Live from the city of kings, Jerry Lawler, Elvis Presley, Alex Chilton, and Young Dolph! That's right, it's live from beautiful Memphis, Tennessee and it's Monday Night Raw! The cruiserweights will no longer be cruiser-waiting, brother, as they make their debut tonight. All your favorites from the Cruiserweight Classic will be in attendance and they will be headed up by CWC winner and new Cruiserweight champion TJ Perkins. I've got a new keyboard situation. The show starts... now!
The show opens with Roman Reigns getting an unanimously negative reception from the people of Memphis. Byron says Roman is out to call out Rusev. Let's see if that pans out. He picks up a microphone and a new round of booing commences. He opens his mouth and Stephanie interrupts him at first to cheers but immediately turning to boos when she steps through the curtain. The Mickster interrupts her before she gets a chance to say much more than a "hold on a second, Roman." Unanimously cheers for Foley despite him being shown as a bumbling stooge for the last two months. Mick apologizes for the main event breaking down last week. Mick books Seth vs Rusev tonight as punishment for them running in on Roman/Owens. Roman demands compensation for getting screwed. Mick gives Roman his US title match and that booking comes with Stephanie's "personal guarantee" that the match will actually happen at Clash of Champions. Mick is upset that the wrestlers won't treat him seriously and keep disobeying his orders. Mick says his career is hinging on whether or not Raw succeeds against Smackdown. To make things right for last week, Mick is going to sign Roman Reigns vs Kevin Owens in a match tonight. Stephanie seems taken aback by this. Owens' music hits and he steps out on the ramp in a suit. He complains that he beat Roman twice in one night last week so he should have the night off to prepare for his match with Seth. Stephanie says that it's true, he did beat Roman twice, so the match will be non-title. Mick says that might be so, but the match will be in a steel cage! "Have a nice day." Rollins' music hits. Oh, he's going to wrestle Rusev when the commercial break is over. I forgot that that match was made in the twelve minutes it took for them to do that opening segment.
Backstage, Stephanie is pissed at Mick for booking Owens in a cage. Rusev runs in on the conversation and he's pissed at Mick for giving Roman a rematch and making him wrestle Seth tonight on Lana's big night. Her movie comes out tomorrow. Rusev says Mick is just jealous because the Rusev family love each other but the Holy Foley crew hate each other. Mick says Rusev has a match "Right. Now." Rusev storms off. "Congratulations," says Mick. "NO CONGRATULATIONS," Rusev yells from off screen. Mick picks up his phone and it's Chris Jericho
Rollins has been in the ring for seven minutes now doing presumably nothing. Taking his shirt off. Rusev's music hits, he makes his entrance, and they begin their match. The match ends in a double countout when both men wander up the ramp following Rollins hitting Rusev with a tope suicida. Rusev goes to powerbomb Rollins through the announce table but instead Rollins superkicks Rusev off the stage. He then climbs on top of the announce table and does a high crossbody to Rusev standing on the floor.
Backstage, Dana suggests a tag team match where the person who gets pinned gets the title shot against Charlotte at Clash of Champions. This backfires when Mick decides to tweak her idea a bit and book a triple threat, Bayley vs Sasha vs Charlotte for the belt at Clash. Mick leaves and Charlotte lays out Dana. They play the cruiserweight arrival vignette again and then sit at the splash screen for like 90 entire seconds.
Backstage, Chris and Kevin complain about Foley. Jericho starts making a list of everything Foley has done wrong and he's gonna show it to him because he's not gonna like IT.
BRAAAUUUUUUN. They call him "the mountain of a man" which I'm going to assume is a dig at the Mountain from Game of Thrones. He's beating up Sin Cara. Sin Cara gets way too much offense in. I'm a Sin Cara/Hunico fan and I don't think Braun should be selling any of his strikes. Braun catches a lionsault from Sin Cara and powerslams him for three.
Backstage, Sasha and Bayley do the friendly rivalry thing. Bayley absolutely can't talk, she's got that "embarrassed and nervous so she can't close her mouth" deal, but it's super endearing.
In the ring, it's time for Sasha Banks and Bayley vs Charlotte and Dana Brooke. Charlotte pins Bayley with an assist from Dana. The Memphis Grizzlies are in the crowd.
