I watched the repeat of raw last night. I thought it was simply an amazing show, brilliantly put together, and even better performed.
Triple H was barely mentioned, I think Cena mentioned him a couple of times in his promo, and that was it. Edge's promo was simply the best promo I've seen in a long, long time, at least since the days of The Rock, and we saw possibly the start of a few guys being pushed - Kofi, Cryme Tyme, Rhodes & Dibiase, Punk...
Punk's title win was excellent too - him waiting for the ref to ring the bell and jumping around was brilliant, I loved the way he walked down for his match with JBL with a massive grin on his face.
I did wonder whether the wrestlers on Raw now appreciate that Trips is gone, there's very much a chance for them to break through, without having to let Trips go over them first. HBK is certinaly now doing what's good for the business rather than what's good for HBK, and I'd really like to see him have an programme with Punk over the title. Clean wins over HBK would certainly elevate Punk to main event status (i don't quite see him there yet), and I don't want Punk to become the next Mysterio, losing every week only to scrape through a PPV.
I also clocked the reaction Cena got - he's suddenly a lot more over than he has been for a long, long time. I don't know if they cleaned up the sound from the live show to the repeat, but hell, he got a fantastic reaction. I think Vince has realised Cena without the title seems to be the way to get people to cheer rather than jeer him, I'm hoping a couple of months jobbing to the likes of JBL, Jericho and even Mysterio could really get him over, before another title run early next year.
On the whole, an excellent show, and I can't wait for next week either!
