Home ▸ RAW ▸ Punk’s Homecoming – RAW 8/18/08

RAW is in CM Punk’s hometown of Chicago the night after SummerSlam, and I get to watch RAW in HD for the first time as my cable company has given me USA HD for just two weeks during the Olympics!

Results and analysis, after the jump!

Chris Jericho makes his way to the ring to kick things off, as we are LIVE in Chicago, IL for Monday Night RAW!  He’s not here to apologize for popping HBK’s wife Rebecca in the face – in fact, it’s Shawn Michaels’ fault!  HBK ducked out of the way, that coward, causing Jericho to miss and and hit Rebecca instead.  Jericho even has a video to show us.  If you haven’t heard, btw, Jericho really did punch Michaels’ wife – accidentally I’m sure, but she swelled up pretty bad.  Somebody in the crowd just yelled “SUPERCUTS” at Jericho.  Anwyays, Jericho continues.  He says that Shawn Michaels knew what he was doing last night.  He couldn’t do it the classy way and sending in a letter of resignation.  He needed to see his name in lights one more time, and hear the fans beg him not to retire – and because of that, all the fans are responsible for Rebecca getting punched in the face last night.  Mostly it’s HBK’s fault, because all he had to do was tell Jericho that he was the reason HBK was retiring.  All that matters is that the last moment of HBK’s career was spent cradling the head of his injured wife, whose injury he was responsible for.  Now his legacy is tarnished forever, and he’ll have to live with that for the rest of his life.  To be honest, Jericho thinks Michaels deserved it.  He had it coming.  Jericho leaves, and RAW goes to it’s first break of the night.

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

Next Monday – RAW will be on Sci Fi.  Hooray.

Back from break, The Animal, Batista, is on his way to the ring.  He falls getting up on the apron!  He’s in action against The Ripper, Paul Burchill.

Batista def. Paul Burchill

Apparently, Katie Lea is in action next – but for now, we’ll just watch Batista destroy her brother.  Well, try to anyway, the former pirate manages to hold his own, until Batista hits the spear and takes control.  He hits a spinebuster and a Batista Bomb, and gets the victory.

GM Mike Adamle is backstage, welcoming the newest member of the RAW roster – Primo Colon, who is Carlito’s brother.  Primo starts to talk, but Adamle sees John Cena and runs up to him like a 12 year old little kid.  He wanted to tell him about his match tonight, but Cena brushed him off.  Cena then runs into Batista, he tells him the better man won last night – but that was last night.

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

Jillian Hall and Katie Lea are in the ring, ready for tag action.  Jillian is excited to be in Chicago, because that’s one of her favorite bands.  She’s going to sing one of their songs for us.  She sings “You’re The Inspiration.”  Badly.  She’s interrupted by even worse music – Kelly Kelly’s theme song.  Kelly’s tag partner tonight is the former WWE Women’s Champion, Mickie James.

Mickie James & Kelly Kelly def.  Katie Lea & Jillian

Mickie and Jillian kick things off.   Mickie takes control, and keeps it even after Katie Lea gets tagged in.  Kelly gets the tag and keeps control of the matchup for her team.  Katie gets the tag to Jillian though, and Jillian takes over.  Jillian and Katie make quick tags, cutting Kelly off from her corner.  Kelly eventually gets the tag, and Mickie goes off on her opponents,  hitting Katie with a neckbreaker for two before all hell breaks loose.  Katie tries to take advantage of the situation, rolling Mickie up for two – but Mickie nails the Mickie-DT on Katie to get the pin!

Video Package:  SumemrSlam hightlights

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

Later on tonight, it’s John Cena vs. Cody Rhodes and Ted DiBiase.  But first…

JBL is on his way to the ring – without the World Heavyweight Championship that he swore he was going to win.  He’s dressed to compete.  Apparently he fired a bunch of people from his companies for no reason, and he’s upset that he didn’t beat CM Punk for the title last night at SummerSlam.  His opponent tonight is Jamie Noble.

