WWE Raw Review 25/07/2011: John Cena New Champion, CM Punk Still In The Picture

THE BIG NEWS: Rey Mysterio won the World Championship tournament only to lose the belt in his first title defence against John Cena in the main event of the show. Cena's celebration was cut short however as CM Punk arrived to greet him with new music and to make a statement by holding up his own (now vacant) World title that he defeated Cena to earn. First week under the new Triple H regime and we were treated to a super eventful show that ultimately spilled into overkill as the night wore on. The show kicked off with the final of the World Championship tournament that had been set up by Vince McMahon the previous week. It pitted Rey Mysterio against The Miz with the belt perched on the outside and the superstars watching anxiously backstage. World Championship Tournament Final: Rey Mysterio defeated The Miz via pinfall to become the new WWE champion. Miz dominated pretty much the entire match. He manhandled Rey into the corner on numerous occasions and repeatedly went for early pinfalls as if to mock the resilience of his opponent. Rey got a great comeback at one point when a missed kick from The Miz led to Rey hitting a hurracana that sent his opponent flying into the steel steps. Back from the commercial break however and Miz had reestablished his dominance and continued to go for quick covers in the process of grounding the little man down. It was at his most vulnerable though that Mysterio was able to find the tools to win the match. Miz had him trapped him upside down on the turnbuckle but wasted too much time in diving to the corner Mysterio countered by moving out of the way and then hitting his opponent's injured knee, landing another hurracana to send his opponent into the ropes and hitting the succesful 619/top rope splash combination. Good effort from both men and a worthy world title clash. *** The announcers put over the win and then reminded us that Triple H is the new man in charge and will be here tonight for a state of the WWE address. Post-match The Miz attacked Rey from behind. Consequently Alberto Del Rio decided to come out and attempt to cash in his Money in the Bank briefcase. It turned out to be just a tease however as Rey launched himself out of the ring at Del Rio before the bell had been rung and after seeing Rey regain his health Del Rio thought better of it and decided to scamper away. It was a nice reminder though of the constant threat that the briefcase holder possesses. Rey was shown backstage receiving a standing ovation from his peers and a respectful handshake from John Cena. Josh Matthews was sent to interview the new champion and Rey cut a cheesy but likeable promo about sacrifice and family and what this win will mean to his kids. He was then caught in a champagne avalanche instigated by his fellow superstars. Recap of the Vince McMahon angle from last week. Match: United States Champion Dolph Ziggler defeated Evan Bourne via submission Match began at a furious pace with a fierce rope exchange which saw each opponent bounce off the rope several times before Bourne landed a dropkick that sent Dolph to the outside. Not to be outdone Ziggler regained control and returned the favour with a stylish dropkick off his own before wearing Bourne down with a lengthy headlock. Bourne negotiated his way out of a hanging supplex spot however and then managed to duck out of the way of Ziggler's running dive and proceeded to run wild on his own with a flurry of kicks and quick impact aerial maneuvers. An Air Bourne attempt went sour however and despite landing on his feet Ziggler quickly capitalised by hitting his Zig Zag finisher and then making Bourne tap out to his sleeper hold. Another solid tv match. *** Post-match Ziggler was heard shouting €œI dare anyone to follow that€ and showed real character and passion in his delivery. If he could bring that sort of intensity to his promos then he could make quite a few more people start to pay attention to his obvious talent. Kofi Kingston versus Alberto Del Rio was announced for later on in the show. Kingston defeated Del Rio in the first round of the previous week's tournament so this was a scheduled rematch of sorts. Backstage The Bella Twins were seen arguing with Eve Torres who was complaining about the fact that they switch and swap during matches. They were interrupted by a strange looking, unfunny dude named Keith Stone (who turns out to be the star of some keylight beer ads) who seemed to have an answer to the problem as he painted a tattoo on one of the twins arms in order to tell them apart. This died a slow death.... Match: Kelly Kelly and Eve Torres defeated Maryse and Melina via pinfall in a Divas Tag Team Match Sloppy match as one might have expected but it was funny to see Maryse imitate Kelly Kelly and then for the Divas champion to return the favour later on in the match. Unfortunately for viewers however Kelly Kelly wasn't able to imitate the actions of a competent wrestler and her horrendous bouncing against the ropes at the speed of a tortoise and general sluggishness was once again embarrassingly exposed. She won with a clumsy fame-asser for a pinfall on Melina and I really hope the cheers that followed were for the fact that the match was over rather than for the Diva herself. It's one thing to have a poster boy like John Cena who might not be the best technical grappler in the world but can still put on a hell of a show inside the ring, it's another thing entirely though to have a Diva leading a division who just makes the entire profession of wrestling look like a joke. ½ * R-Truth was shown talking to Triple H backstage. Triple H's State of the WWE Address This was a fun segment which went on far too long, typical of most outings involving Triple H and a microphone. First of all he put over Vince as the reason why WWE is the force that it is today and praised the man for his €œvision€ and €œpure genius.