Posted in: Fox, Sports, TV, USA Network, WWE | Tagged: bleeding cool, cable, fox, iiconics, living riott, NXT, payback, pro wrestling, Raw, recaps, riott squad, Smackdown, streaming, television, tv, usa, wrestling, wwe

WWE Payback Results: Kickoff Show – Iiconics vs. Riott Squad

Welcome to Bleeding Cool's live coverage of WWE Payback. I'm Jude Terror, and maybe I'll be the only one doing this tonight and maybe not. Who knows. Anything can happen in the Bleeding Cool Payback report! Actually, it all depends on whether Jeremy or Chelsy feel like recapping this nonsense with me. Captain Morgans and Dr. Pepper is the drink of the night for me. With a PPV just a week after SummerSlam, I have a feeling I'm gonna need a lot of it.

WWE Payback Report Part 1 – Kickoff Show

Kayla Braxton welcomes us to the WWE Payback Kickoff Show. Jerry "The King" Lawler, Booker T, JBL, and Peter Rosenberg are on the panel. They give a shout out to Renee Young.

The audio is a tiny bit out of sync and it's very distracting. Kayla shills for the WWE Network and Clash of Champions later this month, and then the panel runs through the card for tonight. One of those matches, The Iiconics vs. The Riott Squad, will happen on the kickoff show itself.

We see a video package for Braun Strowman vs. The Fiend vs. Roman Reigns. Kayla promises us Roman Reigns is on his way to the Thunderdome. Then she asks the panel about Roman's new alliance with Paul Heyman. Peter Rosenberg says this has been one of the moments fans are waiting for, something truly surprising. Be careful, Rosenberg. JBL berates Rosenberg and says Heyman is a terrible person but the greatest manager ever. Roman teaming with him makes sense. Booker agrees. He makes a football reference I immediately tune out of. King says he's seen a lot of shocking things since 1993 in WWE. Roman returning was one of the biggest, but joining with Heyman may have been the biggest ever. Really? Ever?! King agrees that Heyman's a great manager. Rosenberg compares it to being eight years old and seeing Bobby Heenan with Andre the Giant. JBL is like,

Booker thinks Reigns is here to claim the championship and show dominance as the top guy. JBL says this takes away the mid games of Bray Wyatt for Reigns to have Heyman in his corner. The King points out he's been choked out by The Fiend before and until you feel those fingers down your throat, don't count The Fiend out.

Kayla talks about Keith Lee debuting and Randy Orton punt kicking Drew McIntyre on Raw last Monday. We see the video footage. Booker says Lee wants to fry the biggest fish int he lake and Randy Orton is the biggest fish. Rosenberg says Lee might be a rookie on Raw, but he's a grown-ass man. Booker T points out he stole that from him on a podcast earlier. Rosenberg says picking on the biggest guy is what you do in jail. Everyone laughs at him for acting like he knows what jail is like.

We see a video package for Sasha Banks and Bayley vs. Shayna Baszler and Nia Jax. Booker T compares the team of Nia and Shayna to himself and Goldust. The panel talks about the friction between Sasha and Bayley.

Next, Kayla plays us some recaps of the Hurt Business vs. Apollo Crews feud. Kayla wonders whether Apollo has what it takes to win tonight. JBL talks about the numbers disadvantage. King starts talking, but R-Truth shows up. He apologizes for being late to Raw Talk. Kayla explains this is the Payback Kickoff show. Truth has trouble accepting this, but the whole panel insists. Truth says he must have been looking at his 2019 calendar by accident. He admits they're right. They suggest he can hang around and wait until Raw Talk and then he'll be early.

They invite him to talk about Apollo Crews. Truth says he loves Apollo. Talking about Bobby Lashley, Truth says Lashley put him in Nelson from the Simpsons.  This confuses JBL and Truth and Booker T has to explain the gimmick and that Truth means a full nelson. Truth says it hurts. Apollo needs to watch his back, front, side, and all ends tonight. JBL doesn't understand a word Truth is saying. Truth leaves. Kayla says he has a couple of screws loose. The Payback Kickoff show takes a commercial break.

