SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
Opening Segment – HIT: Raw got off to a good start. WWE started the show with a nice video package of the major moments from Saturday Night’s Main Event, including the return of Bronson Reed, joining with Seth Rollins’ faction. That led well into this in ring segment with the group coming out to officially introduce Reed and talk about their future. The only part that didn’t work was the stupid “you sold out” chants to Seth Rollins which made no sense. He did a nice job of turning that idiotic chant around. Despite my criticism of the crowd for that chant, they were passionately booing the group and taunting Rollins with various hate-filled chants, which was good to hear. It wasn’t the longest segment. It didn’t overstay its welcome. It served mostly as a strong visual showing Rollins, Reed, Bron Breakker, and Paul Heyman together.
Penta vs. Gable vs. Lee – HIT: There was a scary moment in this match when Penta accidentally dropped Chad Gable on his head/face while trying to do something overly ambitious in a combo move against Gable and Dragon Lee. Thankfully, Gable was ok and able to finish the match. He luckily avoided a disaster. Otherwise, this match was good. It was particularly fun to watch after the commercial break when it was clear Gable was ok. This worked well to continue to introduce El Hijo del Vikingo to the WWE audience in advance of his match against Gable at Worlds Collide. He ended up costing Gable the win after Gable attacked him while sitting in the front row. The final sequence of the match with Vikingo attacking Gable, Lee getting knocked out of the ring by a Mexican Destoryer, and Penta hitting the Penta Driver on Gable for the win was very strong.
Set Up For Sheamus vs. Rusev – HIT: The squash of Akira Tozawa by Rusev was fine for what it was. The post-match beating leading to the save from Sheamus has me intrigued to see Sheamus vs. Rusev. There should be more meat on the bone of that feud that Sheamus messing with A-Town Down Under the last few weeks which has been fun, but frivolous.
Netflix Comedians – MISS: I don’t need to see these types of celebrities interviewed on the show, and interacting in lame ways with wrestlers like the War Raiders. WWE did a poor job of hyping the Tag Title match, and this was a wasted bit of time which could have actually been used to make the Tag Title match seem important with a video about the three teams, or an interview with one of them at the very least.
New Day vs. War Raiders vs. Creed Brothers – HIT: This would have been better with some type of hype before hand, but the three teams worked hard and put on a good match. It was an interesting heel vs. heel vs. babyface dynamic as The New Day constantly worked with The Creed Brothers to try to dominate the War Raiders. These are three talented teams and their skills were on display here. It isn’t surprising that New Day would take advantage of the naiveté of the Creeds to get the win over them in the end. That fit in with their characters and the story they’ve been telling of building up the Creeds to avoid the Raiders. My only real issue with the match itself is that I’m not a fan of these types of triple threat tag matches where there’s only two wrestlers in the ring at one time who can tag out to any other person. It is lame.
ARTICLE CONTINUED BELOW…
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Uso – Gunther – MISS: This wasn’t a bad segment at all, but it felt redundant. Nothing was really advanced. They had a chance to make sure that everyone remembered that Gunther will get the next World Title match against Jey Uso, and the mic work from both Gunther and Jey was fine here. It just felt more like filler. We saw so many scenes between them during the overly long build to their WrestleMania match, and we recently got a better version of this encounter. So, it feels a little old.
Morgan vs. Sane – MISS: This is a minor Miss largely for the sloppiness that happened at the end of match. Most of it was fine, and it played into the storyline of Roxanne Perez trying to join Judgment Day. But, WWE refuses to have a clean ending. Kairi Sane needed the win after losing her return match last week, but Liv Morgan can’t lose when she’s a Tag Team Champion and is returning from a recent hiatus. So, you have shenanigans involved with Perez and Raquel Rodriguez both trying but failing to help Morgan win. While it did play into that story, it was still a crap finish which followed some very sloppy wrestling to bring the match down.
Rollins vs. Zayn vs. Balor – HIT: Sometimes I’m more forgiving about interference, shenanigans, and non-finishes than others. That was the the case with the main event triple threat where Seth Rollins won to qualify for Money in the Bank, beating Sami Zayn and Finn Balor with the help from Reed and Breakker, as well as the accidental help of Dominik Mysterio. Jey Uso was also involved in trying to neutralize Rollins’ crew. It played into the continuing tension between Balor and Mysterio, as well as the ongoing major storylines of Rollins vs. Zayn and Rollins vs. Uso. The match itself had plenty of good wrestling action throughout. I assumed that Rollins would win, so the outcome was a bit predictable. I would have rather seen more of a clean finish. You can always have the run-ins and shenanigans after the match. CM Punk’s attack after the match worked well.
(Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com’s WWE Raw Hits & Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw each week. Email him at jmezz_torch@yahoo.com. Follow him on BlueSky @jonmezzera.bsky.social.)
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