Thanks to Jon Robertson for sending in the following:
Hello, I attended last night’s WWE Raw World Tour show last night, and I wanted to give a review to you all. I’ll go match by match, and then follow up with an overview.
We got into the arena at around 6:45 when the doors opened. We wound up on the opposite side of where our seats were, so we just walked around to look at merchandise, which were mostly small stands with Cena Foam Fingers, hats, and wristbands, and a few other little things, with one huge stand on the Main Concourse with all the T-Shirts and jerseys. After we got some of the merch, we found our seats on the floor, in the fourth row on the end, which were very good seats. Justin Roberts was the ring announcer, and he welcomed us to the show, they played the National Anthem, and we began.
The first match was Mark Henry vs. Zack Ryder. It started off with Zack going outside the ring every time Mark went to tie up with him. That happened for about 3 minutes. Finally, when the match actually started, it was very short. Zack took out the knee of Mark Henry, only to go off the ropes into the World’s Strongest Slam for the 3 count. Even though it was short, it got the crowd fired up.
The next match was William Regal vs. The Great Khali. When Regal came out, he took his sweet time getting into the ring. He stood on the apron for a good 2 minutes straight while some fan was yelling at him. Once he finally did get in the ring, He took forever to take his coat thing off. He had to fold it and gently hand it to Justin Roberts. This match started the same way as the first one did, with William Regal going outside the ring to get away from Khali. One time, the boring chants hit heavily, and William Regal just stood there, smiling and nodding. Once he did get back into the ring, he tried to shake hands with Khali, in which Khali took his hand and put him into an armbar, or something, until Regal tried to hit him, which didn’t work. Khali then picked up Regal, hit the two handed choke slam, and then hit the chop to the head for the three count.
Next, both Bellas were out, looking hot, as they asked a very easy trivia question, like always, to someone so they could be the guest bell ringer for the next match. The question was, “What is the name of the next Pay-Per-View this Sunday?” Of course, the woman got it right, answering Money in the Bank, and got to sit ringside for the match.
Third Match was set for one fall, and it was for the Diva’s Championship. Eve was out first to a nice pop from the crowd, followed by Alicia, who had a few fans in the building, with the Diva’s Championship with her. They then announced the Special Guest referee, Santino Marella This was actually a very good match, with a couple of comedic spots with Santino. The finish came with Alicia doing the whole hurt leg act from Raw. Santino held Eve off, and when she did Alicia got up and did her little dancing taunt until Eve looked back over, so she went back to playing the angle. Alicia hit the scissor kick for the win after block the front flip of Eve’s.
The fourth Match was Evan Bourne vs. Edge in probably the match of the night, as far as wrestling is concerned. Momentum was back forth between the both of them the whole match. The ending came when Evan was going for a top rope Frankenstiener, but Edge slid off the rope and pushed Evan off, and Edge got the 3-count. I can see why they are pushing Evan Bourne, as his matches with Jericho on TV, and his match here with Edge were top-notch. Evan took a very hard bump at the end there. After the match, Edge was about to leave the ring, when he went to the corner and tried going for the spear, but Evan countered and hit the Shooting Star Press, which looks amazing in person.
Justin Roberts then did promos for Money in the Bank, WWE Merchandise, and the John Cena autographed pics. The Bellas came out and tried poorly to shoot T-shirts out of a shirt cannon, as none of them reached the upper level of the Metro Centre, which isn’t very hard to do, especially with a cannon.
After the intermission, we are treated to a Unified Tag Team Title match, between the now impressive Uso Brothers w/ Tamina, and the Hart Dynasty w/ Natalya. It was a very good tag team match between the two teams. I never thought much of the Uso Brothers until after this match. The Hart Dynasty is very good at keeping the crowd into it, rallying the fans, talking to them, getting the hot tags, and I feel they should stay face. The Hart Dynasty won with the Heart Attack to retain their titles.
Next match was a Triple Threat Match for the United States Championship. First out was the champion, The Miz, who cut a promo asking us if we thought we could beat him up, which of course, everyone said yes. Like Edge, The Miz talked about how bad Rockford is, in which I actually agree with him. He then states that he is one of the most dominate superstars in the in the locker room, “Because I’m The Miz… and I’m… No, you do not get to say my catchphrase! You need to shut your mouths, your not good enough to say my catchphrase, because I’m The miz… and I’m AAAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWEEE
And then it was time for the Main Event. First out was Sheamus to an enormous amount of boos, with the title proudly around his waist. There was a long pause between “Written in Their Face” and “My Time Was Now”, but once it hit, the roof blew off the place. There is no doubt that Rockford, Illinois is a Cena town. He came sprinting to the ring, threw his hat out, threw up the HLR sign, and did his sprint of the ropes. Before Justin Roberts could announce the opponents, the GM sound hits and out comes one of the Bellas again. Justin Roberts read off the card that was handed to him. It stated that the lumberjacks for the match would be Nexus. I marked out for that announcement; I’m a fan of this storyline, as well as the Nexus themselves. Out come the entire Nexus as they surround the ring, with only Barrett at the “ramp”. Sheamus was the first to get thrown out of the ring, and Nexus surrounded him with huge smiles on their faces, and beat the bloody heck out of him before throwing him back into the ring. They did this several times to both Sheamus and Cena. Cena and Sheamus both did their usual moves in this one. Towards the end of the match, Cena rolled outside, and Barrett told the rest of the Nexus not to beat him up. So Skip Shefield got the ringsteps and creamed Cena with them. They then rolled him into the ring for Sheamus to get the cover, put Cena kicked out. Sheamus tried to pick Cena up for that Celtric slam he does, but Cena hit the Attitude Adjustment on Sheamus instead, who kicked out. Sheamus then hit the kick on Cena, who kicked out. Cena then got Sheamus in the STFU, when the Nexus came in and just destroyed Cena. After a minute of beatdown, here comes all of the face superstars to fight off the Nexus which ended the show in a huge pop.
So there’s my review sorry it was so long, but there was a lot to talk about. Overall, it was probably the best show I’ve seen in person. It was even better than the ECW/Smackdown TV Taping from last year. I really enjoyed it, and I feel everyone else in Rockford did too. The only problem I had with it, is that Chris Jericho was advertised, but he never showed up. Randy Orton also did not make an appearance, which bummed me out, but they made up for it with a great show… 9/10 stars. Just a few side notes: I cheered for everyone… I mean it; I was all over the place in every match. I cheered every move, every entrance, everyone. I also yelled out Wade Barrett’s name, he looked over and nodded at me. I even yelled spear at Edge when he was in the corner closest to me, and he look at me like he was trying to say “Don’t cheer for me, I’m not supposed to be cheered for.”
Biggest Pops:
1. John Cena
2. The Hart Dynasty
3. John Morrison
Biggest Heat:
1. Sheamus
2. The Miz
3. Nexus
Biggest Tweener: Edge
Nick was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, and lived there until the age of 18, when he decided to pack his flack jacket and move to New York City.
