Hey, at least you know that the McFamily suffered last night too. Tonight's Raw and all the wrestlers are going to wrestle or whatever, but that's not important right now. The important thing is you? How are you? Did you order the pay-per-view last night? If you did, I'd imagine you're pretty pissed off right now. Wanna talk about it? Go on. Let it all out. Nothing like kicking the new year off with a $35 stink bomb, eh? Well, sit up and don't get all worked up. The Game's the Champ, everyone's hurt, and Maven is still a jobber. All's as would be expected. Look at the bright side. WWE puts on better Raws than pay shows nowadays. Chances are, you'll like Raw even better. You decide. Here I'll tell you all about it…

Triple H is in the house and he's got the World Title on his shoulder. He asks us what the excuse is this time for his victory. Is it politics? Is it favoritism? (JG Note: Ummm, both? It's not a good idea for him to bring that up. I understand the point of having him win the Championship, but why call attention to the somewhat valid complaints? ) Either way, it's about an Elimination Chamber victory for Mr. H. It's about holding the gold ten times. In 2004everyone counted the Game out of the Game, but after he excelled in the movie game and book games and other games, so the game isn't over. Game, game, game, game, and in conclusion…game.

Ric Flair once again backs up his flat-ironed friend by informing us all that he's the best in the business. You see, beeeeing the man and staying the man are two different things. (JG Note: Now this is a strange statement. Ric defines being the "man" as being the "champion." If Triple H was good at "staying the man," then he wouldn't be a ten time champion. He's be a one time champion. It just seemed like a weird statement to make regarding a ten time benchmark. Based on the meaning, it's almost like jab at Trips. Ric didn't realize that?) Cut the chatter, Naitch. Trips doesn't need an endorsement from you to these people. These people aren't worth it. He proved himself last night and there's another person that did the same. Besides the H-Man, last night's most dominant destroyer just happened to be a member of Evolution. It just happened to be Hunter's "friend." Aww. He is the most dominant force in this business today….Batista!

Out steps Davey B and he's dressed up in his Miami Gigolo threads. He's here to date all the old ladies and play some shuffleboard with them. First he needs to step into the ring and stand by the Zach Morris to his A.C. Slater, Triple H. Their joining isn't long lasted though. Hunt held up Tista's arm and Randy Orton shows up to crash the party. No invitation. No gift. Nothing. Not even the ballerina twirl.

With a sullen look on his face, Randall stares at the ring and seems intent on something. He apologizes for interrupting Triple's love fest. It seems that you're just telling one side of the story. To this, Hunter sarcastically says, "Oh look, guys. It's the Legend Killer." (JG Note: When a heel makes fun of a baby face, I'm not supposed to be able to laugh along and agree with him. A part of me was like "Ha ha, Legendkiller, what a dope!" I doubt that's the reaction WWE would want.) Gamy then tells Mr. RKO that celebrations are for winners. However, Ort's a loser. Again, I'm just nodding here, Hunter. Well, that's just not true, contends the young Randy. In fact, he'll prove he's not a loser by showing how you didn't back up Batista when he needed your help! Huh? That's a pretty crappy response to someone that calls you a loser. "You're a loser!" Yeah? Yeah? Well, you're not a good friend! Ugh. Just to push this point, Randall says he's going to show some footage. What footage? Well, get this…it's footage from the pay-per-view. It's footage from the show that both Triple H and Dave headlined, but apparently hadn't seen yet and, when following the logic of this segment, never intended to. Game tries to leave without viewing the magic tape, but his Deacon stops him. We're gonna watch us a movie here, Mr. Levesque , and then we're gonna eat us some cookie dough. Now, stay put!

New Year's Revolution footage: Batista is RKOed by Randy Orton while Triple H just sort of hangs out in the corner. Batista is shocked. This is pretty stupid. What does it say about wrestlers when they don't even watch the bad pay-per-view they appeared on? If these guys were truly students of the game, Hunter and Tista would have watched this already. This isn't "exclusive" footage that didn't air. This was part of the damn show. At least give a reason why Dave didn't see this. Say he was partying all night. Say he was drunk after the match. Say he's Amish and doesn't own a TV. Say something. Anything. Nope. Nothing. He just plum forgot. Somehow, I guess Hunter was going to stop him from watching it forever.