Then we see yet another recap of The Miz denying the existence of white privilege on Talking Smack. Rosenberg starts to put over Big E, but Booker says Big E needs to leave the past in the past. JBL points out that Booker T was famous for the spineroonie. He says he doesn't care if Big E wears a onesie, he's gonna be a future world champ. Booker looks to King for some backup. King makes fun of JBL for siding with Rosenberg. Basically, Booker wants Big E to be more serious. It's funny to think, the job Rosenberg has (nerd who gets made fun of) is basically the job Ryan Satin wants so badly.

We see a video for Seth Rollins and Murphy vs. Rey Mysterio and Dominik Mysterio. JBL is all like, let's slow down on all this Dominik Mysterio praise. He brings up David Sammartino again and threatens to block Rosenberg on Twitter for the tenth time tonight.

Kayla changes the subject to Matt Riddle and Baron Corbin. Booker T puts over Corbin. He thinks Corbin rules like a King should. Lawler disagrees with the way Corbin has been ruling. Both seem to think Corbin will win tonight.

Kayla throws it to the Raw commentary team (Tom Phillips, Byron Saxton, and Samoa Joe) for the only match on the Kickoff Show tonight. The Riott Squad comes to the ring first. Then The Iiconics. The Iiconics mock them on the way to the ring. They say Ruby Riott will eventually scew over Liv Morgan. They're gonna expose Ruby for the fraud she is and that will make Payback Iiconic. I think you gotta make it to the main show before you can alter the nature of the PPV itself, ladies.

The Iiconics vs. The Riott Squad

• The loser of this match has to give up an extraneous letter in their team name.
• Liv and Ruby are wearing matching leather plaid and pleather outfits. Nothing says "punk" like matching outfits.
• Ruby beats the crap out of Peyton Royce. She considers tagging in Liv but changes her mind. Liv looks confused.
• Peyton tags in Billie Kay and then gets Ruby to chase her around the ring, where Kay kicks her in the face.
• Ruby plays face in peril for a while.
• The Iiconics do a good job or preventing her from tagging out.
• Liv Morgan gets knocked down and Billie Kay tries to convince her Ruby hit her on purpose. Liv believes it and starts to walk away.
• Ruby makes a comeback, but no one is in her corner.
• Liv changes her mind, runs up the stairs, and tags in.
• Liv has the hot tag and beats up some Iiconics.
• She falls off the second rope in some kind of high-flying attempt but Peyton Royce sells it anyway.
• Liv tags in Morgan, but Royce kicks both their asses.
• Kay tag sin and Iiconics hit DejaVu on Ruby, but Liv breaks up the pin.
• Liv drags Ruby to the corner and tags herself in.
• Liv tags Ruby back in and they hit a combo move on Billie Kay to get the win.

There was some decent storytelling in that match and only one bad botch. I like that this storyline has been the opposite of a breakup storyline, with the team starting dividing and the story about them putting their friendship back together and building trust in each other. You don't see that too often.

We get a commercial for WWE on Hulu. Then the Riott Squad is at the Kickoff Panel. Ruby is feeling lots of emotions. Liv thought Ruby hit her, but Ruby says the Iiconics have been trying to pull them apart all that time. Liv apologizes. Ruby says this is the beginning for them. Liv gives us a new team name for a new era: Living Riott. Eh… it'll grow on me. I liked Riott Squad because it's the name of a Cock Sparrer Song.

The panel gives us another rundown of the Payback card tonight. Now we get a video package about Randy Orton, Drew McIntyre, and Keith Lee. Rumor has it an new theme song will debut for Lee tonight and the crappy generic metal one we heard on Raw was only temporary. God, I hope so.

JBL is a fan of Keith Lee, but Randy Orton is a great white shark. Booker T says it's a shucky ducky quack quack moment. Booker has advice for Lee: DTA – don't trust anybody. Booker says Lee could break the cloak of invisibility. King tells us that McIntyre experienced a hairline fracture of his jaw from the punt. JBL says Orton has no conscience. Rosenberg says it's the high-pressure situation of Randy Orton's life. He lost at SummerSlam and now he's up against someone like Keith Lee. He's right – this is another one of those situations where someone is gonna look bad with a clean finish.

Kayla Braxton tells us to hurry up and subscribe to the WWE Network to watch payback. Joke's on her – I'm watching this on the WWE Network.

Hey, guess what! I'm not alone tonight. Chelsy is here to recap with me, so she'll be taking over for the start of WWE Payback and its first match. Check back soon! I'm gonna see how drunk I can get before the second match.

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!