WWE Raw live results: John Cena’s last Boston appearance
Massachusetts native John Cena returns to Boston tonight as he will kick off WWE Raw at Boston’s TD Garden and will be in attendance for the beginning of The Last Time is Now tournament to determine his last opponent.
Cena has hyped his appearance as “definitely one to see” as speculation about him being in action has grown.
A pair of first round matches will feature Sheamus vs. Shinsuke Nakamura, and Damian Priest vs. Rusev.
CM Punk will also appear after being blindsided by a Logan Paul loaded punch as he was in the midst of fending off The Vision. Punk will address them all tonight.
Charlotte Flair and Alexa Bliss will defend their WWE Women’s Tag Team titles against The Kabuki Warriors’ Asuka and Kairi Sane. Plus, Women’s World Champion Stephanie Vaquer will face Raquel Rodriguez in a non-title match.
Our live coverage begins at 8 p.m. Eastern time.
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Show Recap —
Shinsuke Nakamura, Damian Priest (selling a damaged left eye), Asuka & Kairi Sane, and Stephanie Vaquer & Nikki Bella arrived at TD Garden in Boston.
In addition to the usual establishing shot of the city, they aired footage of West Newbury, Massachusetts, as fans chanted for John Cena.
John Cena kicks off Raw
The crowd continued chanting for Cena, but they were instead greeted with Paul “Triple H” Levesque, already in the ring. His music played for a while as he soaked up his own crowd reaction. He waited a full minute after the ring announcer said his name before he began speaking.
He said everyone had an opinion, and there weren’t many agreements. Everyone had an opinion on who the greatest of all time was. You can measure it by in-ring performance, charisma, ability to tear down your opponent on the mic, etc. It was all subjective. However, Levesque was in the position to see it from all sides (he began getting ‘What’ chants here), and he knew that tonight, we’d all be able to agree on one thing.
From an objective measure, there was one person at the top of that list. As a box office attraction, someone who gave it all in the ring, ruthless on the mic, and did it all with a smile on his face because he loved the business and wanted to see it elevated to the highest level possible. He was the single greatest asset the business has ever seen. He was, without a doubt, the greatest of all time. (Imagine that being a great asset to a company is the reason you’re considered the greatest wrestler ever.)
Finally, Levesque introduced John Cena.
Cena entered to a huge reaction, and he shook Levesque’s hand. Fans chanted, “Thank you, Cena.” Cena has been asked a lot about who he wanted to face. But only one person asked him what he wanted to do with this exercise. (He pointed at Levesque.)
Cena’s goal was to leave the business better than he found it. To pay back all the opportunities that the company gave him, and that the fans were gracious enough to put up with. The Last Time is Now tournament would determine who could retire John Cena, and that started tonight.
Cena also had an announcement about December 13th at Saturday Night’s Main Event. It would close one chapter, but it would open an opportunity. It would be an opportunity for main roster wrestlers to host exhibition matches against the best from NXT. That night would close one chapter but would pave the road ahead.
Cena didn’t make the schedule, but he did want to come to Boston one last time. It meant everything to be in TD Garden again and feel the atmosphere, surrounded by family and friends.
Dominik Mysterio interrupted. He was booed and greeted with obscenities. Dom confronted Levesque and wanted to know what he would do about last week, when he was interrupted by a deadbeat. Dom was the one who should be interrupting old men.
Cena interrupted and welcomed him to Boston. Dom said this wasn’t about him and told Cena to go to the corner—or else he’d put him down. Cena reminded Dom of who he was.
Cena said Dom might have a chance on any other night, but tonight, Cena felt invisible. If Dom wanted to pick a fight, Cena promised that he would lose. However, Cena respected Dom’s father, so he offered Dom a chance to leave.
Dom was amused because he wasn’t even at his peak yet, but was already better than Cena in his prime. Dom said he would’ve whooped Cena in any era. (The fans told Dom that he f—cked up.)
Levesque interjected to make an announcement: Dom would defend his Intercontinental Championship right now against Cena (who, fortunately, is always dressed in his gear). The crowd went nuts.
(It’s always nice to see Cena at this point, but this was an odd segment until Dom came out. Cena’s SNME announcement aside, Levesque’s opening promo felt out of place, and it couldn’t have been more obvious that he wanted to be the one to make the announcement that would obviously get a big pop.)
Intercontinental Championship match: Dominik Mysterio (c) vs. John Cena
Cena’s final match in his hometown started during a commercial break. They did the in-ring introductions during the break, and Dom attacked Cena when they were done, so the referee started the match.
Cena had the better of it until Dom tossed him into the ring post. Dom countered an AA and hit a DDT. Dom hit a slingshot senton, but Cena got his knees up on another attempt as they returned from a second break (two breaks before the match was ten minutes old).
Cena did his usual comeback and the five knuckle shuffle. Dom slipped out of the AA again and shoved Cena shoulder-first into the ring post. Dom exposed the metal turnbuckle to distract the referee while he grabbed a steel chair. Dom tried the Eddie Guerrero trick of faking a chair shot, but Cena dropped the chair and lay down on the mat. The crowd chanted for Eddie while Cena winked at Dom.