In the office set, Seth is standing around. Stephanie walks in. Seth asks her why she and HHH threw away their relationship with him for Kevin Owens. Kevin is fat, after all. Stephanie says it's not her fault, HHH worked on his own. Seth says she owes him an explanation. She says that she can't answer for HHH, who worked entirely on his own, but she can speculate that maybe Triple H was tired of babysitting Seth after Seth constantly let him down. Seth says that he can become the Authority's worst nightmare. Stephanie puts her full weight behind Kevin Owens after Seth threatens her. Owens is The Man now, per her. Seth says that Shane returning has made Stephanie weak. He leaves.
BO-LIEVE in BO! Gary Graham is the guy the Bo will be wrestling. Cole says he looks like Michael PS Hayes' grandson. Cole is Not Wrong. Bo recites another poem and wins with an overdrive. Graham got a "let's go jobber" chant again.
Cesaro vs Sheamus is next. Boy, I wonder who is gonna win this bad boy now that the series is 3-2 Sheamus. Shockingly, out of nowhere, to the surprise of everyone, Cesaro ties up the series 3 to 3 with a Gotch-style neutralizer.
Backstage, Jericho confronts Foley about him never liking him and taking it out on his best friend Kevin. Foley says he personally recommended Jericho to Heyman so he liked him at one point, but not recently. List of things on the List of Jericho: demeans superstars, steals catchphrases, terrible fashion sense, uses cheap babyface pops as catchphrases. Jericho is going to read the entire List of Jericho to the world!
Jericho's got a list of grievances on a clipboard in the ring and he's gonna air 'em. More items on the list: trying to drive a wedge between me and my best friend Kevin Owens. He starts adding specific fans in the crowd to the list, including "brace face in row 12." Friends with Sami Zayn, also on the list. He's going to cross Sami off the list once and for all. Enzo and Cass interrupt. Enzo does his thing. Enzo says Jericho isn't really best friends with Kevin Owens because a real best friend wouldn't let Jericho look the way he does. Enzo and Cass, Bart and Millhouse, Bert and Ernie, Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn, Ashton Kutcher and Danny Masterson, these are real best friends. The Shining Stars come down and try to sell everybody on timeshares. The New Day interrupt. Byron tries to get Booty Os from Big E but Big E just graphically and violently pelvic thrusts at Byron. Jericho asks them why they're out there and E says "We had nothing better to do!" Woods is giving away two iPhones on his youtube channel. Gallows and Gun interrupt. They're sick of hearing about lists and youtube channels and real estate scams and cereal. That's an insane list of things to be sick of. Jericho is starting a new list, a list of stupid idiots, and everyone is on it. Jericho goes to leave but Sami Zayn cuts him off and hits him with a water bottle. They brawl into the ring and eventually everyone is brawling and it's a big mess. Finally, as the show is fading out to commercial, Corey manages to sneak in the Festivus Seinfeld reference.
When they return from commercial break a match has organized itself. Cass, Enzo, Sami and the New Day vs Shining Stars, Gallows and Gun, and Jericho. Enzo pins Epico with the Boomshakalaka after a Helluva kick sets him up.
Hispanic Heritage Month is September apparently. They played a video for Cesar Chavez earlier that I assumed was the USA Network, not the WWE because there's no way Vince would ever honor a labor unionist. They air a video for Eddy Guerrero.
Mickster out to introduce the Cruiserweights. He stumbles all over his words and it's legitimately sad to watch. He introduces first Rich Swann who comes out to his fake Lionel Richie song. Then he introduces Gran Metalik, followed by Cedric Alexander. I don't think there's going to be a match tonight. Every wrestler gets a talking head inset as they enter the ring. The fourth person introduced is The Brian Kendrick. Okay, this is a fatal four way for the #1 contendership to TJ Perkins' Cruisweight title. Kendrick submits Cedric with the Captain's Hook after a heck of a sprint that probably should have been earlier in the show before I checked out.
The cage lowering music plays for a couple seconds then we return to commercial.
It's main event time. The cage is fully lowered and out comes Roman in his red gear followed by Kevin. Reigns and Owens escape the cage at the same time but Reigns hit the floor first and wins. Cage match is such a terrible gimmick. After Roman hits the ground, Rusev runs out to try to beat Roman down but Roman dispatches with him until Owens slams the cage door into Reigns' face. Owens and Rusev throw Reigns in the cage and lock themselves in with him. They beat him down for several minutes before Rollins sprints down, climbs the cage, and dives off it, crossbodying Rusev and Owens which would have been really cool if he didn't also just dive off the stage. Not quite as bad as Jericho and him doing the cage dive in the same episode, but still pretty bad. The show abruptly ends probably because they're 12 minutes over the top of the hour. Yikes.
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