Monday Night Raw – November 10, 2003: The Good Shows Don’t Survive
Monday Night Raw
Date: November 10, 2003
Location: Fleet Center, Boston, Massachusetts
Attendance: 6,000
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler
It’s the go home show for Survivor Series and since the card is mostly set, tonight is going to be all about the hard sell. While there are several options for building to the elimination match, odds are we’re going to have to listen to HHH talk about his match with Goldberg and that’s not a series of statements I’m likely to survive. Let’s get to it.
Here are last week’s results if you need a recap.
Opening sequence.
Here’s Lita to get things going. She talks about how coming back was a big deal but winning the title back on Sunday will be even bigger. Cue HHH (JR: “IS THIS WHO WE THINK IT IS???” Well who else would be coming out to HHH’s music Jim?) with Evolution to interrupt. Lita asks if she can help them and HHH asks Orton for a dollar. Unless she plans on stripping and dancing for the dollar, she can leave right now.
With Lita gone, HHH shows us a clip of Batista returning and breaking Goldberg’s ankle. HHH makes a lot of threats about Sunday but here’s Steve Austin to interrupt. Austin doesn’t want to hear this but HHH accuses him of trying to have one last Stone Cole moment before he’s fired.
Insults about Sunday’s elimination match are made until Austin asks HHH if he’s planning on wrestling tonight. HHH hadn’t planned on it so Austin tells him to get out. A brawl is teased but Austin says he can do it in six days. For now though, security can come out and escort HHH out of the building. HHH says he’s leaving on his own and threatens to sue if he’s harmed at all. What a waste of ten minutes.
In the back, Team Bischoff laughs at Austin but here’s Team Austin to insult them right back. Matches are imminent.
Intercontinental Title: Rob Van Dam vs. Christian
Van Dam is defending. Rob wastes no time in getting two off a monkey flip (yeah they’re really trying to get that over) as Lawler doesn’t know the difference between the near and far legs on a cover. A thumb to the eye sets up a DDT for two on Van Dam and we hit the chinlock. Back up and Rob catches him with a spinwheel kick in the corner as JR and King debate Christian’s level of creepy. The split legged moonsault gets two but a distracted referee lets Christian get in a low blow. Christian does the bring in the belt so he can use a chair trick but gets kicked down again. The Five Star retains the title.
Rating: D+. You can tell when Van Dam isn’t trying and that was clearly the case here. There’s not much you can get out of him when he just wants to do signature spots and unfortunately that’s been the case for a long time now. Maybe he can bring something out at Survivor Series but at this point I’m not really counting on it.
Shane McMahon is at a restaurant and gets a table for two.
Here’s Coach in a Yankees jersey with something to say. He gets in Lillian’s face and says he’s replacing her for losing her chair (the one Christian picked up) in the last match.
La Resistance vs. Hurricane/Rosey
It’s a brawl on the floor before the bell until the French guys take Rosey down to actually start. The French dance sets up more shots to the leg but a Samoan drop gets Rosey out of trouble. Hurricane comes in to clean house (JR: “The man with green hair.”) as everything breaks down. Rosey gets knocked outside and a swinging neckbreaker of all things ends Hurricane.
Rating: D. Nothing to see here but La Resistance are getting better. There’s still nothing to the characters as they’re just Vince getting out his anger over real world events but at least the in-ring stuff is getting smoother. Imagine that: getting rid of the utterly worthless Grenier and replacing him with another OVW talent works that much better.
Terri is worried about having to wrestle tonight but Lita says it’s going to be fine. Bischoff comes in to tell Terri to go find something less appropriate to wear in the ring. As for Lita, she needs to get ready to “play ball” once Austin is gone. As usual, this doesn’t feel right from Bischoff.
Jericho fires up Team Bischoff. Orton comes in and says he’ll save the day on Sunday. The team isn’t convinced. Long: “That’s one cocky cracker.”
Val Venis sneaks his two women into the locker room and one of them gets to see Lance Storm in the shower. They’re rather impressed.
Shane is ready to order but says he has a guest coming so he’ll wait. JR: “Who’s his guest?” Normally I can tolerate JR but this is stupid even for him.
Lita/Terri vs. Molly Holly/Gail Kim
Coach announces Lita and Terri at a combined weight of 310lbs to annoy JR even more. Terri is in a dress and starts for whatever reason with Gail planting her off a side slam. Lawler freaks out over seeing Terri’s underwear and it’s off to Molly for more beating. JR figures out the obvious about Shane’s guest as Terri makes a comeback and brings in Lita. Not that it matters as Molly sends her into Gail and grabs the ropes for the pin.
Post match Gail rips Terri’s dress mostly off for fan service. The idea here is that this is what the women are going to be used to under Bischoff’s control. Well it’s under Austin’s co-control right now and it’s still happening so what difference does it make?
We look back at Randy Orton cheating to beat Shawn Michaels at Unforgiven.
