Raw Workrate Report 7/23/07 by S.L.L.

Raw Workrate Report 7/23/07
by S.L.L.

Alright, where was I?

WHAT WORKED:

-I'm trying to remember the last time they announced the next PPV's main event the night after the last PPV other than Wrestlemanias. It's probably way more recent than I'm giving it credit for, but that used to be standard business, and it really isn't anymore, because they run several trillion PPVs daily, and they need to cram the build to a feud, the announcement of the match, and the build to the match in the several seconds between them. Orton is a ready-made Cena opponent anyway, so I'm glad they just went with it.

-I kinda wish HHH would take a little more time healing up, as I'm really way more interested in seeing an extended Lawler/Booker feud than the HHH/Booker feud it's setting up. Serious Jerry is still a great micworker, and Booker is always aces on the stick. Jerry re-establishing what being the King was all about to him, how the recognition of your "kingdom" is more important than simply getting a crown by however method, is the kind of character work that I love to see in wrestling. Outside of the brief shining moment that was the "Vince goes crazy" angle, it's been eschewed for much of this year in favor of the 2002 ROH "Shawn won't follow the Code of Honor!" type booking and the interesting but frustratingly Russo-esque worked shootery of the "Vince goes boom" angle. In the wake of the Benoit murders forcing them to basically start from scratch, this sort of thing has been coming through a bit more, and I'm all in favor of it. I already have a pitch-perfect understanding of Festus Dalton's character, and he hasn't even stepped in the ring yet. So when you put King Booker - one of the current masters of the form - up against Jerry Lawler - one of the all-time masters of the form - it really gets me amped up to see Booker vs. Lawler. That, and Jerry Lawler wailing on Booker at the end of this bit. That dude can still punch like a motherfucker.

-Cena's lighthearted tormenting of Todd Grisham was amusing and served it's point.

-Contrary to what some dude wrote on the DVDVR message board, Sandman/Duggan vs. Carlito/Regal was not a MOTYC. It was still pretty good, though, so it has that going for it. Duggan looked more on point here than he has in a long, long time. His punches looked good, and well, it's Hacksaw, it's not like he does much other than play to the crowd and that, so he was 2 for 2 in terms of doing things he does well. This was pretty quick, so it's not like there was much time for anything to register with me, but no one fucked up, and everyone did just fine.

-When Lashley wants to really heinously kill dudes, he can. Carlito afforded us such an occasion. Far as I can tell, most of the dudes who praise Shelton Benjamin are dudes who bash Bobby Lashley. If you're going to praise Shelton on the basis of him being a guy who can run far and jump high, then Lashley's leap over the ringsteps pretty much means he's a million times better than Shelton, since it actually added to what he was doing as a wrestler. His powerslam was really mean looking, too. If only he could translate this kind of athletic badassedness into his matches.

-They say the best gimmicks are a natural extention of the wrestler using it. I'm surprised it took as long as it did to give Orton a "soulless walking nightmare" gimmick, but damned if he isn't great with it. With the castration of Edge's heel gimmick and the injury that followed it, Randy Orton really seems like the most viable top heel in the WWE right now. The stuff with the Rhodes' didn't light my world on fire the way it was probably supposed to. The match with Cody was a fine competitive squash, but nothing to write home about. But they did a fine job of setting up Orton as the heel that Cena needs to take down now, and I'm looking forward to watching that one play out.

-Two Workrate Reports, two London/Kendrick vs. WGTT matches. This one was better, as London came to play, and Kendrick eating death on that missed plancha was nasty looking. I may have to stop making fun of WGTT if they keep this up. They were real good in this match, too. No amateur stuff this time, but all their offense looked sharp, and Haas has a fine German Suplex.

