The Judgment Day start the show, Sami Zayn VS JD McDonagh
The Judgment Day made their way down to the ring to start this week’s Monday Night Raw, but Finn Balor was nowhere to be seen. Damian Priest wasn’t particularly happy about this before JD McDonagh made his way down to the ring with a message from The Prince. JD told The JD that they should worry about other things than him, but Rhea Ripley wasn’t at all interested in listening to what The Irish Ace had to say. Dominik Mysterio then had a great line about “being the Champion of this dump” before Sami Zayn arrived to start a brawl with Mr. McDonagh. No one in The Judgment Day was interested in getting involved. This was a typical totally fine start to Monday Night Raw.
Grade: C+
When we came back from the ad break, we were told that Adam Pearce had made a match between Sami Zayn and JD McDonagh official. Anyone who’s read my NXT Review’s over the past year will know that I’ve been super impressed by JD McDonagh, and it was really cool to see him get an opportunity against one of the biggest stars in the entire company. It was even cooler to see McDonagh hold his own against Zayn and overall, I thought this match was good fun. Some of the moves were pretty cool, Sami being the ultimate underdog Babyface by taking out Finn Balor whilst fighting JD, and in the end, Zayn picked up the victory after nailing The Irish Ace with the Helluva Kick. Whilst it was disappointing to see McDonagh lose, this was one of those (rare) times where the former Cruiserweight Champion actually still came out of this better than before despite suffering a loss.
Grade: B-
Chad Gable VS Giovanni Vinci, Gunther VS Otis, Drew McIntyre and Matt Riddle VS The Viking Raiders
Chelsea Green refused to hand-over the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championships to Adam Pearce and said she was going to hold auditions to find her new tag team partner. Green calling it “Chelsea’s Got Talent” was quite good, but her search didn’t last long as after Katana Chance and Kayden Carter walked in and called their shot, they literally got bulldozed by Piper Niven who just took one of the tag titles from Chelsea and now they’re a team. I would’ve personally liked to have seen “Chelsea’s Got Talent”, but I’m also glad that Piper Niven’s on the show, and now she’s a Champion which is quite amazing. After a video package for Imperium, Cody Rhodes cut a promo about how everyone in The Judgment Day is a Champion except Finn Balor. Gunther was then cutting a promo on the announce table because that’s his thing before the Alpha Academy arrived and said some stuff. Ludwig Kaiser was once again trying to flirt with Maxxine Dupri (which again didn’t work) before Chad Gable went one-on-one with Giovanni Vinci. I thought Gable and Vinci had a decent match, even though they weren’t helped by the fact that it didn’t go particularly long. Both guys are elegant performers who are masters at their craft, but in the end, it was Master Gable who picked up the win after hitting the Chaos Theory. Gunther was not at all happy with this so he challenged Otis to a match and I had a good time with this. Otise was annoying Gunther with all his silly dances, but he was also portrayed as a massive threat which is great. The Ring General is obviously one of the best in the world (Top 3 in WWE in my opinion) and I actually thought they told a good story as well. Otis tried the Caterpillar at one point, but got booted in the face by the Intercontinental Champion which was pretty funny before Gunther picked up the victory by hitting Otis with a Powerbomb! I thought that was amazing and Chad Gable’s suplex to the Champ afterwards was also pretty cool. Overall, all of this was a thumbs-up from me.
Grade: C+ for Gable-Vinci, B- for Gunther-Otis
The Judgment Day were having a chat backstage before JD McDonagh walked in and I swear this guy just follows them. Finn Balor said he’d talk to JD later before The Judgment Day agreed to get back their “killer instincts” and that starts with Cody Rhodes in tonight’s main event. Drew McIntyre was about to answer a question from Jackie Redmond before Matt Riddle walked in and asked The Scottish Warrior if he’d be his tag team partner for his match with The Viking Raiders. Riddle said their tag team name could be “The EdinBros” or “The GlasBros” and I particularly like that one. Drew, on the other hand, seemed unsure but also didn’t rule it out. We then got a video package for Indi Hartwell which is always cool before Drew McIntyre did arrive to be Matt Riddle’s tag team partner to face The Viking Raiders. This was a normal tag team match, there wasn’t really a lot that stood out which is both a good and a bad thing (depending on how you look at it). I actually think the tag team of McIntyre and Riddle works well, as long as the endgame is to have The Scottish Warrior destroy The Original Bro and turn Heel in the process. It is worth mentioning that it’s become a little bit silly when it comes to just how far The Viking Raiders have fallen, but that doesn’t look like stopping anytime soon as they suffered another L at the hands of a Drew McIntyre Claymore.