John “Bradshaw” Layfield def. Jamie Noble

Noble puts up a good fight to kick things off, but then got caught in a JBL fallaway slam.  Bradshaw dominates the match from there.  After pounding away at Noble, JBL hits the Clothesline from Hell.  Instead of a cover though, he picks Noble back up, and delivers a short-arm Clothesline from Hell.  Twice.  JBL makes the cover, and the referee calls for the bell instead of making the count.  Kinda pointless, since the match went to JBL anyway.

Up next, Shane and Stephanie McMahon have a blockbuster announcement.

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

Back from break, the Chicago Cubs pretend to beat each other up in the front row.

Mike Adamle is making his way out to the stage.  He’s got a couple announcements.  Later tonight, CM Punk will face Chris Jericho.  Speaking of the World Title, he’s got another announcement, thanks to Stephanie and Shane McMahon.  At Unforgiven, 5 superstars including the World Champion, will compete in a 20 minute match.  Once the bell rings, anybody can pin or make anybody else submit.  The person who does that becomes the Champion, and will be Champion until another pinfall or submission.  Whoever the current champion is after 20 minutes, will be the World Heavyweight Champion.  The participants:  CM Punk, Kane, JBL, Batista, and John Cena.  You know, I swear I’ve seen this type of match before – oh yeah, they did it in the Hardcore division about 5 times.  They’re calling it the “Championship Scramble.”

Speaking of Champions, Ted DiBiase and Cody Rhodes are on the way to the ring.

Instead of Cena coming to the ring, Cryme Tyme come out, and JTG makes off with the tag team titles as Shad distracts the champions.  This may throw off the champions’ game, as John Cena is on his way to the ring to take on the both of them.

John Cena def. Cody Rhodes & Ted DiBiase

They waste a lot of time with Rhodes and DiBiase both trying to be in the ring, but the referee telling them they have to tag in and out in this match.  When that’s all settled, Cody Rhodes is going to start things off – and then they go to a commercial.  We come back, and these guys have apparently been standing around while we watched commercials.  Cena starts chasing Rhodes around the ring, but when Rhodes got back in he tagged DiBiase, who proceeded to take advantage of the situation to give his team control of the match.  The Tag Team Champions make frequent tags, and Cena pays the price for it.  The tag champs keep the advantage for several minutes.  The action spills outside and Rhodes whips Cena into the steel steps before rolling him back in for a two count.  Cena blocks a DiBiase suplex to create some separation, but Rhodes gets tagged in before Cena could recover.  Rhodes took too long to take advantage though, and Cena mounted a comeback, hitting the 5 Knuckle Shuffle before going for an FU.  DiBiase comes in, but Cena catches him and tosses him out, then locks Cody Rhodes in the STFU for the submission victory.

Up next, an exclusive reaction from Shawn Michaels from last night after his wife got knocked the hell out.

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

WWE finally acknowledges that Harley Race is in the audience when we get back from break.

Last night, Shawn Michaels’ wife got punched in the face by Chris Jericho.  Afterwards, Shawn told Michael Cole that he’s going to go home and comfort his wife and kids, who just watched their mother get punched in the face because of him.  Then… then he just walks away.

ECW commentator Todd Grisham is backstage with World Heavyweight Champion CM Punk.  Punk says that Jericho did one of the “most lowest” things he’s ever seen anybody do.  In Chicago, we deal with people like Chris Jericho.  Jericho’s got a lot more coming tonight than what HBK got last night – and it’s going to be done Chicago style.

The new Intercontinental Champion, Santino Marella, is on his way to the ring with the new WWE Women’s Champion, Beth Phoenix.  He’s defending his title, NEXT!

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

D’Lo Brown vs. Santino Marella

WWE.com will have video of Glamarella’s acceptance speech that happened during the break.  After D’Lo makes his way to the ring, Kofi Kingston’s music hits and he comes down to the ring to join King and Cole on commentary for this one.  D’Lo takes control early, but Santino sidestepped a middle rope dropkick by D’Lo.  Beth gets in the ring, and into D’Lo’s face.  He yells at her to “GET TO STEPPIN’.”  He gets a slap to the face, drawing the DQ.

After the DQ, D’Lo beats up on Santino, tossing him out of the ring, where Kofi used his head as a basketball, bouncing it off of the announce table.  Santino leaves with the loss, but he’s still the Intercontinental Champion.

