"When Vickie Guerrero came out at the beginning of the show, she asked: “Was I just called predictable?” Actually, she wasn’t. Batista must have forgotten that line in his promo. …"

Orton had referred to her no-contact edict as predictable.

RESPONSE FROM KE: I missed that. The way she came out made it seem as if she was reacting to something Batista had said.

Hey Kev, well at least Raw was better than last week ( but I dont know by how much), Couple of ?s/ comments for you. Firstly did you notice the back of Brian Kendrick's shorts had the logo taped over it??? Also what good can possibly come of letting the Miz do anything positive? I liked the Orton Batista set up it turned out well and as much as I like the comedic act of Santina in the back the wrestling matches are getting old.

i really liked the show with a few exceptions I think Orton could have done a better job selling the ankle injury after the shots he took from the chair to just jump out and fly around the ring before he attempted the RKO and then after getting thrown to act kike it was hurt again was funny, and also I know I am in the minority but i am tired of seeing Santino(a) pin Beth I think the story has gone on to long because it hurts her character to me.

That was another weak Raw although it wasn't as bad as last week. SmackDown is looking like it's WWE's number one show as of late.

In their results section, WWE.com suggested the soon-to-be-returning Mr. Kennedy could be THE Tag Team Partner. 'Course, that probably means Kennedy is the least likely to fill the role.

On the subject of Vickie, is she getting worse week by week or is it just me? She keeps fluffing her lines.

Anyone else sick of 15 minute promos to start Raw?

And for that matter, a 15 minute promo with Vicky Guerrero speaking for a majority of that time?

Nothing personal against Vicky, but her character is stale, boring, and annoying. I never thought I would say this but...

BRING BACK ADAMLE!!!

At least with him we could laugh at his mistakes. Vicky makes few mistakes, but I'm too distracted by her hideous visage to care. HD doesn't do her any favors.

And good God, her voice is like a cross between a rusty brake and a dying cockateil. (I've never heard a dying cockateil, but I can assure you it would sound like Vicky.) My soul dies a little every time she opens her mouth.

OUT WITH VICKY, IN WITH ADAMLE!!!

I know that this is a stretch, but what about Festus as a partner for The Brian Kendrick. Brains and Brawn????

i think Kendrick's new partener would be Mr. Kenedy becuase i heared that he is coming back real soon and it would make sance becuase Mr Kenedy is a better heel and raw has too many faces right now

Did anyone notice that Orton forgot to sell his ankle injury for a few minutes last night? It was hurt, then suddenly was totally normal when attacking Batista, then Orton remembered to sell the ankle again.

Regal gets a good pop everytime from the crowd, it's time to make him #2 heel on Raw instead of Big Show.

Good gorilla slam by Phoenix, would have went over better had it been in the ring instead of on the outside

I don't know, this Raw was pretty boring for me. Once again Rhodes & DiBiase become the prey & its been the same guys closing it out for a good few weeks.

With HHH and HBK out, its ridiculous how repetitive this has become. MVP looked like a step in the right direction but now he's feuding with Regal jeez. I will admit he okay on the mic.

How many watts was that searchlight? 8000?

This also shows how much Jericho, Kane, and CM Punk really contributed to Raw someone needs to step up & give this show a shot in the arm.

& change Carlito's music please!!

In a program that included Matt Hardy, Kofi Kingston and MVP, what on Earth is William Regal doing. The last thing I want to see is a Regal-MVP title match.

Kev, any explanation as to why MVP, who came to Raw and immediately made an impact with the main eventers, is now in this program?

I found it interesting that Matt Hardy was cheered when he first came out. It seemed like the crowd forgot that he is a heel.

Kendrick and Noble would be a fun team. They've teamed before, in ROH, when Noble (going by his real name of James Gibson) was ROH champion, to challenge for the ROH tag team championships. The match involved Kendrick (then known as Spanky) turning on Gibson, the night after Gibson won the ROH title. The angle went nowhere, though, as both wrestlers, along with CM Punk, were signed by WWE shortly afterwards (Spanky wrestled his final match for ROH two weeks after this match, Gibson about a month and a half).

RESPONSE FROM KE: Kendrick and Knoble are a great team for ROH because of their work rate and styles, but, like I said, they'd be pretty small in WWE.

Can somebody please get Cody Rhodes some long tights or at the very least some knee pads. I think he's a very talented wrestler, but it's hard to see him as a threat with those knock-kneed-chicken-legs.
I loved Maryse's new saying "If I wasn't in Maryse, I'd want to be"....or something like that. It was hard to tell, it was all in French.
If you thought Cena was something this week you should have seen him in the dark match at last weeks SmackDown taping. WOW! He must have Shane O'Mac recouperative powers. Also good call on the Dusy-esque promo. After he delivered it I said "The American Dream you are not!"
One thing about Cena Eck. I'm with you about all the negative backlash towards him, I don't get it. But don't you think the SuperMan thing get's a little old sometimes?
So what do you think, Batista takes Orton up on his offer to join Legacy after HHH, Shane and the rest of the McMahons flip on Batista when they all return? Probably at Judgement Day....two weeks is enough time for Shane to heel up from a broken ankle, right?

