NXT doesn't suck just yet! And Fatal Four-Way thoughts.

At the end of last night's Raw, it looked like the three-week NXT angle was in danger of jumping the shark. Vince McMahon was laughing in the ring with the seven wrestlers, triumphant in orchestrating yet another double-cross on one of his long-time enemies, Bret Hart. Frankly, McMahon as the ringleader of the group would have been trite and expected for his character.

Luckily though, the angle didn't end there. McMahon's laughter faded into nervous energy, and then, he was flattened by the crew he thought he controlled. I loved this part, as it established that the NXT wrestlers were going to play by their own rules, as opposed to McMahon's. They are currently being portrayed as a rogue faction in the WWE, one that can't be trusted, which I think is the right role for them to play. The next step will be getting them involved in some actual matches, as opposed to just eight-on-one beatdowns of wrestlers and ring personnel.

Raw saved what was a pretty lackluster fatal fourway PPV on Sunday night. While most of the undercard matches were good, the two main events left a lot to be desired. The Smackdown fatal four ended with Rey Mysterio as champion, which is a pretty lackluster result. I don't think most people take him seriously as a champion, not in a match that also had Big Show and CM Punk, both better choices for the belt.

I actually liked the ending of the Raw fatal four, with Sheamus getting a lucky victory out of the match. It would have been better booking for Edge to win that way, but hey, Sheamus has shown himself to be an opportunist in the past, and willing to cheat to get ahead. The match itself ran too short though, considering there wasn't a match over 15 minutes on the entire card, if I recall correctly.

Touching again on the undercard, The Miz was incredible with his rap slamming R-Truth, and his mannerisms throughout the match. He then got into it with Randy Orton the next night, which was awesome, although it only seemed to serve as a way to further the angle between Orton and Edge. Drew McIntyre also had a good match with Kofi Kingston, even if it was a rare reverse screw job on a heel.

Swagger, Punk and actual wrestling highlight Smackdown

Smackdown had three three really awesome segments last night, all of which contributed to its near-perfect show to me:

1) Swagger has really been getting over in recent weeks as a smarmy, arrogant heel, and this Friday's segment was the best one so far. He had a long, drawn out promo that featured him doing push-ups, exaggerating his past accomplishments, and showing off pictures of himself as a little kid and champion at that point. It was the perfect mixture of humor and cockiness for his character; the whole thing felt like something Jericho would have done in his prime.

He was finally interrupted by the Big Show, who predictably started breaking all of the various trophies and displays setup in the ring. This provided some neat visuals, as I think pretty much everyone has the basic urge to go King Kong on a bunch of stuff at various points in their life. I only hope that they let Swagger go over on the Big Show next week, since Show has been better than Swagger in each encounter so far.

2) The Straight Edge Society put a pretty savage beating on Rey Mysterio, furthering their angle. At first, Serena was dressed as the masked attacker and SES member, and Rey was about to hit her until she revealed herself. Then, the real masked man hit Rey from behind, drawing a DQ. However, the SES clearly got the best of the encounter, as they beat the snot out of Mysterio and forced him to pledge while he was unconscious.

3) The show also started out in intense fashion, as there was a good, 15-minute match between Kofi Kingston and Christian over the intercontinental title. Kofi eventually won with Trouble in Paradise after several near falls.

After the match though, Drew McIntyre came to the ring with a letter from Vince McMahon reinstating him, and restoring his title. I imagine this will lead to a feud between Kofi and Drew, which should be pretty good. For now though, next week will feature Drew vs. The Big Show, although I imagine Drew will back out of the match after a few minutes. The interaction between Kofi, Drew and Smackdown GM Teddy Long was really good.

The rest of the show was still pretty good, excluding a squash match between Shad and some local jobber. Surprisingly, there was a fluke title change - An already injured Beth Phoenix had a clash of heads with Michelle McCool, and Layla pinned her to win the title. I imagine this will lead to either McCool turning on Layla, or Phoenix quickly regaining the title whenever the two actually have a match. While Layla has improved in the ring, she isn't a good enough worker to be credible as a champion.

Grade: A+

Rocky roads for Miz, Morrison and Smackdown

On Friday's Smackdown, John Morrison got a clean win against Jack Swagger right before Swagger successfully defended his title at the Extreme Rules PPV. Since then, he lost in a tag team match against the Miz and the Big Show on Sunday, got beat clean by Swagger in a rematch on Raw, and then got drafted to Raw, which also picked up two former world champions - Chris Jericho and Edge - ensuring that it'll be easy for him to get lost in the shuffle.

