We start today’s news with the confirmation that wrestling legend and all-time great Scott
Hall, also known as Razor Ramon, has passed away at the age of 63.
Hall was on life support after suffering multiple heart attacks, however as confirmed by Kevin
Nash, once his family had gathered, they decided to take him off that life support.
Luke had a lovely roundup of his career in yesterday’s WrestleTalk News video, so I
would highly recommend going and watching that if you’re unfamiliar with why Hall
was a huge influence on the wrestling industry as a whole.
Rest in peace Scott Hall.
Hard work pays off, dreams come true.
Bad times don’t last, but bad guys do.
Unfortunately the news doesn’t get much lighter today, as we’re going to talk about
Big E’s awful neck injury that took place on last week’s episode of SmackDown.
A mis-timed Belly to Belly suplex saw Big E’s head crash down hard on the mat outside
the ring, forcing him to be stretchered away.
In an update video after the fact, E confirmed that his neck was in fact broken, but that
he could still move all his digits, which is always a good sign.
In a further update he posted later, E revealed that he wouldn’t be needing surgery, and
that his C1 and C6 vertebrae were fractured, but fortunately not displaced, and there was
no ligament damage and no spinal cord damage either.
While this seems like a very positive update, there unfortunately might be some negativity
to cloud it, as David Chao, who worked as the team doctor for the San Diego Chargers
for 16 years, and has previously worked as a consulting physician for WWE events and
performing surgery, has revealed that Big E’s in-ring career could be over.
Chao wrote an article about Big E’s scenario, specifically to the C1 and C6 fractures that
he sustained, shining some light on the situation, saying:
“The C1 fracture is most dangerous as the top cervical vertebrae is a ring and is commonly
associated with immediate death or complete paralysis.
Thankfully the fracture was not displaced and he will not need surgery.
However, this type of fracture often heals incompletely and it may mean the end of his
wrestling career.”
“The C6 fracture is likely a compression injury to the vertebral body.
This likely requires immobilization but not surgery.
One would anticipate a minimum of three-month recovery with return to full function and
activities for this lower cervical injury.”
It’s worth noting of course that Chao is not involved in Big E’s injury specifically,
has not seen any X-rays or test results or anything of the sort, so his information is
purely based off the general guidelines and knowledge surrounding these injury types,
however his expertise in the area does make him a credible source.
I just hope he’s wrong.
While there is an understandable amount of frustration and anger over Big E’s situation
as he’s such a beloved figure and people want to see him do well, the incorrect thing
to do is direct that anger towards Ridge Holland, the man who was attempting to execute the
overhead Belly to Belly to Big E. A similar sentiment seems to have permeated
backstage in WWE, as according to Wade Keller of PWTorch, “there doesn’t appear to be
any heat” on Holland for the botched Belly to Belly.
Holland reportedly “handled himself well” after the incident, and Keller’s sources
told him it was being treated as an “accidents happen” kind of situation.
And that, at least, is some positive news.
That news was a little rough today wasn’t it?
Grab a loved one, give them a hug.
Spread the love around the wrestling community today, because it needs it.
And now hot tag to Oli.
Now it’s time for my review of last night’s Raw… in about 5 minutes.
Kevin Owens fittingly started his show-opening promo with a Hey Yo, one of many touching
references to the great Scott Hall on this episode.
He said his KO Show segment with Stone Cold Steve Austin will main event the Saturday
night of WrestleMania - whatever main event means these days, as I’ve seen WWE call
the fourth match on the card ‘main events’ sometimes - and then not content with just
burying Texas, he got your whole country sucks heat by saying how much better Canada is than
the US.
Owens is great.
The video package recapping their feud was great.
Stone Cold is great.
But the big comeback story after almost two decades… is a cheap your local hometown
heat bit?
Stupendous!
KO then stunnered the cameraman to end the segment.
His best buddy Seth Rollins, meanwhile, was pretty upset backstage.
Because there is no room on the two night WrestleMania for him to have a match.
Absolutely no time for the 3rd top guy in the company to wrestle on the 29 hour WrestleMania
card.
But he had an idea.
The crowd were chanting for Cody Rhodes, the commentary kept making subtle Cody Rhodes
references.
So he revealed he’ll face Kevin Owens tonight to get the right to have a talk show segment
with Stone Cold Steve Austin - which Sonya Deville booked as the main event.
Meaning she kayfabe let Raw run for an hour without knowing what the most important match
of the night would be.
I get that Seth’s character is desperate, but the Stone Cold return story is already
lacking substance.
To then have both Seth and KO fight over the right to interview him at Mania made them
both feel like undercarders.
Damien Priest recently said in an interview: “Anyone can be a wrestler, there is only
one place to be a WWE superstar.”
