The Best and Worst of WWE Raw for February 13, 2017

Previously on the Best and Worst of WWE Raw: Chris Jericho agreed to a Goldberg vs. Kevin Owens Universal Championship match on Owens’ behalf, which sounds like a bad thing, but they’re best friends so I’m sure they’ll work it out and nothing bad will happen. Also on the show, Braun Strowman beat up four guys who at best could form a regular-sized human if three of the four sat on each other’s shoulders and wore a trench coat.

Remember that With Spandex is on Twitter, so follow it. Follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook. You can also follow me on Twitter. Also, make sure you’re reading the vintage Best and Worst reports.

Hit those share buttons! Leave us comments, spread the word about the column on Facebook and Twitter, and tell everyone in the office you’re not working because you’re laughing so hard at fake fighting jokes.

And now, the Best and Worst of WWE Raw for February 13, 2017.

Worst: Romey MAD Romey WANT STROWMAN give Romey Strowman!

This week we got an unusually great episode of Raw on the whole, so I’ve got to do an unofficial Lightning Round and knock out all the stuff I didn’t like first.

The show opens like every great Raw opens, with … uh, Stephanie McMahon cutting a promo, one of the people who is supposed to be in charge of the show as their job not being able to work one night a week, and Roman Reigns showing up to cut a babyface promo turned into a heel promo by his incredible natural unlikability. He’s like, “I want Strowman now,” and Stephanie — who is a heel most of the time, but has no reason to dump on Roman right now — is like, “I know what you want and what the fans want to see, but I know you aren’t 100% and I don’t want you to get hurt.” Roman’s response is, more or less, SHUT UP, YOU’RE NOT MY MAWM. He gets sassy as hell until The Club (of all people) interrupt, and we end up with Roman Reigns vs. The Club in a 2-on-1 handicap match.

The narrative that Roman Reigns is “not 100%” is HILARIOUS to me, especially in how they physically show it. I mean, I’ve been writing about it for weeks. From the Best and Worst of Royal Rumble:

Roman more or less no-sells getting frog splashed through a table and punched in the face with brass knuckles and has the match won, only to lose when Braun Strowman appears from out of nowhere, chokeslams him onto the Hardest Part Of The Announce Table™ AND powerslams him through a table. Keep in mind that this is the same Roman Reigns who in the past three weeks got beaten up by three guys at once to set up a handicap match in which he got beaten up by two guys, got Code-broken twice, got powerbombed on the ring apron, got F-5’d by Brock Lesnar and wrestled a six-man tag that ended with him being assaulted with a steel chair and powerbombed through the announce table. And he’s just FINE, through ALL of this. So fine that when he loses, he’s able to enter the Royal Rumble ON THIS SAME SHOW and be strong enough to eliminate the Undertaker, and only lose thanks to good timing from two of Smackdown’s top guys.

The next night on Raw — not the next week, but the next night — Reigns challenges Samoa Joe, the guy who just single-handedly injured and removed Seth Rollins to a match. Before it, Joe jumps Reigns and beats him down, splashing him until the announce team is like, “he may have broken ribs!” After everything in the blockquote AND that, Reigns manages to come back and almost has the match won until Braun Strowman interferes again.

This week, super extra not-100% Roman Reigns ends up in a handicap match against the Tag Team Champions. The 2-on-1 match ends in a disqualification when the two guys try to fight the one. I don’t know. Super extra not-100% Roman Reigns who just fought the top 2-man team in the company for several minutes by himself manages to not only survive this beatdown, but recover, avoid a steel chair attack and drive them both from the ring.

If this is an injured, vulnerable Roman Reigns, I’d hate to see what he could do at 100%.

Worst: Not Even Funk Is On A Roll

After seventeen weeks of “witness the makeover of Emma into Emmalina” videos, Emma shows up with some Legend of Zelda A Link To The Past opening music and a sparkly ball gown and says, “thanks for waiting, now I’m gonna change back.” And … that’s it. It’s Seven from WCW. A respected worker gets put into a stupid gimmick, they advertise it forever, then the person finally debuts and is like, “this gimmick is stupid!” And they go back to being them, or some “realer” version than they were before.

Honestly, if she’d just shown up in her Evil Emma gear and said, “I’m not being corny for a bunch of old men,” and like, jumped Bayley after the Women’s Championship match or something, that could’ve been good. Instead, all we got is her awkwardly talking for a few seconds and leaving. Hell, after that, Emma in a plush dinosaur costume dancing to fake James Brown would’ve been better.

