WWE Raw: The Royal Rumble Go-Home

January 19, 2016 6:44 AM - Season 24, Episode 19

Well... that happened.

They're really trying to sell that aaanything can happen at the Rumble, with Roman Reigns at the (gasp) #1 position (from which two people have already won, four if you count the #2 position, which is essentially the same), and the League of Nations and Wyatt Family and Brock Lesnar and Chris Jericho all representing at the end as legitimate threats.

(Yes, Chris Jericho. A guy who's never won a Rumble and who until this week was feuding with Xavier Woods' trombone.)

So we've got what is traditionally the most fun PPV of the year bogged down with the exact polar opposite of what it's supposed to be -- a chaotic festival of random violence, via the biggest push in wrestling history.

Royal Rumble match, Roman Reigns vs. 29 others for the World Championship -- Reigns enters at #1, no other numbers assigned yet. There's generally no way to call anything but the finish here, but the dirt sheets agree that the match has been written, the high spots practiced, and Reigns will walk out with the title. We can only hope that the 20-minute drive from Full Sail to the Amway Center won't be too high a bar to clear for some NXT stunt entries (or that the NXT-adjacent audience won't be mostly cheering for themselves).

Charlotte vs. Becky Lynch for the (sigh) Divas Championship -- Lynch is trying valiantly to save the Divas division from itself, but outsmarting the Nature Boy to do it? Eh. These two should be able to carry a good, hot match that the audience should appreciate.

The New Day vs. the Usos for the Tag Team Championship -- The Usos are back to be in every tag title match until one of them gets hurt. If the Rumble match needs the New Day to pep it up, this might be short and sweet; otherwise, it will presumably be a bog-standard face-in-peril-stretches-for-hot-tag match with Xavier Woods being entertaining on the sidelines.

Dean Ambrose vs. Kevin Owens for the Intercontinental Championship, Last Man Standing -- Brutality. Just... brutality, in a definite early Match of the Year candidate if they let these guys go (and if Ambrose wants it).

Alberto Del Rio vs. Kalisto for the United States Championship -- These two have worked well together when it wasn't a glorified squash (*cough*Smackdownrematch*cough*).

So that's it. Five title matches is your entire card (so far).

posted by Etrigan (25 comments total)

RIP "Iron" Mike Sharpe, Canada's greatest athlete. Cause of death was presumably forearm cancer.
posted by Etrigan at 6:48 AM on January 19, 2016

Oh gods, Triple H is the favorite to win the Rumble.
posted by Etrigan at 6:35 AM on January 21, 2016

I can't remember who, but someone on the internet complains every time the champ comes out first during intros to a title match. This Rumble will be their nightmare I guess, as the champ comes out then watch 29 competitors get slowly introduced over the course of 40 minutes.

Having the title on the line and having Roman be #1 ruins so many normal Royal Rumble possibilities that I can barely stand it. Also, Roman's entire thing is that he doesn't back down and always overcomes. How the shit is he going to do that? He won't roll out under the bottom rope and hang out with Saxton. He won't come down the ramp but refuse to enter the ring. He won't hide in a corner while 8 other men chaotically fight and seem to forget about him. They better never forget about him. If there isn't a competitor or 3 locked up with Roman literally all match it is going to strain my suspension of disbelief. He's the champ! Literally every entrant all match long should focus on him until he is eliminated. Ugh. I am so angry with the WWE for ruining what is my favorite match in my favorite ppv of the year.

All that said, if WWE booking decides to have everyone focus immediately on Roman and he's eliminated before entrant 10 comes down the ramp, I will eat so much crow and be amazed, and can you event imagine how great that would be?

I hope Owens and Ambrose are watching the Cactus Jack/HHH Streetfight from Royal Rumble 2000 for inspiration.
posted by jermsplan at 11:11 AM on January 22, 2016

sweet mother of god, the crowd has a "Heeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyy, we want some Saaaaaaandoooow!" cheer going during the preshow. Not that I disagree with their sentiment, but if the Full Sail crowd is in attendance tonight I'm concerned with how it will affect my overall enjoyment of the PPV. On the other hand, at least AJ will get a pop when he comes out.
posted by jermsplan at 4:40 PM on January 24, 2016

I can't remember who, but someone on the internet complains every time the champ comes out first during intros to a title match.

I don't complain, but I do seethe inwardly and wish some heel would call them out on it.
posted by Etrigan at 4:48 PM on January 24, 2016

Terrific curtain jerk match. KO might be the WWE's hardest working employee at this point. MVP for the match goes to either the luckiest random chair throw of all time or Ambrose's shirt (I promised Mrs. Jermsplan that his shirt would come off, going so far as to claim he must be buying tearaway shirts from somewhere...and then in a table filled match, it somehow stayed on)
posted by jermsplan at 5:33 PM on January 24, 2016

I am 100 percent over the Usos. They made a New Day match boring.
posted by Etrigan at 6:19 PM on January 24, 2016

I am 100% with you. They need to get out of the title picture for a bit. Let some other team be the face tag team of WWE.

