I was Stratusfied with Raw

When Raw started with two straight talking segments, I was skeptical.

Raw in Toronto was good on Monday.

From the welcome presence of Trish Stratus (and she wrestled — and continued her long-distance rivalry with Beth Phoenix) to the re-insertion of Batista back into the WWE Universe, the company really loaded up tonight's show to counteract the premiere of Monday Night Football on ESPN.

• The tease of Batista's retirement, leading to his punking out of Randy Orton and subsequent match on the same show, plus his move to SmackDown, was handled well. For one, it got people to stay tuned to Raw if they wanted to see the Batista-Orton street fight. Second, it got people to tune in to SmackDown this week to see Batista. With Jeff, Rey, etc. all gone, it made sense to move Big Dave — although that probably does stagnate the Raw main events to Orton, Triple H and Cena. Perhaps they can let Shawn Michaels, or perhaps someone unconventional like MVP or Ted DiBiase in there.

• Trish Stratus returned with a completely new look from the last time the "WWE Universe" would have seen her. It wasn't necessarily a bad thing either. She is now a brunette and for lack of better terms, she no longer has any torso enhancements. Trish is one of those rare talents that was able to walk away from the business before it's too late — to the point where the appearances that she does do — are a lot of fun. Remember, she's only 33, folks.

I need to mention that I loved that she continued her feud with Chris Jericho (that's continuity from 5 1/2 years ago) and her rivalry with Beth Phoenix (continued from the last time she was on Raw — in December 2008, teaming with John Cena against Santino Marella and Beth Phoenix).

• The opening match on Raw was a return match from the feature match from last week's Superstars — US champion Kofi Kingston & Primo Colon vs. Jack Swagger & The Miz. The match on Superstars was more fun because they gave it more time. There wasn't really anything wrong with this one, per se — just the length. Swagger pinned Kingston, so I guess that puts him in the US title mix for whenever. Miz also stole the US belt, or at least left ringside with it. By the way, I didn't mention it on my Breaking Point post, but The Miz speaking French in his introduction last night was awesome. Je suis The Miz et je suis awesome!!! They should have chalked it up to him hanging out with Maryse a lot.

• The first thought I had when seeing that Mickie James was coming out for commentary was, must be a No. 1 contenders match. OK.

My second thought when Lilian Garcia said "it was a triple threat match for the No. 1 Contenders Divas Championship" was "Huh??? What did she just say?" Of course, it was one-on-one — Gail Kim vs. Alicia Fox. I figured they would job Gail in her hometown. They did. At least Lilian didn't call her Alicia Keys this week!

Then, I wanted to know why Beth Phoenix wasn't in the match. I got my answer in the next segment. I like when a show all fits together.

The match was good. Alicia won. The match went about as well as a sub-three minute match can.

• WWE has done a really nice job the last few weeks of building Cody Rhodes and Ted DiBiase as separate entities from Randy Orton. Cody Rhodes coming out and mocking Triple H's "Are you ready?" was a nice touch. The guys cut a really nice promo that really put over the magnitude of their tapping out of DX. The Michaels-DiBiase match was going pretty well (I wish Shawn would have come out to Sexy Boy though — minor detail) until the teams brawled wildly into the crowd again. They did let Legacy fight back quite a bit though, so it wasn't like it was total annihilation. This will lead to DX and Legacy facing each other in Hell in a Cell (is it Hell in *A* Cell or Hell in *the* Cell?) in Newark on Oct. 4.

• Evan Bourne and Hornswoggle defeated Chavo Guerrero and Carlito when the little guy pinned Guerrero. I guess that's better than Hornswoggle facing Chavo one on one. For what it was, the match wasn't even that bad. After the match, Chavo conceded defeat to Hornswoggle. Somewhere, a twinkle came to RD Reynolds' eye as he envisioned writing their entry on the WrestleCrap web site in the near future.

• A nice promo by Cena, selling the severity of the beating Orton gave him at Breaking Point and vowing a new more vicious Cena at Hell in a Cell. Sounds good.

• I was glad that Trish's choice of partner was MVP and not the obvious choice in John Cena. Of course, the first part of the match did not last long as Big Show and Mark Henry involved themselves, so it was made "a six-person," as Trish said. It was a fun match. Henry looked like he legitimately got hurt with a flying tackle he tried on the floor on Show. In the end, Trish hit the Stratusfaction on Beth for the pin. I really hope Beth wins the belt at some point between now and WrestleMania, so they can get Trish to come back to do the singles match with Beth. I think that could be really good. Also, along with Molly Holly, they are probably my favorite women's wrestlers, so I'd be all for it.

• Next week's guest host in Little Rock, Arkansas will be Cedric the Entertainer. I know very little about him. At least I've heard of him, unlike what I knew of Jeremy Piven going into his guest host stint.

• Batista beat Orton in the No Holds Barred match. When Orton tried to leave, he was stopped by John Cena and his music, had an awesome moment of indecision and ultimately got spine-bustered (is that the past tense of spinebuster?) and Batista-bombed for the win for Big Dave.

I thought it was a pretty cool show tonight.