Best: Bo Dallas Vs. Ice Cream

I’m pretty exhausted with New Day at this point, I don’t like beloved child-friendly babyfaces doing a Million Dollar Man-esque “drown an unconscious man in cereal” celebration and I certainly don’t like Bo Dallas being the victim, but come on, I’d have to be a pretty dark hearted human being to give a “Worst” to Bo Dallas holding a manilla folder reading “ICE CREAM BLUEPRINTS” over his head and ripping it in half for pro wrestling heel heat in 2017. Bo screaming “NO ICE CREAM! NO ICE CREAM!” while two grown men sob at his feet and another one jumps on him butt-first for revenge is the exact moment you want playing when a loved one walks into the room and asks, “what’re you watching?”

Worst: Teddy Long, Hall Of Famer

How are you gonna induct Teddy Long into the WWE Hall of Fame before you induct John Laurinaitis? The world is bullshit.

Whatever The Cruiserweights Are Doing This Week

“You’re just a boy! You’re out of your depth!”

It sounds like heel posturing, but physically putting Neville beside Jack Gallagher makes Jack look like an actual adolescent boy. His chest looks like a 10-year old’s, and he’s in the ring like, doing handstands and butthole kicks. His most devastating move is a running dropkick, which objectively constitutes about 1/4 of a transitional move in the offense of THE MIZ. Not exactly Dr. Death Steve Williams over here. Neville looks like he just crawled out of a mythical beast’s vagina in a 300 rip-off. Physically it feels less like a clash of styles or whatever and more like, “why doesn’t Neville just grab this dude by the waist and rip him in half.” It’s like a real human man feuding with that Microsoft paperclip.

Gallagher goes on to defeat “Bad At Jackets” Noam Dar, who over the past several weeks has been working hard to develop his character from just “bad at jackets” to, “bad at jackets, has a girlfriend whose name he can’t pronounce.” Like every Raw Cruiserweight match, it’s only a few minutes long, nobody really gets the time or a chance to get their shit in, and the face wins a basic wrestling move.

On the plus side, Gallagher rules, and I’m honestly pretty excited to see Neville start the match at Fast Lane by running at Jack and kicking him so hard Jack explodes into confetti like he’s the fucking Badd Blaster.

Finally we have Akira Tozawa vs. Ariya Daivari, with Brian Kendrick on commentary. Like every Raw Cruiserweight match, it’s only a few minutes long, nobody really gets the time or a chance to get their shit in, and the face wins a basic wrestling move.

Tozawa is great, but does all the stuff you saw him do in the debut. The dive, the snap German, yelling “ah,” all of it. One thing I wish WWE would back away from is pushing the cruiserweight division as “exciting and different” and then limiting them to the same “three moves and maybe a taunt if you’re lucky” they use on the mid-card. Part of the joy of old cruiserweight matches is that sure, each guy had some signature moves, but before they got to that part they’d work in a few things you’d never seen. Or they’d give you some cool way to get to the signature moves. Now they’re just like, “did the crowd like that one thing he did? Do that until they stop.”

Best: It’s Art, You Don’t Need Pants

Up next we have the greatest Raw segment of all time.

Okay, that might be a little much, but it’s in that ballpark. The Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens storyline comes crashing down in the most spectacularly stupid, funny, emotionally compelling (!) way it could’ve: with a Festival of Friendship, a remastering of The Rock: This is Your Life! featuring statues, magicians, and, ultimately, betrayal.

First of all, just watch the damn segment in its entirety. It’s like 20 minutes long with a commercial break, but it feels like 5. It opens with Jericho entering to cheesy music while wearing a sparkly suit and hat, re-purposing Bobby Roode’s glamour harem as Las Vegas showgirls and dragging Owens along behind him. From the start, you can tell from Owens’ body language that something’s up. We saw him backstage talking to Triple H earlier, so now it kinda plays more as “I regret what I have to do to my friend” and less as general Kevin Owens malaise.

