Superstars Nation, I promised I wouldn’t keep you waiting long. For those of you still reading me, you may recall that last week’s recap came out about four days after the original broadcast. Following a stern talking to and several lashes I vowed never to be that delinquent in my duties ever again. Now you can dine on this buffet of Sports Entertainment greatness in a more timely fashion. As a result, the actual writing of this week’s recap took place a mere hour after Thursday afternoon’s broadcast. Unlike that big Monday program where poor Scotty stays up past one o’clock in the morning, I am wide awake, sitting on the couch and because of daylight savings, the sun is even out as we bring you another edition of WWE Superstars. If your work week won’t be made until you find out which member of 3MB gets squashed, then you have come to the right place fella. Not for nothing, but seeing as though I’m the token Irish guy on staff, do you really think I would wait until St. Patrick’s Day weekend to start writing a show recap? So sit back, fire up the corned beef and cabbage and let’s head down to ringside!
Your announcers tonight are Tom “Top of The Morning” Phillips and Byron “Lucky Charms” Saxton.
SIN CARA VS. ALBERTO DEL RIO
Goodness gracious, I love the WWE Network! I know what you are thinking; “Oh man, we’ve seen this match 100 times this year.” I completely understand that reasoning and ordinarily I would agree with you. However, there is one place we have not witnessed these two Mexican sensations clash and it likely would have never happened had Vince not launched the greatest innovation these eyes have ever witnessed. One thing these two have is tremendous chemistry and Del Rio, stale as he is lately, is still a bonafide “main event” player. And we get him on Superstars against a very game opponent. Bless you McMahons!
Del Rio has some heat on him lately having started a little spat with Dolph Ziggler on the big shows. Each has interfered in the others’ matches so perhaps they will rekindle their feud from last year only this time without the World Heavyweight Championship reward at the end. Sin Cara continues to just dim the lights and irritate people in all of his recent bouts. Besides the announce team pumping him up him never participating in a WrestleMania before, they also make a deal over his recent appearance in an animated Scooby-Doo movie. It’s the little things that get us excited on this show.
ADR brushed off a Sin Cara flurry when his opponent got hung up on the ropes in the corner and did a two-footed stomp to the masked one’s chest. Does anyone remember when he briefly used this as a finisher? The crowd is strangely indifferent during the heel segment but woke up when Sin Cara started bringing the head-scissors to the table. Cara caught Del Rio with a kick to the head but missed with his senton finisher before absorbing a devastating superkick to the mush. The victory was signed, sealed and delivered much like Darrelle Revis in New England from there. WINNER: ALBERTO DEL RIO
Thoughts: I could easily see ADR and Dolph fight a preshow match at Mania with Sin Cara on the sidelines again unless all of these characters enter the battle royal we will discuss later. Not a lousy opener but not much to talk about either.
And speak of the devil, Hulk Hogan comes to us in our first Raw recap to give us a big announcement. Our WrestleMania host told us that the event will feature a 30-man battle royal in honor of Andre “The Giant.” I’m pretty excited (big shock there) about this simply because it gives guys on the back-end of the roster a chance at a payday and if used properly, this match could elevate future stars. If they are smart, they will put some NXT guys in there and give some shine to the up-and-coming prospects like Alexander Rusev or Sami Zayn. The winner should receive a push in the storylines in addition to the sick Andre trophy they displayed on Raw.
Next we receive some highlights of Bray Wyatt cutting a promo on both Hogan and John Cena. Am I the only one who wanted to see the Hulkster throw down against the family? Cena challenges Bray to a Mania match as expected. What an amazing opportunity for the artist formerly known as Husky Harris. If you told me in 2011 that that guy would someday be challenged by the biggest name in sports entertainment to a match at WrestleMania, I would have guessed you had too much green beer in your system. Needless to say, this match intrigues me.
More from Raw featuring clips highlighting the last few weeks of The Undertaker/Brock Lesnar program. We recap Paul Heyman addressing the Dead Man first timidly and then displaying some false bravado at the conclusion of another excellent promo. The only thing I dig about this match is that it is a fresh matchup and Heyman’s desire not to lose to the streak in consecutive years is an added bonus.
FANDANGO (W/SUMMER RAE) VS. DOLPH ZIGGLER
I take back my earlier statement about 3MB as it appears they get the night off tonight. Another solid pairing we probably wouldn’t have seen on this show last year. Dolph was the soon-to-be World Heavyweight Champ at this point last March and Fandango was on his way to beating Chris Jericho on the biggest stage. Plus as stated before, Ziggy has some beef with our winner from earlier.
Crowd is on fire for Dolph as we get this rolling. Both men do some pelvic swinging much to the delight of the ladies, but that was quickly broken up by Ziggler taking a back body drop onto the floor. Following a break, Dolph finds himself in a pickle and is doing his usual sick bumping all around the ring. The best spot of the match occurred when Fandango delivered a scintillating spinning heel kick which Ziggler sold as if he were blasted by an oncoming bus. A brawl ensued with our hero getting the upper hand. Seemingly from out of nowhere, Dolph hit the Zig-Zag and poor Summer needs a shoulder to cry on. WINNER DOLPH ZIGGER
Thoughts: The next logical step in the evolution of WWE Superstars would be for storyline progression to occur in order to rope in the loyal fanbase. A run-in by Del Rio or a podium interview with Ziggler might have helped here, but given the meat they have to serve in the final segment, I can see why they skipped that this week. That being said, it’s still awesome to see Dolph win on TV.
We close with a highlight package of Raw from two weeks ago when Triple-H and his henchman (Orton and Batista) murdered Daniel Bryan sowing the seeds of the Goat Face possibly making our dreams come true and enter the WrestleMania main event. Fast-forward to D-Bry’s brilliant Occupy Raw segment which incidentally is this week’s Raw Rebound. If you haven’t seen it, what are you waiting for? It was an awesome spectacle and Bryan potentially competing twice on April 6th will be nothing short of amazing. It almost makes you forget that we were almost about to swallow a truly hideous Orton/Batista main event. Should Bryan complete this odyssey dating back to last August with the ultimate payoff of winning the title in a few weeks, I think we will look back at this journey more fondly than some of us do right now. Was this the original plan? Who knows! But if we are all chanting “Yes” in a few short weeks, it will make all the suffering unequivocally worth it in my humble opinion.
Final Thoughts: If you can’t watch three hours of Raw every week and need a quick refresher, this show has always been there for you. Now mix in a couple of quality matches with guys who are hungry for a push, and now you have something you won’t mind watching on your live stream. Hopefully they keep up with those interviews at the podium and set up some stories while we’re at it.
Until next time Nation, Sláinte!
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