By Lee Stevens, PWTorch specialist

Thank you for joining me as go "Under The Microscope" for Raw. This is not a complete recap of the show. This is a closer look at what was heard, what was seen or what was missing from the broadcast.

The stars at night are big and bright

We will be getting a decidedly Texas feel to the WWE during the next few weeks as we gear up for WrestleMania 25. Obviously, the Hall of Fame class has a Lone Star State influence with Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Funks, Bill Watts, and The Von Erichs, even if their induction wasn't announced on TV.

The opening match continued that trend as we had Shawn Michaels, who calls San Antonio his home, teaming up with The Undertaker. Although The Dead Man is appropriately billed from Death Valley, he was born in Houston and lives in Austin. The Texas twosome tussled with JBL, who lives in New York, but was born in Sweetwater, Texas. His partner was Vladimir Kozlov, who was born and raised in The Ukraine, but in the interest of continuing our Texas trend, their is a Moscow, Texas and I trust that The Moscow Mauler remembers the Alamo.

Sambo

Michael Cole reminded us that Kozlov is trained in Sambo. If you were only slightly paying attention, you may have thought you switched over to a music channel. Samba is a type of Latin music, but as some of the more astute observers already know, Sambo is a Russian martial arts form. Sambo has several different styles, with Self-Defense, Sport and Combat and it was actually a demonstration sport in the 1980 Summer Olympics. One of the more interesting people to practice Sambo is former Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

Research

The WWE is hoping that you'll add the WWE Encyclopedia to reside alongside your World Book and Brittanica selections. The front cover provides a glimpse at the usual suspects, including what appears to be recent photos of John Cena, Edge, and Triple H, but older views of The Undertaker and Shawn Michaels. The Rock and Stone Cold also made the front of the book. I was pleasantly surprised to see Freddy Blassie on the cover in recognition of the importance managers used to play in the WWF/E. Ted DiBiase was a bit of a surprise as was Jake Roberts. I believe Roddy Piper was the last person pictured on the outside of the book, but if you've seen the book in person, please correct me if I'm wrong.

The most notable exclusions are Hulk Hogan and Bruno Sammartino for the reasons we've mentioned several times in the past. It appears that the WWE was more comprehensive inside the pages, including The Hulkster, Bruno, Randy Savage, The Ultimate Warrior, and Chris Benoit who have all shared their moments of exclusion for a variety of reasons.

Fire the decorator

While Edge and Vickie Guerrero argued about the recent romantic revelations, I couldn't take my eyes off of the wall behind them.

"The person I blame for all this is John Cena"--Edge
"I want you to take Cena apart."--Vickie

Even while they were talking about the revenge they would extract from Cena, on the wall behind them was a promotional poster for "12 Rounds," the latest movie from John Cena. "I hate this man with every fiber of my being, but if you're near the mall, please check out his movie, opening March 27!"

Priorities

For the record, the order of Randy Orton's complaints about Triple H's home invasion and attack.

(1) Scared the TV crew
(2) Terrorized the neighborhood
(3) Traumatized my wife

I'm certainly not the perfect husband, but if someone broke into my house and threatened my family with a large weapon and I was recapping the reasons I wanted to get revenge against that intruder, I'm not sure if my wife would enjoy me caring for the guy pulling cables before her. Granted, Lou has been good to my family.

Slight of hand

Triple H has now successfully hidden a sledgehammer behind his back and surprised Legacy with a steel cage. Before the match at WrestleMania 25, I would ask the referee to check to see if he has an Elimination Chamber hidden in his trunks.

If you thought Orton and DiBiase Jr. had plenty of time to sneak in and save Cody Rhodes from getting trapped in the cage, you were probably right. I counted 44 seconds elapsing from the time Triple H waved for the cage to be lowered to the time he actually slid under the ropes. Obviously the sledgehammer helped ward off the potential attackers at first, but I hope someone has since informed them that there are four sides to the ring and all of them are open for business.

Lex, you've changed

I hope you caught Michael Cole referring to Chris Jericho as the "narcissist." Obviously, the classic definition fits as Jericho clearly does think about himself quite often. The wrestling definition doesn't quite match. Between shifts as "The Total Package," Lex Luger worked as "The Narcissist," a man who loved himself so much that he actually brought a full-length mirror to the ring with him. Chris Jericho may be a narcissist, but to me there will always be just one THE Narcissist.

Spell check

Our look back at WrestleMania XV was an English Teacher's nightmare. Just in the first few seconds of the footage, we witnessed (Microscope note: this section corrected by my 12th grade English teacher Mrs. Hawkins) "Boys to Men," "Ex-Pack," and "Road Dog." Boyz II Men sang "America The Beautiful," X-Pac fought Shane McMahon, and The Road Dogg defeated Val Venis, Ken Shamrock, and Goldust.

If you saw Goldust's walk to the ring, you probably recognized The Blue Meanie, who was in his corner for his match. You also saw a woman walking with both of them. Please score ten bonus points if you identified her as Ryan Shamrock, just in time for our St. Patrick's Day holiday.

We also had a brief glimpse of another WM tradition with Pete Rose getting a tombstone piledriver from Kane. If you looked carefully, you saw that the referee in the ring with them was none other than current ECW General Manger Teddy Long.

Another "Where's Waldo?" moment came when we saw Vince McMahon reacting to The Rock vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin match. Just behind him was a brief shot of Ata Maivia Johnson, The Rock's mother, who was later with him during the Hall of Fame induction of Rocky Johnson and High Chief Peter Maivia in 2008.

I did feel bad for someone out of the WrestleMania XV flashback and it wasn't someone in the ring. After Stone Cold won his match, they showed a wide shot of the crowd, including one fan holding a sign which said "KC is Fat." It was probably bad enough ten years ago, but I can only imagine that after several years, KC finally worked through it and finally reached the point where someone could make the assumption that at least they would never have to see that sign again...oh crap.

Sorry KC.

Lee Stevens goes "Under The Microscope" for Raw and Smackdown. You can comment below or e-mail him at GLStevens.Torch@gmail.com

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