This Week In WWE TV – September 30-October 6, 2013

This week: The road to Battleground, as Big Show, Bryan and the Rhodes family continue to deal with the still as yet officially unnamed McMahon Helmsley corporation power couple of authorities and their associates. Plus, Los Matadores and El Torito debut, Heyman makes an honest Heyman Guy of Ryback, The Bo Dallas Invitational and Santino and Emma steal the show at Full Sail.

RAW

– Show started with Punk coming out. He said it was pretty predictable he’d get beaten up in his hometown last week, but the story would end with him getting his hands on Axel, Ryback and Heyman. Maddox interrupted and told Punk he wouldn’t get Heyman or Ryback tonight. Punk said he was looking for an outlet for his aggression, so Big E then interrupted and attacked Punk, leading to Brad making it an official match.

– CM Punk d. Big E Langston in 5:56. Big E more than held his own for most of the match, but Punk put together a flurry at the end and won with the GTS.

– Kofi Kingston d. Fandango in 3:02. After Kofi won with Trouble In Paradise, the Wyatt Family came out. Kofi grabbed a chair, but Bray just cut a promo from the stage.

– Backstage, Orton found The Bellas and congratulated Brie on her and Bryan’s engagement. He told her to schedule the wedding soon because if it was after Battleground, he might not be able to walk.

– Renee interviewed Heyman. He said Punk was obsessed with getting his hands on him, but he’d never be able to do it again and called him a nobody. Renee pointed out she’d seen Ryback and Axel lurking around and asked if it was another trap. Heyman said him just being there was a trap and he had a huge night planned, so dared Punk to make a move tonight.

– Los Matadores d. Heath Slater and Jinder Mahal of 3MB (Fernando pinned Slater) in 4:02. Los Matadores were accompanied by El Torito, who’s the former Mascarita Sagrada in a bull costume. They’re Fernando and Diego and had an elaborate entrance, which involves a lot of springboarding by El Torito. If you’re keeping score, Fernando is Epico and Diego is Primo. Spoiler alert. They pinned Slater with what’s basically a double Shell Shocked.

– HHH and Stephanie brought out Dusty, Dustin and Cody for the Rhodes Family summit. HHH recapped their failings before Stephanie offered Cody and Dustin an opportunity to get their jobs back, if they could beat The Shield at Battleground. If they lost, they’d never work in WWE again and Dusty would be fired too. Dusty accepted on the condition he was in their corner. HHH and Stephanie left and The Shield ran in. Reigns speared Goldust and they beat down Cody. Dusty tried to save but got stomped as well, before The Shield gave Cody the triple powerbomb.

– R-Truth d. Curtis Axel in 4:24. Axel struggled early but took control, only for Punk’s music to distract him and allow Truth to win with the Little Jimmy.

– Brie Bella d. Alicia Fox in 3:20. AJ and Tamina were shown watching backstage. Brie made a big comeback at the end and pinned Alicia with a facebuster.

– Heyman tried to calm Axel down backstage and said Punk was out of his league trying to one up them. Ryback said if Punk wanted them, they should give him what he wanted. Heyman sent Ryback off and told Axel he was going to propose to Ryback tonight.

– Renee interviewed Big Show about his situation. Big Show said he was a good person trying to do what was right for his family. He ended up getting mad about having to knock out Dusty and said he wasn’t going to take it anymore, he was going to knock HHH out.

– Truth asked Brad for an Intercontinental Title shot and Brad said he’d take it under advisement, before Big Show stormed in looking for HHH. He pinned Brad against a wall and forced him to go find HHH.

– Alberto Del Rio d. Zack Ryder by submission in 4:08. Usual Ryder match, he got his token boot in the corner spot before Del Rio countered the Rough Ryder and beat him with the cross armbreaker.

– Heyman and Ryback came out. Heyman said he had to have Punk attacked in Chicago and Ryback was responsible from saving Punk from breaking his face. Ryback called Heyman a genius and said there was nothing he wouldn’t do for him. This lead to Heyman teasing he was going to ‘propose’ to Ryback. The crowd chanted “get a room”. Could have been worse. Heyman actually got down on one knee and asked Ryback to become a Paul Heyman Guy, before Punk’s music hit. Punk came through the crowd and pretended to twist his knee when he jumped the barrier. The doctor checked on him but as soon as Heyman got close, Punk hit him in the ankle with a kendo stick and attacked Ryback. Axel tried to make the save, but he got attacked while Ryback escaped and Punk hit him with the GTS.

