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Raw Redux – June 23, 2008

This week on Raw: It was time for the annual WWE Draft, Raw’s Mickie James and Melina competed in a match with SmackDown’s Natalya and Victoria. Melina suffered an injury and Kelly Kelly danced like a little ho.

Thoughts & Reactions
Has anyone else noticed that the Divas seem to get even less time during the big three-hour shows than they usually do? It seemed last night’s Divas match was the shortest segment of the night – though it’s implications, one could argue, are the most shocking. These four Divas will forever be known as the girls who made JR move to SmackDown! Honestly, when they announced this was an “announcers only match” I was thinking, “Great WWE, tell us what you really think of the Divas”, I thought it’d probably end up being freakin’ Todd Grisham moving to SmackDown instead we were served with one of the biggest drafts in WWE history which we are all feeling the effects of today.

This was for me, a dream match, I love the prospect of Melina/Mickie vs Natalya/Victoria but obviously, this match was cut short with Melina’s injury and the whole segment didn’t last too long. Maybe, just maybe, we will get to see this match further down the line – it could be huge! The big story of course, is Melina’s injury and actually I’ve flip-flopped on this. At first, while watching it live, I thought it was legit but then when the referee announced the double count-out it all made sense – of course they need to move two announcers. And as I found out this morning, it was in fact legit. Looking back, I do think there was meant to be some controversial finish resulting in the double count-out leading to JR and Cole moving, but this wasn’t it. I guess WWE lucked out with a realistic finish to the match allowing that to happen, but at the expense of Melina. Hopefully she’ll be back in action soon, Raw will definitely be different without her.

I wonder if the original finish they had planned involved Beth Phoenix coming out and beating up Melina and then Mickie, Natalya and Victoria just for good measure? Probably just pure speculation on my part, but I’m trying to think what controversial finish WWE originally had planned and that could work as it would advance the Beth-Melina feud. Beth has been noticeably absent from Raw for two whole weeks, what gives?

All in all, there wasn’t too much to write home about except Melina’s injury, though I’m not really all that bitter to be honest. There were bigger stories to be told last night on Raw than the women’s division. They did plug Natalya contending for the Divas Championship and Mickie vs Katie at Night of Champions, so I guess they did what they could given the time they were given.

Individual Assessments
In this portion we will look at each of the Divas individually and the role they played, adding more thoughts yadda yadda:

Kelly Kelly: Dancing while dressed like a banana? Good times, Kelly, good times.

Melina: This sucks, I don’t want Melina out of action for too long.

Mickie James: Was Mickie actually concerned for Melina’s well being? Wonders will never cease! This was really sweet, I think Mickie the person rather than Mickie the character was coming through here. What a compassionate lady!

Natalya: Natalya has accomplished so much in such a short time, as well as SmackDown she’s already appeared multiple times on Raw and even on pay per view.

Victoria: Seeing Victoria on Raw was kind of odd, since I think (well for me anyway) she’s become so synonymous with SmackDown and that is a good thing. Moving to the blue brand has done wonders for Victoria.

Fashion Focus
The Good: None.

The Bad: None.

The In-Between: Melina didn’t look too bad.

Photos
Below, are digitals of the Divas match from RAW. Copyright to World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc.

Video
Watch the match below:

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