The Raw is War Workrate Report
A weekly look at what did and didn't work on Raw is War by Oliver Postlethwaite
Monday, July 6th, 1998
Hey! I swear a whole bunch down below.
What Worked
I still like the Brawl for All, and Savio vs. Brakkus was the best one
yet, probably because I dig recognizing Brakkus from ECW and I've always
liked Vega for some reason. Various well respected web pages are calling
these matches shoots but I'm not sold yet BUT having Brakkus look like
such a pansy can't be called a good booking move, SO... And besides, would
you have rather seen these two in a legit worked pro wrestling match!?!
Drozdov vs. Hawk was decent too.
I like the IDEA of Mabel coming back to wreak havoc for not ever being
mentioned in the build up to King of the Ring but at the end of the day
it's FUCKING MABEL!!! God, this guy sucked bad at his peak so just imagine
how much awfulness he's gonna inflict upon us. He looked OK in the walk-in
but the holy-shit-it's-that-lame-old-fuck-who-used-to-be-in-the-WWF factor
helped out a lot. The match proper was pretty good because Shamrock works
stiff and pulls off cool moves and Jarrett sells even though he always seems
to suck, SO, I'm going to give the whole package a thumbs up. My favourite
part of everything though was Shamrock's post-commercial interview, "Mabel,
if you're any kind of a man...". Come on, if you were a non-wrestling fan
channel surfer that line would have KILLED!
The number one challenger skit was cool because Mankind still looks
awesome as a modern day Leatherface and his acting is great. Everyone
else was ok.
Jacqueline easily beats Sable when it comes to mic work. Sable looked
really bad striking out on all the easy pitches that Jackie was throwing
but the former Miss Texas was good enough to carry the segment herself.
Mero was just there but this was the first time that putting him with
Jacqueline actually worked. Why does this angle remind me of Beach Blast '92?
Dustin vs. Val Venis was pretty blah until the Kaentai DX run-in which
was goofy as hell with Yamaguchi screwing up his lines and looking
completely insane, but his "wife" isn't exactly hard on the eyes.
The 3-way match never took place but who wants to see Kane wrestle on
TV two weeks in a row anyway? Again, this worked because of Mankind
just sitting there and taking it like a man. Kind of a neat booking idea
but nothing mindblowing.
What Didn't Work
The opening soap opera was pretty well done but with all the teased matches
that never happen and seeing all these guys too often on TV, I can't say it
"worked". It was ok, but still...
Vader vs. Bradshaw was good and stiff but the ending was so bad that it has
to go here. I'm sorry, but these I'm-a-tough-shit-so-I-can-run-in-on-anybody
run-ins are the worst. So blame Vince for ruining would could have been a
nasty five minute brawl. C'mon Ross, Bradshaw the youngster?!? He's freaking
37!
I'm diggin' the Paul Ellering heel turn but the DOA SUCK! SUCK! SUCK!
I loved Paul E's over the top evil genius commentary! The less said
about the match the better. The Headbangers tried but DOA just really,
really suck. Did I mention that they...
I didn't hate the actual match involving D-Lo Brown and Terry Funk 'cos I'm
a Funk mark and D-Lo is the best wrestler in the Nation BUT I still don't like
seeing Terry lie down for unproven talent AND I hated the Undertaker walk-in
and subsequent chokeslamming of Funk BUT at least the WWF didn't edit out the
booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooos!
So maybe it wasn't such a good idea to put Mabel back in a WWF ring...
I'm not gonna say it worked but it was too short to be really painful
and Shamrock gets so fired up in the ring that I could watch him wrestle
a broom.
TSN didn't show the DX skit on the airing of Raw I caught. You got straight
to hell TSN.
Ollie