For some reason I couldn't bring myself to get into the US Title match, though none of it looked particularly bad.

And now the Diva's match is the popcorn match? God damn it, WWE. Yay Diva's Revolution.
posted by jermsplan at 6:28 PM on January 24, 2016

(I'm watching alone at home, on the phone with long time WWE fan and best friend, and he told me he'd be back later, taking this match [the diva's match] to do some laundry, and "maybe I'll make myself some popcorn or hit the concession stand while I'm upstairs")
posted by jermsplan at 6:30 PM on January 24, 2016

I really enjoyed the Women's match. Rick was great. Charlotte and Becky were great. The future looks bright.
posted by jermsplan at 6:57 PM on January 24, 2016

BrianRobot, I will choose too believe you are right and the WWE put in long backstory packages to provide bathroom breaks. I'll have more thoughts tomorrow after I've slept on it (realistically, after I've watched the RAW fallout), but right now what I can say is that team Odd Entrants was significantly better than team Even Entrants, and yet I owe my buddy a bottle of Jack Daniels because #30 won. Damnit.
posted by jermsplan at 8:12 PM on January 24, 2016

Well, fuck that. I'm trying to think of a worse ending than Game Books Self As Champion, given the constraints they were under. All I can think of is "CM Punk and Daniel Bryan are #2 and #3, and Reigns eliminates them before #4 comes out", and that's not even an ending. I would have been happier with literally anyone else in the company, and that includes Jack Swagger.
posted by Etrigan at 8:14 PM on January 24, 2016

So the baby woke up at 2 in the goddamn morning, giving me more time to fume about how not only did Triple Ego book himself to win (because he's the Final Boss?!?), but he booked himself to eliminate Reigns as well. Heaven forfend aaanyone else get any heat. Dean could have done it just as a test to see how over he really is (unless they've realized that he's so over he doesn't even need a title, in which case why keep the white belt on him?).

Also, Sami but not Finn, with no NXT booking to explain it? Bo Dallas was the only former NXT champion with two functioning legs who was not in this Rumble.
posted by Etrigan at 11:44 PM on January 24, 2016

Oh, and how THE HELL is the end of that R-Truth moment not Kane pushing the ladder over to spill Truth to the floor? HOW DO YOU NOT DO THAT, MAGGLE?!?
posted by Etrigan at 11:51 PM on January 24, 2016

Who was the last person before AJ Styles to make a WWE debut with zero NXT time (not counting Sting)?
posted by Etrigan at 6:03 AM on January 26, 2016

Ambrose vs Owens was good, with a nice chaotic feel. Owens getting launched over the announce table into Cole and breaking his glasses was a unique way to start a match. The best bit was probably Owens getting thwacked with a steel chair and yelling "I hate you!" in response.

That match had a lot of great bits, but my favorite was when Owens was setting up tables and a ringside fan yelled "I feel like you're wasting your time right now".

I think the HHH win is pretty lame but not as terrible as a Reigns victory would have been. He was gone for half the match, with a goofy rule that Cole had to constantly keep telling us about.
posted by graventy at 7:43 AM on January 28, 2016 [1 favorite]

That match had a lot of great bits, but my favorite was when Owens was setting up tables and a ringside fan yelled "I feel like you're wasting your time right now".

That was literally the only thing my non-fan spouse (Rumble is the only PPV I have to watch live; mostly I catch up the next day at work) really reacted to all night. Mostly, just vague interest, but that line produced peals of laughter.
posted by Etrigan at 7:45 AM on January 28, 2016

unrelated to everything else, I had to buy one of these today: World's Greatest Director Of Operations Mug
posted by jermsplan at 9:05 AM on January 29, 2016 [1 favorite]

Ok, so having had a week to watch all the shows and think about it, I'm not upset about HHH winning the Royal Rumble, though I think the whole story could be written better. Honestly it doesn't bother me at all that an old show runner made himself champ, no like it's the first time that's happened, and I've always been a huge HHH mark, so whatever I guess. The thing that's a little frustrating to me is that what I'd really like to see is the end of the current Roman Reigns story arc, and this move does nothing to end it and in fact probably indicates it will continue for several more months before we can hope it would end. I'd love to see younger or newer faces in the title picture, but if we're still going to be stuck in the "Roman overcomes everything put in front of him" story for a few more chapters, I really don't mind one of those chapters being "The guy in charge decides to do things himself." If nothing else, that's usually a good shot to be the last chapter, right? Then we can start a new story of "Roman defends the belt against a huge number of deserving guys, but finally as the favorite and not the completely unbelievable underdog"?

