First the hardys, and now these two put on a better match on free tv then they did at WM. They should have just put Cena on last at WM so they could end with their good guy and still give Orton the strap.

The Santino Milli Vanilli moment with the video speeding up was santino gold.

Just five word's " The Age Of Orton Returns.".

I totally agree on the Orton/HHH comment

How many times was it mentioned that HHH, Shane & Batista were hot heads? I should have counted.

Punk is being set up for something... Just don't what...

Just want to go on record as saying my 6 year old daughter will be challenging Chavo Guerrero next week on Raw. I hope Chavo brings his A game.

I like both Cena and Jericho, but I'm going to disagree with you about last night's match, Kevin. It was very sloppy in a lot of places.

It's a mistake to put Steamboat in another PPV. It may not be quite the same as Ric Flair ruining his send-off by getting back into the ring, but it's in that vein. Steamboat rocked WrestleMania weekend partly because he was being inducted into the HOF, but also largely because nobody expected him to be particularly good. At Backlash, he won't have the benefit of lowered expectations.

And besides...there's no suspense. Last time was a face-off. This will just be a rematch—of a feud that's way overextended, and that nobody much cared about to begin with.

Kev,

I hope you or someone agrees with me...the whole Orton/HHH storyline has got to end. The crowd seems to not care one bit about it, and adding Shane and Batista to the mix made it more bad than good. Shanes punches are horrible, and the fact that he can attack Dibiase & Rhodes and always get the upper hand is just ludicris. He is not a wrestler, and makes EVERYONE look bad. And Batista is just horrible...he looks so bad in the ring, he looks like at any given moment he is either gonna injure himself or his appoinent. He makes wrestling look fake. Now that RAW has Batista, Cena, HHH, as the main faces, I swear I have no reason to watch. They bring nothing toi the table for me, and I always said Cena and Batista are the reasons I started to hate WWE...

I guess where I started to get was do you think they are gonna drop this angle anytime soon, seeing the crowd reaction??

I went to the show with a Cena-hating friend but even he had to admit that the Jericho-Cena match was great. HHH vs Orton was awesome, their Wrestlemania match was dissapointing but im glad they saved this match for the UK, we deserve a couple of important and good matches now and again. Cena and Edge also had a dark championship match at the end of the night, no prizes for guessing who won but it was a decent little match. All in all it was a great night of wrestling...

...Except when Punk botched the finish on Kane. He fluffed it completely but covered Kane anyway, got the 1,2,3 and left the ring. He was then called back by the ref and made to do it again with not even an attempt at an explanation for the live crowd. From where i was sitting it didn't look too great the second time either.

Oh, and Santino/Santina had the crowd cracking up, there's plenty of professional comedians who couldn't get a laugh from a crowd that big but Santino is fearless. What a legend.

NO REGAL?! I wish he was drafted to another show. He'd make a great ECW champ. He's gonna get lost on the raw roster, work dark matches, and either get released or become an agent. I'll bet they don't even put him in KOTR this year. What a waste!

I only got to see the end of the Jericho and Cena match, but that was very entertaining. I was kind of hoping that Jericho would sneak back in and code breaker Edge, setting up a program for those two. I still think the ground work is there for the angel once Edge wins the title. Jericho can say Edge screwed him and owes him a title match. The question is, will Jericho turn face, or will it be heel versus heel.

Also, you didn't address my question in the Lockdown thread. Do you know why Lashley was released by WWE?

RESPONSE FROM KE: This is what I wrote when he eas released in Jan. 2008:

"Citing sources within WWE, [wrestlingnewsdesk.com] reported yesterday that Lashley asked WWE executive vice president of talent relations John Laurinaitis for his release because he was upset over his WrestleMania payoff and his issues with several producers, most notably Michael Hayes.

And why shouldn't Melina be scoring pinfall wins over Beth Phoenix?

RESPONSE FROM KE: I don't buy Melina as champ. Beth is doing too many jobs.

I'm interested to see how well the Jehrico-Steamboat match at Backlash plays out. I'm guessing that match is an audible that came out of the reaction Ricky got during Wrestlemania week. The question in my mind is does Ricky get to go over to give the legends "closure" in the fued with Jericho?

If it turns our like I'm hoping, that may end up being another match that should have been the Wrestlemania event instead of the embarassment with Piper and Snuka that we saw.

RESPONSE FROM KE: I don't see the point of a Jericho-Steamboat match but perhaps it will lead to another angle.

Even though it was just a good but not great match, if something along those lines had taken place as the WM main event, people would have a lot higher opinion of the show. Jericho/Cena was an excellent TV match, but then again it's not hard to look good in a match with Jericho.

