Smark Out Moment

Vince McMahon loves competition. WWE vs. WCW, Raw vs. Smackdown and WWE vs. TNA (that is a long shot at best), but you get the idea. In the world of Vince McMahon competition is key. As Paul Heyman said in his documentary, Ladies and Gentleman, My Name is Paul Heyman (which, by the way, check out the review by Callum Wiggins - great job, man), Vince McMahon is a junkie for competition. He needs it.



Well, here comes the biggest competition to date for the WWE in 2014: Monday Night Football. The summer is over and during the summer there is no real competition on cable television, but now it's time for Monday Night Football on ESPN, starting with a doubleheader on September 8th.

Since 2006 Monday Night Football has been a staple on ESPN, airing on ABC before that. It averaged 17.3 million viewers last season, as reported by Variety last December.  Recently, Monday Night Raw ratings have been below 4 million viewers, and interest hasn't been there. Viewers have been turning off Raw.

I don't blame them. It hasn't been stellar, at all. The build up for SummerSlam was average. The aftermath and looking forward to Night of Champions hasn't been that great. But when there is no real competition, the WWE gets a pass. With Monday Night Football starting up this Monday, however, the WWE finally is trying to put together a Raw that people will want to watch.

So let's breakdown the "Season Premiere" of Raw. We are getting a steel cage match between Chris Jericho and Bray Wyatt. On paper, I love it; those two are having a great feud. It is has been intense, intriguing and some of the better programming in recent months. I could see this cage match to be a Night of Champions match, but it is going to be on Raw and I am okay with that.

In addition, we get another SummerSlam rematch: Roman Reigns vs. Randy Orton. Reigns has a lot of momentum going, but I only see this as a match to end Reigns/Orton and start Reigns and Seth Rollins. So, I fully expect Rollins to interfere in the match and begin their program into Night of Champions.

Furthermore, we get another train wreck program with the Bella Twins. Although, the great twist with this is... we get Jerry Springer to do an interview segment with them. Sadly, he could be the best actor in the entire segment. Whoever on creative decided to get Jerry Springer: brilliant. Because this program has an entire classic Jerry Springer show feel to it. Sisters fighting, bad acting. I fully expect the crowd to chant "Jerry!" "Jerry!" "Jerry!". I tip my cap to creative with getting Springer to help.

I give the WWE a lot credit. They fully understand that this upcoming Raw is going to be tough. They have done a decent job trying to construct a Raw that could draw a lot of eyes. But let's be honest here; they will not and can't. NFL and Monday Night Football are just too powerful right now.

I will watch Raw, here and there. I fully expect Raw to be better than what they have had in recent weeks, even months. Just not enough to get past Monday Night Football.

Will you watch Raw this upcoming Monday night? Leave your comments below.