Monday Night Raw – February 27, 2012 – Cena Wins Again Because Rock Can’t Be Serious

Monday Night Raw
Date: February 27, 2012
Location: Rose Garden, Portland, Oregon
Commentators: Michael Cole, Jerry Lawler

The main thing to see tonight is that Rock is back (again). We’re scheduled to get his response to Cena’s promo from last week. This should be the start of the serious part of their feud as opposed to the stupid comments that Rock has made over the past year which have been based on comedy rather than the desire to see a fight. Let’s get to it.

Daniel Bryan vs. CM Punk

Nice to see another match getting the proper build. Saving something for PPV? What does that mean? Punk comes out first but Jericho comes out instead of Bryan. He says Punk is one of his favorites but Punk isn’t as good as he is. Jericho never had to say he was the best in the world because everyone else said it for him. He talks about how he didn’t care what people said backstage because he knew he’d have the best match on the card.

Punk yells at Jericho, talking about how Jericho didn’t invent everything in wrestling. Did he invent being from Canada? Jericho says Punk doesn’t take anything seriously but he needs to do it with Jericho, because he’s something different. Punk goes off on Jericho again, talking about he’s been here talking about he knows he’s the best and has been here swimming with sharks while Jericho was off Dancing With The Stars. Jericho says he’s still the best and while he was off doing all that stuff, all he was thinking about was Punk and proving that he’s the best in the world.

Oh yeah we’ve got a match to get to. Bryan comes out and jumps Punk. Ace, Otunga, Long and Santino are all at ringside. The bell will officially ring after a break. Back with Brian firing off kicks in the corner but Punk hits a cross body out of the corner for two. Teddy and Ace are on commentary here so Cole sucks up to Ace. Punk comes back with knees to the back for two. He backdrops Bryan to the floor and sets to dive, but Bryan calls AJ over to tend to him.

The distraction lets Bryan take Punk’s knee out and send him into the steps. We take another break (pretty fast no?) and come back with Bryan holding an abdominal stretch. We missed the ending from last week with Punk almost winning off a superplex with the interlocking legs. Punk hits the knee in the corner but he bulldog is countered. He slams Bryan down and hits the top rope elbow but his ribs are too hurt to cover.

Otunga tries to interfere but Punk kicks him down. LeBell Lock is countered and Otunga gets up again. The wrestlers hit stereo cross bodies as Santino knocks Otunga down. Ace pulls Santino down as Bryan is walking out. Sheamus throws him back in and Punk hits the GTS. Ace says that’s a DQ and the bell rings at 10:20.

Rating: C+. This didn’t have the time to be anything good and was more about setting up Smackdown vs. Raw at Wrestlemania than the match itself. Clearly they needed to use the world titles against each other to accomplish this too right? The match again didn’t have a clean ending which is good, but it’s having these potential main event matches for free on TV that makes PPV matches less important.

Punk poses on the stage when Jericho runs out and beats him up. He slams Punk on the stage and puts him in the Liontamer.

We get a video on HHH vs. Undertaker from last year with testimonials from big names and The Miz saying how amazing it was. IT WASN’T THAT GOOD!

Kelly Kelly vs. Nikki Bella

Nikki slams her into the mat to start and does a Hennig neck snap. Kelly does her screaming headscissors and kicks the other Bella down. She reverses a rollup to pin Nikki at 1:30. Your usual Divas stuff.

John Cena vs. The Miz

Miz says that no one works harder than he does and how he’s flown 16 hours to do PR in Russia. For some reason though he isn’t even on the card for Wrestlemania yet. What better way to show why he should be on it than by beating the guy that he beat in the main event last year? Miz escapes a quick AA attempt and hits his usual stuff to take over. Cena hits a backdrop and some clotheslines but walks into Miz’s short DDT for two. The corner clothesline hits and Miz goes up, but misses his top rope ax handle. Cena starts up his finishing sequence and hits the Shuffle. AA and STF end this at 4:04.

Rating: D+. Miz gets crushed. Again. This is the problem with most upper midcard guys anymore: there’s no way to get them taken seriously because they’re always against a big star on TV and half the time they have to lose. Maybe they shouldn’t have these matches on free TV? Nah that’s crazy talk.

Rock pops up on screen and does the You Can’t See Me sign.

Tag Titles: Epico/Primo vs. R-Truth/Kofi Kingston vs. Jack Swagger/Dolph Ziggler

Ok then. This is actually more like the WCW Triangle matches where you have three people in the ring at once. You can only tag your partner though. Kofi, Dolph and Primo start us off but Ziggler chills on the floor. Things break down quickly and now there’s no one in the ring. Kofi and Swagger fall to the floor and we take a break.

Back with Primo, Swagger and Truth in the ring and Swagger breaking up a Truth sunset flip. Swagger and Primo get in an argument and it’s off to Ziggler. A great dropkick by Ziggler puts Truth down but Primo tries to steal the pin. Truth comes back and hits a combination Downward Spiral/DDT to both guys. A double tag prevents the tag to Kofi but Swagger gets in a fight with Epico, allowing the hot tag to Kofi.