To which Dax Harwood responded.
“Yeah, but I want to be a pro wrestler” Is Damien trying to turn heel?
He got instant karma with yet another match against Finn Balor, which oddly was just background
music to Austin Theory building his SmackDown match against Pat McAfee on commentary.
Balor got distracted taking out Theory, letting Priest get the win.
If you listen really closely during the Omos vs Commander Azeez, you can actually hear
Vince McMahon’s erection.
But you know what?
I don’t blame him.
Because there was one spot where Omos pretty much deadlift suplexed Azeez without taking
a bump and it looked awesome.
Omos won.
What are we going to do with Rhea Ripley now she’s not in a random tag team anymore?
Erm, put her in another random tag team?
Promote that man!
Ripley scared Carmella so much, she jumped into Corey Graves’ lap.
If you listen really closely during that spot, you can actually hear Corey’s erection.
And for some reason, that distracted Queen Zelina, letting Liv Morgan get the win.
Far more interesting in all this was a graphic promoting Edge up later, where he was 100%
blue.
That’s Batitsa’s gimmick!
It’s no longer Black History Month, so the Hurt Business quickly lost to the Mysterios.
Dom and Rey tried to hit a 619 on Logan Paul afterwards, but Miz saved him.
Stupendous!
Queen Sharmell will be going into this year’s Hall of Fame.
Sure, whatever.
Then out came all new, all blue Edge!
Following last week’s promo, Edge cemented his new character with new entrance music
and a you people promo.
But not all ‘you people’ promos are bad.
They’re just lazy and overdone in WWE.
Thankfully, Edge’s performance made it really, really good.
He said ever since his return, he’s been trying to please the fans.
He ripped his tricep trying to make you people happy.
But in attacking AJ Styles, he realised that’s the real him.
AJ was still off selling the conchairto, as he should be, but he did tweet that he’ll
return next week, where Edge “better prepare himself, stupid haircut and all.”
Dude, AJ.
Those in glass houses.
Veer is still coming, although he appears to have got tangled in some trussing.
I’ve seen Bianca Belair vs Doudrop so many times.
Yet somehow I don’t tire of it.
They had another very good back and forth match, where I still pop for Belair hitting
the KOD on her.
Becky Lynch Pilmanised Belair’s neck in a chair on the ring post afterwards - in revenge
for Becky’s real life crushed throat.
And also, Becky likes gooooooold.
In by far the best thing on the show, Randy Orton had organsied a title celebration/Riddle
birthday combo.
The balloons looked deflated.
The popcorn had been bought from the concession stand.
Party planning isn’t the Legend Killer’s thing, but he’s trying and it was genuinely
really, really sweet.
RKBro, as an act, have done a rare thing in WWE.
They’ve gotten better over time.
I actually never want Randy to turn on Riddle.
The Street Profits then came down to challenge RKBro for a title match at Mania, because
they’d beaten them a few weeks back.
That led Randy to cut an awesome babyface promo on how nobody tells him what to do,
but Riddle pointed out they gotta face somebody at Mania, so why not the Profits.
Montez disrespected Randy’s party planning abilities on the way out - I mean, where’s
the Pizza Hut trilogy meals? - which fired up Riddle to challenge him to a match.
The charisma and plotting of this segment was flawless, and the Riddle vs Ford match
afterwards was really heated too, with Montez even slightly working heel - which I don’t
think I’ve ever seen him do.
Alpha Academy, who are also wickedly over, took out both teams for the DQ, hopefully
building a three way for Mania.
Even more hopefully in a TLC match, despite that not having anything to do with the story.
I just want one.
WWE played a really good video package for Scott Hall in his passing, which Corey Graves
emotionally introduced on the verge of tears.
And the main event saw KO wrestle Rollins for the right to have a talk show segment
with Stone Cold at Mania, while Stone Cold only really cared about promoting his beer
on Twitter.
[TWEET] They had a really good match.
Of course they did, it’s Owens and Rollins.
But the story sucks.
KO stunnered Seth for the win, which derails any momentum Rollins might’ve had.
The big reports going into this episode was that if a deal had been agreed, this was where
Cody would return to set up a Mania match with Seth.
That obviously didn’t happen.
But even if it does, now the idea of him facing Rollins isn’t exciting at all.
What did you think of Raw?
Let me know in the comments.
The tag title stuff aside - which is genuinely great - Raw feels like all its roster are
feuding with things that aren’t there.
There’s no WWE Championship.
There’s no Brock Lesnar.
There’s no Stone Cold.
It’s an empty show, which is even more exposed by its three hour length.
This week’s Raw is 42%.
Now watch the first episode of our new 2K22 MyGM series!