Grade: C+
Rhea Ripley VS Indi Hartwell, Shinsuke Nakamura explains his actions, Becky Lynch VS Trish Stratus
Raquel Rodriguez didn’t seem particularly happy that she’s still not medically cleared to compete, but Candice LeRae told her that her time will come. Drew McIntyre and Matt Riddle then ran into The New Day backstage and Kofi Kingston was not impressed with them believing that they deserved a run at the tag titles. Whilst the main point of this was to set up a match for next week, Kofi mentioning that Drew was the one who injured him has me intrigued. The Women’s World Champion Rhea Ripley made her way down to the ring as she was about to face Indi Hartwell (who was making her main roster singles debut). This match didn’t really go that long and not a lot happened if I’m being honest, the most noteworthy moment came when Rhea just attacked Candice because she can. Ripley then dropped Indi Wrestling with the Riptide to pick up the easy victory. LeRae and Hartwell then double-teamed Ripley after the match before they narrowly escaped. Whilst this was a “it just happened” match, it was cool to see Indi back wrestling properly after her injury at NXT Spring Breakin’ (one tag team match that went 40 seconds doesn’t count).
Grade: C+
Shinsuke Nakamura made his way down to the ring in a fully black suit (I wonder if Bobby Lashley gave him that one) as Michael Cole tried to get an answer from The King of Strong Style as to why he attacked Seth “Freakin” Rollins last week. Shin said it was because he wants the World Heavyweight Championship before Seth Rollins arrived because he wasn’t buying it. Seth thought that Nakamura was hiding something because he would’ve always given The Artist a shot at the title if he just asked. Rollins then granted Nakamura a match for his World Heavyweight Championship before the two shook hands and Shinsuke whispered something in Seth’s ear which clearly bothered The Visionary. Rollins then turned around and got met with another Kinshasa from Nakamura. I liked this quite a bit, this was the first time in a long time that Shinsuke Nakamura felt like a Main Event player, and the (not-so) crazy thing is he always should’ve been. Whilst many people view Payback as a “B-PLE”, Rollins-Nakamura is anything but.
Grade: B
The Miz wasn’t impressed with Bryon Saxton fanboying over LA Knight and rightly said that “beating Top Dolla doesn’t make you a top star”. Miz then said he might show up on SmackDown soon and that he’ll face someone way better than LA Knight next week. It was then time for the big match between Becky Lynch and Trish Stratus to finally take place. I didn’t think this was particularly good, it felt quite sloppy in places and the story that was being told wasn’t that good either. There were a couple of good moves from both women, but on the whole, it didn’t feel as good as what it could’ve and should’ve been. What was even worse was the match ended in a double count-out because this feud will never end and we then saw the two brawl through the crowd and by the merchandise stand before Zoey Stark arrived and helped the Hall of Famer lay out The Man. Why we couldn’t have just ended the feud with Becky winning I’ll never know, and the only reason why this match doesn’t get a lower grade is because Trish Stratus pretending to put on a Seth “Freakin” Rollins shirt whilst at the merchandise stand was actually quite funny.
Grade: C-
Cody Rhodes VS Finn Balor
Gunther was not at all impressed with Ludwig Kaiser and Giovanni Vinci and told them that he’s going to make everything right by retaining his Intercontinental Championship against Chad Gable next week. Adam Pearce was then furious with Trish Stratus and Zoey Stark and told them that Trish’s third match with Becky Lynch will be inside a Steel Cage. I’ve just realised that if Becky wins, they’ll be tied at 1-1 meaning they’ll have to have a fourth match which nobody wants! It was then time for the main event of the evening as Cody Rhodes went one-on-one with Finn Balor. It was a pretty even contest early on, but it changed a bit when the Women’s World Champion Rhea Ripley and the NXT North American Champion Dominik Mysterio arrived. Damian Priest also arrived and the closing moments saw Finn Balor try to use a chair against Cody. What I liked about this is Balor kept pointing to Dominik as it was Mysterio who threw the chair in the ring before Priest threw his MITB Briefcase through the legs of Finn which allowed The American Nightmare to nail The Prince and Senor Money in the Bank in the head with the briefcase before Cody hit Cross Rhodes to get the victory. After the match, The Judgment Day started to attack Cody before Sami Zayn made the save. However, he was thwarted by none other than Judgment Day McDonagh before the dominant faction beat the crap out of the two Babyfaces, including Priest sending Zayn crashing through the announce table with a Razor’s Edge. All of this was solid, I thought the match was decent, and I liked the post-match stuff, particularly JD McDonagh’s involvement.
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