Was it just me, or was King trying REALLY HARD to be a heel on Smackdown? For god's sake, he was arguing against Kalisto as US Champ making really borderline comments about why a luchadore shouldn't be US Champ WHILE DEFENDING HIS PREFERED GUY ALBERTO DEL RIO AND KALISTO TOOK ON NEVILLE. I could barely handle it. Incidentally, this match made me wonder what the argument is against resurrecting the Cruiserweight Championship, particularly with the glut of talent on NXT which is generally viewed as too small for the main roster.

Speaking of NXT, brianrobot is totally right, that match was great. I'd be down for a 5 week series of grudge matches where they go through all the combinations of 1v1 those teams can create followed by a payoff tag match, with plenty of ringside shenanigans. Maybe throw in a few bonus matches by finding a valet for American Alpha and go mixed tag, or have the first tag match ruined by Alexa so then we get yet another tag match where she's banned from ringside.
posted by jermsplan at 2:03 PM on February 1, 2016

Ha, brianrobot, when you put it like that I guess I was damning with faint praise more than I realized.

The Kalisto vs Neville match was pretty good, but may just make you wish it had been better. My feeling was that the first minute or so was really fun, both guys going full speed, offensive, not playing the ultimate underdog. Then there was a huge out of ring spot, followed by a lengthy recovery and a commercial break, and after commercial everything was slow, big spots with a big buildup, then a pretty decent finish. Still, it seems like the bookers see them as big spot machines, and the match kind of reflected that, whereas I feel like a 5 minutes match that was fast and furious like the start of this match would have been better overall.
posted by jermsplan at 7:29 AM on February 2, 2016

NXT was kind of interesting. I don't know if the normal crowd was out of town, or someone told them to STFU for once, or if they really were just too confused by the pacing of the matches to get into their normal obnoxious flow. Unknown Female vs Asuka was not the squash everyone was expecting, and the crowd sounded like a more typical small gym full of local wrestling fans. Then, Finn vs Creed opened with a long sequence of exchanged grapples and holds, and crowd again seemed unsure what to yell, if anything, and mostly sat in silence.

The Finn vs Creed match was really good, in my opinion, though it did annoy me in my (seemingly oldschool) view that they should protect Finishing Moves more than they do. Did Creed need to kick out of a top rope foot stomp to the back of the head? (On a technical note, was this move not a Coup de Gras because Creed wasn't lying on the mat? Is it actually a different move in the WWE's mind? Even the commentary team stumbled when calling that move.) Did Finn need to kick out of the gorilla press into standing moonsault? There wasn't even a title on the line, Creed isn't even #1 (or arguably 2 or 3) contender, why were these two kicking out of one another's signature moves?
posted by jermsplan at 7:35 AM on February 5, 2016

I don't know if the normal crowd was out of town, or someone told them to STFU for once, or if they really were just too confused by the pacing of the matches to get into their normal obnoxious flow.

That was apparently at the end of a long taping session.

Unknown Female vs Asuka was not the squash everyone was expecting

That was most-recent past NWA World Women's Champion Santana Garrett, who they really should just get around to signing.

There wasn't even a title on the line, Creed isn't even #1 (or arguably 2 or 3) contender, why were these two kicking out of one another's signature moves?

Agreed. This whole match was just weird, like Finn showed up at the tapings and they were like, "Oh, shit, you're here and we have nothing for you to do... um... I guess Apollo Crews isn't busy?" They had a few obvious options:
1) Crews wins, thereby tangling up the #1 contendership even more.
2) Baron Corbin runs in again to try to re-assert his contendership, thereby re-igniting a feud with Crews.
3) Bullet Club run-in, giving us weeks of "Is Finn Balor now a heel?" teasing.
4) Wreck two guys' finishers for no reason and end it like a midcard ROH match.
If it had been on Raw, I'd say "Of course, it'll be 4", but on NXT it was kind of the only surprising thing they could do.

American Alpha and Enzo & Cass are still so over I'm kind of surprised every time I get to the end of Raw and realize that I haven't seen them called up yet.
posted by Etrigan at 7:56 AM on February 5, 2016

(sheesh, I was really out to lunch, calling Crews Creed that many times)

Cool deal with Santana Garrett, meant no disrespect calling her Unknown Female. Hopefully we do get to see more of her after that performance.

I am also shocked that American Alpha, Enzo and Cass, and Blake and Murphy all haven't gotten called up yet. Particularly the two face teams, because for god's sake could that division use a new face team. I actually turned on MainEvent the other day, and Uso's music hit to open the show and I said "are you fucking kidding me!?" loudly enough that my wife asked what was wrong.
posted by jermsplan at 1:45 PM on February 5, 2016

And thus ends an era.
posted by Etrigan at 1:10 PM on February 8, 2016

In re NXT, Brandon Stroud reminds me why he's one of the all-time great recappers: "Sometimes I watch Lucha Underground and wonder why I bother with anything else, and then a dorky Minnesotan wristlock wizard shows up to piss off the New Jersey Calvin and Hobbes by ruining their hip-hop references."
posted by Etrigan at 10:58 AM on February 12, 2016