Raw - February 28, 2011 - Buffalo, NY

With 34 days left until WrestleMania XXVII, Raw started off with Triple H sharing his thoughts about his career & The Undertaker. When he was done, King Sheamus, who some thought ended The Game's career, came out to confront him, but before he had a chance to do anything, HHH kicked him downstairs. From there, it was an all-out assault on Sheamus and Triple H finished him off with the pedigree on the announce table.




As Sheamus was being helped up by officials, the Raw GM announced that he still had a match to compete in against the returning Evan Bourne. Once the bell rang, Bourne took full advantage of Sheamus' weakened state & finished him off with the shooting star press a.k.a. Air Bourne.




Michael Cole came down the isle and asked for Jerry "The King" Lawler to get in the ring with him so that he could answer his challenge face-to-face. Cole stated that the Raw GM's exact ruling was that The King could not "strike" Cole or else he would be fired. To accept Lawler's WrestleMania challenge, Cole wanted his trainer to be at ringside & a hand picked special guest referee. After The King accepted the terms, Cole announced that his trainer would be Jack Swagger. With Swagger in the ring, Cole punked out Lawler to the point The King couldn't take it anymore. Just then, Swagger performed the ankle lock on Lawler as Michael Cole laughed in his face.




Randy Orton entered the ring, defying the warnings of CM Punk and the new Nexus. As Nexus showed up & started walking towards the Viper, the Raw GM announced that Orton would face each member of Nexus in one-on-one matches within the next few weeks & whoever could beat Orton would get to be at CM Punk's corner at WrestleMania. With no other Nexus member allowed at ringside, Michael McGillicutty was the first to try & take down Orton. Suprisingly, McGillicutty held his own, but a sudden RKO ended his hopes to be at WrestleMania. After the match, Orton wanted to insure that he gets Punk one-on-one so bad in 5 weeks, that he kicked McGillicutty in the skull before running into the crowd before the rest of Nexus could get to him.




WWE Champion The Miz, along with Alex Riley, came out and stated that he was getting tired of being overlooked by John Cena & The Rock. As The Miz continued to demand respect, John Cena appeared and wanted his WrestleMania title match against The Miz to be 1-on-1, which meant that he wanted The Miz to get rid of Riley. Just then, the Raw GM announced that Cena & Riley would face off inside a steel cage & if Cena wins, Riley would be gone from The Miz's side.




With the Divas Champion Eve sitting at the announce table, a battle royal took place to determine a new #1 contender for her title. The last two ended up being Gail Kim & Nikki Bella and as referees were trying to get Maryse away from ringside after being eliminated earlier, the Bellas used Twin Magic to throw Gail Kim out of the ring. After Brie won the battle royal in controversal fashion, Eve had enough of their antics & attempted to do something about it, but the Bellas were strength in numbers.




Live via satellite, WrestleMania XXVII host The Rock addressed the comments made by John Cena and made their verbal battle a little bit more personal.




As United States Champion Daniel Bryan came down to compete in a match, The Miz ran down & assaulted him. Afterwards, The Miz simply stated that the reason he attacked Bryan was because he could. With that, the steel cage came down for the main event.




The main event was on as John Cena wrestled Aley Riley in a steel cage, where you must escape to win the match. And of course, The Miz did all he could to prevent Cena from leaving. During the match, The Miz decided to have a little fun and take a picture of Cena's face that was pushed up against the cage by Alex Riley. Towards the end, The Miz tried to keep the door closed, but Cena was too strong & litteraly fell out of the cage to earn a victory. But Cena would not have long to celebrate as The Miz immediately got up & executed the skull crusing finale on him before making his way to the back.



Next week, Raw will be live from Dallas, TX and Stone Cold Steve Austin is scheduled to make an appearance!