The go-home show for Raw is from Brooklyn and predictably will feature many appearances from most of the part-timers who currently are the most over performers in the company. A week after Vince McMahon declared that the Undertaker must defeat Shane McMahon or else it would be his final WrestleMania match, it’s believed that the Undertaker will appear, possibly in a segment with Vince and Shane.
Roman Reigns got a strong push last week, jumping HHH in the parking garage on Raw, followed by laying out both Dudley Boyz on SmackDown. He proclaimed himself “The real authority,” something that HHH and Stephanie will likely have a rebuttal towards this evening. Chris Jericho will respond to A.J. Styles challenge for a WrestleMania match tonight. Dean Ambrose, Kevin Owens, Charlotte, Becky Lynch, Sasha Banks and the usual cast of characters are expected counting down to the biggest week of the year.
Our coverage starts at 8 ET.
The Big Takeaway: The go-home show for WrestleMania was a last ditch effort to get Roman Reigns over. And it failed. Possibly the biggest failure yet. In a stunning example of how out of touch the creative forces behind the company is, they had Eva Marie debut as a babyface mystery partner for a team in a ten-women tag at WrestleMania. Marie was greeted with a chorus of boos. The show was mainly promos with a scattered array of matches. Once again, the best match on the show featured Kevin Owens. There were some good segments trying to build various matches, but there’s no helping Reigns at this point. At least not as a babyface.
Show Recap:
The Undertaker started the show. He said this WrestleMania will not be his last, which threw cold water on the idea he would intentionally lose to Shane McMahon on Sunday. He said he’s made it clear to Vince McMahon that Shane’s blood will be on Vince’s hands, but Vince’s blood may be on his. He realizes that Shane will fight until his last breath, but WrestleMania was his yard, Hell in a Cell was his house, and Shane will rest in peace.
Shane came out and cut a promo from the ramp to a very good response. Not to sound like Bobby Hennan trying to get over a repackaged star in the 1980s, but he looks in the best shape of his life. Shane said he was the instrument of change in the WWE, while Undertaker was his father’s instrument of destruction. Shane said next Monday night, whatever was left in his body would crawl down to the ring, leave Hell in a Cell in his rear view mirror because all of the WWE fans deserve better and he will be in control of Monday Night Raw. If Shane had to cement his legacy by destroying the Undertaker’s legacy, that’s what he’ll have to do.
Undertaker told him he needs to watch his mouth because Shane doesn’t get to talk about his legacy. Shane got in the rign in Undertaker’s face, and this had a palpable buzz. Shane said Undertaker’s legacy died two years ago at WrestleMania. Crowd started chanting “Suplex City.” Undertaker said Shane was just like his old man, which figures, seeing how from the day he was born, he’s been his daddy’s bitch. Shane threw punches that backed Undertaker to the corner, but Undertaker threw Shane over the top rope.
Undertaker threw Shane into the barricade several times, then went to clear the table. Undertaker went to give him the Last Ride into the table, but Shane escaped and hit him across the head with a monitor, which Shane had to look hard to find, probably searching for the gimmicked monitor. Shane hit Undertaker with the monitor. As Undertaker was prone across the table, Shane lost his mind, climbed the top rope and jumped off the top with a diving elbow. Crowd went nuts as Shane his made to his feet. On relay, Shane may have only connected slightly on the elbow as Undertaker was laying too far away, but Shane’s vertical was amazing. Shane staggered his way to the back, but Undertaker rose up after selling for about a minute, then got up and gave Shane the throat slash as Shane watched on.
Zack Ryder defeated Chris Jericho (1:55)
Before the match, they aired a promo from the Raw preshow where Chris Jericho said he wouldn’t wrestle A.J. Styles at WrestleMania and he would beat Zack Ryder tonight. Styles came out before the match, doing more micwork than ever before saying he would get his match with Jericho and wouldn’t leave ringside until he did.
Jericho had Ryder in the Walls of Jericho when Styles started a “Y2 Jackass” chant, which got a better response this week. It was another distraction finish as Ryder pinned Jericho after a small package. Jericho became unglued, hitting Ryder with a Codebreaker. Jericho destroyed another monitor from the remains of the Undertaker-Shane brawl, then granted Styles his match at WrestleMania. He said this would be his 12th WrestleMania, but it would be Styles worst, and it would be the worst night of his life.
Charlotte (C) defeated Becky Lynch (6:32) in a nontitle match
Charlotte won after Becky Lynch chased her into the ring, but Ric Flair held Lynch’s boot long enough for Charlotte to kick Lynch and pin her with Natural Selection. Sasha Banks was at ringside just watching. Either they have no faith in her interview abilities or they didn’t have a headset available in the wreck that was ringside, but she didn’t say anything.
Vince McMahon did an interview with Rene Young. Vince said he wasn’t surprised at the brutality of the battle between the Undertaker and Shane earlier, but an angry Undertaker is the type of Undertaker he wants representing him. Shane walked in and cut a good promo on his father saying on Sunday, he would take 40 years of beatings and turn it around on his father. He said the irony of Sunday would be Vince stole the WWE from his father, and this Sunday Shane would take the company from his father.
