Like I said it wasn't over the line but it worries me because they have burned thru the safe shoot stuff.

The failed body builder dig made Punk look stupid. So Cena on a whim became more successful at something you have worked for your entire life? How does that make Cena look bad?

I feel the same way watching old territory footage where a guy gets called a washed up football player. It makes everyone look bad.

Super Dave went off the air 20 years ago. More people surely would have gotten Funkman over Super Dave at this point.

It's probably a coin flip.

They can't mention Super Dave because he appeared on TNA once.

Hey, who first invented the term "five moves of doom"? I know that SKeith was the one to popularize it the widest, but I shudder to think that a line he created was actually spoken on Raw, especially in freakin' 2011.

I'll second that.

I'll blame Triple H. Bodybuilding is his "thing." He's a veritable Gordon Solie when he's doing commentary on the Mr. Olympia telecasts.

Punk mentioning that Cena's fans pee in their pajamas when he comes out got everyone involved in that segment to crack at least a smile. It also should be noted that Punk has pretty much turned face on his promos despite being matched up against Captain SuperBabyfaceMan. I guess you can argue how much of a percentage of fans watching every week are privvy to insider type stuff, but he's certainly tapped into a long ignored segment of the fanbase that is responding to what he's doing.

Is it really long ignored? The Rock has been murdering Cena over the past few months expressing similar sentiments. And even as far back as 2006, Kurt Angle and HHH used anti-Cena sentiment to fuel their face turns.

Triple H really made me laugh tonight during his opening promo. Something to the extent of he's the only man bigger than both world champions and the entire roster and that everyone is in his shadow or something. It was pretty surreal.

I don't recall him saying anything about being bigger than both WWE Champs. He did say that the special ref is a guy who lately has been casting a big shadow, ie: "throwing around his weight". And that would be him in his new role.

THIS

I think I heard about 9 people in the crowd pop

I thought the entire segment was great. It's not how I envisioned the Punk think going when this all started, but it felt like they at least have an idea where it's going now, unlike the last couple of weeks

Go back and watch it again....he said "this person" was bigger than both of them, but clearly in a tongue in cheek, "omg could it be HBK? OR TAKER??" "No, it's just me" kind of way." Going for the cheap laugh, also building up that he's an asshole who will turn heel sooner than later

At first I thought the finish of Summerslam would be Hunter helping Cena win and Cena turns heel and goes corporate. But they had Punk mention that in the closing seconds so I don't think that is happening. I still think Cena will win. Anyone else mark out for the Yahoo Serious reference?



I believe Scott started using the term in 1997 so yes that is terrifying




I love post retirement Bret

I enjoyed the contract signing last night but the Punk/Cena/HHH segments are way.....too.....long.

I'm usually someone who ff's through a lot of promos (especially when HHH is involved), but I was glued to that last segment.

I do agree that they're laying it on pretty thick with the hinting of HHH/Cena screwing Punk over to get the title off of him. It's the most interesting way to continue this, to me, though. I hope they don't pull one of those swerve for the sake of a swerve things.

Thanks. And I don't care if it's a body-building term, "skinny fat ass" is still stupid.

It's not two words. It's skinnyfat ass.

Oh. That's much better then.

I thought it was going to be Taker as guest referee.

That would be horrible. He'd make them look tiny, he can't easily drop down to the mat, and it makes no sense for him to be involved in a shooty political angle.

I agree, but it's not like Hunter's going to be doing any Tommy Young style sliding three counts here.

I figured they would do it to help the buyrate.

If they did Ref In Peace posters, it would be worth it.

I rescind my previous comment.

Undertaker's Dead Ref outfit would also probably be pretty funny.

So...did HHH officially announce the end of brand extension during his opening promo?

Didn't hear that. Did see that he hotshotted himself against Punk.

John

Us cynical "anti-WWE" guys fucking called it.

And yeah, it seems like the roster split was reconnected tonight.

And from the way it actually went down, what are you "cynical anti-WWE guys" going to claim when Punk goes over?

From Insider

Shouldn't Punk go over the "boss"?

John

Why the hell did they even announce the Nash match then? Do some kind of angle or something to get him out of it. Instead, they just do a random thing at the end of the show? They didn't even pull that off right. They had Cena's music way too loud, and you could barely hear what Punk and HHH were saying. The whole thing was just very, very poorly done.

It depends how it's done. Triple H knows full well how to work a match where he doesn't really put his opponent over despite doing the job.

