Pre-show notes:

- Last stop on the Road to Wrestlemania! Toot toot, etc.

- Don’t be afraid to leave a comment on this report. We’ve build a great community of intelligent, funny wrestling fans and you should be a part of it, because seriously, you aren’t gonna find it anywhere else. Except on maybe whatever report you’ve just stumbled upon and are super into.

- Big thanks again to Casey/THESTINGER for helping me out with gifs and pictures. Be sure to visit his gifs Tumblr for the stuff I didn’t use.

- Follow us on Twitter @withleather, follow me personally @MrBrandonStroud and like us on Facebook.

- If you’re going to be at Wrestlemania this year (or in Miami for Wrestlemania weekend, at least), make sure you let me know so we can find each other and say hi. More on this at the end of the report. If you find me on Sunday and I don’t at least have a mark photo with Stan Hansen, keep me from killing myself.

Please to enjoy the Best and Worst Of WWE Raw for March 26, 2012.

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Wait, that was last week. Or was it 2002?

Tonight: a special documentary!

Get unprecedented access into The Rock and John Cena’s incredible journey in a special hour-long documentary tonight at 8/7 CT on USA Network. Then later tonight on Raw, Rock and Cena will meet for one more live in-ring confrontation before WrestleMania.

Or, I don’t know, skip the documentary and watch the two hours of video packages that follow it.

- This is the last (important) stop on the Road To Wrestlemania, so expect a lot of major things to happen! Hahaha, just kidding!

- Poll of the week:

- Last week we had a weird error where the site wouldn’t let you post comments on the reg and gave you “SLOW DOWN INTERNET GUY YOU’RE PARTICIPATING TOO MUCH” messages. That problem has been addressed and solved, so let’s get this bad boy back up to the 2,000+ monster it was.

- I’m going to be at Wrestlemania this weekend (section 138 … stop by, say hi, bring a With Leather sign!) so the tentative Best and Worst schedule looks like this: Best And Worst Of Raw tomorrow, Best And Worst Of Wrestlemania X-7 on Friday. A “Best And Worst Of Wrestlemania Weekend” for Monday morning (I’ll be on a plane for most of Monday), Best And Worst Of next week’s Raw written by comedian Chris Trew for Tuesday, and Best And Worst Of Wrestlemania 28 proper by me on Wednesday. Other festivities will hopefully be announced soon.

- My personal Mania weekend schedule, should you want to catch up with me: ROH on Friday, WrestleReunion Saturday morning/afternoon, WWE Fan Axxess on Saturday night to catch up with all the NXT and Funkasauric people I love. Marlins/Yankees on Sunday afternoon, Mania on Sunday night. Jet lag and writing cramps all other days and times.

- Remember, the top 10 comments from tonight’s open discussion thread will be featured in tomorrow’s Best and Worst Of WWE Raw report. That makes you an Internet celebrity by proxy! You’re even more important if you tweet this report, retweet it, share it on Facebook and get all your wrestling friends to come hang out and make jokes.

- To nominate a comment for one of the top 10 of the night, be sure to reply with +1. That’ll make it easier for me to differentiate between the 18-or-so comments we get instead of the usual 2,000 because of a server error.

Pre-show notes, written to one guitar ditty over several hours:

- Don’t be afraid to leave a comment on this report. We’ve build a great community of intelligent, funny wrestling fans and you should be a part of it, because seriously, you aren’t gonna find it anywhere else.

- Big thanks again to Casey/THESTINGER for helping me out with gifs and pictures. Be sure to visit his gifs Tumblr for the stuff I didn’t use. We should just start a Tumblr of “kids at wrestling shows” gifs.

- Follow us on Twitter @withleather, follow me personally @MrBrandonStroud and like us on Facebook.

- Pardon my lateness and my weird updating, I’m covering SXSW for UPROXX. If you’re in Austin this week, give me a shout.

- If you’re going to be at Wrestlemania this year (or in Miami for Wrestlemania weekend, at least), make sure you let me know so we can find each other and say hi. Section 138, if you’re wondering. Also probably ROH on Saturday afternoon, and Axxess that night. Mark photo with Brodus Clay pending.

Please to enjoy the Best and Worst Of WWE Raw for March 6, 2012.

Read the rest of this entry »

Now that’s a Rock I can get behind.

On tonight’s show:

- The Rock will perform the “Rock concert”.
- John Cena will “rap”.
- And more! (Probably not)

Also something to remember: To nominate a comment for one of the top 10 of the night, be sure to reply with +1. That’ll make it easier for me to differentiate between the 2,000-or-so comments that are left.

Pre-show notes, written on my forearm in sharpie to make a point:

- Don’t be afraid to leave a comment on this report. We’ve build a great community of intelligent, funny wrestling fans and you should be a part of it, because seriously, you aren’t gonna find it anywhere else.

- Big thanks again to Casey/THESTINGER for helping me out with gifs and pictures. Be sure to visit his gifs Tumblr for the stuff I didn’t use, especially the one of Dusty Rhodes emptying garbage into a garbage truck. Special thanks to teens on the Internet for that one Hayley gif.

- Follow us on Twitter @withleather, follow me personally @MrBrandonStroud and like us on Facebook.

- If you’re going to be at Wrestlemania this year (or in Miami for Wrestlemania weekend, at least), make sure you let me know so we can find each other in the darkness a la The Green Mile and say hi.

Please to enjoy the Best and Worst Of WWE Raw for March 6, 2012.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tonight on Raw:

- Teddy Long takes over as the Raw general manager thanks to an edict from the mysterious Board Of Directors, meaning nothing will be planned out, Randy Orton will probably have at least three matches and Teddy will be waiting by the curtain to interrupt any kerfuffles with an impromptu tag team match announcement. Also, if we’re lucky, the return of the White Boy Challenge.

- Pre-emptive best: David Otunga and Teddy long switching clothes, finding out that they’ve been accidentally wearing each others’ sizes.

- The Rock will be in the house! Or he won’t.

- Triple H and the Undertaker were oddly absent on last week’s show, which nearly guarantees a solid 33 minutes of THIS BUSINESS to open up tonight. I hope they reveal that when they say “this business” they don’t mean wrestling, they mean public speaking.

Poll time:

Also something to remember: To nominate a comment for one of the top 10 of the night, be sure to reply with +1. That’ll make it easier for me to differentiate between the 2,000-or-so comments that are left.