Social Outcasts were in the ring. Curtis Axel got enough time to chime in “Happy birthday, Dad” to Curt Henning before the Big Show and Kane came out.
Kane and The Big Show defeated Curtis Axel, Bo Dallas, Adam Rose and Heath Slater by DQ (:28)
Bo Dallas, and Adam Rose ran in to attack Kane and Show. It led to Goldust, R-Truth, Konnor, Viktor, Damien Sandow, and a host of others for a preview of the Andre the Giant Battle Royal. It led to Show and Kane choke slamming Axel, Dallas, Rose and Slater at the same time. Kane choke slammed Show last week, but there was no show of malice between the two this week.
Stephanie McMahon and HHH came out. Stephanie told the fans to get down on their knees and grovel to the king, HHH. Then HHH said none of the fans will ever have the ability to make their dreams a reality, but Roman Reigns did. He’s one in a million, someone who could turn his dreams into a reality. Crowd started to boo the mention of Reigns quite heavily. HHH said Reigns became WWE World Heavyweight Champion for 5:15. What about the reign that started after he beat Sheamus in December? HHH said Sunday would be his 20th WrestleMania, and he’s always obessesed with being the champion, and the fame, power and wealth that came with it. He became the greatest WWE Superstar of all time. After awhile, he was OK with putting on a suit and letting that fire die.
But when Reigns power bombed him on the table a few months ago, it relit his obession of being the champion. Reigns has already lost on Sunday when he re-lit the fire, which meant he would destroy Reigns’ dreams. HHH got minor cheers during his promo.
Stephanie took the microphone. Reigns came out to heavy boos. HHH stomped on him, but Reigns made a quick comeback and sent HHH packing. Reigns got booed big time as the last man standing and the crowd chanted “Roman sucks.” Reigns had a brief staredown with Stephanie before she took off. They teased Reigns spearing Stephanie, but even that couldn’t get the crowd on his side. It just gets worse for Reigns.
HHH and Stephanie were shown walking out. It sounded like HHH wanted to leave the building, but the microphones weren’t on. Usually, that means HHH gets his heat back before tonight ends.
The New Day came out to their best crowd response yet. They came out with Xavier Woods mentioning the official cereral for WrestleMania is “Booty-O’s,” which had it’s own graphic on the TitanTron. Kofi Kingston said the League of Nations would never have their cereal because no one wants to taste “Rusev’s Bulgarian Booty Flakes.” Big E. managed to pay tribute to Phife Dawg, which got a good response, saying “Can I kick it?”
Kofi Kingston defeated Alberto Del Rio (7:35)
Alberto Del Rio attempted the cross armbreaker, but Kingston turned it into an inside cradle for the pin. Highlights early included Del Rio being distracted by Woods playing the Mexican Hat Dance on the trombone. With New Day going over almost every week on League of Nations, I would anticipate a title switch on Sunday.
Postmatch, Jonathan Coachman came out to announce SportsCenter would be live in Dallas all week long. Then he pulled out a box of Booty-Os and started dancing, which Michael Cole deadpanned “Coach, no.” Coachman got mainly cheers, even though he was a heel for most of his run. Of course, he was among the people in the uneviable position of having to replace Jim Ross at one point.
They showed Joan Lunden as the recipient of the Warrior Award for this year’s WWE Hall of Fame.
Reigns started to do a promo with Young when Bubba Ray Dudley showed up challenging him to a fight backstage. Devon Dudley walked in. Reigns belted Bubba and Devon, but HHH predictably showed up to nail Reigns from behind and they all put the boots to him. Bubba threw him into a wall. The Dudleys left, and HHH told Reigns would never get the championship again. HHH placed the belt on a cart, then slammed Reigns’ head onto it to the sound of loud cheers in the background.
Kalisto (C) defeated Konnor (1:49) in a nontitle match
Kalisto won with Salida del Sol. Afterwards, Viktor ran in and took a Tornado DDT. Ryback came out and had a staredown with Kalisto, barked “Feed Me More” and left. Kalisto still isn’t over in the slightest.
Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman cmae out. Heyman said he serves as the advocate for the baddest beast on the planet today. Heyman said his job was to hype fans up for the fact they’re six days away from seeing a once-ever fighter do his thing, perform at a level that not one individual could ever achieve. However, there’s one goof, geek, lunatic that always strays away from the rule, who thinks he has what it takes to perform at the level of Lesnar, Dean Ambrose. Heyman gives Ambrose credit because he’s a lot smarter than a lot of people thinks. Heyman said Ambrose think that if he takes a UFC Heavyweight Champion out of his element in a street fight and use a weapon against him, it will mean bad news for Lenar. But Ambrose has to step into the ring against Lesnar, who is fully prepared to give Ambrose the defining WrestleMania moment of a lifetime. Heyman said Dr. Brock Lesnar would perform a colonoscopy with every one of those weapons on Ambrose. Heyman said he said it 2 years ago, and he will say it again: he started to announce Lesnar as the winner of the match when Ambrose came out with a wagon with his logo painted on the side.
