofi Kingston. Next was Kane taking on Dolph Zigger along with AJ and Big E Langston. Fun to see AJ and Dolph after just meeting them earlier. AJ and Langston got kicked out after interfering. Kane ended up getting the win. Solid match. Next was the moment we were all waiting for all night. The Rock. I was absolutely in on going to this show knowing that I would get to see The Rock probably one last time live. The crowd was standing during the break in anticipation of him walking out. His music hits and Bridgestone Arena goes crazy. Loud reaction for him and it got even louder as he walked on to the stage. Just awesome watching the reaction and the lights for his entrance. Music sounded awesome but every bit of music sounded awesome all night over that system. Fun to chant the “Finally” line again and also the ever fun Rocky chants. Rock goes into his story bit telling his story as a 15 year old living in Nashville which was hilarious. The crowd was eating it up and having a lot of fun. CM Punk ends up walking out and the two face off. The two go at it in the ring. Rock is about to hit the people’s elbow and then gets tripped by Heyman. That leads to the GTS from Punk leaving Rock laying. Punk takes the WWE title and walks up the ramp saying “story time is over”. That got a reaction from the Punk fans in attendance. I love both Rock and Punk so I was just enjoying watching it.
So, let’s get into the post show stuff cause there was great stuff in here. Rock was still getting up as Damien Sandow’s music hits. This guy is about to get fed too. LOL. Sandow rips on all the fans and also on Rock. Rock starts firing back with comments. He then tells to get their camera phones out cause in three seconds he is about to give Sandow something that everyone will want to capture. On three, Rock hits the Rock bottom and follows with a funny people’s elbow. Rock then celebrates walking around the ring greeting fans. As he gets to the ramp, John Cena’s music hits. Rock stops and watches the entrance. Rock and Cena come face to face with both acknowledging each other and the WrestleMania sign. Rock then gives a motion to Cena of “go ahead” toward the ring. Rock leaves and Cena enters the ring for the dark match. Ziggler, AJ, and Langston make their way to the ring while Cena’s music plays. We get a ten minute match between Cena and Ziggler that was really good. AJ and Langston again got kicked out of ringside for the second time in the night for interfering. Lot of back and forth reversals. False finishes and then a ref bump. Langston returns to ringside and nails Cena with his big finisher move that he does. Ref counts slow and then Cena is able to kick out which gets the arena roaring. Cena catches Ziggler off the top doing his roll through and picks him right up into the AA. Nails it and Cena gets the pinfall. Crowd goes crazy. Really good match to finish the show and the crowd was really into it.
Some other random notes through the night. Those three hour shows are long. When they announced the six man tag was next, I was thinking wow, is it just now 8:00? They always schedule big segments and matches as lead ins for ratings into the next hour. WWE does a good job of filling time in those breaks. They are constantly running videos up on the screen to watch, doing entrances during the break, or whatever else such as the show your signs break. They do a good job of filling that down time. My favorite sign might have been the cookie monster sign that said “feed me more”. I cracked up at that.
Overall, it was a really good show. Some solid matches in the mix of the show and it was a lot of fun to attend live. I’m really glad that I went. Great to meet AJ and Ziggler earlier in the day.
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