Batista stares down his boss and the boss contends that he was hurting. That's why he couldn't help you. Yeah, that's the ticket. H was all sorts of messed up. Come on, kid. That's the truth. Randy again catches him in a lie by cueing up the footage from the match's conclusion.

New Year's Revolution footage #2: Batista and Triple H celebrate. Mr. Pantene doesn't look so hurt there. Trip is up on his "friend's" shoulder, much like Randy was. How long before the time comes for Mr. H to abandon you, Beastman? Again, Dave Batista is surprised. Again, it's disturbing that WWE doesn't pay Dave Batista enough to be able to afford pay-per-view. Orton offers to take care of this situation tonight. He demands a title match with the Game right here, right now! The crowd doesn't react all that much. Hmmm. He didn't do the ballerina twirl, so that can't be it.

April 12, 1998

Please, Satan! Please!

(JG Note: Thanks to reader Neal Greenberg for pointing out the resemblance Bisch now has to Burt. I always saw Eric as Billy Bob Thornton after a three month bender. They both work, though.) Fuzzy Wuzzy Eric Bischoff confronts all. Here's the deal, Hunter. That stip about Mr. Randy and your title is over. It's a new year. It's new rules. Orton deserves the chance to face you for the World Title! Crowd applauds politely. Also, according to Easy E, Batista deserves a shot too! Crowd pops bigger than they did for the Legend Killer. So, with that being said, Bisch decides to book…Randy Orton meeting Batista for the chance to get a title match. No big reaction with that at all. Ho-hum. Jim Ross screams "That's a main event! That's a main event!" Well actually, Jim, that was the opening match on Raw a month or two ago. Maybe that's why no one cheered. Maybe it's also because it appeared that WWE was going to give away a bigger match than this. They teased about four different match combinations and then delivered the most unexciting one. I understand that they can't give away a big match, but to get your audience's hopes up first segment in and then let them down is a bad move. Way to start the night.

Commercial Break. Learn to rap, become notorious, collect bling - Spike TV. No idea what they're trying to tell me here. Is it a hidden message. Should I follow these commands? Did everyone see this commercial or was this some sort of Field of Dreams "If you build it, they will come" message from Spike Lee TV to me?

Raw Press Conference Footage from Japan Shane McMahon announces to the members of the Japanese press that the show will be coming to us all from Japan for the first time ever. No one paid attention, though. After hearing of Shane-o's vanquishing of the Monster Kane, the reporters were too busy begging him to defend their country from Godzilla.

(1) Shelton Benjamin pinned Maven in a Royal Rumble Qualifying Match Are you kidding? They hold this match tonight? Holy God, are you kidding me? Did Maven become spectacular after a good night's sleep? I don't get it. It's almost an insult to the viewers that ordered your show. Not only that, but any momentum Mave may have had between his low-midcard baby face act to heel has been shot down. If you're going to turn a perennial midcard guy, you should protect him from jobbing too soon following his change of attitude. Now you have a lowermidcard heel Maven. What's the point? The match itself was passable and ended when Shelly B nailed the Tough Enough Champ with a T-Bone Suplex and scored the pin. The sad thing? Maven, even in jobbing, is still one of the most successful TE Champions. Says a lot, huh?

Still to come: Christy meets Maria in a Lingerie Pillow Fight and then Hunter's current friend faces Hunter's former friend for the right to fight him.

Commercial Break. I don't like the Royal Rumble Commercial one bit. It's just beyond stupid. The whole point of it is that Vince McMahon would have to be having a nightmare in order to put that bad on television, right? But he really put it on television. I've probably complained about this before, but for the life of me, I can't grasp the logic behind this.

Things have gone fairly well with Hassan and Daivari, right? OK, guys, how about this? We introduce…wait for it…Johnny Tsunami and his manager, Scott Petersin. Hah? Hah?