Even though ultimately the draft is all but meaningless, the WWE still did a poor job in not explaining last week that the new rosters didn't take effect until after Backlash.

Hey Kevin, did you know that more young males visit wwe.com than oprah.com? I was absolutely astonished to learn that last night.

RESPONSE FROM KE: I picked up on the Oprah thing as well. Why WWE included something so obvious I have no idea.

Kev, you might think Santino is funny. At first he was, now it's lame and a waste of airtime. He is making a joke of the female division of the WWE. Gail Kim should have stayed at TNA. i channel surf when the fool comes on. WOOOOO

Plus, this RAW Main event was much shorter, which was a saving grace for it.

As for Randy Orton and The Legacy, I think WWE has changed its mind before WrestleMania on pushing them to the moon (and rightly so, since the group dynamic isn't working too well). I don't think they will win on Sunday. This was the go-home RAW broadcast before Backlash, so an Orton victory reflects less likelihood of a team win on Sunday.

Orton and Triple H should be fighting one on one for the strap so Orton can go over Triple H. So now if H loses he has an excuse.

RESPONSE FROM KE: I agree.

Mike—I agree with you (mostly). The fans aren't really into the Orton angle. For instance, Batista seems to get a bigger pop when he comes out just to wrestle (Matt Hardy, Chavo, etc.) than when he comes out to participate in the feud. And you're absolutely right that Shane's embarrassing "work" makes everybody else look bad.

Batista isn't that bad as a wrestler, though. He's certainly no Shawn Michaels, but he's nowhere near the Shane McMahon/Great Khali end of the spectrum.

Kev, we'll have to agree to disagree on Melina.

In terms of wrestling skill amongst the WWE Divas only Gail Kim and Mickie James (and possibly Natalya) match Melina. I know Beth has an amateur wrestling background but I find her in ring repertoire is limited. At least it has been recently.

Melina's version of Petey Williams' Canadian Destroyer is best finishing move I've ever seen from a female wrestler and better than most male wrestlers. I just wish she utilized it more.

Now one could argue Melina is not over as a face and that could account in part for your negative assessment of her as Womens' Champion. It might also account for her return to Smackdown.

She does work better as a heel. However, she hasn't been given much mike time as a face as she did during her heel run. I think she's pretty good on the mike and a little more mike work could help her cause.

It is worth noting Beth has been given a lot of opportunity on the mic and has become George Burns to Santino's Gracie Allen.

OK, I have a bit of a soft spot for Latina women.

But Melina couldn't wrestle her appeal to me would be dime a dozen.

I

I know these things can change, but I just read a house show ad for june featuring cena, trips, and punk v. jericho, orton, and edge. Things are looking good for a cm punk push! I for one hope so.

I liked the phrase "(the draft) goes into full effect" next week after Backlash, because without addressing it, it would be confusing. Simply saying "(it) goes into effect next week" would leave us asking, "Soooo, what's with Big Show?"

Anyway, to address the suggestion to have the draft on the night after Backlash, I don't think WWE makes the call on their 3-hour broadcasts. As I understand, it is USA Network's request, so if USA asked WWE for 3-hours, then WWE went to its stand-by for the WWE Draft.

In retrospect, I think it could have been the perfect time to do a King of the Ring tournament and save the Draft for mid-June, but I guess WWE was not thinking in those terms when they made the call in March.

Is anyone else annoyed by how the collective fans of wrestling have been dubbed "The WWE Universe”? I really don't like how the we have been branded. It's more dumb than the women being called "Divas" and wrestlers being called "Superstars" ,because it’s just too pretentious (in my taste) for a business to use its customers as a homogenized piece of their product. We’re fans, not “residents of the WWE Universe”…

I was there on Monday, and the Cena/Jericho match was officially excellent, obviously the crowd noise will be rejigged for the broadcast, but the crowd were 10x more into this than the Orton/HHH bout, which had an exciting finish but was obviously marred by Hunters slowness and tendency to spend most of his match time outside the ring (doing irish whips into the steel stairs etc.) instead of actually trying to wrestle. Jericho got a lot of heat in his segment with Steamboat, but as you could see his reaction in the match was great, and Cena's wasn't quite as awful as it came across. I do feel sorry for him having to wrestle Y2J, as you would only rarely see HHH or Batista booked to fight a guy like him or Undertaker outside the US for fear of them getting booed.

I've been watching WWE for years and this has got to be as dry as it has ever been for me. I couldn't care less about the WWE title match, I just want to see Orton win cleanly because he is clearly an one of if not the best athlete WWE has to offer (Shelton Benjamin being the exception, and one of my favorite performers).

No better time than the present to give the push to the younger stars. MVP, Shelton, CM Punk, Kofi Kingston, and John Morrison are the first to come to mind. And guys like Evan Bourne and Jack Swagger are ready for bigger programs.