Randy Orton vs. Shawn Michaels
Flair isn’t here tonight and the teammates are barred from ringside. Orton takes him into the corner for some uppercuts to start but gets chopped for his efforts. It’s too early for Sweet Chin Music so Shawn punches him down for two instead. Shawn tries to get a bit too fast though and gets sidestepped to the floor for a big crash. Back in and Orton hammers away, with Lawler saying his fist is on Shawn’s chin like melted pizza cheese.
We hit the chinlock for a few moments before the exchange of strikes goes to Shawn. There’s the forearm into the nipup but the ref gets bumped. The backbreaker drops Shawn again and Orton grabs a chair, only to get backdropped through it instead. Now Sweet Chin Music can connect for the pin.
Rating: C-. This was a pretty standard TV match with Shawn not really doing anything too fancy. It also doesn’t help that Shawn pins Orton six days before one of the biggest matches of Orton’s career but you knew he would get his win back as soon as possible. Not bad but too short to mean anything.
Shane eats appetizers and here’s Kane as his guest. They glare a bit until Shane promises that Sunday will be their last fight. Shane talks about how whoever goes into the ambulance is done for good so Kane asks how Linda is doing. He electrocuted Shane’s testicles so Shane could never have kids. Kane: “Did I succeed?” Kane doesn’t know love so Shane must know pain. Shane says Kane is pathetic instead of evil. He knows Kane is scared and everyone, even Kane’s brother, knows it. On Sunday, he’s being put out of his misery. Shane leaves, thankfully paying first. This was, in a word, stupid.
Dudley Boyz vs. Scott Steiner/Mark Henry
Non-title. Steiner hammers on D-Von to start but gets shoulder blocked and legdropped. Bubba and Henry come in with Mark shoving him hard into the corner. The slow beating continues so D-Von comes in, earning both Dudleys a clothesline of their own. Steiner’s pushup elbow gets two but D-Von elbows him down.
The hot tag brings in Bubba as everything breaks down again. Bubba’s running clothesline manages to put Henry down but Steiner chairs Bubba in the back to break up the 3D. Of note: we’ve had five matches tonight and three of them have involved the usage of a chair. At some point you need to come up with something fresh.
Rating: D-. Long, slow, boring and just bad, but what were you expecting from the team of Scott Steiner and Mark Henry? There’s not much you can do when Henry is probably the better option of the two and Bubba and D-Von aren’t that level of miracle workers. Hopefully Steiner and Henry don’t last long on Sunday.
Post match Henry and Steiner destroy the Dudleys.
Austin is annoyed and Bischoff AGAIN points out that Austin has to trust people. They’ve beaten that into our heads for weeks now but one more time can’t possibly hurt anything right?
Clip of Lebron James in the front row last week. This week: some New England Patriots are here.
A backstage worker brings Jericho some water but he yells at her for taking too long. Trish Stratus pops in and doesn’t like what she saw so Jericho apologizes. They actually agree to go on a date. I love how we only get a little bit of this every week and it’s taking its time for a change. You don’t get that often enough.
Michael Cole and Tazz run down Smackdown’s half of the card. JR and King do the same with the red side.
Booker T. is reading WWE Unscripted with John Heidenreich. Apparently John wants to get a copy for Little Johnny for Christmas. Someone knocks on the door but there’s only a note addressed to Booker saying I STILL REMEMBER.
Booker T. vs. Chris Jericho
Booker gets in a hiptoss to start but misses the side kick and crotches himself on the ropes instead. A top rope elbow to the jaw gives Jericho two and we hit the chinlock. Jericho’s sleeper drop gets two and Booker is right back up with a right hand. The Book End doesn’t work but Booker grabs his spinning rollup into a crucifix out of the corner for the quick pin.
Rating: D+. Another victim of the time issue here as Team Austin continues to win the night. That doesn’t bode well for them on Sunday but at least they went with a logical build towards the pay per view. I’m glad they went with this over a week rather than doing it for a month or so on end as you would see today.
Post match Jericho puts him in the Walls as the rest of Team Bischoff comes in for the beatdown. Team Austin makes the save and takes care of Coach for running his mouth a little too much. Standard operating procedure here.
Video on Shane vs. Kane. That dinner scene was suffering enough.
Goldberg vs. Batista
Non-title. Goldberg, with a broken ankle, doesn’t even take the title off before gorilla pressing Batista without much effort. Without much height either but he’s hurt. Batista heads outside and grabs the leg to ram it into the apron. A shot into the post makes things even worse and a spinebuster plants Goldberg. The spear cuts Batista in half but here’s HHH for the quick DQ. Well duh.
HHH gets in the Pedigree but goes for the sledgehammer, allowing Goldberg to spear him down. A hammer shot to Batista sends HHH bailing to end the show.
Overall Rating: D. This was as ho hum of a go home show as you could have gotten and since those are often bad in the first place, the show was made even worse. The Survivor Series match looks good but HHH vs. Goldberg and Shane vs. Kane are both death. Maybe the Smackdown side can help but at this point, Sunday is looking pretty rough indeed. Bad show here, but more uninteresting and uninspired than anything else.
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