-When something bad happens to Vince McMahon or the WWE as a whole, the usual way they deal with it is to create an angle or gimmick ridiculing it. Vince is accused of lewd acts in a tanning booth, they run an angle where Melina accuses Batista of raping her. Vince catches heat from the PTC, he creates Right to Censor. Their strategy this time is to avoid bringing up the situation at all, but there are hints of it creeping through, intentionally or otherwise. Here's the thing - in all of those situations, the on-screen stand-in for Vince/WWE is a face, and the accusor is a heel. But here, it's been just the opposite. Last Smackdown, they had MVP on commentary - a heel, mind you - going on an extended rant about how the media treats him unfairly, makes baseless accusations about him, is jealous of his successes, etc. Babyface Michael Cole deferred to his point, but they were pushed on him by a heel, and championed more enthusiastically by heel JBL. Here, babyface Candice Michelle goes to the primary management figure, heel Johnathan Coachman, and tells him she doesn't want to participate in a match because of the dangerous nature of it, and how she doesn't want to get hurt just because of management's petty rivalries. Management brushes off her legitimate concerns, and tries to distract her from her very real fears by appealing to her ego, talking about the significance of championships and high-profile matches. It was a fine segment, if for no other reason than I'm glad to see that horrendously abusing a woman is a heel move again, but it's kind of a weird trend I'm seeing. Maybe the trouble the WWE has with the media stems less from their incompetent PR department and more from Vince being the Catch Me Killer.

-The main event was a quick, angleriffic affair, but they did fine. Cena got beat on convincingly, Candice was a fine damsel in distress, Jeff Hardy wasn't afraid to totally wail on Umaga with chairshots, and the finish was pretty good, letting Cena beat all three of the other male champions without really making any of them look weak.

WHAT DIDN'T WORK:

-Man, I need to see some more Beth Phoenix matches. Well, not really. It would actually be a tremendous waste of my time. But I've got a kind of morbid curiosity. With Khali turning up the heat - at least within his ability to do so - Beth Phoenix might now be the shittiest wrestler on the WWE roster. It's not a sure thing. Snitsky's right around the corner, ready to strike. But she's down there. Most shitty Diva wrestling gives you the sense that you're watching non-wrestlers with a bare minimum of training trying to pull off things way beyond their abilities in a desperate, futile attempt to gain some crowd interest aside from "Hey! Look at my tits!". Beth doesn't give you that feeling. Beth gives you the feeling of someone who is a trained wrestler, and just isn't any good at it. She didn't push herself too far beyond her limitations, but her limitations aren't much different from, say, Maria, who at least appears to be making an effort. Not like anyone in this match was great, but Beth was really bad. Really, if people need to be fans of a clunky stiff with weak-looking strikes who's pushed mainly based on their size, not sure why anyone would rally behind Beth when Khali is right there. The fact that anyone at all was really excited about Beth's return to TV is really further proof that women's wrestling post-GAEA is for fetishists and fetishists alone. Incidentally, the Santino/Maria relationship continues to be adorable, but you can't tempt me with Regal and Umaga involvement and deliver Melina and Beth instead. That's just not cool.

-Snitsky broke a little boy's arm once, but he didn't care. It wasn't his arm. He just wanted to FEEL. Sorry. You can't go around aborting babies and expect me to care about your past as The Bad Seed. See, this is why Vince Russo had a sum total of one year as a viable wrestling booker. You can't go all out every time, because it becomes impossible to top yourself, and people stop caring. Snitsky made his TV debut by ABORTING LITA'S BABY ON LIVE TV. How is he supposed to follow that? It sure isn't going to be by wrestling.

-Jeff Hardy's been so consistently good lately, that it becomes kind of pointless to talk about him "looking like his old self", because that's how he looks pretty much all the time now. Which means that the period of the last couple of years where he was a sloppy, drugged-up fruitcake is now, in a manner of speaking, his new old self. And boy, did Jeff ever look like his new old self against Kennedy. Jeff botching the run up the ropes and landing on his head was a really ugly scene. Once that happened, it was like his confidence was gone. He was just missing everything. And while I'm not really as down on Kennedy as some people are, it's not like he's going to be carrying this one by himself. Still, Jeff was very, very close to crippling himself here, and with the best/worst possible timing, too. Jeff's improvement is remarkable, but he's still no company man.