SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
Opening Segment – HIT: Penta was a good choice to win Money in the Bank. He has so much momentum right now and is getting huge babyface star reactions. He was good in starting off Raw celebrating his MITB victory. You gotta love his Dinero en el Banco briefcase with pyro. His performance was good. Je’Von Evans coming out to congratulate him made sense. As much as I hated the entire ambulance angle from the PLE, at least Evans was selling the injuries here. Bron Breakker spearing Evans was a good way to follow up on their interactions in MITB, while setting up a good feud between him and Penta moving forward.
Mysterio vs. Cass – MISS: I am not a fan of Big Cass, so personally I don’t care about him constantly losing. But, I don’t understand from a business standpoint why you bring him back after all these years, only to job him out to a bunch of smaller wrestlers. I thought they were setting up Cass to get himself disqualified for continuing to beat on Rey Mysterio in the corner while ignoring the referee’s counts and warnings. I think that would have been better for him. Instead, he lost after interference from Dragon Lee. I’m not a fan of having babyfaces cheat to win like that. So, this really didn’t work at all.
Green vs. Perez – HIT: I love Chelsea Green as a character and performer. She always seems to understand the assignment. She was good in confronting Liv Morgan to hype their Crown Jewel match (which I couldn’t care less about – but that’s about the gimmick, not the wrestlers). But, Green isn’t great in the ring. Roxanne Perez is great in the ring. She helped cary Green to a good match here, but Chelsea put in the work and was good too. Having Green lose after multiple points of interference from Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez worked well enough. She presumably will now defend her title against Perez on an upcoming Smackdown. What they do with that match will be interesting.
Femi – Heyman – HIT: Oba Femi continues to be a huge star on the rise. He gets great babyface reactions from the fans. His match against Bronson Reed at the PLE was very good. We didn’t get anything from The Vision about that match, but we did get Paul Heyman coming out to talk to Femi, presumably to pitch working together. I love how Femi just shot Heyman down without even listening to the pitch. The line about how others like Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns were Paul Heyman guys, but he is an Oba Femi guy was great. I’m very curious to see where they go from here.
ARTICLE CONTINUED BELOW…
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Gable vs. Fenix – HIT: This was a very good Intercontinental Championship match with Chad Gable getting a hard-fought victory in a successful defense against Rey Fenix. I wish there hadn’t been two commercial breaks in the match, but we still saw about 13 minutes of great wrestling action between these two. Fenix came very close to getting the win, and loses nothing despite taking the loss. The aftermath finally sets up Ethan Page to get his IC Title match soon.
Vaquer – Lynch – MISS: A match between Stephanie Vaquer and Becky Lynch should be great. If they actually established one or the other as a heel, and had a strong babyface vs. heel dynamic, it would be very good. Even a face vs. face match between them could be great if they were presented as strong positive characters. Instead, they keep showing them as petulant children when they deal with each other. I was very disappointed when Morgan won the Women’s Championship. It was a major yawn moment for me. This booking isn’t working for me either.
The 946 vs. The Usos & Sikoa – HIT: The build for the main event was strong. It was good to see that Solo Sikoa hasn’t rejoined the Bloodline. He made it clear that he won’t follow The Usos, and won’t acknowledge Reigns as his Tribal Chief. The brief encounter between him and LA Knight in the back was strong, and I’m curious to see where Knight goes from here. The match/brawl between these two teams lived up to the hype. It was well done as a brawl to start, settling into a solid six-man tag, before breaking down into very long, physical, and memorable brawl to end the show. Jaida Parker was good in her role. They all did well. This culminated with Carmelo Hayes being introduced as a new member of 946, even though he’s not from anywhere close to a 946 zip code. He also doesn’t jump out to me as someone who would fit in with the style/personality of the rest of the group. But, I am a big fan of his and he has been languishing on Smackdown. So, I am hopeful that he will be a nice addition to the faction. But, it can’t just be because he’s an angry black guy. There has to be more to it than that.
(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)