– The Shield d. Dolph Ziggler and The Usos (Reigns pinned Ziggler) in 8:33. The Usos hit a pair of dives after making a strong start. Jimmy was cut off during the break. Ziggler made a comeback and the match broke down. Ziggler hit Rollins with the Zig Zag, but after Reigns had made a blind tag, allowing him pin Ziggler with the spear.

– In HHH’s office, the police confronted Big Show. Stephanie stopped them from arresting him and embarrassed him again. When they left, he punched a hole through a HHH poster and the wall.

– Renee interviewed RVD. They showed a Youtube video with clips of RVD in various hardcore matches. I guess to plug their Youtube channel they’re showing these videos as if you were watching them on Youtube, which just feels weird. Anyway, RVD said Del Rio had no clue what hardcore rules meant.

– Santino Marella d. Antonio Cesaro in 2:48. Santino managed to avoid the giant swing and went for the cobra, but got distracted. Cesaro got Santino in the giant swing second time round and threw the cobra outside, but got caught with a surprise pin.

– Lawler brought out Bryan and Orton to end the show. Orton said he’d been motivated and inspired by the title being held in abeyance and said he was genetically superior. Bryan said unlike Orton, he didn’t need anyone to motivate him to reach his full potential. Orton brought up Brie causing Bryan to attack. Brie ended up coming out, as Orton gave Bryan the draping DDT off the apron on the floor. He then gave Bryan an RKO through the announce table, with Brie checking on Bryan to end the show.

MAIN EVENT

– Damien Sandow d. Santino Marella in 7:54. Sandow called Santino the king of the stupid before the match, which Santino seemed fine with and a puppet wielding pest, which he didn’t. Crowd were into Santino. Sandow had a few problems during the match and Santino teased the cobra, but Sandow managed to escape. He stole the cobra sleeve and used it as a distraction, allowing him to hit the Silencer for the pin. This was pretty fun and Sandow won, so win win.

– The Wyatt Family d. The Primetime Players (Harper pinned Titus) in 4:23. Young was worked over and Titus only made a brief comeback before being pinned with a spinning clothesline from Harper. Bray gave Titus the Sister Abigail after the match.

– Curtis Axel d. Zack Ryder in 3:50. Axel survived the token boot in the corner to win with the face first neckbreaker.

– The Real Americans d. Tons Of Funk (Cesaro pinned Tensai) in 4:35. Two things to see here. One, Cesaro actually did the giant swing on Brodus. Two, the last minute or so when it was Tensai in the ring with Cesaro. Cesaro won with the Neutraliser on Tensai.

NXT

– Santino Marella and Emma d. Fandango and Summer Rae in 10:20. Renee was on commentary for this match. Santino and Emma managed to get some synchronicity going in their entrance. Eventually. Lots of wackiness before the match even started. Fandango had problems early with Santino, until Santino had problems with high fiving his partner and not realising that counted as a tag. Fandango took control after a cheap shot. After some trouble, Santino finally made a tag and Emma ran wild. Santino tried to give Emma the cobra sleeve to use but Summer cut her off. In the end Fandango was knocked into the ring and Santino won with the cobra. Super fun match.

– An Ascension promo aired saying they’d take the tag team titles tonight.

– Luke Harper d. Kassius Ohno in 2:58. No Bray or Rowan with Harper. This was Ohno’s return, but Harper won pretty decisively after a big boot and the spinning clothesline.

– Enzo and Cassady cut a promo on Dawson and Rusev, before a video aired for Mojo Rawley who debuts next week.

– NXT Tag Team Championship: The Ascension d. Corey Graves and Adrian Neville (c) in 10:37 (Conor pinned Graves) to win the titles. The Ascension worked over the ribs of Graves. Neville eventually made a comeback and hit a corkscrew dive onto both. Conor pulled Victor out of the way of the Red Arrow, so Graves tagged himself back in. But he ran straight into a knee and The Ascension hit the elbow legsweep combo for the win.

– Bo Dallas Invitational: Bo Dallas d. an unnamed jobber in 1:11. Before the match, Bo explained the concept and announced it was ‘Bo time’. I don’t know how long it’ll take people to do the 180 to the 180, of hating face Bo so much he had to turn, to loving heel who thinks he’s a face Bo, but I think it might happen if he keeps going. The crowd got behind Bo’s first, scrawny opponent with chants of “let’s go this guy”. He almost won with a roll up before Bo regrouped and beat ‘this guy’ with a spear.

