Pre-Segment 1: Chris Jericho is out for his match, blathers about Rey hiding behind the mask, and that we suck. You know how it goes.

Segment 1 [Singles Match for the Intercontinental Title]: Chris Jericho defeats Rey Mysterio by pin, and retains. Match was damn good! One cool spot came early, where Rey was flung to the apron. Jericho hit the corner to do his springboard dropkick, but Rey just kneed him and sent him flying out of the ring. Rey tried then following up with his flying Senton or whatever it’s called, but Jericho just threw his face into the announce table.
 

Toward the endgame, Rey was taken down, so Jericho tried the Walls of Jericho. Rey countered by flinging him into the ropes in the 619 position. Jericho countered the finisher, but it actually put Rey in the 619 position. Jericho tried for it, but Rey countered with a moonsault!

Finish of the match was Rey putting Jericho in the 619 position and actually hitting it. When Rey tried to counter with his Senton, Jericho caught him as if wanting to do a powerbomb. Instead, Jericho pulled off the Velcro strap holding Rey’s mask on. As Rey dealt with that, Jericho hit the Codebreaker and made the pin.

Segment 2: Josh Mathews interviews Randy Orton in the back, who says… well, a whole lot of nothing, really. John Cena appears to make fun of him. Moving on…

Segment 3: Vince McMahon speaks on the Titantron and says that he’s not going to pick the GM of RAW, that his big announcement of the night is… that he’s selling Monday Night RAW. Uh… okay…? He’s going to announce to whom exactly after the RAW title match.

Segment 4 [Singles Match for the ECW Title]: Tommy Dreamer defeats Christian by pin, and retains. Match was all right, nothing exceptional though.

Segment 5 [Fatal 4-Way for the WWE Title]: Randy Orton defeats Big Show (and outlasts John Cena and Triple H) by pin, and becomes the NEW WWE Champion!!! …Damnit. Match was damn good, and had some great action at the end, even if the result of the match just pisses me off.

Stupidity from Orton halfway through, when he went for the Punt Kick of Doom on Show. Show grabbed his leg, but then re-grabbed the leg because Orton slipped and lost his balance. As Show clotheslined Orton as Cole recovered the slightly blown spot by saying “Orton hesitated for just a second and look what happened!”Nice way to polish a turd!

Show continued the offense toward the end, doing the middle rope splash against Cena, throwing Orton out, then actually hitting a decent Spear against Trips! The pin failed, however.

The endgame was montage of finishers, with Trips hitting Show with the Pedigree, then Cena hitting Trips with the FU, Cena fails pinning Show, Orton throws Cena out, Orton hits Show with the RKO, makes the pin. Exciting? Yes! Confidence-building? HELLLLLLL NO!

Segment 6: With the RAW title match over with, Vince hits the ring to announce who he nonsensically sold RAW to. Is anyone thinking about the fact that it’s basically impossible to sell half a product?

Vince blathers, and it’s all retarded due to the premise, so I’ll just get to the crux… It’s Donald Trump. Trump appears on the Titantron, trying to get some cheap pops, except no one gives a fuck. Trump: “We’re going to give the RAW audience something they’ve never had before!” Possibly future Mrs. Falkon: “Good writers?” Bwa ha ha ha!!!

Anyway, Trump’s “big first announcement” for next week is that it’ll be the first RAW ever without commercials, which you already know if you read OO every day.

Segment 7 [Singles Match]: Mickie James defeats Rosa Mendes by pin. Match was lame, though Mickie’s final DDT looked dangerous as hell. I love seeing the women work stiff.

Segment 8: Hornswoggle and Goldust are out with the T-shirt gun, and Miz comes out to talk. Miz blathers in Trump’s direction that Cena is the past, that Miz is the present and future. Miz demands the magazine cover shoots, movies, and so forth, and promises that the fans will totally want more.

He notices that Horny and Goldy are still in the ring and demands him to leave. Goldust replies that Miz is so totally ripping off Goldy himself, that he’s got no imagination… then says that Miz should change his name to “Whiz,” because when he starts talking, that’s what everyone gets up to do.

Miz replies that Goldy is definitely not in any position to give advice, that he’s just trying to recapture his fame, that “Goldust in 1999 was funny, but Goldust in 2009 is irrelevant.” He says that he could beat Goldy down, but no one would care, so he’s a waste of time. Miz then says that he’ll show Trump that he can take risks that Cena wouldn’t… and beats down Goldust anyway.

With Goldy down, Miz picks up the T-shirt gun, then shoots Hornswoggle in his little pot o’ gold. Nothing says badass like shooting a midget in the crotch.

Segment 9: Mathews interviews CM Punk in the back. Mathews recaps the whole Money in the Bank crap, then asks Punk for his thoughts… who says a whole lot of nothing, other than trying to do another tweener promo. Matt Hardy appears and tells him that Punk is totally awesome because he totally would have done it too. Punk replies that they’re nothing alike though, because Matt has done everything out of jealousy, and that he has been all about earning things the hard way.