Once we’re in the ring, Jericho gifts Owens with the dumbest shit possible, from a sculpture by “Norwegian minimalist maximist ar-teest” Ralph Guggenheim that represents friendship, to a re-paint of Michelangelo’s ‘The Creation Of Adam’ with Chris Jericho as Adam and Kevin Owens as God. Jericho is literally calling his best friend “God” here. After that, we get an appearance from FRIENDSHIP THE MAGICIAN, whose name alone would’ve given him like three Bests in these columns. Friendship is bad at magic, so Jericho triumphantly adds him to The List.

The centerpiece of the tone poem is the return of Gillberg:

Instead of even really registering it, Owens just bolts out of the ring, murders Gillberg on the ramp and tosses him into the LED board at ringside. Knowing what we know, Owens is kinda torn up about what he’s about to do until Gillberg shows up. Once Owens sees Jericho making a funny joke out of this serious-ass situation he’s gotten Owens into against unstoppable Harley Davidson Dad Real Goldberg, something changes. Maybe it’s bloodlust. Jericho just stands there clapping the whole time, and yells, “YOU JUST BEAT HIM!”

Jericho changes then, too. He starts speaking to Owens in the most sincere voice that’s ever come out of Chris Jericho’s mouth about how he’s his brother, and how he loves him, and how working with him’s made the last year in WWE one of the favorite of Jericho’s career. It’s beautiful, and touching, and the moment you realize Jericho is fucked.

Owens remembers he has a gift for Jericho too, and Jericho happily opens it. It’s a New List, which Jericho loves until he realizes what it means. “How come my name’s on this?” Oh man. That might be the new, “I’m sorry, I love you.” We get the slow reveal that it’s the List of KO, and Owens waits until the precise moment of realization in Jericho’s side eyes to jump up, brutally beat him down and toss him into the Jeri-Tron 6500.

What works so beautifully about this segment for me, aside from the fact that the people involved were doing incredible work and that it was entertaining, is that it plays almost like a love letter to Chris Jericho’s career. It’s (possibly unintentionally) like a Greatest Hits compilation. He does a “you’re gonna get … it!” joke, starting it before a commercial break and ending it after, just like he did with his list of 1,004 holds. He gets tossed into the Jeri-tron, just like he did when he turned on Shawn Michaels. There’s a dash of Owens’ greatest hits in there as well, which is reacting to any honest moment of human emotion with violent rage and apron powerbombs. He and Jericho always worked it out until Jericho became the thing Owens fears the most: a best friend.

Absolutely killer from start to finish. Jericho let having fun change him back from Evil Jericho. Owens is under the hand of the Authority, and is incapable of handling friendships. Jericho loved too much and flew too close to the sun. Now Owens is an actual heel threat again, and Jericho can come back for WrestleMania as a conquering, beloved babyface and ride off into the sunset for however long he wants. Beautiful pro wrestling everything.

Worst: Enzo Amore vs. Cesaro

Here’s something you don’t read a lot: Cesaro had the worst match on the show.

For once, it’s not even about my comical head-desking every time Enzo and Cass cut promos these days. Their pre-match promo was dorky, but high energy and lots of fun, which is pitch-perfect Enzo and Cass. The match was just dirt poor. Watch for that weird moment in the middle where Cesaro tosses Enzo out of the ring, Enzo continues his feud with ring ropes by messing that up, then launching HIMSELF over to the floor in an exaggerated, shruggy heap. The pan back to Cesaro staring a hole through him, looking like he wants to kill him is pretty great. So is that double stomp to the guts Enzo gets.

I guess part of the problem is that Enzo vs. Cesaro shouldn’t even be a wrestling match. That’s like saying a bird had a “wrestling match” with a car because it shat on it. Cesaro should have just made a loud whooshing noise, spring into a European uppercut, dislodge Enzo’s entire skull and send it flying into the 12th row of the crowd. Or like, into Big Cass’ lap. It’d only take Cass what, 10, 15 seconds for the message to reach his brain and make him scream?

Best: Samoa Joe Is Not Here To Be A Lackey

One of the best parts of an already Full of Best Parts show is the backstage sit-down interview with Michael Cole and Samoa Joe, in which Joe explains that he’s not like Seth Rollins or Kevin Owens. He owes respect to the man who gave him an opportunity, but he’s confident in his own abilities. So he’s gonna help The Authority, but he doesn’t NEED them. He’s like … how should I put it … an independent contractor?