– Bo checked on him after the match and announced since he barely broke a sweat, he wanted another opponent. Kruger and Cesaro both came out wanting to take the challenge and they argued. Cesaro faked allowing Kruger the match before attacking him. Bo took out Cesaro from behind, leaving the path clear for El Local to come out.

– Bo Dallas Invitational: ‘El Local’ d. Bo Dallas in 0:20. ‘El Local’ looked a little different than last week. He immediately avoided a spear and hit a Sami Zayn esque kick in the corner for the quick win, earning a title shot in two weeks. After the match he unmasked and sure enough it was Zayn, much to Bo’s shock.

SMACKDOWN

– Big Show came out. He talked about the situation with HHH and Stephanie and asked for some understanding from the fans. He said he’d take his frustration and rage out on The Shield tonight and if he was going down, he’d take The Shield with him. HHH interrupted. He said he was ashamed of Big Show for questioning his authority and his problems were all on him. HHH told Big Show because he was a friend, he no longer owed the bank for his mortgage, he owed him. He warned Big Show to get his emotions in check or he’d be living in Big Show’s house. He then changed the main event to a four on one match with Orton as The Shield’s partner before saying they were cool now and leaving.

– Rob Van Dam d. Fandango by DQ in 2:24. Van Dam managed to kick Fandango straight in the face, before Summer crotched him as he went for the frog splash, causing the DQ. Fandango attacked afterwards but Ricardo distracted him long enough for RVD to recover. And he gave Fandango the Van Terminator with a trash can. Luckily, somehow, Fandango’s face stayed in one piece which is about all you could hope for here.

– Ryback d. R-Truth in 2:25. After a punch from Truth, Heyman fired Ryback up by saying Truth was a bully. And Ryback hates bullies. Ryback won with Shell Shocked and after the match, Axel gave Truth a clothesline to the back of the head.

– Renee interviewed Del Rio. He said after he beat RVD, he’d put in him in the garbage and send him back where he belongs. A stage hand delivered him the broken trash can from earlier as a present from RVD and Del Rio threw it down and stormed off.

– Alberto Del Rio d. Dolph Ziggler by submission in 10:33. Sandow did commentary. Cole and JBL kept trying to goad him into cashing in. Del Rio controlled things for a while before Ziggler hit a facebuster off the top. After a back and forth finish, Ziggler almost won with a sunset flip powerbomb, but Del Rio escaped a sleeper. Ziggler kicked out of a kneeling superkick and escaped the cross armbreaker, hitting a fameasser for a near fall. Del Rio then countered a zig zag and hit a flapjack, before winning with the cross armbreaker.

– Los Matadores d. Heath Slater and Jinder Mahal of 3MB (Diego pinned Jinder) in 3:19. Like on Raw, Los Matadores won with their double team samoan drop slam move, this time on Jinder. After the match 3MB tried to attack but got sent outside and El Torito hit a big double springboard dive onto them both.

– Renee interviewed Heyman, Ryback and Axel. He said R-Truth’s thoughts of becoming Intercontinental Champion were fiction and Punk would go down in a blaze of glory at Battleground.

– Brie Bella d. Aksana in 2:09. Brie won with a facebuster off the second rope. After the match, AJ came out with Tamina and said she’d do to Brie what Orton did to Bryan on Raw.

– Kofi Kingston d. Big E Langston in 0:53. Kofi won quick with a surprise roll up. The Wyatt Family then came out and surrounded Kofi on the ramp. They didn’t attack him and instead Bray did another promo.

– Four On One Handicap Match: Randy Orton and The Shield against Big Show had a DQ one way or the other in 5:39. Big Show held his own for a while before getting worked over. Big Show fought back late on and there was a disqualification when Ambrose brought in a chair. Orton hit Show with the chair and Reigns hit a spear to save Orton and Rollins from a double chokeslam. Orton gave Show an RKO before The Usos ran off Reigns and Rollins. Orton tried to stomp Show’s neck in the chair but Bryan made the save. Ambrose saved Orton from the YES Lock. Orton escaped, leaving Ambrose to take the running knee from Bryan to end the show.