€ He then said however that he wants to talk about the future and after congratulating Rey Mysterio on his title victory announced that he would now be defending it tonight against John Cena, a match which both men had apparently eagerly agreed to backstage. Although it made some sense later on in the show my immediate reaction to this is was why on earth would you waste a money making spectacle on free television, a foolhardy piece of short-sighted thinking that WWE have been guilty of numerous times in the past few years of declining Pay Per View numbers. Triple H then said that he had resigned Jim Ross who came out to the announce desk to greet an estatic Jerry Lawler and a not so estatic Michael Cole who refused to shake JR's extended hand. Cole then took it upon himself to stand on the announce table and proceed to speak ad nauseum about his ill feelings towards JR €œThe only thing bigger than you gut is your ego...€ etc and insisting that he refused to work alongside him. Hunter gave an equally long winded reply as he basically told Cole that he was contracted to do both shows and so he could walk but that would mean losing out on the dough and thus he had until Friday Night Smackdown to make his decision. He was then given the night off from announcing in order to mull things over. Cole at this point backed down and simply wanted to return to the announce desk but Triple H told him that he couldn't announce because he had a match to get ready for. Cole looked horrified. This was an utterly pointless segment that served no purpose other than to make people hate Michael Cole even more than they already do. Following this R-Truth came out and rambled on with his usual conspiracy spiel. Triple H did a funny parody of his schizophrenia deal before Truth walked out on his new boss after feeling that he was being made fun of. Before he could get far however Hunter announced that he had re-signed John Morrison who returned to give R-Truth a beat-down in revenge for the one he had received at the hands of Truth a couple of months earlier. Despite his absence Morrison received a mid-card reaction at best. Graphic hyping up the John Cena/Rey Mysterio WWE title main event. Match: Zak Ryder defeated Michael Cole Ryder won in a matter of seconds with his Rough Ryder finisher. Good to see the internet darling back on the flagship show but his talents were wasted in this nothing bout. DUD Match: Alberto Del Rio defeated Kofi Kingston via submission Quick energetic match. A number of reversals, pin counters and swift takedowns which resulted in Del Rio getting in a sneak attack from outside the ring apron and making Kofi tap to his cross-armbar. ** ½ The Miz was interviewed backstage with the superstar moaning about Hunter's new regime, saying that Cena should have been fired and that Mysterio would make a poor face for the company as champion unlike himself who is scheduled for an appearance on the George Lopez show this Wednesday. Fine delivery but the material is getting a bit repetitive now. WWE Title Match: John Cena defeated Rey Mysterio via pinfall to become the new WWE championship Perplexing opening few minutes saw the pint sized Rey Mysterio try to ground down the 6 ft bodybuilder John Cena with a headlock but as the action wore on this developed into a super exciting clash. The story was pretty simple in that both men had scouted all of each others trademark moves culminating in a gamut of counters and reversals. Some particularly effective spots included Cena catching Rey during a 619 attempt and transitioning the move into a power slam, Cena's move of dooms routine behind halted by a dropkick to the knee, Mysterio rolling out of an attempted STF submission and countering with an STF attempt of his own, Cena then coming to his feet and holding Mysterio in the FU position only for his knees to buckle as a result of the vicious kicks he had received at the start of the match. The crowd were massively into the near falls and cheered loudly for the finishing sequence that saw Rey's 619 attempt thwarted by a recovering Cena who met him in the middle of the ring and finally landed a succesful FU attempt to become the new champ. After the match CM Punk walked out to the tune of a new cool rock theme and held his vacant title up against Cena's newly earnt trophy. VERDICT: This was a jam packed show, some of it encouraging, some of it not, but at least the one constant at the moment is that each week's events are making you want to tune in to see what happens the following week and developing intrigue around what might transpire at the next PPV. I liked the manner in which Punk put Cena in his place at the end by non-verbally telling the champ that he's the real king of the ring. I imagine this must lead to some sort of unification angle at Summerslam but with Punk's contract details still somewhat of a mystery its hard to judge where they go from here. The point is though that it better go somewhere good to justify the purpose of giving Rey Mysterio a one day reign that essentially made his hard earnt world championship tournament victory seem pointless. Quick title changes can cause great damage to a wrestling company and WWE don't want to fall in that trap again of impatiently trying to give the audience everything they want all at once rather than making them wait for it. On the plus side there was some more excellent wrestling this week particularly in the main event with Raw continuing to give some of the mid card talent time to shine in the ring. Ring work is one thing however but there must now be a concentrated effort on behalf of the creative team to try to give these guys some more depth in regards to their personality and motivations. Finally it's good to see a fresh face in charge but if Triple H is to maintain an on screen presence then that role would be much better suited to short, meaningful bursts as opposed to long winded comedy segments that take up valuable time on the broadcast. P.S. Awesome to see Jim Ross back in the role to which there are no equal.