Three Up, Three Down 4.20.12: WWE Raw 4.16.12

No long introductions this time — let’s take a look back at what worked and what didn’t work during Monday’s taped Raw in London.

THREE UP

Mark Henry vs. CM Punk
Never mind that this was the third week in a row these two men met. Henry and Punk once again put on an entertaining match, with this one exceeding three-star quality. In fact, this bout felt like a pay-per-view quality match. Numerous spots were awesome and fairly unique, including:

-Punk’s suicide dive: Punk luring Henry to the outside, only to head back into the ring to spring a dive through the ropes on him, was crafty.

-Punk’s bulldog off the barricade: I couldn’t recall ever seeing this before. Punk’s tightrope act on the barricade into a bulldog was something completely new.

-The finish: Keyed by Henry’s brutal head-first bump with the steel chair in the corner, and finished off with Punk’s chair-assisted elbow drop, the ending was believable. Punk truly had to pull out all the stops to defeat the World’s Strongest Man, and click for more to see the video:

Also, let’s take this time to give serious props to Henry. Any young, up-and-coming wrestler in the “monster” mold should study Mark Henry match film. Granted, Henry’s physique makes him a one-of-a-kind monster, sure, but he wrestles the gigantic powerhouse style about as perfectly as anyone. Most people will predictably give Punk all the credit for the entertainment value of this match or their last two encounters. Punk deserves plenty — he was great, as usual. But don’t discount Henry’s value as a worker. Everything Henry does in the ring makes sense from a psychological standpoint and his offense often looks so real it makes you cringe. Punk’s selling complemented that.

Brock Lesnar’s promo
Wow, the WWE has shown no hesitation to stick to Lesnar’s niche. They surprisingly mentioned UFC on TV last week. Now, they give us a UFC-style promo featuring Lesnar? For a second I thought I was watching a Spike TV hype-up special for a UFC pay-per-view.

That’s not to say that this was bad, though. It was actually terrific and suited Lesnar’s style very well. Lesnar is clearly more comfortable in the form of a pre-recorded interview (though I realize because this Raw was taped in London, all segments were technically pre-recorded, but my point still stands). It seems the War Machine has become accustomed to that style during his time in the UFC. I’ve always felt something was missing during Lesnar’s live promos and interviews from his first run in WWE to his backstage interview last week. Some aspect of Lesnar’s delivery is just awkward, and I can’t put my finger on it. I’m not sure if it’s just his delivery, but it feels incomplete. So instead, this style of promo worked perfectly and only helped add even more a big-match feel to his upcoming encounter with John Cena at Extreme Rules.

YES! YES! YES!
I stand by what I said after WrestleMania. Daniel Bryan’s 18-second World Championship loss to Sheamus is the best thing to ever happen to his career.

Bryan is becoming a sensation, not only in the eyes of supposed “smart” fans, but casual fans as well. I give you example a, which involves my roommate who sometimes wanders into my room and watches wrestling with me. He is the definition of the detached, casual fan.

My roommate walked into my room right at the beginning of the backstage segment involving Bryan and Kofi. As soon as Bryan began his “Yes!” shtick, he began to thoroughly laugh his ass off:

Just like the London crowd ate up “Yes!” and chanted it during both expected and unexpected portions of the show for the rest of the night, “Yes!” was often shouted sporadically in our apartment for the rest of the night. Daniel Bryan is becoming a star.

THREE DOWN

The fall of tag-team wrestling
This is by no means a new development in the WWE landscape, but that doesn’t make it any less of a bummer. Besides the squads of Tag Team Champions Primo and Epico and Santino and Funkasaurus can anyone even name another current pairing? And sadly, Santino and Funkasaurus have only teamed together ONCE! Yet, they have already looked like the most legitimate team the company has to offer.

And despite the dearth of tag teams, the WWE hasn’t done much lately to make its champions look very strong. Having Primo and Epico be punked out against the formidable, yet thrown together tandem of Big Show and Great Khali was a curious decision. How does making your champion team look pathetically weak help matters for an already struggling division?

I will concede one thing this match gave us: Rosa Mendes’ appearance with Primo and Epico. She was pretty much the only good part of this match.

No diva involvement
Speaking of Rosa brings me to this point. Yes, Rosa is extremely attractive, but this was the second-straight Raw in which we saw no women participating in the ring. It’s also convenient that this comes after my last point, because like the tag-team division, the divas division is in one of its weakest states since WWE began maintaining a full-time women’s circuit. Call me bizarre, but I actually enjoy women’s wrestling when it’s of decent quality and involves characters that we are made to care about. But it’s been a long time since the WWE has given the slightest effort toward developing any of its female WRESTLING characters (so that excludes Vickie, AJ, Eve’s latest role, etc). The last try was probably Kelly Kelly’s Cinderella-like run to the Divas Championship.

And don’t suggest that the WWE isn’t capable of creating captivating women’s wrestling story lines. One of the best feuds of the last decade was between Trish Stratus and Mickie James, culminating in a great Women’s Championship match at WrestleMania 22. It can be done.

The Zack Ryder tragedy
I ranted about this last week, too, but it deserves a reprise.

It became almost immediately clear on Monday that Ryder’s match against Kane was only a means of furthering Kane’s feud with Randy Orton. So if that was the only purpose, wasn’t there anyone else, besides Ryder, that could be feed to the shark that is Kane? I suppose because of Ryder’s act he’ll remain popular, regardless of what happens to him in terms of in-ring success. But it’s a damn shame a guy who was United States Champion not too long ago has fallen so far so quickly, and only seemingly to elevate Eve, whose new purpose we don’t understand yet at all.

I can’t help but pose the question…