Raw Recap: 8/25

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RAW, playa

Source: Theddt.com

Written by Doug Graham


WWE RAW
August 25, 2003

They're live from Tucson, Arizona and I love how SpikeTV plants an ad for RAW coming on Next instead of just letting the RAW broadcast begin. Good work boys, SpikeTV is going places.

Goldberg comes down to the ring to open up the broadcast. Instead of having Goldberg get a three move win over a wrestler, they allow for a mic to be placed in his hands. Goldberg rants and raves about how he wants Triple H and how he wants the Title.

Evolution's music pipes up and Trips comes out flanked by Ric Flair and Randy Orton. H grabs the mic and he says how he isn't going to give Goldberg a shot at the Title because he just defeated the five best guys in the company in the Elimination Chamber. They toss around the standard "you've got the belt, I want the belt, so I'm gonna be on your ass until you give me a shot at the belt" banter until Trips steps forward and let's Goldberg know that Goldy is pissing him off. And the rest of us.

Trips tells Gold that he'll put up the belt, but Goldberg has to put up his career. H then says that he isn't talking about Goldberg going to some "second rate promotion like Smackdown" when he loses. Trips gives Goldy some credit though, saying that he could run through Smackdown's "paper champion". It's about time they started developing some hate between the brands. It only took them a year and a half.

Goldberg spits out a few more words and in the hope that they will stick together as sentences. He succeeds, barely. Goldberg agrees to the match.

Trish Stratus is in the opening match of the night. Gail Kim attacks Trish in the aisleway. They have a match. I don't pay much attention. I think Trish gets the win. Molly comes down and lays Trish out as Trish goes to exit and then a fierce stardown between Molly and Gail. OK...so Molly just looked at Gail weird like, but someone needs to put some effort into making this show quality.

Theodore Long and Rodney Mack hit the ring and Long lets us know that he is expanding Thuggin' and Buggin' Enterprises. He's found someone who's going to earn his Player's Card tonight. He then says BAM! and snaps a buspass out of his pocket and to the air. He introduces Mark Henry and the only thing I smell is the return of Ahmed Johnson. It has to happen.

Henry and Mack are taking on the team of Mark Jindrak and Garrison Cade. Surprisingly, the white boys got in some offense. Rodney Mack was made to look like a bitch and Henry looked irritated before coming in to make one of the two opponents (like I know these fuckheads) his bitch. Henry gets a big time powerslam.

I'm feeling a Henry - Mack feud which is unfortunate, because T & B Ent. just needs a few more peices and they are THERE.

Storm and Goldust are in the back talking about Goldust sending him in the women's locker room last week. Goldust stutters a bit and Mini-Dust is humping Lance's leg. Rosie comes by and my first thought is "cool, let's turn Storm into a superhero", yea, it's no Blue Meanie, Stevie Richards and Nova joining the fray, but it would be entertaining nonetheless.

Rosie instead just asks Storm if he knows what the commotion is in the ring. Rosie goes up to some chick with a clipboard and headset and asks about said commotion. The broad mentions a guy with a gun and Rosie is off. Hurricane comes by and finds out that the guy with the gun in the ring is shooting T-Shirts to the crowd, but Rosie is off to save the day regardless.

They take a break and when they get back they show what happened during the break. Essentially Rosie knocking out the t-shirt gun guy and Hurricane coming out looking quite dismayed. We got the joke. No need to actually waste another two minutes of our time. Christ, now WWE is turning into the drunk guy who just doesn't know when to end a bit.

Terri is in the back with Stone Cold. Austin mentions how Bischoff and Coach provoked him at SummaSlam. Bischoff comes out and says that Austin wasn't provoked and that Coach is the Employee of the Month.

No word on whether Triple H had to be restrained and informed that it was only for storyline purposes.

La Resistance come down with some random guy, who has a name now, he's Rob Conway and even though he's American, he sees our flaws. He gets on the mic and winds up calling America the real terrorists in the World. They need to get Rob Conway a Canadian Beret. Not because it makes sense, but because they're hot items every time the Winter Olympics roll around.

Spike comes out as this is a six man tag non-extravaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaganza. Bubba Ray and D-Von slip in from the crowd like Tecmo Bo Jackson and the match is underway with a quick beatdown that revolves into two men for each team leaving the ring and finding the tag rope. They just love to fuck with my emotions, don't they? We can't have just ONE tag match where there are no tag ins? Please.

I like the way this feud is going. They've built it up slowly, and to me, it just keeps gaining steam.

I'm just waiting for the War Games style match in which they bring pseudo-Celebrities Janeane Garafolo to team with La Resistance and Joe Scarborough from MSNBC to team with the Dudleyz. Good times.

The Dudleyz hit the 3D on one of the Frenchmen, but shit gets chaotic and one of the other Frenchmen hits Bubba for the belt and the resistance gets the win.

Chris Jericho brings out Linda McMahon for the highlight reel. Linda says she thought about firing Bischoff, and then NO CHANCE, YOU'VE GOT, NO CHANCE IN HELL rings over the storied University of Arizona Wildcat Gymnasium. Vinnie Mac comes out and proceeds to talk about his life being in shambles. Mac calls himself the only Victim out there and that he let Bischoff into the house. Here comes the money. Dolla Dollas, can't Shane join Thuggin and Buggin Enterprises?