Cena hoisted Dom up for the AA again, but they bumped the referee. Cena applied an STF, and Dom tapped out. Cena, who has been doing this for more than 20 years, leaped to his feet to celebrate as if it was over, but there was no referee.
Dom tried a belt shot, but Cena ducked it and hit an AA. A new referee ran out to make the cover, but Dom kicked out. The fans were on their feet.
Dom tripped Cena on the ropes and hit a 619, followed by a frog splash. However, Cena rolled through and hit an emphatic AA for the pinfall win. The crowd exploded.
Cena celebrated with the Intercontinental title, a belt he has now won for the first time. Cena is now a grand slam champion. He thanked Boston and said the champ was here.
Match result: John Cena defeated Dominik Mysterio to win the Intercontinental Championship (13:30)
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During a break, Byron Saxton interviewed LA Knight, who is in the Cena tournament. Knight congratulated Cena, but he never cared about having a ‘dream match’ with anyone. But now Cena had something he wanted. Knight kept going, and his promo was actually cut off as they returned from break.
Babyface members of the roster greeted Cena backstage and congratulated him. Rey Mysterio shook his hand, and the crowd cheered. They popped even bigger when Cena bumped into Cody Rhodes. They shook hands.
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There was a Veterans Day video.
A SmackDown clip showed that Aleister Black was to blame for Priest having a bad eye.
The Last Time Is Now Tournament Round One: Damian Priest vs. Rusev
The crowd came right down for this match, and they were dead silent for Rusev getting the heat on Priest during a break. Priest eventually came back with kicks and a crossbody off the ropes, but Rusev targeted his eye (as he did earlier). Rusev raked Priest’s eye and hit a Matchka Kick for the pinfall win.
Match result: Rusev defeated Damian Priest (8:51)
Extraordinarily dull match and weak finish.
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AJ Styles and Dragon Lee met with Adam Pearce backstage. Dragon Lee suggested their team name be Dragones Con Estilo (Dragons with Style), but Styles didn’t like that. Styles said they’d work on it.
Maxxine Dupri approached Pearce. He asked her if she was ready for Becky Lynch. She said yes… and no. She could train forever, but there was nothing that would make her feel “ready.” She wanted the match. Pearce made it official for Madison Square Garden next week.
Pearce left, and Lynch appeared out of thin air to punch Dupri in the face. Lynch told Dupri she didn’t stand a chance.
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CM Punk segment
Punk entered, and he made his way to the ring as they went to break. During the break, Punk went to the announce table and saw they had some action figures of Dusty Rhodes, John Cena, Hulk Hogan, and Logan Paul. Punk put down the Paul figurine and had Dusty stand over him.
Punk was pissed off and wasn’t about to wait for a douchebag to interrupt him. Punk was calling him out. Punk was in Boston, and he was dressed for a street fight. He knew Paul was a piece of garbage, but didn’t quite know how big a piece of garbage he was. Punk said Paul wasn’t about to get a title shot, but Punk would still fight him. Paul had his eyes on Punk’s belt, but Punk would put his boot up Paul’s broccoli-headed millennial ass.
Paul sauntered out and remained on the stage. He wondered why Punk was so mad, and Punk told him to stop wasting time. Paul told Punk that he once got punched by the greatest boxer of all time, Floyd Mayweather, but that was nothing compared to getting flattened by Bronson Reed last week. After dropping Seth “deadweight” Rollins, The Vision would crack anyone who didn’t conform to them. Paul didn’t want to get cracked every week.
Paul thought he knew it all, but after getting hit with that Tsunami, his eyes were opened to a whole new vision. Paul Heyman, Reed, and Bron Breakker entered to join Logan.
Heyman led his men to the ring as he called Punk the single most unlikable person in the world. Punk had no friends. His friends didn’t betray him; he betrayed his friendships. Punk was a miserable, rotten bastard, and he couldn’t be more unlikable unless his name was AJ Lee.
Punk said Lee would leave the four of them in a pool of their own piss and blood. She wasn’t there, so Punk would do it instead. He invited them to the ring.
Jey Uso joined Punk in the ring from the crowd (without his music). They were still outnumbered, so Cody Rhodes ran out to his music to even the odds.
The two sides brawled as Punk grabbed Heyman by the shirt. Logan saved Heyman, but Punk chucked him into the barricade. Reed wound up alone in the ring, so the babyfaces took shots at him before tossing him from the ring.
The heels bailed as the babyfaces stood tall in the ring (with the fans loudly singing Rhodes’ name).
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Women’s World Championship match: Stephanie Vaquer (c) (w/ Nikki Bella) vs. Raquel Rodriguez (w/ Roxanne Perez)
WWE Raw and PLE recapper/reviewer. Contributed to WrestlingObserver.com as the SmackDown reviewer in the 2000s before turning to WONF4W in 2015.