Tha Raw Report: Cutting Edge

There is nothing on "Raw." Randy Orton, Edge and Santino Marella are it. Everyone else either isn't used properly or is an afterthought. Chris Jericho is the best in the world at what he does, and tonight he plays valet to Wade Barrett, and then plans an attack on Big Show with the Miz. Big Show's on another brand. It's either time to end the brand split or get writers who know what they're doing.

I truly wish TNA was better. It would bring some competition back and Vince needs competition. TNA is apparently moving back to Thursday nights. Vince wins that one, so I don't expect the product to improve.

The "Beat the Clock Challenge" is a pretty good gimmick to use, and in the case of giving someone the opportunity to pick a match stipulation it's even better. In the case of Cena and Batista it's just something adding to nothing. Cena and Batista going into WrestleMania wasn't half bad. I think it was partly because it fit, and people figured they could put one good match together. Now it's just getting crazy.

Shouldn't they have done the "Beat the Clock" next week? I mean damn, Flava-Flav is going to be the guest host. They could have used his clock to time the matches. I'm not sure what the general consensus is on the guest host shtick, but seriously, it's time to move on.

The angle doesn't have to die. Just name a General Manager. Ricky Steamboat, Sergeant Slaughter, Matt Striker, Doink the Clown. It doesn't matter. Get a GM that knows what's going on, and you can keep the guest hosts to have a big name on "Raw" every week. They don't have full GM responsibilities, just let them sale whatever it is they're selling.

I'm not going to completely kill "Raw." As I said earlier, Orton, Edge and Marella are it. Edge may as well have been shooting when he said he "used to be," the Rated R Superstar, but now the WWE is all PG. I don't know who lied to Vince and said that PG was the way to go. Sure it's great to have the audience under the age of 15.

I don't advocate not listening to your parents children, but when everyone was watching wrestling, a lot of parents didn't want their kids watching it. It was edgy, it was cool, it was what you had to do on Monday night or your friends would give you shit for the entire week.

Let us not forget also that it wasn't a gimmick when Edge won his first WWE Championship at New Years Revolution that following that he became the most watched WWE Champion since "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. Edge probably doesn't have many World title reigns left in him. Not because of injuries, but because he's lurking dangerously close to Triple H's number and Flair's record.

I say put the belt on him as a heel, and let a reign last longer than a month. Orton has six reigns already, Edge has nine. Orton has in a way transcended character. He isn't "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, but he's doing what Austin did. Austin was a heel but the people loved him. Orton is a heel, and people love him.

Edge got more heel heat for himself and more face reaction to Orton by demanding Orton to speak. Orton can pull this off perfectly. He doesn't have to speak. He can stand there and seethe. It's working for him. He isn't to where Sting took it, and probably never will be, but go with what works.

Orton and Edge should be carrying "Raw." WWE Championship and main events. Sure Orton has been in an unbearable number of pay-per-view main events, but what you need to ask yourself is would you rather see Orton main eventing, or Cena and Batista? John Morrison should be moving into the main event picture as well, as should Ted DiBiase. As I said, they aren't using guys correctly.

Ted DiBiase was in The Marine 2, John Morrison: Rockstar came out a while back. Instead of just throwing advertisements out occasionally, and hoping people buy it because they are WWE fans and are loyal. Use workers like guest hosts. If they have something they need to sell, put them into the position to sell their merchandise.

D-Generation X got entire segments of "Raw" to sell merchandise. The guys with things that should, and need to sell are given commercials and pop-up ads. Come on. There are so many fundamental problems with everything right now it isn't funny.

Speaking of guest hosts, now would be a great time to capitalize on Floyd "Money" Mayweather. Bring him back in some capacity. Not saying he'd turn ratings around and be a savior, just that he would bring viewers in temporarily. While he's there give it your best possible product and try to get and keep people's interest.

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