Why is The Miz partying like it's 1998?

Miz's 3-0 against John Cena haymaker is straight out of Chris Jericho's playbook. You might recall during Bill Goldberg's undefeated streak in WCW that Jericho would go to the ring and challenge him only Goldberg wouldn't respond. With every successive time Goldberg didn't answer the challenge he would say he was 1-0, 2-0, etc. At one point, Jericho wrestled a midget version of Goldberg. I sincerely hope Miz doesn't wrestle a midget version of Cena anytime soon.

If mimicry is the sincerest form of flattery then at least The Miz could be interesting. In the words of Jericho, "If you have nothing to say would you please shut the hell up!!!"

With this in mind, I hope The Brian Kendrick isn't paired with The Miz although it is certainly a plausible scenario. Two cocky heels in a tag team. I suppose I would rather have The Miz wrestle with Kendrick than see him wrestle a three foot version of Cena.

Then again couldn't Paul London be brought back?

My favorite line of the night was Vickie Guerrero asking Orton, "how's this for predictable?!" before setting up the same scenario as last week. Yeah, that could definitely be considered predictable! Good job, Vickie?

Clearly Brian Kendrick's partner will be The Brian Blair. What a team! Oh wait, was it B. Brian Blair? Hmm, nevermind.

I love it when they book faces like they did with Batista last night. Instead of being stoic and having a "take all comers" attitude, he took things head on and assaulted the two backstage like a heel would. Great stuff! I don't think Batista has much of a chance leaving the next PPV with the belt, but last night was good none the less.
Oh, and Sean the cynic, Adamle sucked. Besides, he's doing sports for the NBC newscast here in Chicago. He's not very good at that either.

A stretch, but maybe they'd bring back London to be Kendrick's "new" partner.

First, I'd like to applaud Matt Hardy for coming out in street clothes. Anyone who is not scheduled already to have a match shouldn't just be walking around in a t-shirt and trunks like toddler.

The Legacy is possibly the best idea these people have had in a while and it's hard to watch them job out every week. In order for heels to have traction you gotta have appear as a threat. They need an Arn Anderson though and I can't believe they didn't consider making Shane their manager.

Kennedy HAS to come back heel.

"I found it intresting that Matt Hardy was cheered when he first came out. It seems like the crowd forgot that he is a heel."

I had mentioned a few weeks ago that M. Hardy needs some new ring music because what he has now kind of envokes a "Yeah! Here comes Matt Hardy!!" reaction from the crowd.

Having seen Maryse work the last few weeks she is certainly a nice looking lady,I like that blond hair/hairpiece/fall.What I dont understand is her weird "voguing" and hand gestures.She looks like the "I am pinching heads" guy from the "Kids in the Hall".Come to think of it,he was Canadian too.Hmmm.

Hey Kevin- one question do you think that the girl Cody Rohdes was talking to backstage looked alot like Velvet Sky and it never showed her face.
What do you think?

RESPONSE FROM KE: Honestly, I didn't really notice her.

"I loved Maryse's new saying "If I wasn't in Maryse, I'd want to be"....or something like that. It was hard to tell, it was all in French."

What she said in French, loosely translated, was that some say good things about her, some say bad things about her, but the important thing is everyone is talking about her.

Then she said the "If I wasn't Maryse...." line in English. I thought it was a good line, too.

Chris,
You may want to read my comment about Maryse again, I think you missed one tiny little word.
Thank you for the English translation. I always wonder if there saying something complety off the wall just to get a rise out of there fellow countrymen.
Now can you tell me what Sheik Abdual Bashir is saying?

"First, I'd like to applaud Matt Hardy for coming out in street clothes. Anyone who is not scheduled already to have a match shouldn't just be walking around in a t-shirt and trunks like toddler."

JGavin, when I saw Hardy in jeans I knew I had to comment. That shows exactly why wrestlers walk around in their wrestling attire even when they aren't booked for a match. Batista, Rhodes, DiBiase, MVP, Regal, and Kingston all wore their wrestling gear for talk segments and were ready for action when Vickie set up a match. Poor Matt Hardy though had to grapple in his jeans.

Andre, WWE is PG programming. It's "If I wasn't Maryse ..." not "If I wasn't in Maryse..."

Cena has to quickly recover from being thrown into a search light. With HHH, HBK, and Undertaker out they couldn't have Cena out for a PPV as well. Then again, it just shows how ridiculous it is to have PPVs so close to each other, at least from a creative standpoint.

