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TNA Slammiversary IX was last night. Honestly, I can't even comment on the show because I missed most of it. The only notes to come out of the show were that Mr. Anderson beat Sting to become the new TNA World Champion with Eric Bischoff's assistance despite Anderson and Bischoff being enemies on TV leading up to the show. Kurt Angle beat Jeff Jarrett to seeminly end their feud. Bully Ray beat AJ Styles in a Last Man Standing match, easily the match of the night, although the finish was quite dumb. TNA will tape shows tonight and tomorrow. Their next PPV is July 10, Destination X, which will bring back the six sided ring for one night only. It's typical TNA that they have buried the X Division for the past few months, and now they are building an entire PPV around the X Division. TNA has been bad before, but they may be approaching an all time low.
Tonight is a three hour Raw being dubbed as WWE All Star Night to help promote their latest video game (which came out months ago, so this seems strange). The novelty of these "supershows" featuring guys from both Raw and Smackdown wore off long, long ago since guys switch brands seemingly every week. Instead, it usually leads to a long, drawn out show that really tries your patience and fails to keep viewers interested for 3+ straight hours.
It's also the start of hell month for WWE writers. Here's their upcoming schedule:
- June 13 - 3 hour Raw
- June 14 - Smackdown
- June 19 - Capital Punishment
- June 20 - 3 hour Raw
- June 21 - Smackdown
- June 27 - 4 hour Raw (live Raw followed by taped Raw for July 4)
- June 28 - Smackdown
- June 29 - Smackdown (for July 8 )
Last week's Raw was a pretty terrible show. Early numbers show that Over The Limit may turn out to be the 2nd lowest buy rate of all time only behind December to Dismember. And based on the build for Capital Punishment, it's a strong possibility that the show will do worse. With a live 3 hour show tonight, and a live 3 hour Raw next week, what reason do fans have to shell out $45-$55 for an incredibly weak looking PPV? Granted, I am happy that Truth is in the main event taking on Cena, but there is not a single person in the WWE Universe that believes Cena is losing the title to Truth. Orton vs Christian will be a good match, but we've already seen it multiple times. And Miz vs Riley is a new match, but no one is paying $45 to see this match. And at this point I can't tell you any other matches for the show.
R-Truth has been a very entertaining character since turning heel. However, he's playing the role of a clown rather than a serious heel. He's been beaten up by Cena. He's run away from a family in the crowd. He's come out dressed up like a Civil War soldier. They've just done nothing to make us believe he has any chance of beating Cena, and thus, the match is selling no PPVs. I would say Truth needs to go over Cena strong tonight, laying him out, but I just don't see that happening. Cena will probably come out and joke about Truth. They'll have some type of match. Cena will dominate, and then Truth will get some type of garbage victory. And that will be what WWE thinks will make fans buy the PPV.
Steve Austin was the special guest referee during last week's main event between Cena/Riley and Truth/Miz. Austin got involved in the finish Stunning The Miz helping the faces to get the win. The Anonymous Raw GM dinged in and reversed Austin's decision for getting involved, now announcing Truth and Miz as the winners. Then inexplicably, the GM said that Austin would be the special guest GM for tonight's show. Why? Why not! I'm sure Austin will be fine, but it's just completely illogical.
The Miz burial continued last week as he was laid out by Austin and Cena. I'm not a big fan of Riley at this point, and I had always thought Riley was just being used to eventually help put Miz over, but if Miz is buried again tonight, simply getting a win at the PPV isn't going to help bring Miz back. Miz was horribly booked as champion, and he's being booked even worse now that he's dropped the belt.
CM Punk beat Rey Mysterio two weeks ago. Last Mysterio beat Punk. Do they go again tonight? Probably. That's fine, they have very good matches.
Kofi Kingston beat Zack Ryder. My guess is that is the only time we see Ryder in a match on Raw all year. Tonight's show is from Long Island, but considering the non-reaction Ryder got, I bet they punish him by keeping him off TV tonight.
Alberto Del Rio called out The Big Show last week which brought out Ricardo dressed as Show. You would have thought that the car injury angle would have kept Show out long term, but my guess is he's back tonight to set up a match for Capital Punishment.
Michael McGuillicutty, one half of the tag team champions, lost clean to Santino last week. Again, I would assume that this is setting up a McGuillicutty/Otunga vs Santino/Kozlov match at the PPV, but that match is absolute death.
