It’s Raining Yen, Hallelujah, It’s Raining Yen – 205 Live Recap – June 13, 2017

205 Live, the most thrilling 45 minutes WWE gives us each week, is live in front of those in New Orleans who aren’t passed out drunk in their seats already.  Let’s see how much energy they still have.

• We kick off with Akira Tozawa and Titus in the backstage area, as Titus continues to woo him to the Titus Brand.  Titus is not very entertaining to me, and honestly, sometimes I think it is entirely intentional.  I think he’s supposed to be this annoying.  I do think it is strange that much like sticking the Bollywood Boyz with Jinder Mahal, they’ve elected that rather than make any effort whatsoever to push Apollo Crews they’ve just stuck him under Titus’s clearly broken wing.  But he did change the words to “It’s Raining Men” to “It’s Raining Yen”, which was remotely clever and I didn’t hate it.  Maybe the Titus Brand is growing on me in the realization it is supposed to be annoying.
• For some reason Tom Phillips has been replaced on the table by Vic Joseph.  He’s fine, but Graves-Phillips was magic on the desk.
• Cedric Alexander vs Ariya Daivari – I’m pretty high on Daivari.  He’s no Mustafa Ali, but he’s pretty damn good.  Unfortunately, we’re stuck in the carousel that is this Alicia Fox/Dar/Alexander/Swann storyline, and Daivari is being served up as sacrifice, but not without his opportunities to shine a good bit.  He carries the majority of the match in fact, but not before Noam Dar makes his way to the ring with Alicia Fox barking out orders on FaceTime (which is even more annoying than she usually is), only for Cedric to thwart his attack, kick out of the roll up coming off the distraction, and pick up the pinfall.  Cedric Alexander wins.
• Did you remember that Money in the Bank is on Sunday, and if you sign up now you’ll get both the Money in the Bank and Great Balls of Fire PPVs during your free 30 days?  Well, they want you to know that you do, as if having Phillips plug it relentlessly on Smackdown didn’t hammer it home quite hard enough.
• The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived is out to explain his tweet regarding needing to reevaluate things.  I’m assuming that means he’s going to take some time away, probably to do his book tour as Food Fight which appears to be out now and is available here.  He’s claiming that he has leg and neck things going on that he is awaiting clearance for.  Tony Nese, of all people, interrupts him.  As Aries isn’t cleared to compete, Gentlemen Jack makes his way out as the defender of Austin Aries and honor itself, so we’ll get a Gallagher vs Nese feud for a bit.  Gallagher tells Nese he is no Austin Aries, then when Tony strikes, he is assaulted with an umbrella.  We find out later that Gallagher vs Nese is booked for next Tuesday.
• They squeeze a lot of bullet points into a 45 minute show.
• Rich Swann attempted to appeal to TJP’s better self, which is apparently TJ Perkins, because he doesn’t take shortcuts and he earns everything.
• Mustafa Ali video package, because if you didn’t already think he was amazing, why not see a highlight reel.  It is interrupted by a message from Drew Gulak.  I like when they do these Gulak videos, his politician character is great.  They will actually have a match next week.
• Main Event: TJP vs Akira Tozawa – Very well done match between these two guys.  Tozawa is violent, strong and extremely quick.  TJP is a fantastic mat wrestler who can throw in the flips and flash to keep the crowd invested.  I thought this was a great matchup that the drunks in New Orleans didn’t seem to be behind quite as much as I was (of course I was watching it rather than working at 9:15 AM).  Perkins is just incredibly innovative, and he’s doing moves that I’ve never seen before, like the double chicken wing gutbuster about 3/4 of the way through.  He’s really good.  If he’ll stop dabbing, and drop the video game character thing if he’s going to be a bad guy, I think he could shoot right back to the top of the division.  I’d love to see TJP and Ali for the Cruiserweight Championship at some point.  That would be a hell of a show, kind of like this match with no stakes.  That snap suplex is just nasty.  Tozawa is a hell of a talent for this roster.  Good find H.  Akira Tozawa via pinfall following a snap suplex and the senton from the top rope.  Just a damn fine match.
  • These are two really talented guys, so can someone please explain to me why in the hell there was a CM Punk chant about half way through this matchup?  No, they weren’t flipping around for a few minutes, and TJP was showing off his immense ring technician skills with a series of submission moves, but that’s part of wrestling.  During the course of a wrestling program you should expect to see some big spots, some high flying/flashy stuff, some big slams, entirely too much talking, and some people showing the fact that they actually know how to wrestle technically.  Please stop overusing the What? chant and for the love of VKM, CM Punk is never coming back.  Ever.  This isn’t like a maybe he will one day like the Hardyz thing.  He is never coming back.  He hates the entire company and has no reason to go back.
• Following Tozawa’s win, Neville finds Titus in the locker room.  He wants Titus to know that Akira Tozawa isn’t even close to being on The Neville Level (and honestly, nobody is).  Neville is going to kick the teeth out of Titus’s mouth when they inevitably have a match on Raw, because you know it’s coming.

Watch this show.  Please watch this show.  Hopefully we can get the numbers up and they’ll quit feeling the need to shit on it with dumb appearances from the Raw women’s division members who wrestle like champions on Mondays and then get in stupid catfights for no reason on Tuesdays.  This is not where you’re going to rebuild the Divas division.  Oh hell no it isn’t.  Here’s your obligatory gif, because the Level is through the roof, and nobody is on it.  Hell Neville can’t even reach it, he has to point to where it is.