Wow. I…uh…

(2) Muhammed Hassan pinned Hurricane Helms after a Downward Spiral On the way to the ring, Hassan jaws with Jerry Lawler. JR tells us that although Hassan and Daivari are billed from Detroit, that doesn't make Detroit bad. Great. Now they have to worry about offending Detroit too. Ross makes special care to remind us all that Hassan and Daivari don’t represent all Arab-Americans. (JG Note: Probably because most Arab-Americans would have an easier time beating up Jerry Lawler.) In fact, these two have their own agenda. It's like a public service announcement. Don't hate Arab-Americans. We just need heels. Stay in school. I'm Jim Ross and that's one to grow on! The bad guys deliver an anti-media interview and Daivari speaks in dat dere foreign talk. When the Hurricane and Rosey finally do show up, it's all pretty elementary. Muhammed is new and Hurricane Helms doesn't win much. Assume the positions. 1,2,3. It's over. MuHa has wrestled two matches and he's already just another guy on the show. Splendid.

Commercial Break. Ice Cube has a new movie called, "Are We There Yet?" Craig from Friday is now playing the role of the goofy adult that the kids outsmart. God, I feel old.

Dave Batista's arms are the size of my head. He's sitting there, thinking about his place in life. Suddenly, Triple H enters the picture. He doesn't want Batista to think that he's against him. Look, Davey, the Game wants you to win tonight. He wants to face you. It's something you deserve. Awww. Everything gets all Hallmark Movie Channel, but quickly jumps back when Davey tells Hunter that, "Eventually we all get what we deserve." He hits him on the shoulder and there appears to be some trouble brewing round here. With Roscoe closing in, you have to wonder how them Duke boys will find their way out of this one...

Edge looks angry and lost backstage. If he finds the ring, he'll be going to it after the commercial.

Commercial Break. There's a Royal Rumble ad that hypes Heidenreich versus the Undertaker. They should have a big graphic on the screen that says, "Please order this anyway."

(3) Edge defeated Rhyno via submission Edge found the ring. In that ring, he found his punching bag. The loyal sunject of Jobville, Rhyno, took a beating from the rising heel and despite his Gore attempt, couldn't take it to the Canadian. The E-Man eventually landed a Spear of his own and then, with Rhyno down, Edge pulled his crossed legs up while digging his knee in his back. Not yet named, but painful looking, the Edgeman scores the win. Not much to this one at all.

Following the official word, Edgy appears angry. He's calling out Shawn Michaels, by God. He's doing it now. With a contorted look of rage, the Edgemeister stands his ground. Get out here, Shawn! Shawn! Shawn! Stella! Stelllll-aaaaaa! As we go to break, J.R. says that he's not even sure if HBK is here. Funny enough, with the way Raw does things lately, I wouldn't be surprised if he wasn't here.

Commercial Break. There's a movie called "Alone in the Dark." Who the hell would name their movie that? Talk about giving critics a stupid pun to use when trashing your movie. Even if you make a good movie, the critics would have to pan it just because you gave them such a great set-up. Alone in the Dark is more than a clever name, Roger. I was alone in the movies…which is dark because the lights are out! Ah ha ha! Oh ho ho.

We’re back and Edge seems to think that Shawn Michaels is the most selfish man in this business. He even lists all times that the Heartbreak Kid has screwed him out of glory. Man, I tell you, HBK has a thing for screwing those Canadians. I guess we all have our fetishes.

Of course, when there's a neighbor from the Great White North in the ring, Shawn can't help but show up. He does just that and gets right into the E-Man's face. He tries to deliver a speech about how Edgy bitches and moans too much, just like he used to do himself. Playing the role of step dad with a heart of gold, Michaels tries to impart some wisdom. However, before he can get too far into it, he's thrown off by a fairly loud "You Screwed Bret" chant. He stops and stares. Rather than turn the other cheek, Shawn deals with this situation post haste.

"You got some fellow Canadians*…What is it with you folks coming to Florida? Stay in your own country! If you think you're gonna ruffle the Heartbreak Kid, you got another thing coming! Don't mess with my TV time. I'm talking here!"
- Shawn Michaels, 9:59pm

* At this point, Edge tried to steer the conversation back to the point. Shawn stopped briefly and then turned back to the front row.

