A scary injury on Monday Night Raw. WWE commentary cuts coming.
And Rock ‘The Dwayne’ Johnson might’ve just set up a match with Roman Reigns.
Happy new year, fam. I’m Oli Davis, and this is the WrestleTalk News.
Despite Christmas being nearly a week old, Hunter Claus tweeted on the 30th December:
“Not going to confirm or deny the rumors of a former @WWE Champion appearing at #WWERaw
Day One… but I will say to stay tuned.” You naughty Paul. You naughty, naughty Paul.
Many speculated it could’ve been Andrade, who had reportedly finished with AEW that
same day. Maybe it could’ve been Brock Lesnar. Perhaps it could be CM Punk, making his latest
emotional return to wrestling. I’ll cry every time for you, Punk!
But the Monday Night Raw Day One special trumped even the loftiest of expectations.
It was Jinder Mahal! Naughty Paul. You naughty, naughty Paul.
Joke, he was interrupted by a returning Rock ‘The Dwayne’ Johnson - where he seemingly
debuted a remixed version of his entrance music. Michael Cole ejaculating.
It appears WWE ring announcer Samantha Irvin wasn’t told, with her shoot reaction being
caught on camera. The Dwayne’s appearance appeared to be the
latest in a run of fan servicing segments with no follow-up, like his one night SmackDown
return back in September… until he asked the live crowd where he should sit when he
gets dinner tonight. Should he sit in a booth, at the bar… or at the head of the table
- the heaviest tease he’ll face his Bloodline cousin The Head of the Table Roman Reigns
yet. The Rock himself has revealed that match was
originally “locked” [QUOTE] to take place at 2023’s WrestleMania 39, where Reigns
instead beat Cody Rhodes. If Rock vs Reigns is happenings at Mania 40, it means we’ll
get to see the latest chapter of Cody in his: neverending story-ah-ah-ah-ah. Story!
And Cody isn’t the only WWE guy getting his role cut…
PWInsider has reported that WWE’s new year’s resolution is to cut back on announcers. As
of Raw’s Day One show, “announce teams will all consist of two men booths. That means
that Michael Cole's time on Smackdown ended last month.”
Cole was reportedly kept on the SmackDown team in August during the last shake-up because
WWE’s broadcast partners wanted him to be the primary face of the product, keeping him
on both brands. It was also a way to provide support for the less-experienced Patrick.
That means SmackDown will now be announced by just Patrick and Corey Graves, while the
Raw booth is expected to be Cole with Wade Barrett.
Cole needed his three decades of experience to deal with an on-air injury on Raw’s Day
One special. During the Imperium vs Kofi Kingston and Jey
Uso tag match, Giovanni Vinci’s head whiplashed onto the canvas from taking a mid-air dropkick
bump. Vinci’s appeared dazed and stayed on the
mat following the spot. The referee paused the match, communicated with backstage officials,
and made the call to end the bout early. The ringside doctor tended to Vinci, who rolled
out the ring. Thankfully, Vinci himself has posted an update
on X: “Sto bene. Grazie mille 🙏🏼”
Which is Italian for “I am fine. A thousand thanks.”
Now hot tag to Pete for the full review of Raw Day One…
Luke is off this week so now it’s time for my review of Monday Night Raw, in about 5
minutes. This Day 1 episode of Raw began with Wade
Barrett and Michael Cole in the ring, running down all the matches for the night, which
I quite liked, more of this. It also made the night feel more important with a bunch
of title matches. But we started with a non-title match: Becky
Lynch vs Nia Jax. Which to me seemed like a pretty done deal before we went in. They
were hyping this as 5 years in the making, referencing Nia breaking Lynch’s face in
late 2018, and it seemed like to me that this was done to give Lynch a nice win heading
into Mania season, giving the match some heat to make Becky’s win have even more significance.
Nia Jax won clean. And if you know how much I like Becky and how much I’m not a fan
of Nia’s in-ring work, you’d expect me to be mad about this. But I’m really not,
because this match ruled. I don’t know what magic these two were making but they told
an incredible David vs Goliath story, whipping up the crowd in attendance in a frenzy with
every nearfall as the match progressed. Top rope Samoan Drops, a Disarm-her that Nia powered
out of, a sunset flip powerbomb, but in the end it was that punch once again. Becky leapt
off the second rope and Nia caught her with the uppercut which Lynch sold like she’d
been shot. Nia then delivered the Annihilator for the win and the crowd, in Jax’s hometown,
were rabid with boos. This was really, really good.
Cody Rhodes then came out to the ring after a recap of Shinsuke’s Night Before Christmas
rendition and said he wants to finish this chapter of the story tonight. Shinsuke appeared
on the screen and said no, next week instead. Alrighty then.
Kofi Kingston teamed with Jey Uso to take on Imperium next, which ended with referee
stoppage after it looked like Vinci was injured after taking a nasty bump in the ring. Following
a Kofi dropkick, it looked like Vinci either caught the dropkick on the face or bounced
his head off the mat hard when he landed, or both. Unfortunate for everyone involved,
particularly Vinci of course, though he has since tweeted to say he’s fine, so fingers
crossed he’s not out for too long. Best wishes on your recovery Vinci.
