He announces a "Baywatch Babe Triple Threat Tag Team Match" and a PPV World Title Match between "Jackie" Swagger and Randy Orton at Extreme Rules.
Right away the Divas Championship match between Eve Torres and Maryse kicks off without commercial break. Eve wins the title with a nice bridge countering the "French Kiss" DDT. Well, at least it was a decent athletic move. Fuck, my standards are lowering.
Now an "Earth Shattering" announcement by ShoMiz which is just a bromance moment wrapped in the message that ShoMiz is the greatest tag team in WWE history.
Out comes Bret Hart. He names The Hart Foundation and The British Bulldogs as two teams that are better than ShoMiz.
Out come the Hart Dynasty. David Hart Smith challenges Miz to a singles match and if he wins they get a title match at Extreme Rules. Miz accepts the challenge on the condition that if he wins then Bret has to come on Raw next week and say that ShoMiz is the greatest tag team of all time.
In Miz's words, Really? Is this what passes for storyline intrigue? If Davey Boy is in fact looking on tonight, then I think he just changed the channel.
The match is on after the commercial break. Schmoz finish. Crowd was mostly dead for this, which is a shame and it carries on this angle another week with more Bret to come. The Hart Dynasty have no steam now. Way to go, Fed!
Batista and Otunga are backstage. Batista tells Otunga to get him a cup of coffee…as he punks away, he runs into the Hoff who tells him he'll be facing John Cena tonight. Kitt says it'll take 22 seconds for Cena to win. Ha…ha.
Evan Bourne is out to the ring. Carlito's already in the ring, which essentially means he's jobbing. It's a decent match, albeit with a predictable hope spot leading to the Shooting Star Press for the pin.
Up next is Cena vs. David "A-List" Otunga. Cena's out first and Otunga is out with Batista behind him in a sweater vest. That joke writes itself. I wonder if Kitt could predict that the first 22 seconds would be all rest hold. Nothing but headlocks and awkward hammerlocks as Batista looks on from the top of the ramp. John Cena is "putting on a clinic" and I can't help but remember an 80s vignette when Hulk Hogan was teaching Hillbilly Jim how to "wrestle". Yes, it's THAT good! STF finishes off the squash and then leads to the staredown with Batista who takes off the vest, the tie, the penny loafers, the freshman pin, AND the corsage…they flex off and scream at each other from 30 paces.
Sheamus enters the ring. A Brit dude's sign says he needs a tan. Does the pot ever call the kettle white? Yup, right there. Short promo about the street fight between him and HHH. Kofi Kingston out to interrupt. They have a match right now for Kofi to get some revenge.
They've now used Kofi as job meat for Sheamus two weeks in a row. He came out for revenge against someone who just announced a Street Fight against one of the top guys in the company. They really should have used a local boy for this spot instead of someone of any discernible value. What will they do with Kofi now is anyone's guess, but I'll say he'll be drafted in a couple of weeks.
Carlito backstage with Vladimir Kozlov teases quitting due to frustration about the guest host steez while Kozlov vows to destroy MacGruber next week on Raw if he doesn't get a match. Twenty bucks says they face each other next week.
Baywatch Babe match is next as Hasselhoff comes out as the the Special Guest Lifeguard. All of the participants borrow JoMo Slow-Mo and a some Baywatch swimsuits for their entrance. Santino is the referee and gets a good "Santino" pop as he jogs out. Hoff in the chair looks like the meds are kicking in and it's a little bit creepy. The Bellas win, Santino swallows the whistle and out comes Hornswoggle to revive him with a Tadpole splash.
Orton vs. Batista is closing the show. A good contest, but they're essentially fighting the same kinda fight. They look WAAAAAY to similar and someone in the back should be doing something about that. Swagger runs in and attacks Orton with a gutwrench powerbomb; Cena hits a headhugger on a downed Batista and does a mock 10 Count. A few shouts and we're out.
Although I liked that they kept a lot of Raw in the ring this week, a lot of the talent is being misused. I say this in the knowledge that often winning in the ring is secondary to looking good. Absent from TV this week notably were HHH, DiBiase, Rhodes, MVP and Christian and as a result we were treated to three Diva segments (if you count Otunga…ZING!). When you're missing talent on the roster, it's a golden opportunity to give other guys a chance to shine and aside from Evan Bourne picking up a W on TV, none of those opportunities were used very well.
The Hoff stuff was odd because he got a good pop at the beginning but he was also really fucking creepy in that Lifeguard chair near the end.
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