The Rise of Samoan Joseph – A Raw Recap for 6/12/2017

Tonight’s Raw came to us from THE CAJUNDOME!  It’s somewhere in Louisiana, obviously.

One of These Samoans is Not Like the Others

As promised, Brock Lesnar showed up at Raw, with Heyman in tow, to answer the attack on Paul last week’s Raw.  Heyman was quick to point out that there’s something different about Joe, he’s not related to all the other Samoan’s in the business.  Joe wasn’t going to let Heyman and Brock just cut a promo on him while he hung out in the back.  He shows up to crash the party.  As you can imagine, it quickly got out of hand, leading to Angle emptying out the locker room to unsuccessfully hold the two away from each other.

One thing of note, Joe shut down Brock’s double leg takedown twice.  I really think Joe could go toe-to-toe in a shoot with Lesnar and actually win.

Lesnar’s dance card might be tentatively booked with Strowman, a match that I do want to see, but I actually hope we get a Brock Vs. Joe series.  I hope that Vince see’s the potential in this.

UnBearable

After Ambrose rudely interrupted The Drifter’s riveting song last week, they get their first match together.  I think it was the match of the night.  I wanted the 2 out of 3 falls match to be great, but I realized that they are not going to waste it on a Raw against the last game of the 2017 NBA Finals.  I knew that it would have a wonky finish.  So this is the last match most people watched if they didn’t immediately change the channel after Joe and Brock.  It was a solid match where Miz came in to distract Ambrose ultimately leading to a victory for The Drifter.

The Drifter’s entrance music is a little too produced for my tastes.  It should be sparser.  He rarely uses it anyway.

Miz is angry and wants an entourage.  In the stupidest move he’s made in months, he approaches Heath Slater to see if he will be his protection.  The mistake is that he does this right in front of Rhyno (who has a delicious plate of cheese and crackers).  He quickly finds himself booked in a tag team match with the former SDL Tag Team Champions and is in need of a partner.  Who will it be?

It’s the bear from his celebration last week.  The one that was the red herring as Miz thought it was Ambrose.  The bear even had his own entrance video and was instantly over.  Miz, and the rest of the audience, was immediately suspicious.  Sure, it wasn’t Ambrose last week, but surely it had to be this week.  Miz started out the match, wary to go anywhere close to his corner, trading blows with Slater and Rhyno.  But he couldn’t stay away from the corner too long.  The bear tagged himself in and went to town.  The match continued until finally Miz couldn’t take it any more and attacked his partner.  It wasn’t Ambrose.  Confused, he slid back in the ring to try to finish the match.  The bear followed but immediately hit Slater with the Dirty Deeds.  Maryse sees this and tries to warn Miz…but it’s too late.  And as he realizes what’s happening, he accidentally knocks her off the apron.  She leaves him alone once again to eat a Dirty Deeds.  Ambrose drapes Slater across Miz for the pinfall.

I like what they’ve been doing here.  It’s a weird story but they’ve somehow breathed life into this feud.  The only think I don’t like are Cole’s bear puns.  They’re unbearable.

The Ongoing Mysteries

Kurt Angle’s Embarrassment

No real new clues on this mystery this week.  Miz made mention of it when he suggested that Ambrose be suspended or fired.  Kurt didn’t take too kindly to that idea.  All we know this week is that it’s not going away and more people are finding out about whatever it is.

Enzo and Cass and Big Show…and The Revival

Another week and Cass is out cold in the back right as they are about to have a match with Gallows and Anderson.  Instead of forfeiting, Enzo suggests that he can find a partner, just like last week.  Cass is having none of that.  Against the refs wishes, he heads out to face The Good Brothers in a tag team match.

Cass is quickly taken out, leaving Enzo to fend for himself.  He can’t hold them off and eats a Magic Killer and a pin from Karl Anderson.  They aren’t done though.  They want to continue to inflict pain on the little nerd.  Big Show is having none of it.  His presence makes the Good Brothers scramble.  They’re not stupid enough to take on Show right now.  Show checks on his little buddy while Cass, who is just coming back to his feet, looks on jealously.

In the back, Enzo asks Show the question we are all thinking.  Did he attack Cass just so he could become a tag team with Enzo?  Show’s demeanor changed and bristled at the idea.  Of course he didn’t.  And Show had one word to describe Cass, and he spelled it out for him…S-A-W-F-T!

And the Revival has been spotted again in the background of a shot.  Logically, I think it is them but it seems too obvious at this point.  I also don’t know who it would actually be.  The Big Show part of the angle is strange and weird and I love it.  Even if it wasn’t Show, I now want Cass Vs. Big Show to happen at some PPV.  Enzo on a forklift match?  Who’s SAWFT match?  Would terrible Vince Russo gimmick would you like to see them wrestle in?

Everything Else

• The main event was The Hardy Boyz Vs. Sheamus and Cesaro for the Raw Tag Team Championship.  It was a fine match but it was clear there would be no title change tonight.  Sheamus scored the first pinfall on Jeff.  Matt Hardy scored the second pinfall and a Double Count-Out was the final fall.
• Seth Rollins confronted Bray Wyatt, so I guess we are doing that now.  Seth questioned, and I’m paraphrasing, “Wait, I call you a couple of names and you attack me in my match?”  Someone is figuring out how wrestling works.
• Alicia Fox’s ex-boyfriend defeats Alicia Fox’s current boyfriend in a 10 second match while Alicia Fox is on FaceTime.  If you don’t know who those two people are by those descriptions, this storyline is not for you.
• Apollo Crews defeated Kalisto with Akira Tozawa getting the VIP treatment in the front row.  Afterwards, Titus handles Tozawa rather aggressively to get him in on the post match victory selfie in the ring.
• In the other Cruiserweight match, Neville attacked Swann during his entrance to send a message to Aries and TJP.
• There were Goldust and R-Truth pretapes.  I hope this goes on for months before they actually meet each other on the pre-show of a B PPV.
• With the first Women’s Money in the Bank ladder match happening this Sunday, Raw wanted to remind you that they have a women’s devision too!
  • Emma returned.  She might be my favorite Raw Women’s wrestler.  Let’s hope she can stay injury free for a while so she can make an impact.
  • It also seems like Sasha is done with her Alicia Fox program for good, thank god.
  • Sasha Banks, Mickie James & Dana Brooke def. Raw Women’s Champion Alexa Bliss, Nia Jax & Emma after Alexa Bliss walked off.  Sasha locked in the Banks Statement on Emma for the submission victory.  Welcome back Emma?
  • I have concerns about how they are handling Alexa Bliss.  I feel like I’ll be writing quite a bit about it next week.  Until then, I’m going to see how next week’s Raw goes.
• Bayley had a interview with Corey Graves.  I’m still not sure what they’re doing here.
• Speaking of interviews, check out Bring It To the Table where Graves actually asks about the Broken Matt gimmick.