Kind of funny that HBK says he can't be ruffled, meanwhile he's clearly been ruffled. Anyway, the Ruffled Kid gives the big brother speech to the Canadian enemy. How does Edger respond? He hits Kid Heartbreak. The two brawl like crazy until they are separated by Johnny Ace, Dean Malenko, and a bunch of refs. See, Johnny? See? You don't have to come out and break up fights with the really tall guys! It's the small guys like this that give you problems. I see the light now. The bigger the better, by God!

Commercial Break. Skittles - Believe the Rainbow. OK. The Rainbow told me not to buy Skittles.

Michaels and Edge are beating the "holy hell" out of each other according to J.R. No pun intended, Boy Toy. Back in the arena, Simon Dean is here and business is about to get boring.

Simon starts selling his System again. You know what? I'm over all this. I can't believe how quickly this act got old. At first I dug the pre-tapes and concept. Now it's become apparent how thin this one-joke gimmick is. It's nothing against Simon Dean, he's done great with what he's been given. It just seems like there isn't too much character development that can be put into a character like this. He's Val Venis, the Godfather, Dean Douglas, and Reverend D-Von. He has an employment gimmick. From Trucker Norm to TL Hopper to Duke Drose to Repo Man and all the guys in between, gimmicks based on the one-note premise of the performer's career, which is inherently pretty stupid considering that the job of all these people is supposed to be wrestler, don't last long. At this rate, Dean will be used as the jobber they feed to Kane within a month. With that, Simon calls out a man in the back that is over 300 pounds and is known for wearing a mask. We all expect Rosey, but…oh no. Remember what I said about a month? Try two minutes.

Kane is here and he confronts Super Simon Nova. The two stand face to face and Dean feeds some Simon pills to the Big Red Machine. Apparently, the Monster isn't into supplements. He's much rather beat up the Body By Jake Guy. With punches and chops, all looks grim for Dino. The only weird thing is that it doesn't seem to make sense. The crowd is confused and it looks like Big Red is starting a feud with Bodydonna Simon. The crowd doesn't react much to Kane's presence and the announcers don't make it out to be a big deal. Talk about a flat moment. At least he's moved on. It's better than seeing him get the Big Red Pee beaten out of him by Gene Snitsky.

Cue Gene Snitsky

This is the feud that doesn't end. Yes, it goes on and on my friend. Some people started fighting it, not knowing what it was and they'll continue fighting it forever just because…This is the feud that doesn't end. Yes, it goes on and on my friend. Some people started fighting it, not knowing what it was and they'll continue fighting it forever just because…

Snitz shows up and pummels his Big Red Obsession with a chair. Once again, he causes bleeding from the Monster's mouth. As Kane lies in pain, Gene whips him with Simon's workout belt and leaves the scene. Content with his damage, Snitty smiles. It sure didn't take long for WWE to turn Simon Dean into an afterthought and the Monster Kane into a chump.

Commercial Break. Blockbuster announces the end of late fees! Wait, what? You're supposed to bring those tapes back?

Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler thank us all for ordering New Year's Revolution. I half-expect them to apologize.

Triple H and Ric Flair discuss ways to motivate Batista and prove their loving support. Hunter has a brainstorm. He tells Naitch to remind the Deacon of his poor record against Randy Orton. Confused, Ric questions the logic. However, Hunter says that Tista digs "negative reinforcement" and convinces him that it's a good idea. (JG Note: Convincing people that illogical things will be productive? It's like getting a glimpse into the writer's meetings.) OK, H. Slick Ric will do it. Flair believes him because he can't help but trust Hunter's loving stare. That's what I'm guessing. I mean, how brain-dead would you have to be to believe that. Also, shouldn't Ric know Batista just as well as Hunter? Shouldn't he know that he doesn't respond to "negative criticism?" How stupid is Ric Flair's character supposed to be if he plays into tricks like this? I feel like there's toddlers that would see through this ruse.

