Too many tainted finishes, and an especially egregious trope that made everyone look stupid, but good Jey-Punk segment and Knight-Breakker match – WWE RAW HITS & MISSES (10/27)

Opening Segment – HIT: Raw got off to a good start with the verbal encounter between Jey Uso and C.M. Punk ahead of their match at Saturday’s Night Main Event to crown a new World Champion. Both Jey and Punk performed well. The fans were into both as babyfaces, but seemed a little more behind Punk. It will be interesting to see how the crowd reacts to them on Saturday when they are actually wrestling. This was a good way to hype their big match while also advancing the story between Jey and his brother Jimmy.

Penta vs. Rusev – MISS: The action in this no. 1 contendership match between Penta and Rusev for the Intercontinental Championship was good. The issue is the incredibly predictable and boring way the end of the match was booked. After we saw Dominik Mysterio make a call about having a problem, it was clear that this match would end in a no contest with interference from El Grande Americano. It is so stupid to think that a heel champion would still expect a no contest in a no. 1 contendership match to mean that they won’t have to defend their title. It always turns into a Triple Threat match. It is beyond tired. It is lazy. The announcers also look stupid for talking about how smart it was of Dominik to get the match thrown out.

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Breakker vs. Knight – HIT: WWE did a nice job of setting up this match with both L.A. Knight and Bron Breakker talking about wanting to face the new World Champion, whoever it ends up being. Paul Heyman wanted to calm Breakker down so he set up this match as a way of putting Breakker ahead of Knight in line. It makes sense that Breakker would be more likely to get a World Title match if he defeated Knight. That is what ended up happening in a very good match. There was a little distraction from Bronson Reed, which did take away from the quality of the match, but not enough to ruin it. Otherwise, it was fun to watch with the right winner.

Sheamus vs. McDonaugh – MISS: As I talked about last week, there were stories that either developed or started in the main event battle royal. One of those stories was the new feud between Sheamus and Judgement Day. While Finn Balor & J.D. McDonaugh wanted a rematch against A.J. Styles & Dragon Lee (aka A.J. Lee) for the tag titles, Adam Pearce informed them that one of them would have to face Sheamus instead. That led to this match between Sheamus and McDonaugh.

It had very good wrestling, but followed the pattern of having outside interference in all the matches to that point on Raw. There was interference in the first match causing the no contest. Raquel Rodriguez served as a distraction for Nikki Bella in her match against Roxanne Perez (a solid but not quite Hit-worthy match). In the third match, Reed distracted Knight at the end allowing Breakker to hit the big spear for the win. And in this match, Balor interfered multiple times in ways that called into question the visual acuity of the referee. Without the interference, this match was easily a Hit. If it had been the only match with interference instead of the fourth in a row, it probably would have been a Hit. WWE has to do something about this booking philosophy. I am sure that Sheamus will get involved in the tag team title match next week.

Main Event – HIT: This was a very good World Tag Team Title match with Charlotte Flair & Alexa Bliss successfully defending their titles against Bayley & Lyra Valkyria. I enjoy the way both Bayley and Valkyria play their roles with the unhinged almost bipolar Bayley, and the very uneasy Valkyria slowly buying into their team.

Nothing happened in this match to advance that story one way or another, but that’s okay. That allowed the wrestlers to just put on a good match focusing on the wrestling action. It was also nice to see a clean win for the first time on this show. It would have been very easy for WWE to have the Kabuki Warriors interfere, so it was good that they held off their appearance until after the match when they attacked both teams. Of course, they will ultimately get a World Tag Title match and, once again, I have a strong feeling that that match won’t end clean as Bayley & Valkyria are likely to get involved.

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.