As announced last week, RAW (and SmackDown) will have an exciting tournament happening over the next few weeks. That’s right, let the King of the Ring begin! And as if that returning tournament wasn’t enough, we had a long awaited return of Sasha Banks as well. It should be a plenty busy three hours of wrestling and sports entertainment on RAW, so let’s crack open this Nutshell and get right into it!
Best Match of the night:
Flip a coin here, but I have two choices.
Personally, I was really into Joe and Cesaro. Solid, hard hitting match, even if Cesaro likely had no chance.
Then we had our main event tag title match, which was entertaining in it’s own right.
Worst match of the night:
The 24/7 segment between Elias and R-Truth was so bad. Like, most previous installments of the 24/7 Championship segments have been great, or at least good and enjoyable. Tonight’s was really not good. I don’t know if it’s because Elias actually kicked out and retained the title or what…but it was not entertaining.
Star of the Night
If only by default, Seth Rollins and Braun Strowman. Why? Because they are your new RAW Tag Team Champions.
Spot of the Night:
Not much to choose from, but the RKO out of what normally would have been a Shatter Machine was pretty nifty.
Jobber of the Night:
In a non-traditional use of jobber, how about Xavier Woods? He took the worst of the Revival/Orton offense, so I think he deserves this.
Upset of the Night:
I knew Strowman would be getting a push, but didn’t expect that his push would include RAW tag team gold. Mildly surprised to see Strowman and Rollins defeat Gallows and Anderson to become new tag champs
Holy Sh** Moment of the Night:
I’d have to go with the attack, by The Fiend, on Jerry “The King” Lawler. Here’s the thing though…sure, he beat Finn Balor, and while Balor is taking some time off, it wasn’t really like WWE had Wyatt destroy Balor. Instead, most of the brutality from The Fiend has happened at the hands of who? Retired, washed up guys who offer no resistance.
At some point, you need to get him into a program with someone better, no? Or at least have him lay out some bigger names, or more active wrestlers? I mean, I think putting down No Way Jose is more impressive than Lawler.
Botch of the night:
Not sure if it was a botch, or just a really terrible looking spot…but Sonya DeVille hit Alexa Bliss with a kick, and Bliss sold it weirdly. Like, a delayed stumble to the mat and then rolled in an odd fashion out of the ring.
From another perspective…WWE has a backup announcer ready to go, waiting in the wings, suited up and all? This is kind of up there with the camera in the car before a certain Superstar was being put through it’s window, or having “no idea” who was behind the hit and run of Reigns, yet somehow WWE has that car’s dashcam footage. We get it, this is scripted and all…but it’s just odd. I mean, Vic works 205 Live…which is Tuesdays. Not much of a reason for him to be standing by on RAW, is there?
Noteworthy Moment:
Samoa Joe and Cedric Alexander are the first two Superstars who advance to round 2 of the King of the Ring tournament. I like those two moving forward thus far.
Rey was basically announcing his retirement, only to be talked out of it by his son. Sounds like a father-son tag team match will happen at some point, which will likely serve as a passing of the torch.
Banks didn’t say much, but she didn’t have to.
Overall lowlights:
I wouldn’t say we had lowlights, but I will say this show was good, but not as great as last week’s. Considering how strong last week was, however, that’s a hard show to top…so I’ll give it a pass
Overall highlights:
A strong start to the King of the Ring was the best part of the night tonight. The tag title change was an unexpected surprise to boot. It will be interesting to see where that program goes, for sure.
After the final bell:
Sasha had a strong heel follow up, without saying a whole lot.
I like how Joe and Cedric looked in their opening matches.
How long will Rollins and Strowman hold onto the gold? That will be interesting to watch.
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