Ambrose pulled a crowbar, a baseball bat, steel pipe, Mick Foley barbed wire baseball bat, a fire extinguisher, a chainsaw from Terry Funk, a kendo stick and a portion of the ring steps in the wagon, then simply hauled it to the bat without saying a word on the mic as Heyman watched on in concern. Lesnar watched with his standard stoic look.
It was announced that HHH would come out later for yet another interview segment with Stephanie. I guess 15 minutes earlier wasn’t enough.
Emma defeated Paige (2:52)
A segment that totally backfired. The Divas division is now being handled like an afterthought again. Instead of teasing her return a few weeks out, Emma just showed up tonight as a heel on Raw for the first time. She’s now part of a heel team called “Bad and Blond,” also comprised of Lana, Summer Rae, Naomi and Tamina. They’re wrestling Paige, Brie Bella, Natalya, Alicia Fox and a mystery partner at WrestleMania. All the teams were at ringside. Emma won after Tamina distracted the referee, and Lana came in and hit Paige with a barefooted kick.
This led to a brawl between the two groups. Then the mystery partner for the face team came out—Eva Marie. I rubbed my eyes in amazement. Vince McMahon thought she would get treated as this conquering babyface. The fans booed her more than Reigns. She might as well have been Donald Trump in Brooklyn for all this did for her. She cleaned house, but none of the babyfaces wanted anything to do with her. Apparently, getting under on your debut is contagious and they didn’t want any to get on them. The announcers didn’t explain why Eva Marie was so unpopular with her teammates, like they’ve never seen NXT before. Just a total cluster of a segment from people too out of touch to make a coherent decision about the current product. And you wonder why Bailey stays in NXT?
Truth approached Goldust backstage saying that he wouldn’t have his back in the Andre the Giant Battle Royal. Truth seems to think they’re tag team partners who have a tough decision to make when they square off in the battle royal. Goldust doesn’t understand what he’s talking about because they aren’t partners. Truth started to cry and blew his nose in Goldust’s handkerchief.
Snoop Dogg was named as the new inductee into the celebrity wing of the WWE Hall of Fame.
Sami Zayn, Dolph Ziggler and Sin Cara defeated Kevin Owens, Stardust and The Miz (21:17)
Sami Zayn pinned Kevin Owens after the Helluva Kick. This was a match featuring the six participants in the ladder match on Sunday for the Intercontiental Championship, so Owens didn’t want to be involved. He was more willing to let the participants to slug it out, refusing to tag in. After everyone hit their finishers on each other, Owens tagged in and tried to give Zayn the pop-up power bomb, but Zayn hit a dropkick. Miz and Stardust walked out on Owens before the finish. Crowd was big on Zayn early, but then they got bored and used the match to get themselves over. There was a thunderous chant for CM Punk, along with Rob Van Dam. and “This is Booty.” Then they chanted for New Day. Who would have imagined the most over regular babyfaces in the company would be Woods, Big E. and Kingston a year ago?
HHH and Stephanie came out for yet another promo to end the show. Stephanie started putting down the fans again saying more of what they said earlier about how fans lived their lives just like Reigns, and they always fail. Stephanie said HHH’s championship isn’t going anywhere, and neither are they. HHH said millions of dollars are at stake on Sunday, and people could take their morality and shove it.
Reigns came out again to no reaction at all. He limped outand punched Reigns in the nose, with Reigns selling it heavy from the pedigree on the steps a month ago. Reigns threw HHH into the barricade. Stephanie ordered a group of heels to come out and help HHH. with Rusev, Sheamus, Del Rio and Stardust coming out. Then the New Day, the Usos and Dolph Ziggler came out for a pull-apart. Reigns threw Miz over the announcer’s table, for some reason. HHH started to back off once a crowd formed between him and Reigns, then ran back to go after Reigns. Reigns responded by doing a tope onto a group of heels, including HHH. Bubba Ray made a catch of Reigns that would have made Andrew McCutchen proud. Fans chanted “You still suck.”
FINAL THOUGHTS:
Tonight was the final straw for a year’s worth of work. The verdict is in: Reigns is not the guy. He could have been. If he had kept the championship at Royal Rumble and carried it through to WrestleMania, there was a chance for him. But they’ve booked him poorly, putting him in a group of no-win situations. First by taking the championship from him at Royal Rumble, where HHH didn’t come off as a cowardly champion who backdoored his way to the title, instead stepping over others to get the belt, typical of his reputation. Then came Fast Lane, where he was the least favorite of the three men in the main event. At some point, Vince McMahon has to ask himself what exactly are the fans revolting against? Is it John Cena and Reigns as personalities? Or the company’s narrow view of what a top star should be? I think it’s the ladder. Now that the audience has dwindled, there’s a greater percentage of hardcore fans than in the 90s. Their mindset of who to get emotionally invested in is based on years of watching Ring of Honor, New Japan and other promotions. Inside the McMahon bubble, there’s a mentality that’s very different, as best shown tonight by somehow thinking Eva Marie would be greeted as the new Divas superstar. Instead, she was a target of scorn, the polar opposite of how the segment was geared. As WrestleMania season winds to a close, there are more questions than ever about how in touch the powers that be are with the people who watch their product, and the answers may not be pleasant.
