The Miz and Jericho together? Holy heck!

Last night's Raw was one of the best of the year so far, and by far the best post-draft edition. You might be asking, “Wasn't the draft last week?” Well, yeah, but still. Several factors made Monday's Raw worth catching.

The foremost of these you can surmise from my picture selection, as my two favorite performers, The Miz and Chris Jericho, seem to be forming some sort of alliance. Both of them ranted about how horrible the WWE crowds are, and about the lack of respect they got from the Big Show. Given that both are the best guys the WWE has on the mic right now, a partnership – whether it be for the tag team belts or just a mutual admiration society – could give The Miz the proper rub he needs to challenge for the world title.

It seems like the initial angle will be Jericho and The Miz going after the tag belts, which are currently held by the Hart Foundation. It was hinted that the pair would use this to gain access to Smackdown, in an attempt to lure the Big Show into a fight. The exact details weren't revealed yet though.

However, there was plenty of other good stuff going on in the show. There were two Beat the Clock matches, featuring John Cena vs. Wade Barrett and Batista vs. Daniel Bryan. For once, the WWE let Bryan actually go for a bit, as he managed to score a near-submission on Batista with a submission hold. Batista broke it and won in about five minutes, but Cena won the overall challenge in 4:30, and thus gets to pick the stipulation for his PPV match with Batista. The seeds for a triple threat already seemed to be planted though, as Sheamus kicked Cena in the face before he could pick the stipulation.

Although it got absolutely no reaction from the crowd, Maryse had a decent win against one of the Bella twins. Similar to Randy Orton and The Miz and Jericho though, I think her heelish behavior (and ridiculously hot looks) will eventually get her over with the crowd. Unfortunately, the only decent competition for her is either buried in the division (Gail Kim) or on Smackdown (Beth Phoenix, Layla and Michelle McCool) or released (Mickie James).


Wayne Brady was decent as co-host, in that he wasn't a detriment to the proceedings. He even had a funny backstage skit with Santino, William Regal, Goldust and Vladimir Kozlov, of all people. A Santino-Kozlov pairing was teased, which is so odd that I definitely think it could work, similar to the old pairing of “Hacksaw” Jim Duggan and Nikali Volkoff.

However, the highlight of Brady's night was probably receiving an RKO from Randy Orton in the final, intense segment of Raw. Edge was hosting a segment of The Cutting Edge, and Brady invited himself to it because he wanted to meet Edge's guest, Randy Orton. Orton came down and RKOed Brady, and refused Edge's offer of teaming up again. The two fought for a bit, setting up a feud between the two for a bit, it seems.

All in all, there was a good amount of action on the show, and the cheese was kept to a minimum. If Raw can keep stringing together episodes like this one, it might be able to challenge Smackdown as the WWE's best show.

Grade: A-

Extreme Rules plays it by the book, but still entertaining

Catching up on recent WWE programming, starting with last night's Extreme Rules pay-per-view, before moving on to the three-hour Raw draft in a second post at 7 p.m tonight...

I thought the start of the PPV was great, with Sheamus beating the crap out of Triple H with a metal pipe. It was savage and brutal, which is a good idea for a PPV built upon the idea of all "extreme" matches. Of course, it wasn't surprising that Triple H was able to compete later in the show, but I was surprised they let Sheamus go over. I read after the show that Triple H has some neck damage and needs time off, so that was an effective way to get him off television for a while.

After the opening beatdown came the Miz and the Big Show, taunting the other wrestlers in the back. Teddy Long came out to argue with him, and once again, the Miz looked like a million bucks and a future champion. As a result of the Miz claiming he and Show were the greatest tag team of all-time, Long setup a three-tiered gauntlet for them.

The first team of R-Truth and John Morrison lasted the longest, although it was disappointing to see them lose after about seven minutes; both are guys who should be pushed at this point. MVP and Mark Henry were next, and not surprisingly, they lasted about two minutes. ShowMiz has beat them about 40 times the past couple months. And finally, the New Hart Foundation came out, with Bret Hart, and pinned the Miz after about 30 seconds. This earned them a title shot on Raw.

Outside of the tag matches, which were pretty solid, there were two highlights. First, CM Punk vs. Rey Mysterio was a great technical match. It was a quick pace and had a slew of near falls, before Punk finally got the upper hand with the help of an unknown assailant from under the ring. And the other strong match, not surprisingly, featured Edge beating Jericho in a steel cage match that felt like the blow-off to their feud. While I liked their Wrestlemania match a bit more, this was still a good match.

The rest of the card was kind of meh to me. Jack Swagger vs. Randy Orton featured some utterly sick usage of some trash cans - I have no idea how Swagger softened that blow, if at all. However, the finish had him going over clean, and although Orton hit an RKO after the match, I don't think the match really helped either wrestler that much.

Finally, the last man standing match between Batista and Cena was just OK. It wasn't actively putrid or anything, like a Great Khali match, but they have fought so many times now that anything they do seems like a rehash. The ending was sort of innovative, as Cena used duct tape to fasten Batista's legs around the ring post, preventing him from getting up. However, this wasn't entirely convincing to me, as it seemed like he could have gotten up.

Overall though, I thought this was a solid showing for the WWE. While there was no "oh my god!" moment on the show, none of the matches were complete wrestlecrap either. Even the "piss break" matches, like the women's championship and the strap match, were kept short and relatively brisk.

Grade: B+

All pictures from the photo galleries at WWE.com.