Like Chris said, what Maryse said in French (being French myself, I just can't get used to this Quebec accent, by the way, it sounds so funny that I could even watch a Celine Dion's interview, no offense to Quebecers :-)) sounded like an Oscar Wilde sentence, "No matter what people tell about me, the most important is that they do talk about me" (not sure about the genuine formulation, but that's the idea). Great sentence for a cocky heel, actually. Well, we would do all love to talk more about her, I guess, but maybe we would have more chances to do that if the women's division was booked in a more interesting way...

About Batista outsmarting Orton, Kevin, I don't agree entirely: once again, Batista was DQed in a match with Rhodes and Legacy, for the second week in a row. Not very smart, considering that he knew that a loss would mean he would have to fight all three Legacy members at the same time (well, he probably had planned to take Priceless out anyway).

One last thing: am I watching too many thrillers, or was Batista's hunting of the Legacy supposed to make us think that maybe DiBiase was betraying Orton? I mean, first Ted comes to Orton and says he can't find Rhodes. Later on, Orton finds that Rhodes is safe, but DiBiase is found almost knocked out, and we never saw who attacked him. At that moment, I really thought that was strange, and I figured out that a little bit later we would see Rhodes assaulted by someone in the shadows, which would make us think the attacker is Batista, but could be DiBiase. Things didn't go that way as we saw Batista assaulting Rhodes; still, I wonder if they scripted all this on purpose, for us to wonder about a possible DiBiase's betrayal of Orton... Did anyone else think like that, or is time for me to take some pills?

RESPONSE FOR KE: I didn't see Batista as being outsmarted by getting DQ'd. It wasn't like he hit Rhodes with a chair right in front of the ref. Rhodes brought the chair in and Batista just took it away from him. He never used it, so Batista actually got screwed more than outsmarted.

I loved RAW because of two things. Mickie James scored a pinfall, and The Brian Kendrick finally won a match. I sure hope to see Mickie James win the diva's title, she would give it so much credibility. But Santina needs to end asap. I am so sick of it, it's terrible. I hated it from the battle royal at Wrestlemania, and I hate it now. I almost turn off RAW, I can't stand it. It's a complete waste of the abilities of Beth Phoenix.

@Axl - I didn't see the conspiracy theory you mention, but I did wonder for a bit if someone else was helping Batista backstage, like maybe HHH. I figured they wouldn't show who was doing the attacks to leave us guessing a little, but then they showed it was Batista.

@Ryan: I was being facetious; I don't think anyone really wants Adamle back, but Vicky’s gimmick is terrible. There is no excuse for “excuse me!”

My point was that I would like to see someone else get a shot at the authority figure role besides Ms. Excuse-me. Her gimmick was lame and repetitive on SD, so instead of WWE writing new material for her, they have just moved her to Raw for a supposed fresh start.

It's just another example of the laziness of the so-called creative team. TNA gets criticized for changing angles and gimmicks too rapidly, but at least they try to keep things fresh. I'm not suggesting WWE take the same approach, but I do feel like they should be more proactive in developing new characters, as opposed to getting lucky every once in a while and running them into the ground. Their current formula with talent development is to give someone a catchphrase, and have them repeat it ad-nauseum until nobody cares anymore.

Catchphrases have always been a part of wrestling, but I feel as though there is too great an emphasis on them today. For example, The Rock’s catchphrase was” If you smell what the Rock is cookin’!” The difference between today’s catchphrases is that with the Rock, his tag would be preceded by a lengthy promo. Today it just seems like performers in WWE walk out and say their catchphrase, without any preceding build-up to what should be the climax. It would be like a musician walking onstage, playing their most well-known song, and then saying “Good night!”

Batista attacking Orton's ankle might have been a better exclamation point if we hadn't watched Orton switch quickly between (1) being severely injured, laying on the mat and clutching his ankle (2) then jumping up and looking perfectly fine and going for an RKO, (3) then immediately back to laying on the floor, clutching his ankle and crawling away.

WTF, that. Orton doesn't usually make mistakes selling.

Actually after last week, I taped the 5/11th RAW and watched it in 20 minutes last night --- I think that's what I'll do from now on (and I may even stop doing that) - RAW IS BORING.....I have a hard time dealing with Cena/Big Show, the Miz, the Brian Kendrick, and so on.

Smackdown is definitely a lot more appealing to me, what with John Morrison, Jericho, Jeff Hardy, Edge, Rey Mysterio - while I may not like some of them, the chemistries are good, and the show itself is very good - plus I can definitely deal with Teddy Long a lot better than Vickie G.

On another note, in the past months, you hardly ever saw Brian Kendricks come into action without Ezechial?!?! And now he needs a tag team partner - where is Ezechial? Not that I like either or them or care, but just curious.

RESPONSE FROM KE: Ezekiel was drafted to ECW.

I guess I have to give RAW some props for showing a different camera shot in the video recap of last weeks beatdown of Shane.The cam they used was way on the other side of the ring and with the whole ring taking up the picture so you couldnt see that Orton missed Shane's foot with the steps by about 9 feet.The original shot was damn near a close up that looked ridiculous.