A week with nothing really to report, apart from Kevin Nash’s supposed firing. Raw has become established as a brand cross-over show and the Super Smackdown was a one off, the WWE probably could have made that whole thing a lot less confusing, or at least look like it wasn’t a completely spare of the moment decision. To be fair they might have been planning it for a long while, but it sure didn’t look like it. But speculation aside, let’s get on with the report…

Weekly Top Ten:

1st Place: Mark Henry (10/10)

The World’s Strongest Man takes the top spot again this week after dominating Ezekiel Jackson and slamming Zack Ryder after teasing him perfectly. Mark Henry may only have a single string to his bow, but at the moment he is playing it to perfection. With the company fully behind him as a monster heel I’m starting to believe that he might actually have a chance of becoming champion. The only thing that makes me doubt it is the number of excellent matches Orton is having at the moment, these make him look like he is a legend in the making and that the company has a lot of faith in him as the Ric Flair to Cena’s Hogan. So him keeping the belt would seem quite likely as well.

2nd Place: Christian (9/10)

Thank god for Raw, that’s all I can say, at least in terms of keeping Christian in the main event scene at least. If Raw hadn’t become a place for Smackdown superstars to shine as well then Captain Charisma would have been demoted to upper mid-card already. It’s not that his upcoming feud with Sheamus is a bad thing; it’s just that it’s no world heavyweight title feud. Being in the main event of Raw helps Christian secure second place, underneath his replacement in the Smackdown main event scene.

3rd Pace: Sin Cara (8/10)

The ‘Evil’ Sin Care makes his way into third place after finally breaking his silence and showing himself as an actual personality. Getting one over on a game Daniel Bryan was a surprise, and a great way to properly start their feud. I’ve gone from having little interest in the botching Cara gimmick to now being eager to see the new Sin Cara in the ring against Daniel Bryan, in-ring competition is one thing, but without a proper story behind it, it just doesn’t have as much impact. The WWE are definitely moving in the right direction with this character now in my opinion.

4th Place: Beth Phoenix (7/10)

Slamming Eve and backing up Natalya gives Beth enough momentum to grab herself the fourth spot on the chart. Although the founding half of the Divas of Doom wasn’t successful in her first attempt at taking Kelly Kelly’s title I’m hoping that is just a blip and that at Night of Champions she will emerge victorious. Still saying you are going to make a change is one thing, backing it up is quite another and I’m wondering if Beth Phoenix will really be able to resurrect the divas division if she becomes champion, after all she can’t do it single-handedly, and without adequate match time there is little opportunity for her and a decent opponent to put on a good show anyway.

5th Place: Wade Barrett (6/10)

Barrett is billed to be working the house shows with Sheamus so it was interesting to see how the two worked together on this week’s Smackdown. I think Barrett was held back a little by Sheamus being built up as a major face at the moment so he wasn’t allowed to get too much offence in but I reckon the two good put on a good show if they ever meet on more even footing. Then again it’s not like he lost the match by getting pinned so there is some saving grace, although he did still get a boot in the face at the end of it all. Barrett looks to be being passed up to some extent at the moment but that doesn’t mean that the company doesn’t have plans for him in the near future, once again like with Christian it is a good thing that there are spots on Raw now open for him to get a look in on some kind of main event level.

6th Place: Natalya (5/10)

Close but no cigar for the second half of the Divas of Doom, setting in stone that Beth is the one who will be taking on Kelly Kelly for her title for the time being. Natalya did show a lot of goodness throughout the match though and being a bad girl clearly suits her, so hopefully this angle will go on for awhile so that she can let her personality and talent shine through. Then again unless creative is serious about this angle I am worried for the longevity of anything to do with the divas.

7th Place: Cody Rhodes (4/10)

The man with the pointless clear plastic mask got a decent showing on this week’s Smackdown, becoming the latest opponent who has faced and been put over, while still losing, by the champ Randy Orton. This new tactic has been a great success for both Orton and his opponents and I hope they keep it up. Although since Orton has been working a punishing schedule as of late it is hard to see him keeping to matches of this length or quality for an extended period of time, unless he has made a personal vow to become one of the most highly regarded performers of all time, an admirable goal, unlike John Cena who works all the time and yet still looks like he phones it in with non-main event matches, like he did with Wade Barrett the other week, all squash and no substance.

8th Place: Jack Swagger (3/10)

The All-American American was actually allowed to look strong this week on the main event of Raw, but he still eventually lost to Super Cena. However at least he is getting some exposure with this whole Ziggler-Vicky angle and he was able to make Morrison and Riley tap out to the Ankle Lock in their eight-man elimination tag match.

9th Place: R-Truth (2/10)

Truth faced Punk in a losing effort, but made up for it with his usual amusing promo prowess. Truth is a natural catchphrase maker and everything he says seems to be taken on by the crowd. It is an underappreciated art to make the things you say on the mic stand out, sure they might be stupid or not even make any sense, but I’d take R-Truth on the mic over any bland and predictable face promo any day.