It’s great though, seriously, because it allows Joe to be an evil hench-person without having to be that spineless wimp antagonist role they slide everyone into. Seth Rollins is part of a paramilitary attack team or whatever for years and could beat everybody, then turns on his friends and gets help from his bosses and suddenly can never win. Kevin Owens was a prize fighter who pinned John Cena clean his first night on WWE PPV, and now he’s half of a formerly gentle friend group that couldn’t win without each other. Joe’s like, “nah, I’m good, I’m just gonna collect Authority paychecks and kick a dude’s ass if my boss tells me to.” ILU, SmoJoe.

Best part: he says he’s not some “Sami Zayn” who is just “happy to be here.”

Word of that gets around to Sami, who addresses it after he defeats Handsome Rusev in the next installment of Rusev’s story, also known as, “we don’t have anything for you for WrestleMania, would you like to be in the battle royal?” After the match, Sami’s like, “you’re damn right Samoa Joe’s no Sami Zayn!” Joe’s response is to run out, punch him in the side of the head and choke him out. Because SAMOA JOE, capital letters.

Here’s a quick clip of what Joe is saying during the beatdown:

Sami vs. Joe at Fastlane should rule. Let’s hope they give us a classic, and one less difficult to explain than the one from NXT.

Best: Braun Vs. Brawn

Braun Strowman faces Mark Henry this week, and faces Big Show next week. They’re getting him prepped for the biggest and strongest wrestler of all time, Roman Reigns. I’m giving this a Best because hey, Mark Henry, and because at least they let poor old Mark hit a few moves before he got destroyed.

Best: It’s Bayley

So. Bayley defeated Charlotte a few times on Raw, earning her a title match at the Royal Rumble. Charlotte lost those and won at the Rumble, fair and square, because she loses on weekly TV and wins at pay-per-views. She just had three (3) sets of title changes with Sasha Banks, wherein the Women’s Championship changed hands every time it was up for grabs. Sasha won it on Raw, so Charlotte won it back on pay-per-view. Sasha won it BACK on Raw, so Charlotte won it back on pay-per-view. Then, shockingly, Sasha won it on Raw, and Charlotte had to win it back on pay-per-view. Having done that cycle once with Bayley, they’ve decided to just do it the hell again. So here’s Bayley winning the Women’s Championship from Charlotte on Raw, a couple of weeks before a pay-per-view. Fill in the blanks.

As pessimistic as that sounds, I’m super happy for Bayley and glad she gets her first of what will obviously be many Women’s Championships on the main roster. The journey from challenger to champion wasn’t quite the grand spanning of years it was in NXT where we literally watched a child grow alongside her favorite wrestler as part of the pathos, but I mean, what is? The match was good, and for a while there I thought Charlotte was low key trying to injure her. The kick to the face, the moonsault off the apron, all of it. Charlotte is the jam.

The finish makes sense, and at least works to protect Charlotte with some future story implications. Bayley looks like she has the match won, but gets distracted by Dana Brooke, who has re-materialized from the mist or whatever to help Charlotte win title matches. When it looks like Charlotte’s going to take advantage and win, Sasha Banks shows up and crutches her in the boob, evening the score. It works because Charlotte’s side cheated first in the match, and because now we wait to see if Bayley gets noble about Sasha interfering and giving the belt back to Charlotte, or if Sasha’s going to pull a YOU WON BECAUSE OF ME and turn heel on her. Either way, we get some intrigue between Sasha and Bayley — the WrestleMania match we should be doing one-on-one, probably — and Charlotte gets her final pay-per-view Women’s Championship rope-a-dope of four before WrestleMania.

It’s interesting to think about what’ll happen there, too. Charlotte wins, presumably, but what if she doesn’t? What if Sasha gets mad that Bayley ended Charlotte’s pay-per-view streak and SHE didn’t? That could be good motivation. A lot of it could be, and the wrestling continues to be situationally great, so big ups for another match well wrestled and another Raw main event. With history~!

Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Week

DenseMan1

Charlotte’s one weakness: someone whacking her in the tits with an aluminum crutch.

KYIrish

Charlotte should stop accepting title matches on Raw

Cami

So Emma devolved into Danna Brooke? The timeline is very confusing.

Baron Von Raschke

Well…at least with KO turning on Jericho they won’t have Sasha turn on Bayley. No way they would run something like that more than once in an episode.
/Goes back to reading B & W of Elimination Chamber with four post-pin beatdowns.

Nevers