The rating is in for the million dollar giveaway show from Monday June 9th, 2008 and the verdict is...not so good. Apparently it came in at a 3.0 for the night. Ouch and ouch again. Even giving away money for a passcode didn’t get McMahon the ratings that he was looking for. Imagine that….if you forced yourself to watch the show you know how bad it really was. If you had the sense to use TiVO or a VCR then you are the smart fan that didn’t waste your time on the garbage that McMahon put on the air this night. The only thing worth talking about in order to keep any fan up to date on the “storylines” of the show is that Chris Jericho heel turned on Shawn Michaels. Here’s a quick rundown of what took place: HBK comes out. Jericho thanks him for coming out tonight. Jericho says he put on a good performance at the previous ppv, and Jericho is proud of him. The crowd loves him, even though he lost to Batista. HBK appreciates it, but wants to know if Chris has a question. Jericho says yes, he brings up the knee injury and faking, HBK says he would do anything to win, and he did that. He technically didn't lie to anyone but Jericho. Jericho says he got super-kicked and HBK got cheered for it. HBK is loved, but he couldn't get away with it. Jericho got booed for telling us about the fake injury. He did the right thing, but gets booed for it. Fans would rather boo an honest man instead of HBK. So how does HBK turn into such a lying, cheating, pathetic human being? Jericho decides to attack! They brawl and then Jericho kicks HBK in the crotch. Jericho faces him down and says HBK lied to him and that HBK started all of this. Jericho then picks him up and tosses HBK through the Jeritron-9000! Jericho walks away and leaves HBK in agony inside the ring. There you have it, Jericho is now a heel and will officially feud with HBK, it’s about time. Although I had thought that they were going to turn HBK heel, so that’s a surprise to tell the wrestling fans that you know.
On the same show they also teamed up Umaga with Snitsky to go against Rhodes and Holly. Needless to say, Umaga and Snitsky beat the tag team champs-but it was a non-title match so it didn’t really mean a thing. Ted Dibiase, Jr. comes out and berates the losers and says to be prepared to lose the belts to him and his new tag team partner, who is to be announced in two weeks-can’t even wager a guess yet on this one.
The unfortunate thing about the whole night was the million dollar giveaway was given a lot of time and it really slowed the pace down that they had for the show. We also had to watch another match up between Cena and JBL, Mickie James went against Beth Phoenix, and Cryme Tyme went against Santino and Carlito. Cryme Tyme beat Santino and Carlito, so I am beginning to wonder why Santino and Carlito are even together in the first place. Maybe the writers don’t know what they are doing until the draft comes up in a couple weeks and are holding off on putting anyone into any feuds until then. If giving away money doesn’t put ratings on the board, I just don’t know if I have much faith in the writers to improve the storylines either cause they sure haven’t done a bit of good since WM 24. Having one worthwhile storyline with HBK and Jericho won’t save this show that has been on cable for so long.
There was a throw away match at the end of the show with HHH and Jeff Hardy. I say throw away because there was no real winner because of a Cena interference during the match. Hardy won by countout. A match that could have gone somewhere hit the wall and didn’t advance a story at all. Will next Monday have something to do with Hardy, Cena, and HHH? One can hope that will happen. Having a triple threat match at the Night of Champions would be a hell of a lot better then watching another Cena/HHH match again. Only time will tell I guess. Seeing as how the ratings weren’t what the WWE was expecting from the giveaway, you would hope that Vince and his writers will come up with ideas for his wrestlers storylines to help the WWE’s fleeting ratings...
That’s my 3 cents worth, til next time...