WWE Raw Preview: Pipebomb & Del Rio Fallout, Ryback & The Shield

wwe-raw2 Tonight, WWE RAW celebrates 20 years on TV and gives the WWE a chance to give some old faces and fan favourites some time to come back and remind everyone that they used to be relevant. It€™s such a shame that they are not relevant anymore and take away time that could be used on talent who are most definitely relevant. The rumour is though that WWE management have cancelled many of the old faces due to appear to focus more on what they should be focused on, advancing feuds to sell Pay Per Views and considering we are quickly moving towards the Royal Rumble, this is absolutely key! Too often lately creative have taken the easy way out of writing a full show by having these €œlegends€ appear so they can take a break and not write something that people will care about. I only hope tonight€™s RAW is billed as a celebration purely to get viewers watching the show so they can blow our socks off with something major. I doubt it. One of the big draws that WWE is advertising for tonight is the Rock Concert, a segment so that The Rock can wow us with a silly song that basically pokes fun at Punk whilst actively trying to remain as childish as possible. Granted this will likely be a funny segment but unless CM Punk comes out and calls Rock out on this, telling everyone just how stupid it is and that the feud is about the WWE Championship not penis jokes, it will very much be a throw away segment that only further grows Rock€™s ego and idiocy. CM Punk is smart enough to know that they cannot just re-hash Cena€™s feud with Rock so it will likely take a different turn to the €œconcert€ before €˜Mania. One can hope at least! We must also expect development in relation to the shock World Heavyweight Championship win of Alberto Del Rio on Smackdown Vs The Big Show. Development in the form of Big Show complaining about having to defend the title in the first place and perhaps even gaining a re-match on RAW or a match booked on the Rumble card, most likely with a stipulation. We€™re getting to see the WrestleMania plans come to fruition now seeing as ADR won the title seemingly out of the blue and tonight we will likely see some more seeds planted to bolster the €˜Mania card. Team Hell No have their final evaluation from Dr Shelby in what will likely be a funny throw away segment that I will guess will lead to their defence and potential loss of their tag titles at the Rumble to the Scholars. This will also likely lead to the team disbanding prior to €˜Mania to either feud against each other or to move on to bigger and better things. Tonight though, I will enjoy the chemistry between Kane and Bryan alongside the hilarious Dr Shelby brought together in a genuinely funny segment. Outside of the Rock / Punk feud the main emphasis will likely be on the Rumble Match itself and considering this year we are likely to see more main eventers and genuine stars than in previous years involved in the Rumble, it is likely this may harness more time than the WWE title feud. Expect more names to be added to the match along with the Cena / Ziggler and Orton / Sheamus €œfeuds€ to be extended that tiny bit more. Last week we saw Cena demolish all of Zigglers momentum in one fell swoop, hopefully this week we won€™t see Cena and Ziggy simply move on but perhaps some payback will be landed by Ziggler on the residential Superman of the WWE. Last week we also saw Orton and Sheamus try to €œoutdo€ each other against 3MB and I sincerely hope more meat is added to this prior to their inevitable last 4 confrontation at the Rumble. Kaityin will once again challenge Eve for the Divas Championship and in my opinion Eve will flake out of the match by way of count out once again; leading to a Lumberjills match at the Rumble. I€™m fairly certain that WWE were planning AJ vs. Eve for €˜Mania but seeing how strong Kaitlyn has been recently, you may see AJ demoted to the manager of Ziggler permanently. The Shield will have to answer Ryback€™s questions as to why they targeted him during the TLC match last week, definitely costing him the match and the WWE Championship. I would presume that Ryback wants a piece of all 3 men; however, Ryback in the Rumble would make more sense to his character, especially if he were to eliminate several wrestlers. I see The Shield declaring they are entering the Rumble, Ryback follows suit to get his hands on them, potentially one on one during the match. It will add a nice dimension to the Rumble along with several occurrences that could happen during the Rumble match up to keep it interesting. All this along with a more than likely appearance by the first inductee into the 2013 hall of fame, Mick Foley and the potential for more names to be announced for this year€™s class. Last week RAW had the TLC Match and Punks Promo, this week WWE will have to try really hard throughout the night to keep people€™s enjoyment and adrenaline levels just as high!
 
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WhatCulture WWE Editor: An Ex Wrestler, Computer Game Retail Employee, Batman fanatic and all round nerdy man who's views on Wrestling and all that come with it border on the obsessive.