Albany, New York, 6/7/04
By: Tom Dinardi, rajah.com reader
Hey yo. This is Tom Dinardi, your former RajahWWF.com WWE Confidential Reporter (wow, now that that show is off the air and the website title has changed, I know it's been a while), and I was lucky enough to attend RAW in Albany, New York, with floor seats a few rows away from the ring. Here's the stuff that you guys didn't see:
We got to hear the usual recorded spiel, then it was followed with the WWE Desire video. The guys who got pops were: Andre the Giant, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Hulk Hogan, Jimmy Snuka, Jeff Hardy, Ultimate Warrior, L.O.D., Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, Bret Hart, Owen Hart, British Bulldog, Undertaker, Diesel/Kevin Nash, Razor Ramon/Scott Hall, Shawn Michaels, the Montreal Screwjob (mainly Vince being spit on), pretty much anything from the "New Generation" era, Kurt Angle, Rob Van Dam, Lita, Trish Stratus, Ric Flair (lots of "WOO!"s, as was the thing to do for most of the night), Chris Benoit, & Eddie Guerrero.
Fink came out next, and we got right into things. The first match may have been a dark match, but I don't know because Fink said we would kick things off with Heat and all the screens had the Heat logo. I'm guessing it's for International Heat, but here's all the matches:
Match #1: Val Venis pinned Puerto Rico in 5 minutes, 38 seconds. I didn't catch the other guy's name, but he was announced as being from Puerto Rico. Val got a big pop, Puerto Rico got a decent pop. They were both faces for a little bit, until Puerto Rico turned on Val and started working on his leg, but we cheered him still annyways. Val scores the Money Shot for the win.
Match #2: WWE Women's Champion Victoria pinned Molly Holly in a Non-Title Match in 4 minutes, 47 seconds. Kinda weird that this match has gone from being on the WrestleMania card to being on an episode of Heat that most people won't see. Ah well. Victoria didn't do her dance. She got a pretty good pop. Molly came out to the first heat of the night, and there was a lot of it. Victoria picks up the win with the Widow's Peak. Molly kept her wig on tonight.
Match #3: Hurricane & Rosey defeated Arch Kincaid & John Walters in 5 minutes, 31 seconds. Hurricane pinned Arch (I think) after climbing on Rosey's shoulders, who was sitting on the top rope, and hitting a splash. The jobbers got a lot of heat, and it made for a good match with lots of taunting by Hurricane. There was a botched pin where one of the jobbers was suppose to save his partner from being pinned by Rosey, but he didn't make it in time, so there was a few seconds of confusion.
Match #4: Garison Cade pins Maven in 6 minutes, 39 seconds. First (and I think only) "Boring" chant of the night. Cade got heat, Maven got a pop. I think we've been taught well. Maven was caught with a hard punch when he came off the top rope, and Cade followed it up with the elbow drop from the top for the win.
A promo for the WWE Bloodbath Cage Match DVD thing aired next.
Match #5: Rhyno pins Steven Richards in 10 minutes, 10 seconds. Any night where two ECW guys get more than 10 minutes in a match is a good night by me. Massive ECW chants to start. Steven got a small pop, Rhyno got a much larger one. Steven bolted from Rhyno a few minutes in when he was goign to get the Gore, and later threw a tantrum when Rhyno wouldn't stay down. Steven missed a flip off the top rope, and it was followed with the Gore.
Next was the live preview for RAW they do 10 minutes before it goes on. We got the T-Shirt Guy next, followed by Lillian Garcia coming out and singing the National Anthem. Jim Ross came out to a pop, and Jerry Lawler came out to a pretty big one as well.
The crowd was VERY hot all night. I'm watching the tape now, and it didn't come off as good as it was there. The only thing we were really dead for was when they were going through the Bad Blood matches. Even when they showed the screens for matches like Eugene vs. Johnny Nitro, we were going crazy.
Not much happened during the breaks. After Gail Kim vs. Lita and the backstage stuff, we got the Chris Benoit Desire Video with the Finger Eleven song "One Thing". After the attack on B enjamin, Evolution left and Shelton was helped out to a pop. The clip with The Rock got huge pops from the crowd, especially when he talked about coming back. After more backstage stuff (yes, we were still hot), we got more action from the T-Shirt Guy. After Jericho vs. A-Train, Jericho left with his music playing, and some "Jerry" chants started that were directed towards Lawler. We didn't see the SmackDown! Rebound here. After Triple H took his seat in the skybox, nothing really happened. After Bischoff made the Handicap Match 2-on-3, Kane took out Edge on the outside while Benoit was beaten on in the ring. After the 2-on-3 Handicap Match finisher, La Resistance left to heat from the crowd. Benoit took time to get to his feet, then left to cheers from the crowd with Edge. After Eugene vs. Johnny Nitro, Nitro got the "Nananana, nananana, hey hey hey, goodbye" treatment briefly, but it was cut off by the SmackDown! Rebound (yep, they randomly showed it here). After Orton's entrance, his music just played for a whle. I looked up at the skybox that Evolution was in, and sawa a familiar brown haired female with Triple H. I used my camera to zoom in, and it was none other than STEPHANIE MCMAHON. I got some pictures that I'll get posted when they are developed. It was a bit of a surprise seeing her, but no one else caught it.
I don't know if there were any commercials during the Main Event, but it went 20 minutes, plus Shawn Michaels was in it, so that's always good. After the show went off the air, Triple H got the upper hand on Shawn and they ended up going out the window of the skybox. Triple H went to the ring with Ric Flair, and Shawn Michaels eventually recovered and made his way down to the ring. Let me tell you right now, all this had the crowd going absolutely insane. We were all on our feet, on our cheers, and just waiting to ssee what would happen next. Shawn Michaels traded shots with Flair a few times as he attempted to get into the ring. Triple H tried to get Flair to jump HBK, but HBK caught him with the Sweet Chin Music. Then HBK got in the ring, controlled Triple H for a bit, then hit Triple H with some Sweet Chin Music of his own. Shawn went around the ringside area slapping everyone's hands, then left and Lillian Garcia closed the show.
Overall, it was a pretty good show. The crowd was lively. But there was something about all the people who had floor seating being uptight, but maybe that has to do with the fact that I didn't have to pay $40 for my tickets and I was able to get them for free. Who knows. I won't bother with the pop/heat lists, because most everyone got big pops, and anyone we didn't like got heat. Not really much to seperate them.
And that will do it for now. WWE should be coming back in the fall or winter, so until I get you with that report, keep yourself occupied by checking out my websites: Kids Critics, where we'll soon be releasing info on how you can be apart of the first public showing of Kids in Space 2004, and FORCEchangeNOW, my band that currently has one of our live songs up for download. Yeah, that'll do it for now. So until next time, I'm Tom Dinardi, and I'm out. Later.
