by It was a solid Monday Night Raw of in ring action, however as per usual had a few questionable booking decisions. Let’s get right to it.
Sasha Banks opening the night on the microphone was a good way to get things off the ground. However, her beef with Nattie makes little to no sense and she should have come back to feud with Bayley. Maybe they will build to that as I do like her sudden mean streak.
The problem with this is that her match later on that night was so predictable. Did anyone in their right mind really think a healthy Red Hot Banks would lose to broken down Natatyla?
Almost pointless to even have that match unless you’re going to have Becky Lynch interject herself. By the way, where the heck was she tonight?
The Street Profits need to go back to NXT and stay there. This is getting worse every week. They are not funny, they are not tough, it’s just plain dumb! The crowd needs to start booing, however their pure silence actually speaks volumes too.
The match with Ricochet and Drew McIntyre was excellent! Very interesting to me that they would have two of the favorites battle it out in the first round as that could have easily been the final. Both guys deserve a push moving forward.
Baron Corbin and The Miz also had a great match. Both guys looked sharp and Baron Corbin is really starting to look like a possible dark horse to win this thing. Corbin has come a long way since Mania 34 and it appears will finally live up to the early hype behind him coming out of NXT.
Bayley and Nikki Cross having such a good match for no title, just shows how deep the division is right now. However, I’ve always said that it does no good to have a non-champion lose a non-title match.
Nikki Cross losing tonight, hurts her dramatically moving forward, and at the same time why was one half of the Tag Champions even in that match.
Can Braun Strowman finally win a singles title?
The Tag Team Turmoil was great with smart booking in certain area’s and questionable in others. It was smart to have The OC and The Viking Raiders both get counted out. No one looks weak, and neither team had to take a pin.
However, as much as I like the thought of Dolph Zigler and Robert Roode teaming up, it damages established teams. I say this simply because WWE creative spent months and even years trying to build all those other teams just to have them lose to single wrestlers thrown together that were floundering?
Roode and Ziggler have been whipping boys as of late and now we’re supposed to believe they suddenly have a chance to defeat the top two faces on RAW? Speaking of tag teams, is Rey Mysterio tagging with his son or not?
Another POINTLESS match was having Cedric Alexander defeat Cesaro. The whole premise was that Cesaro may injure Alexander so he can take his place?
That is an awful message to send in a business built on protecting your opponent. That was just plain dumb and no one in their right mind would believe that Alexander would lose. Didn’t I already type that once tonight?
Great ending with Braun Strowman getting screwed out of the United States Championship from AJ Styles. Keeps both guys looking strong, builds Styles even further as a heel and also builds towards the Strowman heel turn soon enough. Only a matter of time before he gets frustrated and turns on Seth Rollins.