Is HBK ever gonna get another title, or even a title match? Honestly I don't think I will see a better match than HBK v. Undertaker at Mania. I don't even care who its against, he is the best in-ring performer alive and he could carry the match himself.

Even the dumb fans know that the punches are fake, so wheres the logic behind the Big Show finishing off high quality opponents with a big right hand? We get it, he's a big guy.

And just a side note, Jericho needs to put the pants back on.

"It amazes me that the announcers still play up the history between Triple H and Orton from their days with Evolution. If Triple H turning on Orton out of jealousy five years ago is the basis for their current feud, shouldn’t Orton be cast as the babyface seeking retribution? …"

It makes perfect sense. Triple H is the babyface who never apoglizes for his past. Plus, I think most people would agree that turning on a fellow wrestler over a title is not at all equivalent to hitting your finisher on a guy's wife. I know Triple H went to Orton's home and destroyed it, but Triple H didn't put his hands on Orton's wife. Even if he did, it would have been okay because IT WASN'T REALLY ORTON'S WIFE. See, it all works out.

wouldn't it make sense for orton to win, then turn on or drop legacy? usually that would be odd, but in this case, you have the precedent of HHH turning on orton after he won, so orton justifies it in his loony way by thinking priceless will be jealous or he was just using them to get the title. then orton becomes anti-hero, either hhh or orton feuds with batista and dibiase and rhodes go back to being tag champ contenders.

Next week's Raw main event: Cody Rhodes vs Ted DiBiase, with Rhodes' Legacy t-shirt at stake.

I don't have a problem with Melina so much. They were setting her up for this kind of push years ago with Foley and she got hurt and lost her momentum (a la Candace now). The woman can work/enter a ring and she's developing a pressence. I'd take her over McCool who seems like one of the robot Lucy Liu's from Futurama when she's walking/talking. I also think there is some mileage in a heel Beth taking some losses before she snaps and turns into a mega-face. Her mic work as a face has a ton of potential with how comfortable she's gotten playing off of Santino.

I loved the Cena/Jericho match. There were some slow spots, but the sequences at the end were so well done. So was the early trading of punches. That could have gone on for 10 minutes and that crowd would have eaten it up.

Definitely agree about the main event too. It almost seems like too little too late. This should be the rebirth of the push Orton got last year, but I read a pretty telling quote from Ted Sr. saying Vince's lack of trust in Orton to behave in hotels etc. is why guys like Cena/HHH keep gettiing the straps back. I don't see how Orton can really get back to the malicious side he had going. It's tapped out and been exposed already, which sucks since there was a lot of potential there. Hopefully he goes back to that screw everything kind of mantra and Legacy can follow the NWO mold.

You can tell by the total lack of fan response that people just do not care about the Hunter/Orton feud.

If the crowd response was this poor for any other wrestlers, the angle would have been dropped long ago.

Kev, I disagree on the HHH/Orton angle on Raw being done @ WM simply because by doing so HHH would have to continue chasing Orton for retribution which would eventually hurt Orton. The angle had better finish soon for Orton to move to another angle where he'd have more command. I kinda like fancied a Vince/Orton feud for a while which would have elevated Orton big time but that seems out of the Windows too. So let's wait and see what the WWE comes up with. My main problem with Orton as well as Cena who are the two superstars of the later generation is their inability to switch between face and heel swiftly and get over. That what prevents them from being in the class of the Michaels,Rocks,Austins and even Hunters of the world. WWE should seriously look into that.

what do you think about a batista heel turn at backlash this sunday???

RESPONSE FROM KE: A Batista heel turn has been rumored for what seems like forever. At this point, who knows?

Jeff, I agree that it certianly seems that something is being set up between Batista and Shane. I was thinking maybe Shane will turn on HHH and Batista and join Legacy.

Jericho - Cena match was awesome. When the match was announced, I expected it to be that same Jericho-Cena match that we've seen past year. But the match completely blew my mind. I was so intrigued in the match that I almost switched off my tv in anger after the way that match ended. I was hoping for Jericho's first win on John Cena, because as far as I remember I don't think Jericho has ever defeated Cena (correct me if I'm wrong)
Definitely the best tv match of the year till now.

Orton-HHH matches have always bored me. And this match was no different.

Kev, just noticed... Shawn Michaels has been MIA after his match with 'Taker at Wrestlemania...

I've read somewhere that his knees were injured and that he could be out until July.

Any truth on that? He could use the time-off ya know since Raw has been full of faces recently (Batista, Triple H, Cena, etc..) Thoughts?

RESPONSE FROM KE: He was working through injuries for a while. From what I have read, the plan all along was to get him through Mania and then take some time off.