10th Place: Tyler Rex (1/10)

One half of WWE’s newest tag team continues to make his mark on Superstars by beating the team of Percy Watson and Titus O’Neill. Rex might not have the biggest personality in the WWE but I think he works as a tag team competitor, especially with a mouthy guy like Curt Hawkins backing him up.

2011-2012 Season Top Ten: Overall Top Ten:

1st Place: R-Truth (148/230) – 1st Place: The Miz (672/1230)

2nd Place: The Miz (128/230) – 2nd Place: C.M. Punk (666/1230)

3rd Place: Alberto Del Rio (99/230) – 3rd Place: Chris Jericho (564/1230)

4th Place: Cody Rhodes (99/230) – 4th Place: Jack Swagger (356/1230)

5th Place: Christian (99/230) – 5th Place: Cody Rhodes (336/1230)

6th Place: C.M. Punk (88/230) – 6th Place: Dolph Ziggler (311/1230)

7th Place: Mark Henry (77/230) – 7th Place: Alberto Del Rio (294/1230)

8th Place: Wade Barrett (70/230) – 8th Place: Sheamus (294/1230)

9th Place: Sheamus (51/230) – 9th Place: Wade Barrett (273/1230)

10th Place: Jack Swagger (48/230) – 10th Place: Randy Orton (224/1230)

Weekly Filler:

The Face-Off: Jeff Hardy

Just simply that, why TNA is letting Hardy back in after less than a year is beyond me. Sure you shouldn’t hold grudges and exclude good talent, that would just be bad for business, but Hardy isn’t that good and it hasn’t been long enough for him to really get his shit together to where we know that he won’t mess up again, that right there is bad for business. Hopefully TNA will have some sense and not put him back in the title picture straight away. They could play a whole redemption angle where he has to wrestle a load of really hard or demeaning matches before he gets anywhere near the main event scene, perhaps then hiring him back wouldn’t look like such a terrible idea.

Face the Facts: Mason Ryan as a Face

Like Batista only better, because he has hair and comes from the UK. Mason Ryan looked good as a monster heel but he clearly has a lot of work to do on his mic presence and getting over with the fans, so being a face is the perfect place for him. He can go over with the crowd by picking up some easy victories and not having to go on the mic, just like Ezekiel Jackson and most other big men. If he wants to truly make a mark in the business though he is going to have to learn how to talk eventually, but being over with the crowd first won’t hurt.

On the Rise: New Tag Teams

The WWE are as good as their word so far, clearly trying to develop new teams, not only on Raw with the champions Airboom and The Awesome Truth, as well as lesser teams like Khali & Mahal and Otunga & McGilicutty, but also with their lower card teams on Superstars of Rex & Hawkins and now Watson & O’Niell. The only problem now is that they all have crap names, apart from perhaps The Awesome Truth. I know Airboom is cheesy but it’s better to have some sort of name than just being the sir names put together, to be a real tag team you need something more permanent.

The most important thing is for the WWE to realise that the tag team is the natural place to put developing talent before they are ready to break out on their own. Having a strong tag team division means that you have a strong lower card and guys who really take off as a tag team have a place even if their singles career doesn’t go so well. It’s just another area for them to draw in. A few years ago you would look to each division to see what they were offering up on the next PPV, now it just all seems like filler towards the main event, and sometimes even that feels like filler. The filler PPV is a contradiction in terms and shouldn’t be allowed to exist, not just in relation to its main event, but to al its matches. Hopefully some of these newly developing teams will take off and we can finally start watching the at division with some interest again, especially since its been several months since TNA had any real good tag action.

Flat-Footed: NXT

It’s just a joke. The show went from being an interesting new concept where the WWE’s newest talent got a chance to showcase themselves and develop their craft, to now being an internet show with no real audience and no format to speak of, there isn’t even really a rookie-pro relationship to play off of anymore. Sure the challenges were dumb, but without them there isn’t really much of a difference between NXT and Superstars, especially since half the matches aren’t even wrestled by the rookies anymore. NXT is just like Superstars but with a much smaller roster, and in this case that is not a good thing. While the WWE is somewhat to blame for the relative failure of NXT a big part of it is also to do with the rookies themselves, many of them just didn’t shine through like they were supposed to.

Maybe that’s a little bit harsh, after all it’s hard to look good while running a keg carrying contest, but all you have to do is look at a guy like Wade Barrett and the great promo he delivered with just the prompt of ’wind’ to go on. A guy with real talent will shine through, even on a show with a poorly thought out format and a tiny audience.

That’s all for this week, NXT appears to be coming to a close after what was a shambles of a last season, TNA are having their No Surrender PPV, but I’ve almost given up hope that they will be able to put on anywhere near as good a show as they even could last year. I’m looking forward to the new Raw format, even though the name is a bit stupid, it’s a good chance for the Smackdown superstars to be seen by a larger audience, balancing out the idea of Smackdown being the ‘B’ show. You’ll notice the conspicuous absence of Del Rio from the chart this week, unlike last week where he wasn’t able to compete due to visa issues, this week he just didn’t impress enough to make it on the chart. This is bad news for the supposed face of the company and Del Rio will have to do a lot better if he wants to be known as more than just a transitional champion. For now this is James Wright signing off.

Source: wrestlingtruth.com