He cleans house with his high flying stuff and gets two off the cross body. A double Boom Drop to one of each opponents but Ziggler hits the Zig Zag to break up the Trouble in Paradise. Swagger gets two off that and then grabs the ankle lock on Epico. Trouble in Paradise takes Swagger down and Primo hits a Backstabber on Kofi, allowing Epico to steal the pin to retain at 8:21.

Rating: C. Why in the world would you keep the titles on these guys? No one cares about them, they’re not particularly good and their matches are nothing special. Is this supposed to prove that they’re better than these two teams? Not having them lose clean to Kofi/Truth last week would have done the same thing.

Post match Kane comes out to clear the ring and beat up everyone in sight.

Ace and Otunga are in the back talking about the Oscars when Teddy comes in. Nothing to see here.

We recap the Eve heel turn and her wanting to use Cena.

Here’s Eve in the arena with new EVIL music. She says she doesn’t care that she uses people because it’s not her fault that men can’t resist her. The men should blame themselves for their weaknesses. And that’s it.

We see Eve in the back and Kelly messes up the whole thing with her awful acting. Alicia is next to Kelly for no apparent reason. Eve leaves them there.

Trailer for Edge’s new movie. Oh great. It’s a buddy comedy.

Orton is back on Smackdown to face Bryan.

Big Show/Sheamus vs. Cody Rhodes/Mark Henry

Henry isn’t allowed time off to heal is he? Cody shows us a clip from Mania where Show lost to Floyd Mayweather. Cody immediately tags Henry in and Show stomps him down to start. Show spears him down and glares at Cody who is on the ramp. Sheamus tags himself in and Brogue Kicks Henry down for the pin at 59 seconds.

The Board of Directors are going to announce something at 10am tomorrow and it might involve potential leadership changes on both shows.

We get a recap of Cena’s promo last week and Rock is up next.

Shawn will be on Raw next week.

Here’s Rock for the big response. The fans chant for him and he seems legit taken back by it. Rock says look at his arm which is real. He’s covered in goosebumps because this feels good. He says this might surprise some people, but he’s not here every week. Him saying he’d never leave didn’t mean that he’d be at Raw and Smackdown every week. The fans chant Fruity Pebbles.

Rock says he was born and raised in this business and is here for no reason other than because he loves the WWE. He’ll always be a part of it and it’ll always be a part of him. He finally says Cena’s name and the people boo. For years, Rock thought Cena was a phony. He didn’t think that someone who graduated from a private school could become the Doctor of Thuganomics. But then Rock realized that Cena really is that guy.

Cena said that it took forever to get to Rock but why, when he has Rock’s cell phone number. Instead of talking on the phone or in person though, Rock would rather slap him in the face with a piece of kung pow chicken. Last week Cena said that he’ll fight at Wrestlemania for all of the people in the back that love to be a professional wrestler. Rock grew up as one and he was always taught that no one was going to fight for himself but himself.

When he was climbing the ladders (he climbed ladders?) do you think anyone fought for him? Do you think anyone fought for Austin, Savage or Piper? Rock fights for the people, not the boys in the back. He says kung pow is now trending world wide. That made my eyes roll. Rock says the people aren’t tired of being entertained. That’s what he does: he entertains.

Rock says he mentioned Cena eating Fruity Pebbles and then a few months later, Cena was on a cereal box. He said lady parts and it was chanted. Now Rock leads them in chants of Rocky and lady parts. That’s what Rock does: he entertains. The most interesting thing Cena has done all year is change the kind of shorts he wears to camouflage. That’s been effective because we can’t find his balls anywhere. And cue Rock telling us that Cena’s missing balls is trending.

Cue Cena thank goodness. Cena says that only Rock could come up with calling someone kung pow chicken. He is the guy that talks Rock down because Rock isn’t here. However, Rock is only half right because Cena will run Rock down when Rock is here too. Cena used to love Rock too until he met Dwayne Johnson. Dwayne is self-centered and egotistical and Cena doesn’t need words trending on Twitter, or his promo printed on his wrist (which Rock apparently had).

At Wrestlemania, Cena is going to be looking into the eyes of Dwayne Johnson, not The Rock like everyone else will see. Cena says carry on and continue trending and leaves. Rock says that’s just like Cena to walk away before the right. Rock and Dwayne Johnson are the same person and he’ll be kicking Cena all over Wrestlemania, if you smell what he’s cooking. Rock sounded REALLY desperate after Cena left.

Overall Rating: C+. This was ALL about Rock’s response to Cena and the rest of the show meant nothing. That being said, the rest of the show did nothing for me at all. It wasn’t a bad show or anything but nothing on it made me any more interested in the show than I already am. Punk and Jericho are going to have a good match but it’s going to mean nothing in the long run by comparison.

Results
Daniel Bryan b. CM Punk via DQ when Sheamus interfered
Kelly Kelly b. Nikki Bella – Rollup
John Cena b. The Miz – STF
Epico/Primo b. Jack Swagger/Dolph Ziggler and Kofi Kingston/R-Truth – Epico pinned Swagger after Trouble in Paradise
Sheamus/Big Show b. Mark Henry/Cody Rhodes – Brogue Kick to Henry

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