Shane rips into his pops and Jericho defends Vince. I'm sure looking forward to a Linda/Shane vs. Vince/Jericho match with Kane and RVD as special enforcers. Jericho says that Shane wasn't an invited guest and Jericho wops Shane with a mic. Jericho and Vince bounce out that peice and then Vince says that later tonight, it'll be Shane against Jericho.

Randy Orton takes on Maven. I tune in a little late and I understand Flair with Orton, but HBK is out with Maven. Four minutes of nothing and then Orton starts to mimmick HBKs actions. He hits the RKO and then picks Maven up aftera two count. He heads to the corner and warms up the band. HBK is watching this and is OBVIOUSLY pissed. Orton hits the worst Superkick ever and HBK looks more pissed.

Terri is with FunkMaster Flex who is hyping his new SpikeTV show that has stars like Lil Kim. He yells something to the extent of HOLLA AT YA' BOY! and it's the best RAW segment in weeks.

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Bischoff and Coachman come out. Bischoff presented Coach with the employee of the month award and Coachman went on a long rant, that I actually enjoyed. It was one of those weird times in my life where everything happening should have been terrible. There's no reason for Coach to cut a decent promo, but the guy did. Or maybe he didn't. Maybe it was terrible and I'm just PRAYING that this angle turns into Jim Ross off my television, but come on, can you blame me? Coach says Austin owes him an apology.

Christian comes out and Christian says how Austin owes him an apology for not putting him on the PPV. Stone Cold comes out with a manilla envelope. He says he has a sympathy card in there for Coach, puts his hand in to pull out the card and just comes up with the middle finger! SWERVE BABY! CRASH TV! OH YEA! King stands up from the broadcast position to become like the 100th person involved in this segment. Christian busts in with the line of the night, ah, fuck it, line of the year for this piss poor show, "Excuse me, Excuse me! Intercontinental Champion Talking!" Good thing they brought that belt back.

Oh yea, this all leads to Christian defending the IC Title against King.

That match begins and Coachman is with JR, which is the only good part of this match. Coach is pressing JR, who is trying to call the match. JR eventually says something about "dogs" to Coach and Coach responds by asking "why you gotta make this racial?" which tops Christian's line. God, the comedy in this segment is so great. BTW, fuck the match, Christian won, no shit.

I'm sure when they designed it they were going for the "we'll have Coach annoy JR while JR is trying to do his job as the BEST p by p guy in this business!" and it just came off as "wow, JR is trying to call moves in a match for the first time in months just because Coach is breathing down his neck."

Coach is backstage doing the overhyper thing and interviewing Christian. Coach sends it back to JR, but Austin comes out. Coachman against Lawler. Next Week. Hell in a Cell with a SCAFFOLD hanging above A BED OF NAILS and barbed wire replacing the ring ropes. Gonna be electric.

Shane McMahon and Chris Jericho to end the evening. Shane comes skipping out. They do some shit and then Shane Mac sets up Jericho on a little table outside of the ring. Before Shane can hit a big move, Kane's music hits, Shane gets distracted and Jericho goes on the attack as Kane doesn't come out. Commercial. Way to go aholes.

The best thing is that this commercial ends at oh, 10:59 and Slamball is hopping off da chain at 11:05 and JR decides to emphasize that they just TOOK THEIR LAST COMMERCIAL OF THE NIGHT. Thanks, jackass.

The match goes on some more, Jericho goes for a Lionsault and Shane gets the knees up. Kane's music hits again and here comes Kane. Kane chokeslams Shane and exits, but stands in the crowd until Shane comes to follow him. Shane runs after Kane throughout the backstage area and then to the outside.

Shane is outside and decides "hey, here's a ramp, maybe Kane left some tracks on it like a deer or rac²²²² or something" and looks down at the ramp. Kane jumps him and they fight their way up the ramp to a platform next to a dumpster. Kane knocks Shane down and then reveals like nine gas cans. He starts pouring gas in the dumpster, then just throws the gas cans in. He lights that bitch up and prepares to toss Shane in it. Shane fights out and tosses Kane into the flaming dumpster.

Shane then says something overly cheesy about Kane burning in hell to end the show.

Alright, I liked this show. I know, I know, the level of wrestling was down. There weren't any good matches. I've enjoyed maybe three matches from the past two months on RAW more than I have the TNA stuff I've seen and most of the CZW stuff I watch each week. That being said, I'm not expecting great matches week after week on RAW. If they floor me with great, innovative matches, then I'd praise the hell out of them and would love to see it.

Tonight they didn't do that, but I still liked the show because the "other stuff" was better than it has been. The other stuff meaning the Coach stuff kept my attention, I liked the Dudleyz/Resistance feud continuation, even the Vince/Linda marital problem stuff.

As for the ending...as it stands now, I like the ending just because it was completely different. They're trying something. Whether it works or not is still left to be seen. They might have backed themselves into a corner with Kane getting tossed into some flames, but I am curious about whether or not they can pull it off. If they do, good for them. If they don't, well, tonight's ending just becomes crap.