Strummer

And the company was its own worst enemy teasing a Bryan main event push in summer/fall 2013 before taking it away after HIAC. Really the company caused the backlash. Doing the cage match angle with Wyatt raised expectations and from that point there was no turning back. Again why did they give that the main event slot when it really wasn't leading to anything big down the line? And I agree that them giving in was more about Batista not getting over as a face than anything with .Bryan.

remember an anonymous WWE worker wrote Meltzer a letter complaining about just that (taking the company's side). Pretty sure everyone thought it was Orton

Bryan confirms (or the latest one to confirm) that he was supposed to face Sheamus at WM last year. That really should put to rest that the WWE had the main event plan from the start (not that anyone around here is saying that) Meltz really has come out shining and smelling great through this whole deal. Dead on from the beginning http://www.newsday.com/sports/pro-wrestling/daniel-bryan-wwe-superstar-thought-neck-injury-might-end-his-career-1.9811542

damn how could I forget the Shield one!

btw, I know a lot of people are down on him on the mic but I thought Rollins was just fantastic in that Heyman segment

Bryan now sporting the 1996 Shawn Michaels hair. He looked pretty damn good in both matches. That is the first time I can remember other babyfaces saving him from a beatdown. I don't recall that happening at all last year in that 9 month storyline. Hopefully they don't fuck around with the Kane match next week. Something tells me they move that match to Raw

this is true. I can't think of any other heel in recent memory that has been put over this strongly. Steph looks like she can't keep her hands off him and Hunter is the Denny LaChance to his Gordy LaChance (minus Denny dying in a jeep accident). That brief period where Hunter and Steph was goen he sure looked to be getting over pretty well as top heel now he's back behind them

I seem to be in the minority but I think Rollins isn't that bad on the mic. He tends to drone on too much but that may be the writing. With Hunter and Stephanie back he's no longer lead heel either so I think that will potentially hurt his heat. I assume he is working Orton at mania so they probably don't have plans to put the title on him in the next few months. Who does he cash in on? If its Bryan that will get him nuclear heat

the thought just occured to me that with AM Raw cancelled this might be the first time since the national expansion that WWE does not have a weekly recap show airing on cable or in syndication. Well if you don't count SD as a weekly recap show

yeah he said Vince is writing all of his promos. The fact that Vince is personally writing for him makes me believe they are not going to sway in regards to his planned push. That promo last night was just embarrassing. Vince also wrote all of the closing promo on Raw. Stephanie telling Cena he was her hero reeked of cheeseball Vince

my guess is they load up SD next week and maybe for the first couple weeks before settling down to the show it has been for the last 5 years or so. I'm sure this means Hunter, Stephanie and Cena all over the show next Thursday. Plus Bryan wrestling

championship game on Monday is projected to do record numbers for cable. RAW is fucked

Bryan will be working house shows against Luke Harper before the Rumble. I love Harper but I hope that's not his return program for TV. At least it's not Kane. Yet. Oh wait he's scheduled against Kane too. Umm at least they are just house shows

They were also ringside at Mania and briefly shown during Bryan v Hunter

Foley was humiliated by Vince and Stephanie in an angle on Raw in late 2000 and never really got any revenge. A huge part of that obviously was him turning down the match with Vince at Mania 17 but the point is that even when babyfaces were running things the heel decision makers always seem to gain power in the end. Long was in charge when SD became basically angle free with Vince not paying any attention. Steph was basically a tweener in 02/03 with a slight leaning towards face but then Vince returned as a heel and the show became all about them. So even when faces have a little bit of power they usually go right back to heels. Look what just happened

PWI says one of the reasons Rollins was added to the title match was to tease tension between Lesnar and the Authority. Ie he doesn't have to be pinned to lose the title. The plan is to eventually tease tension between Heyman and Lesnar heading into Mania

Rollins seems like too much of a nice guy on twitter. He just apologized to fans for missing a house show. Yeah he needs to start burying guys and going to the gym with Hunter

that Edge and Christian lawsuit angle sure had a plethora of interesting arcs and a strong pay off didn't it? Already dropped apparently

PWI says Vince wrote the entire final segment with Hunter and Stephanie by himself after several script changes. A deal where he was speaking through them

any notice they changed the Raw opening credits with Reigns front and center? in retrospect they should have waited to bring Hunter and Steph back till after the Rumble. There is no reason why we need three full months of this stuff till Mania. Unless Sting gets over huge or somehow they integrate Bryan this thing is headed for a slow death march. The crowds the past 2 weeks have made it perfectly clear that they are sick of this storyline

The show was brutal to watch but the defense will be if the crowd pops big when Orton and Sting return to fight the Authority. If the internet is right, then fans will be too apathetic about the Authority to care about Sting and Orton getting revenge on them, ratings won't move, crowd sizes will be down, etc. But I bet it works fine. I think the problem is the fans thought they *already* got the payoff to this at Survivor Series. Now we are back to square one

As far as I remember Bryan wasn't mentioned once tonight. They probably are saving him for next week. He's booked for both shows

I can't off the top of my head think of a main event segment had that little crowd reaction

Oh my God that last segment was just excruciatingly awful. The crowd couldn't have cared less. I knew it was a mistake bringing them back this soon

Not exactly. HHH was going to be Austin's post-Mania challenger, but an Austin heel turn wasn't the original plan. Austin heard some boos at No Way Out, so he decided that the Stone Cold character had run its course and it was time to turn. But then HHH decided he didn't want to turn face, which is how we ended up with the Two-Man Power Trip. pretty sure that was No Way Out 2002 where Austin was freaked out that his match with Jericho had a dead crowd and he basically took over the whole match and afterwards told Vince that it was a sign he needed to be pushed even harder as a babyface. That's at least part of the reason why he squashed the NWO at every turn in the build to Mania and was basically not letting any heel get any heat on him. He was squashing the Flair/Arn/Benoit/Eddy faction every week that Spring before he walked out. This paranoia doesn't really get talked about much when talking about his departure. never heard anything about that 01 run except he was reluctant to turn and briefly thought about ad libbing a stunner to Vince at the end of WM 17