(4) Chris Jericho & Chris Benoit defeated Christian & Tyson Tomko when Jericho forced Tomko to submit This match is a good example of how Raw has started doing mix-and-match booking every week. There's nothing good about an undercard that consists of nothing more than cycling people through different opponents. We all like good match and they're fun and all that, but I'd like to see Christian settle into another feud rather than face guys he can put on a good match with. Tyson benefits from this match too. He's in there with three well-established guys and looks good by being associated with them. The only problem is that Tyson has been playing the same role forever. He's gone from being the bodyguard of the CLB and Trish to being Christian's weird friend. If they could get him a one-on-one conflict, he might seem less one-dimensional. Again the announcers tell us how much they love the Elimination Chamber. They don't mention the undercard though. Good move. The match itself was ok. Nothing too great, but better than what we've seen so far tonight. It definitely built throughout and ended when both Tyson and Sister Christian were locked in finishers. Benoit had Chrissy T in a Crossface and Y2J had Tomko in the Walls of Jericho. Ty tapped and JR hails the Crippler and Fozzy as Warriors. "Warrior" in the great wrestler-sense. Not "warrior" in the face-paint, right-wing sense.

Triple H is pacing when Ric Flair returns. Apparently things didn't go well with Batista. He didn't respond to the negative reinforcement, Champ. He's not in a good mood now. Tista damn near Powerbombed Slick Ric in the hallway. In fact, Davey doubts that Evolution even supports him anymore! Come on, H Cubed. Don’t'cha love your little Deacon? Don't be silly, Ric. Of course Gameboy loves his manservant. Tell you what, he'll prove it tonight. You show the world you love him, Hunter! You stand by your man! Oh, I'm getting verklempt…

Smackdown Rewind Paul Heyman is put to rest on Smackdown. To those fans that follow the newsletters and internet, it was a symbolic ending to a man that has been at odds with WWE's powers-that-be. To those fans that don't follow the newsletters and internet, it was the chubby bald ECW guy getting stuffed into a coffin.

Jerry Lawler has waited all night for the Lingerie Pillow Fight between Maria and Christy Hemme. It's next! (JG Note: If Jerry Lawler is so horny all the time, why wouldn't he just work in a strip club? What message does it send when your announcer is more excited about this than the wrestling matches? WWE pays him and he's not into it. Why should we spend any money?)

Commercial Break. Napoleon Dynamite is out on DVD. I haven't quoted a movie this much since Caddyshack. K'bye.

New Year's Revolution Recap: Lita gets hurt. That's starting to become her gimmick.

There's a bed in the ring and Lillian Garcia introduces Candace as the special ref for the Lingerie Pillow Fight.

(5) Christy defeated Maria in a Lingerie Pillow Fight Somehow reading about this isn't the same. Two women in lingerie rolled around with pillows. For five bucks you could see something like this live and get to participate. The crowd reacted OK. Then again, they were in the building. I'm watching this on television. Does anyone in charge there realize that fact? It's 2005, the world is at our fingertips. We don't need half-naked women on TV anymore. We can get fully naked women on TV now…and on the computer…and in magazines…and in clubs….and for a fee. There's countless places to find our libido fix. If we're watching wrestling, how about some good storylines and solid performances? Just a thought.

Randy Orton and Dave Batista are walking to the ring. Hopefully they'll take the bed out of it before they get there, otherwise this match will be somewhat awkward.

Commercial Break. M & M Bars are "Amazing." Yup. M & M's in a Chocolate Bar. Sounds like pretty mind-blowing stuff.

Vignette for Masterpiece Chris Masters I liked the video. Characters like this are always easy to work with. He's not really pigeonholed into a gimmick, but rather he has a persona. With so many of the gimmick-heavy newcomers (Kenzo, Muhammed, Simon), it'll be nice to see what they can do with Masters.