So, yeah, I think the WWE's booking is still suspect for its main show. While the show opened up with a great tag team match, ShowMiz sure did dissolve quickly after they lost, with Show knocking the Miz out. I kind of wish they teased the break-up more, and with Show getting drafted to Smackdown, there is little chance that they'll feud now. I don't really know where this leaves the Miz either - While I'd like to see him drop the U.S. Belt and get involved in the world title picture, I doubt that the WWE will have Cena drop the belt to him.

Speaking of the title chase, despite Internet rumors, Batista is still seemingly employed by the WWE. There was talk that Extreme Rules would be his final show with the company, but in a minor upset, he came out on top in a triple threat match with Sheamus and Randy Orton for the No. 1 contender spot. I'm really, really hoping that there is a swerve coming before the next PPV, because Cena and Batista have fought about 500 times in the past two years, it seems.

Regarding the actual draft itself, the yearly hosing of Smackdown in terms of name performers continued. They lost Jericho, Edge, Morrison and R-Truth to Raw, and only got back Big Show, Kofi Kingston, Christian and Kelly Kelly. Smackdown at least got some good talent back in return, but Christian and Kingston aren't nearly as established with fans as Jericho and Edge; they're closer to the mid-card in the WWE hierarchy than serious title contenders.

R-Truth already provided the best moment of Monday's show in a backstage confrontation with Ted Jr. He noted that the current champion was looking for a "new Virgil", like his daddy had, and slapped Ted across the face.

And hey, brace yourself fool! Who's hosting next week? It's Wayne Brady bitch! Hopefully he won't have to choke a bitch.

Grade: C-

The Monday night Raw doldrums

Unrelated to the rest of this post but always important to mention - Chris Jericho is the man.

I shamefully enjoy professional (fake) wrestling, which normally surprises others and forces me to mount an awkward defense of my interest. Yes, it's fake, but so is everything on television. Yes, it's a bit like a soap opera, and yeah, it is kind of homoerotic that guys are clutching each other, and yes, that's weird. But there is something oddly entertaining about it to me, to the point where I've never really been able to stop, even when the programming is in a down cycle.

I think there is something primal in wrestling that gets pretty much every guy interested in it at some point. I was substituting for an elementary school gym class last week, and casually commented on a CM Punk shirt a kid was wearing. This was a bad decision from a class control standpoint, but good for me personally, because soon every kid was asking me about the wrestlers I knew and (somewhat comically, somewhat scarily) trying to put their friends into the Go To Sleep (you put the person up on your shoulders, then swing them down toward a knee to the face).

All the kids I knew growing up watched wrestling, but pretty much all of them dropped it as we got to middle school and high school. I didn't really advertise that I watched it, but it never came up in casual conversation, except for a few times when "Stone Cold" Steve Austin was fighting with The Rock and the corporation and Mick Foley (1998, 1999). From conversations in college, when I grew a little less ashamed about my habit, I found out that there weren't really many people watching it in secret like I was.

Enough with this trip down memory lane, though - The current product leaves something to be desired. The most pressing issue to me is what has happened to Monday Night Raw. This week's episode was OK, with a bloody, intense confrontation between Randy Orton and Ric Flair to hype up this Sunday's meeting between Orton and Batista. However, even the hilarious Santino Marella and a solid MVP-Kofi Kingston match couldn't keep the hour I watched from dragging a bit.

After the draft, it seemed like Raw would become the dominant brand, because of all the star power - HHH, Batista, Orton, HBK, The Big Show, John Cena - in the top tier. Oddly though, this has made most of the booking predictable. After a slight push to MVP, involving him in the Orton-HHH--Batista-McMahon family angle, he is back to the midcard, in a feud with the pedestrian William Regal and Matt Hardy. All of the big names force the WWE to book formulaically at top, since HHH and Batista and Orton aren't going to be losing often to the likes of MVP and Kofi Kingston.

Meanwhile, Smackdown and ECW lost a lot of their marquee talent, and both have been great since the draft. Because there aren't really any talent "tiers" on the shows, the only focus is on good angles and good matches. Both of the shows, and to a lesser extent Superstars, are normally my focus in a given week as opposed to the normal flagship, Raw.