Segment 10 [Triple Threat Match for the World Heavyweight Title]: CM Punk defeats Edge (and outlasts Jeff Hardy) by pin, and retains. This is probably the best fucking match WWE has put on free TV this year. This one was pay-per-view worthy… hell, it was pay-per-view MAIN EVENT worthy. This absolutely is my #2 Match of the Year so far in 2009.

Awesome spot sequence early, where Punk was on the ropes. Jeff went up to superplex him, but Edge caught him and held him up for a Doomsday Device. Punk went for it, but Jeff fell forward for a victory roll; it had the net effect of having dodge Punk—making him eat canvas—and putting Edge in a pinning situation. As they all got up from that, Edge and Hardy went for a double clothesline on Punk, who also went for his own twin clothesline, with a net result of all three guys eating clotheslines and hitting the mat. Awesome!

A bit later, Edge was in the corner, and Jeff was in the opposite corner. Punk grabbed Edge’s head, ran forward, and did a bulldog, but in midair, he clotheslined Jeff. Bodies everywhere, baby!

A bit later, Edge managed to get Punk in the Sharpshooter. Jeff wanted to get in on the man-touching, so he mounted Punk and applied a sleeper to Edge. That looked uncomfortable as hell for all involved. Shortly after that, Punk threw Jeff in the corner, Edge threw Punk in the same corner, Edge went for a charge, Punk flipped over for a sunset flip, Jeff dropkicked Edge to finish it, then Jeff hit the ropes and kicked Punk in the face to break the pin.

Amazing sequence a bit later too. Punk set up Edge for a GTS, Edge snaked out and shoved Punk into Jeff, Jeff grabbed Punk for the Twist of Fate, Punk spun through and set up for a GTS on Jeff, Jeff slipped out as Edge ran forward, Edge goes for a Spear on Punk, Punk leapfrogs it, Edge winds up Spearing Jeff but doing it really high and stiff. Good lord.

A bit later, Punk throws Edge to the corner. Punk goes for his jumping knee, but Edge moves. Punk goes up on the top rope, where Edge shoves him off… and something goes rather wrong. Punk drops and hits lands really frickin’ awkwardly on the steps. Moments later, an EMT (soon joined by a second) hits Punk’s side. Inside the ring, Jeff hits a Whisper in the Wind, which Punk manages to break up before bailing again to be attended to.

It’s a work though, as Jeff follows up with a Twist of Fate and Swanton Bomb. He goes for the pin, but Punk pulls him out and chucks him into the steel steps. Punk then quickly gets in the ring, and basically sits on Edge’s throat while holding his legs for a pin. Good god, was that a ride!

Post-Segment 10: Theodore Long pops out to announce that Punk will defend his title against Jeff Hardy at the next pay-per-view, The Bash.

Segment 11 [Tag Match]: Carlito & Primo defeat DH Smith & Tyson Kidd (w/ Natalya) by disqualification. Match was only a few minutes long… once the faces got any kind of momentum, Generation Douche, who were doing commentary, came in and assaulted them.

The match itself was pretty lame. Only thing worth writing about was a blown spot almost immediately in the match. Primo went for a flying headscissors on DH, but didn’t get a good grip with his legs. He basically fell off DH’s shoulders, but then DH fell forward anyway and sold it. Bah.

Segment 12: Santino Marella is sitting next to Vince in the back. Santino is here simply to make sure that he’s still going to have a job… and so will Santina. Really? The whole Santina thing still isn’t over? And Vince says that he’s attracted to Santina? Sigh.

Vince then takes a phone call from Trump, and tries to professionally tell him that he was so totally rude in his so totally pre-taped segment. Further, Vince says indirectly that Trump has an announcement for us after the Battle Royal.

Segment 13 [10-Man Battle Royal, Winner is #1 Contender for the WWE Title]: Triple H eliminates John Cena to win the Battle Royal. Match was decent and fun. Only one really interesting spot… early on, Matt smacked Show from behind. Show no-sold it and turned around, so Matt decided the prudent thing to do was bail. He exited the ring via under the bottom of the rope, then stood. Show quickly ran over, grabbed Matt’s hair, then pulled him back up over the top rope and into the ring… just to throw him back out over the rope. Bwa ha ha ha!

Post-Segment 13: Trump appears on the Titantron. He announces that the title match between Trips and Orton will not be at The Bash… it’s going to be on RAW next week, and it’ll be a Last Man Standing match!

Final Thoughts: The night was above average… but the Punk/Jeff/Edge match was beyond average. Beyond good. Beyond great. It was absolutely awesome, extremely entertaining, a stand-up-and-cheer match that transcends all the shit WWE tries to cram down our throats every week. Incredible and amazing… though not as good as Taker/Shawn from WrestleMania, but a very close second.

Most of the night is worth a watch. The nonsensical story of Vince selling RAW to Trump is just all kinds of retarded, but by god were the matches fun. And you definitely, definitely need to check out the triple threat. Seriously: download it, steal your neighbor’s DVR, anything it takes. Frickin’ awesome, and a reminder why we’re wrestling fans in the first place.