Backstage, Kane’s old music is playing as he’s walking down the hall.

<COMMERCIAL BREAK> Tomorrow night, Matt Hardy takes on Mark Henry for the ECW Championship in a SummerSlam rematch.

WWE 24/7 Classics on Demand – May 16, 2002:  Tajiri covers up Torrie Wilson in a bikini contest.  Her opponent, Stacey Keibler was subsequently challenged to a bikini contest by Trish Stratus, who forgot her bikini and competed in her underwear.

Kane’s pyro goes off, and he’s no longer got Finger Eleven’s “Slow Chemical” as his theme.  In fact, it’s almost a different mix of his original theme.  Anyways, we get a recap of him revealing that he’s destroyed Rey Mysterio last week.  Kane says it looked like everybody was shocked when he pulled that mask out of his bag.  The bag made him feel good, it comforted him, it put a smile on his face.  We don’t realize that Mysterio’s been missing for about 6 weeks – and there’s a reason for that.  Kane never liked him.  He doesn’t like him, and he doesn’t like people who do.  He’s a slithery little slime, hiding behind a mask.  He’s like a fungus that grows in the marshes of your psychee.  Six weeks ago, he destroyed Mysterio in a parking lot – but spared his life.  Mysterio is alive, but his spirit is broken, crushed, dead.  Is he alive… or is he dead?  Evil laugh.

Kane’s evil laugh is interrupted by The Animal, Batista, who doesn’t fall getting into the ring this time.  Batista beats the crap out of Kane, hitting a spinebuster – but Kane attacks Batista’s injured knee to get away from a Batista Bomb.  Kane chokeslams The Animal.  His craptacular new music plays and he makes his leave.

<COMMERCIAL BREAK>

Next week, RAW is on Sci-Fi, and in three weeks, it’s Unforgiven on Pay Per View.  They run down the card – which consists of only one match so far, and then it’s match time.

Chris Jericho def. CM Punk

Lance Cade is along for the ride tonight.   Punk is rocking some Chicago Cubs tights tonight.  I’m sure the team, who are sitting in the front row, are thrilled that another man is wearing their logo in his underwear.  As you’d expect, a back and forth matchup here, with unique offense from Punk, including a variety of submission holds.  After a break, Jericho is in control with a variation of a chinlock.  Punk battles out of it, but Jericho keeps control of the match.  Jericho utilizes submission holds, and Punk fights out of them.  It continues until Punk catches Jericho trying for a bulldog, and kicks him in the face.  Punk starts to take control, striking Jericho with his martial arts kicks, and a double underhook backbreaker for two.  Jericho takes back over after Punk goes for a bulldog of his own, tossing the champion across the ring and hitting a lionsault for two.  Jericho goes for the Walls of Jericho, but Punk fights out and gets a two count off of a Hurricanrana.  The match continues to go back and forth, with both men going for their finishers numerous times, Jericho even managing to lock in the Walls of Jericho, with Punk able to get to the ropes.  Punk hits a bulldog from the top rope, but runs into Lance Cade on the apron, distracting the Champion long enough for Jericho to nail the Codebreaker for the win to end the show at 11PM.

My Thoughts:

This show wasn’t bad, though I’d have expected the hometown guy to win in the main event.  The finish to the JBL/Jamie Noble match was kind of strange.  I think the referee screwed up, and screwing up is the last thing you want to do if you’re a WWE employee right now, seeing as Wes Adams was released for pretty much botching the end of the main event on ECW last week.

I don’t think Kane’s new music is scary enough, but it’s about time they’ve started having him do promos while bathed in a glow of red lights again.  I’m interested to see where the feud between Kane and Rey Mysterio goes, because they can’t keep Rey Rey off TV forever.

I hate how the WWE tries to pawn off a concept match from 8 years ago as something new.  The only difference between the Championship Scramble at Unforgiven and the Hardcore Battle Royal from WrestleMania 2000 is that it doesn’t have to be the champion that you pin or force to submit.  Ah well, whatever.  See you guys for ECW.

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