After a video package of WWE’s holiday tour, The Miz hosted MizTV, advertised as special
guests being The Judgment Day. Instead it was just R-Truth representing Judgment Day.
Truth says he’s doing PR work for them, he’s doing admin work, because nobody likes
Judgment Day so he’s trying to make them more likable.
They were interrupted by JD McDonagh and Dominik Mysterio, who said Truth isn’t in Judgment
Day, to which Truth replied by saying that JD was the one who lost the Loser Leaves Judgment
Day match. Dominik got booed an insane amount in his hometown of San Diego, but a tag match
was set up of JD & Dom vs a reunited Awesome Truth. Triple H cares about you, fans who
have nostalgia of 2011. The match was absolutely nothing, centred
around the comedy of R-Truth not knowing what team he was on, and while some bits landed,
like him standing in the neutral corner, other bits didn’t and it felt like the joke overstayed
its welcome a bit. Awesome Truth won. The new women’s tag champs Kayden Carter
& Katana Chance were partying in a pre-recorded segment, because they like to party, and were
interrupted by Piper Niven & Chelsea Green who set up a rematch for next week’s Raw.
After a video package earlier in the night hyping the match, and a quick video package
here hyping Rhea Ripley, we got Ripley vs Ivy Nile for the Women’s World Title. This
was also a very solid match, with Nile getting a bunch of good offense in, but ultimately
succumbing to Ripley with a headbutt, knee to the face and Riptide for good measure.
Both looked good coming out of this, and leaves room for Nile to challenge in the future while
keeping Ripley strong. Great stuff. We then got the return of a former WWE champion.
As Oli mentioned earlier, it was initially revealed to be Jinder Mahal, which I found
very funny that they were also leaning into the joke of him being a former WWE champ,
until the joke continued. And continued. And continued.
Jinder cut a lengthy promo about America and why it was bad, while reciting the National
Anthem in Punjabi and getting the fans to boo their own National Anthem. Mahal called
himself the unifier, saying America has never been more divided. But then, after quite a
long time, The Rock made his return to Raw, and despite the best efforts of Michael Cole,
this was a fun moment. And I was looking forward to Rock coming out, hitting a Rock Bottom
on Jinder and we could move on with our lives. So The Rock then cut a long promo about Jinder
Mahal for some reason, saying everyone knows about his resting bitch face and calling him
the biggest asshole on the planet, stuff which doesn’t make sense because Jinder is barely
on our screens. Why is Jinder the focus of this promo? The Rock sings a song about his
balls and then decides he wants to beat him up, so Jinder strikes first, but of course
Rock comes back, hits the Spinebuster and the People’s Elbow to leave him laying.
If the segment had ended there I would have called this a colossal waste of time, but
Rock did give the hint about a match with Roman Reigns that Oli covered earlier.
Now, there’s Elimination Chamber coming up in Australia, with the governmental board
responsible for bringing WWE to Australia requesting The Rock to be there at the show.
Could they be doing Rock vs Roman at Elimination Chamber to set up Roman vs Cody at Mania?
The last hurrah of Roman’s title reign being beating The Rock before dropping it to Cody?
Or is that just my wishful thinking and optimism, and it’s just going to be Rock vs Roman
at Mania and Roman retains again, and the cycle continues? I like the idea of Rock vs
Roman, just not at WrestleMania. The loss of Cody at WrestleMania 39 is only marginally
justified if he then wins at Mania 40. If that spot gets taken by Rock, with Roman retaining
again, it will make that loss even worse in retrospect.
Also this segment on Raw was 21 and a half minutes, and it did not need to be that long
at all. We also got a recap of that segment immediately after an ad break where I think
Michael Cole came again. Shayna Baszler & Zoey Stark beat Tegan Nox
& Natalya in a mostly nothing match next with little crowd heat. How are the crowd supposed
to care when they don’t get enough time to have a great match? Needed that time for
Rock & Jinder of course. And after a video package hyping it, we got
Drew McIntyre vs Seth Rollins for the World Heavyweight Title. This was another great
match between the two, because how could it not be at this point, with loads of great
counters upon counters as the two know each other so well at this point.
Damian Priest tried to cash in his Money in the Bank briefcase during the match, including
a briefcase shot to Rollins behind the referee’s back, but Drew stopped the cash-in with a
Claymore to Priest and a German to Dominik. Drew then hit a Claymore on Rollins, but in
pinning him, he dragged his foot onto the bottom rope, meaning the one person who beat
Drew again, was Drew. Seth came back and hit the Stomp for the win to end the show. The
finish was a little wonky, as it did make Drew look a little stupid, but I get what
they were going for with Drew being his own worst enemy once again.
The wrestling on this show was okay to great, with Nia vs Becky blowing my expectations
out the water, Seth vs Drew being fantastic as always and a good Ripley vs Ivy Nile match.
That Rock segment was insanely long though, and while it builds a lot of intrigue for
WrestleMania season, I don’t know if all of it is good curiosity. Some of it is fear
for me. Fear that they’re going to do the wrong thing, again. This Raw was a ⅗.
2024 has just begun, and Oli and Luke have some bold predictions for what could happen
this year: click the video on screen to watch it now.