(6) Randy Orton pinned Batista with a roll-up Triple H and Ric Flair sat at ringside during this match. It just seemed predictable from the start. The agitated relationship; the inadvertent collision; the unfair loss - It was all verse-chorus-verse stuff and did nothing for a rivalry that could really cause an impact if presented well. The triangle between Hunter, Batista, and Orton can be played up so many ways, but instead sticks to this tired weekly exchange. I like the slow turn of Dave, I just think that WWE is doing less with it than they really can. The optimum thing to do here would be a double turn. Have Batista leave the group and bring back Randy Orton. Orton has shown that he's coming off like a forced baby face and the fans are ready to scoop up Davey B and carry him through the streets. Why not? Cut your losses. Instead things continue to seem forced. The highpoint of this match was the group of fans that loudly chanted, "You screwed Chyna" into the Game's ear. The finale was all expected in this situation. Tista went for the Powerbomb, but Orton reversed it into a DDT (JG Note: Like they do in the video games). Batista counters an RKO by slamming Randy into the ground. Ric Flair jumps on the apron to distract the ref on one side, while Trips brings his chair to the other. He holds it up and argues with Dave. Guess where this is going. Guess. Come on. You know. Ort comes from behind, pushes Davey into the chair, and pins him with a bad roll-up. Was it on purpose? Was it on accident? Therein lies the question.

Following our hero Randy Orton's latest lucky win, Batista stares at his "friend," Triple H. What was the meaning of all this? What could this be? Mother of mercy, could this be the end of Evolution? Don't lose sleep over it. We're out of time. Dave and Hunt have a staring contest as we fade to black.

All in all… The night started off on an under whelming note. In the first segment, there were a number of choices teased for the show's main event. WWE chose to go with the least exciting of the choices. They had to expect the crowd to be somewhat letdown by Batista-Orton in light of all the other options. Come to think of it, considering how they've known their audience lately, there's a good chance that they probably didn't expect it at all.

If they did, they wouldn't have put on Maven and Shelton tonight. I can't believe they had them wrestle tonight on Raw when they didn't run it last night on the pay show as advertised. It's not a good way to encourage fans to order your multiplying pay-per-views. Add that to the fact that all of last night's big moments were replayed tonight for free. It takes away the feeling that you missed something if you didn't order and takes away the satisfaction that you saw something special if you did.

Then there was Triple H's lame tricks to get under Batista's skin. It wasn't that I didn't dig the concept. I like the cold war. I like the drawn out conflict. I get it. The whole thing just seemed poorly written, though. Why wouldn't Tista have already seen the piece of footage Randy showed him from the match he wrestled last night? No explanation was given as to why Evolution, the students of this industry, didn't review their performances following an important match. Randy didn't have exclusive tape. He had tape from the show they were on! If the participants don't even watch it, why should we? After that we had Trips trying to psyche out his Evolution partner using reverse psychology that anyone on the planet besides Ric Flair would have picked up on. Even the closing moments of the final match seemed like more of the same old thing. As far as the slow turn of Tista, I like the concept. I just hate the execution.

Kane returns and immediately gets injured by the same guy in the same way. Why not call him the Big Red Girl? Even if he comes back to defeat Snitsky next week, there's still the image of him getting punked out twice by the person. Tonight was a bad night for the Monster and I can't imagine planning that segment without fathoming how counterproductive it is to Kane's character. Then again, this is Kane we're talking about here. I feel like they enjoy messing with his momentum. It's like a Raw writing team drinking game.

The highpoint was Edge's segment with Shawn Michaels. Had it not been for HBK stepping out of script and bashing the pro-Bret crowd, tonight's show would have had very little reason to be remembered. Edge's act has also grown by leaps and bounds. He's gone from unaccepted to bankable future commodity.

Simon Dean and Muhammed Hassan already feel played out. There was a Lingerie Pillow Fight. This was the type of show that you realize isn't good halfway through. You try to look back at something you really liked and can't pick out much. This show has been on cruise control for a while now. With the Road to WrestleMania starting soon, hopefully we could start moving things forward. God, I hope so.

I'll see you guys here next week with some more Raw Insanity. It'll be Chris Jericho versus Chris Benoit and Kane versus Gene Snitsky. Canada, hide your babies! Thanks for reading. Be Well.