Greetings all, and welcome to this week’s wonderful Raw Redux. I didn’t see Raw as it aired last night, so imagine my surprise in discovering the powers that be have somehow magically allowed me to recap JTG! More on that later, though. Tonight was a pretty sweet night for the females, as Layla and Kaitlyn teamed up to face off against Eve and Beth Phoenix in tag team action. Not only that, but we get some segments backstage with Kaitlyn and Eve, as well as our General Manager, AJ Lee! As always, let’s kick things off with some action.
We head out to the ring to the sound of two insatiable women, in the form of Kaitlyn and… hey, wait a second, is that our Divas Champion? It is! Layla has finally showed herself on Raw again. Following their entrance comes that of their opponents, who are no stranger to one another, in the form of Eve and Beth Phoenix. They actually promote the match this Friday between Eve and Kaitlyn, which is an excellent touch although feels weird that Layla is again playing second fiddle.
As soon as the bell sounds, we get things started with Beth and the champion. Phoenix immediately goes for a military press, but Layla counters out into a bit of a miscue of a sunset flip. Beth immediately takes her into their corner, as Eve tags in with a kick.
Torres continues the ambush of Layla, sending her into the ropes. Layla comes off with one of her bridge roll ups, but this too doesn’t seem to execute smoothly. The Divas Champ with a kick and then leaps off with a crossbody from the corner for a two count. She applies a headlock, but Torres fights out and sends Layla into the ropes again. Layla avoids making contact in Eve’s trap, and then proceeds to bust a move like we’ve seen her do before. She bumps Eve in the head with her bottom (way to make me miss Naomi, Layla!) and then makes the tag in to Kaitlyn after hitting a clothesline. Kaitlyn with a nice backbreaker for a two count on her opponent this Friday.
She executes a jackknife cover, but only for the count of dos. Michael Cole makes his first great comment in the history of his tenure in WWE by claiming Kaitlyn is a future Divas Champion, just as Eve sends her right into the turnbuckle. Kaitlyn hits an elbow to the face and leaps onto the second rope, but Torres brutally slams her off and goes to town on the lime green adorned Diva. Eve makes the tag back into Beth, who DRILLS Kaitlyn with a nasty kick and then chokes her out with her boot. Phoenix knocks Layla off the ropes as the two of them double team Kaitlyn while the Divas Champ keeps the referee distracted. Kaitlyn then boots Beth in the stomach and fires up! Not for long though, as Beth applies a Canadian Backbreaker! Kaitlyn slips out and throws Beth into Eve, knocking her to the floor. From there, she rolls Beth up and gets the big win over the former Divas Champion!
Skip to 0:17
Backstage, we spy… okay, I think I’m in a dream right now because I honestly can’t believe that I’m seeing JTG and Kaitlyn backstage on Raw in a segment where they are the focus. AJ, you just know how to win me over more each week. JTG is complaining to Kaitlyn about not getting a spot on the card when the show is now three hours. JTG, I don’t think it needs to be said how much I’m a fan of yours, but are you really complaining about this to someone who has only ever been on Raw to perform a can-can in a line up after a 14 Diva tag team match? At least pick Kelly Kelly or something. Nonetheless, he calls this situation crazy… which sparks our slightly crazed GM, AJ Lee, to interrupt while in mid skip!
AJ demands to know what he just said, but he tries to downplay it. He wants Kaitlyn to take his side on this matter, but AJ won’t let him get a word in! She begins to laugh and states that if he wants to compete, he can get to the ring right now! JTG heads off, leaving our Chickbusters as the focus of Raw! AJ says that yes, they’ve had their differences, but Kaitlyn doesn’t really believe she’s unstable, right? Kaitlyn lets out a laugh and says that she can think of many words to describe AJ, that of which unstable is not one of. The two laugh, as Kaitlyn hurries off and AJ’s expression turns from happiness to slightly on edge. I love it!
Backstage, CM Punk is stretching as Eve Torres approaches him. She congratulates him on becoming a new version of himself. He denies that he made any sort of a change at all, claiming he just fights for respect. Eve states that she doesn’t believe anyone believes that, especially John Cena to which Punk claims he will go tell him face to face right now.
Check out AJ’s match making abilities below around the 11:33 mark:
Also, witness her distress terror as she discovers the bad side of having such a powerful role when Brock Lesnar invades Shawn Michaels car and kidnaps him by skipping to the 9:17 mark:
Thoughts: Match wise, I actually really enjoyed it. It was much longer than we’re used to, felt fresh, and I thought Kaitlyn worked nicely with both Beth and Eve. Layla was definitely off her game early on, but aside from those two mishaps, she wasn’t that bad, in my opinion. It’s so refreshing to have matches on Raw going longer than a minute. Whether or not you were a fan of the action in ring or not, the Divas do seem to be getting a little bit more time to work now that the show has expanded to three hours, and that is a huge positive because the age old complaint has been about them not getting enough time to wrestle on the main shows.
Also, I couldn’t be more happy for Kaitlyn. This was another big win for her over Beth and she deserves some spotlight as far as I’m concerned. Kaitlyn is one of my favorite Divas in WWE, and if we’re just going by the Divas who actively compete in the division, she is my favorite. She helped make NXT Redemption my shining star of wrestling programming, and I find her to not only be improving in the ring each week, but she also has the acting chops as well for backstage segments. She can be funny, as seen through her NXT run, and she can also be serious, like in the segments with AJ on SmackDown earlier this year. I just think she’s something special and I would love to see her become Divas Champion. I’m kind of worried for the match with Eve this Friday though because I don’t want either woman to become Booker’s assistant now that they’re seeming to have spots in the actual division. It will likely mean they cease wrestling as AJ has, but on the other hand, it also means we will probably at least be guaranteed to see them on a weekly basis. When it was first announced, I wanted Kaitlyn to win the position because she’s in desperate need of screen time more so than Eve. After tonight though, I kind of want Eve to win because I feel like you need a heel to bounce off a face in administrative roles. It would be much more interesting in my opinion. Then you could maybe have Kaitlyn undergo this lucky streak of wins and work her way up into a Divas Title feud with Layla.
I have no clue what they’re doing with Layla and her title, but at this point does it truly matter? Her reign has probably been the worst in the title’s history, which sucks when it’s for reasons beyond her control. I don’t see how much of anything can salvage it at this point. Personally, I wouldn’t mind if she just dropped the belt in a battle royal at SummerSlam or something because I feel like it needs to go to someone else now. I mean, she’s held the title for almost four months and how much of that has she been on TV? They don’t seem to want to invest in her without Michelle McCool by her side, so maybe giving the title to someone else will spark an interest. Probably not, but there’s hope. I sort of call the Divas Title a curse because it seems like whenever a Diva gets to hold it, they vanish from TV provided their reign lasts more than a week. It’s sad, but on the bright side the matches are getting longer and I hope that this interest in Kaitlyn does not die down anytime soon.
Also, bonus points for storyline continuation with the Chickbusters, as well as Eve continuing with the role as the little voice filling CM Punk’s head with ideas!
