WWE Monday Night Raw
March 11th, 2013
Raw is live tonight from the Bankers Life Fieldhouse in in Indianapolis, Indiana. WWE.com is advertising appearances from the Undertaker, Triple H and Brock Lesnar as well as the usual roster. WWE Champion Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson will not be present on the show in a live capacity. Chris Jericho is also expected to make his return to Raw this week, after a short stretch with his rock band Fozzy in Australia.
Raw starts out with the arena in darkness, as Justin Roberts asks everyone to stand for a tribute to the late, great and legendary Paul Bearer. This is the same video tribute WWE ran on YouTube last week when the news first broke. As the video ends, the iconic gong hits and the Undertaker makes way to the ring – the blue arena effects looks really cool in the Fieldhouse. When the Deadman reaches the ring, he motions as if to raise the house lights, but instead Paul Bearer's iconic urn is shown in the middle of the ring. Undertaker gets down on one knee and pays his respect to his long-time friend and manager until –
CM Punk's music hits. The Undertaker looks extremely pissed off as CM Punk makes his way to the stage with a microphone. As the crowd boos him, Punk says the people are misunderstanding him, because he just wanted to come out and extend his apologies and condolences to the Undertaker. But not for the loss of Paul Bearer, but for the loss of the streak at WrestleMania. Punk talks about how 'Taker will always be perfect in the eyes of Paul Bearer, but the rest of the world will get to witness 20-1 in just a few weeks time. There is no response from the Deadman – just a deathly stare down as the segment ends.
A member of The Shield will be competing in singles action for the first time ever, next!
The WWE Active application shows that during the commercial break, CM Punk continued to soak up the heat from the live crowd, until Kane came out attempted to chokeslam him off the stage. Punk escaped and ran to the back as Kane followed, destroying the locker room trying to find the former WWE Champion.