CM Punk, Evan Bourne, Kofi Kingston, & Rey Mysterio vs. Kane, Manu, Cody Rhodes, & Ted Dibiase - Raw 9/29/2008
Totally missed this when Mike assigned it. Probably because I was making a post at about the same time. Anyway, the babyface team appeals to me quite a bit, so I was excited. Match was pretty good: opened with crazy babyface offense and bunches of dives, and it was all really fun. Comes back from the break in the middle of a Bourne FIP segment. Nothing really blowaway great, and it was a pretty small portion of the match, but it was pretty good, and then Punk came in off the hot tag and started to clean house. Best spot of the match came when he kicked either Rhodes or Dibiase in the head-- don't remember which one, but they were both standing on the apron-- and then Manu hit a great chop block. That led to a pretty lengthy Punk FIP spell, and though I would've preferred Bourne or Rey to get the long FIP section, Punk was plenty good and sold his butt off. None of the heels were very good at this point, but you don't need to be very good to take turns tearing a knee apart, so they did fine. Some good cutoffs, good drama, etc, and the whole time, I'm thinking, "Is there a guy I'd be less excited to see take a hot tag than Kofi Kingston?" and then Rey got decked and I knew Kofi would get it. He got it, and I didn't hate it. I generally like his cross-bodies off the top rope, and this was no exception. Then he ran around and stomped a bunch and people cheered, and then everything broke loose. Changed my mind about the chop block being the best part of the match: the finish is better and probably the best thing Kofi or Kane has ever done. Bummer Rey didn't do much here, but it was still a fun little match.
And the biggest thing to take away from a match like that is how easy it is for WWE to put something like that together, which makes it frustrating that they don't do it more often. I get that it'd get excessive if they were throwing away 6 & 8 man tags on every show, but they could get away with doing one every week or every other week, and it'd be a bunch of fun, and people would like it, and it'd get more guys on the show, and it could keep current feuds in people's minds while giving them a chance to see some new match-ups.