I don't like this at all. Way, way too soon to do the match with HHH. At least with Nash they could have turned it into an Attitude era style backstage brawl/angle more than an actual match. As long as it was done well fans wouldn't feel ripped off, and it would probably come off better than a straight match. They could have even stuck Punk into the Cena-Del Rio match.

I can't believe they were dumb enough to get this far along into the angle and not have a green light on Nash. They should have known before SummerSlam. This is WCW/TNA level stupidity.

I'll wait and see how it plays out before I make that kind of judgment. My gut instinct was to not like it, but I'm not going to say it's stupid before I see where it goes.

It's pretty ridiculous (though not at all surprising) that they've taken a super hot program that could have carried them right through to Wrestlemania and pretty much hot shotted it in that you can't see the conclusion coming any later than Survivor Series. They are blowing the marquee match with just a couple of weeks notice on a completely minor PPV, and you have to assume the logical end to all this is HHH going over Punk at Hell in the Cell, given that it's his 'signature match' and all.

Really, they should have taken Punk off TV longer, but even then the program wasn't a disaster through Summerslam whereas ever since it has lost steam considerably. They could have done the Nash feud even with some sort of non-match at the next event (or morphed it into a handicap/tag match where Punk is searching for a partner all night, even bringing Cabana back for a one shot though that's more than a little fanciful), and then done some kind of multi-man match at Survivor Series, a final Punk/Cena at the final event of the year, a Rumble storyline that writes itself then a feud finally with Triple-H leading to the big match at Wrestlemania to co-headline with Rock/Cena, Undertaker v ? and the World Title match/matches, depending on whether they plan to merge them. Stacked card with a long build.

It's even more bizarre in an era where they don't mind having Christian and Randy Orton having a feud lasting six months, yet once they stumble onto something that is over, entertaining and fresh, it's veering quickly ahead to the end in just a couple of months.

I wonder what fun summer angle they screw up next year.

Raw was all kinds of shit last night.

Ziggler/Orton was fine, with a good second half, but whilst they made Ziggler look good in losing, who's to say (especially since he's going to be feuding with Swagger it seems) it's going to mean anything down the line.

The opening interview was bad on all counts. Punk came off really annoying and sophmoric. Nash was just bad. And then when Hunter leaves, these two guys who hate each other, with Hunter having to restrain Nash, they just stand there looking at one another. It must've looked even worse to the live crowd what with Orton coming out and then both guys just quietly leaving? Seriously, WTF.

Mark Henry shouldn't be backing down from the fight. How hard would it have been to have the faces duck a double clothesline, and bump him to the floor with a double shoulder block or something? Or better still have them duck but Christian grabs Cena's feet from the floor and Henry bump Sheamus again to give them more heat...

The "big announcement" was, as mentioned, poorly-mic'd, and wasn't even shown to the live crowd to pop (?).

Last night to me, felt like the first time C.M. Punk was using someone elses material. It just felt like the same old tired shit that John Cena does (which he did himself later too, can't resist those bad breath jokes!)

I know that Punk is really good. I know that he's a "smark darling" (for the last of a better phrase). But as a top babyface, how long until internet fans turn on him? When the WWE machine is behind a wrestler and basically saying "OK, cheer this guy." It makes it seem less "cool" and it sours some fans. Not just that, but how many different ways can Punk say "by the way, STEPHANIE MCMAHON~!" until people stop giving a fuck? Throw in the fake throwing up and it's heading off a cliff.

"Rack him."
-Jim Rome

John

So did Trip kill off the brand extension?

John

No, WWE Creative are too incompetent to book without the brand extension, according to Dave Meltzer. So they need that structure still in place for booking house shows in advance, even though the top guys will now appear on both shows.

edit: Wrong thread.

So the new stip for the Punk/HHH match now is HHH's COO spot is on the line. This angle has really started to suck the past couple of weeks.

So...anybody still want to defend this turkey?

COO HHH means no more of the mysterious RAW GM.

Calling it now: Nash runs in and costs Triple H his job, which leads to Mr. McMahon's return with John Laurinaitis as his toady.
Then, Kevin Nash forms a new NWO stable with The Miz and R-Truth and they feud with CM Punk/Triple H/John Cena into 2012.

The HHH/Punk segments Monday and Tuesday were awful. They made me hate wrestling and Punk in particular. Between those and the Impact taping I'm convinced talking is killing wrestling. They need to restructure the shows to have fifteen minutes of talking combined.

But that's kind of a problem too. Yes, the anonymous GM was dumb as hell, but if you're going to run a storyline for over a year, you might as well have it lead to something. For that matter, why does Teddy Long get to keep his job? It's yet another example of those who try to follow closely being punished by having their intelligence insulted.