WWE Raw Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. WWE Raw is the Monday night professional wrestlingtelevision program for WWE. WWE Raw is usually seen as WWEs flagship program over its sister programs, WWE Smack. Down, WWE NXT and WWE Main Event, due to its longer history and the way it is promoted. Starting as WWF Monday Night Raw, the program first started on January 1. USA Network for one hour. The original Raw broke new ground in televised professional wrestling. Traditionally, wrestling shows were taped on sound stages with small viewers or at big arena shows. The Raw formula was very different than that of its predecessor, Prime Time Wrestling. Instead of taped matches, with studio voice overs and taped chat, Raw was a show shot to a live viewers, with angles as they happened. The first episode had Yokozuna winning against Koko B. Randal Keith Randy Orton born April 1, 1980 is an American professional wrestler and actor best known to sports entertainment audiences for his. Daily coverage of the pro wrestling industry. Download our free mobile app on iOS Android for the latest wrestling news. CCtXNaTiw/Vw_ONHhRqRI/AAAAAAAAAxo/dd_Q2GN98w8ozUegb5iRwhpaMqs0bxTcwCLcB/s1600/1.jpg' alt='Wwe Raw Total Edition 2015 Download' title='Wwe Raw Total Edition 2015 Download' />Ware, The Steiner Brothers winning against The Executioners, WWF Intercontinental Champion. Shawn Michaels winning against Max Moon and The Undertaker winning against Damien Demento. The show also featured an interview with Razor Ramon. Raw came from the Grand Ballroom at Manhattan Center Studios, a small New York City theater and played live each week. The combination of an intimate venue and live action proved highly successful. However, the weekly live schedule proved to be a financial drain on the WWF, and taped shows began airing every other week. From early 1. 99. September. 19. 99, Raw was shown live on one Monday and then the next day Tuesday next Mondays Raw was taped. This meant that Raw was live one week and taped the next. The storylines and characters during the early years of Raw still had a healthy dose of the old Federation gimmick heavy style. For example, there were moments such as Irwin R. Schyster tearing up Tatankas headdress, the different Undertaker sightings during the Undertaker vs. Undertaker storyline, leading up to Summer. Slam 1. 99. 4 and characters like Duke The Dumpster Droese, Doink the Clown, or Thurman Sparky Plugg. Raw was also one of a kind, in which they covered the unexpected, exciting moments, a prelude to the Attitude Era, in which it coined Raw as Uncut, Uncensored, Uncooked. Some of those moments are Razor Ramon losing a match unexpectedly to Sean The 1 2 3 Kid Waltman, who was later known as X Pac, Marty Jannetty beating Shawn Michaels to win the WWF Intercontinental Championship, and Raw was the first WWF television program of any kind to show footage of Lex Luger bodyslamming Yokozuna at the USS Intrepid. The first hosts of Raw were Vince Mc. Mahon, Rob Bartlett and Macho Man Randy Savage. Sean Mooney conducted the interviews and Bobby The Brain Heenan also helped contribute. In March 1. 99. 3, Rob Bartlett was dropped from the broadcasting team and was replaced by Bobby Heenan. Then on December 6, 1. Gorilla Monsoon kicked Bobby Heenan out of the WWF forever. In reality, this was a storyline between Monsoon and his close friend Heenan, who decided to leave the World Wrestling Federation in order to lighten his travel schedule and because he did not want to take a 5. After about a year, Raw moved out of the Manhattan Center and traveled to various regular Federation venues in the United States. In 1. World Championship Wrestling WCW began showing its new wrestling show, Monday Nitro, live each week on TNT. Raw and Nitro went head to head for the first time on September 1. Due to Raws taping schedule on several occasions, WCW Vice President Eric Bischoff, who was also an on air personality, would often give away the results of WWFs taped Raw shows on the live WCW show. Some fans also looked at Raw taping results on the steadily growing Internet as a result, this caused the ratings of the taped Raw episodes to be lower. WWF Raw had a live broadcast every other week to save costs, until September 1. At the start of the ratings war in 1. Raw and Nitro exchanged victories over each over in a closely contested rivalry. Beginning in mid 1. Wo angle, Monday Nitro started a ratings win streak that lasted for eighty three continuous weeks, ending on April 1. On February 3, 1. Monday Night Raw went to a two hour format, as the Attitude Era was starting to come in full stream in the WWF. In an attempt to break the momentum of what had turned into ratings domination by WCWs competing Monday Nitro, Extreme Championship Wrestling ECW was brought in as Jerry Lawler challenged ECW on February 1. In an episode where Raw returned to the Manhattan Center, the challenge answered on the following weeks show with Taz, Mikey Whipwreck, Sabu, Tommy Dreamer, D Von Dudley, and the Sandman. ECW owner Paul Heyman did a call in interview on Raw the week after that. During 1. 99. 7, there were more and more controversial elements in Raw and WWF programming such as the Nation of Domination, and the D Generation X racial graffiti storyline designed to implicate Bret Harts the Hart Foundation, and the XXX Files series. On March 1. 0, 1. Monday Night Raw officially became Raw is War. The March 1. 7, 1. Bret HartVince Mc. Mahon ringside altercation that unknowingly foreshadowed events in November with profanity normally unheard on TV. Brian Pillman did a series of XXX Files segments with Terri Runnels, which further pushed the envelope. These segments ended prematurely with the September 2. Raw, after the death of Pillman on October 5, 1. After Wrestle. Mania XIV in March 1. WWF regained the lead in the Monday Night Wars with its new WWF Attitude brand, led in particular by rising stars Steve Austin, The Rock and Mankind. The classic feud between the villainous WWF Chairman Vince Mc. Mahon who was re imagined and re branded from the color commentator into the evil company chairman character Mr. Mc. Mahon after the real life Montreal Screwjob incident and fan favorite Steve Austin who had been released by Bischoff in the summer of 1. The April 1. 3, 1. Raw, headlined by a match between Austin and Mc. Mahon, marked the first time that WCW had lost the head to head Monday night ratings battle in the 8. Frozen Throne Free Download Installer more. While Raw was taking a new approach to programming, Nitro would start making lackluster shows with the same storylines. Older stars such as Hogan and Nash frequented the main events, while younger talent such as Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero were not given opportunities to advance, and the only newcomer elevated to main event status at this time was Bill Goldberg. Meanwhile, on Raw, fans were immersed in the feud between WWF owner Vince Mc. Mahon and Stone Cold Steve Austin. New talent such as Triple H and his D Generation Xfaction, Mankind and The Rock were elevated to main event status on the WWFs program. Superstars such as Kane, Val Venis, Goldust, etc. WWF as the place where new talent comes through unlike the WCW counterpart. Things were so heated between the two programs that, when both shows were in the same area on the same night Raw in Hampton, Virginia, Nitro in Norfolk, D X was sent to film a war segment at the Norfolk Scope where they berated WCW and interviewed fans on camera who stated that they received their Nitro tickets for free presumably in an attempt by WCW to pack the arena as full as possible due to low ticket sales. On January 4, 1. 99. Mick Foley, who had wrestled for WCW in the early 1. Cactus Jack, won the WWF Title as Mankind on Raw.