The 08/01/16 edition of WWE Monday Night Raw reviewed in about 4 minutes – including the latest ex-WWE star returning to the company, Smackdown’s Randy Orton crashing Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman’s promo segment, and Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens starts the bromance.
SASHA BANKS STATEMENT
After their show-stealing match last week, the women opened Raw. In a great little exchange, Charlotte called Sasha Banks a ‘one night stand’ champion. The Boss replied with, “honey, you’re the daughter of Ric Flair. If it wasn’t for a one night stand, you wouldn’t be here.” Pretend I’m dropping a mic right now.
Chris Jericho came out to defend Charlotte, so Enzo Amore (without Big Cass) came down to support Sasha/hit on Sasha. I was ready to hate this, but the whole segment was pretty darn entertaining. Try and guess what it all led to?
CHARLOTTE & JERICHO BEAT BANKS & ENZO
Inter-gender tag team match, playas! Dana Brooke interfered and Charlotte got the pin for the finish. Jericho continued to beat down Enzo, but Big Cass ran down for the save.
The whole bit was made increasingly great by three reasons:
1) Kevin Owens was on commentary. More on that in a bit.
2) Owens said the actual line: “Sasha Banks with a nice move that I used to use back in 2005 on the independents”.
And 3) At the end, the referee forgot who the women’s champion was and tried to give the belt to Charlotte.
Jericho is presumably entering a feud with Enzo and Cass, so he needs a partner, and Kevin Owens stepped up. I’m looking forward to Kevico more than any match at Summerslam now. Or should that be Y2Owens. KO2J. JeriKO?
Here’s the other stuff that happened!
BRAUN STROWMAN BEAT EVAN ANDERHOLM (JOBBER)
Strowman’s latest victim explained he gets $1,000 just for getting in the ring with Braun, and $5,000 if he wins. Which he didn’t. Strowman killed him.
SHINING STARS BEAT GOLDEN TRUTH
The Shining Stars didn’t even get an entrance, but they won with a new type of distraction finish: R-Truth playing Pokemon Go. It’s super effective.
FINN BALOR INTERVIEW
“HE’S IRISH?! I mean, I knew he was Irish, but I didn’t know his voice was Irish!” is probably what a large portion of the audience thought when Balor first spoke here. Seth Rollins quickly took over the interview from Michael Cole and showed just how incredible he is on the mic. Balor…apart from the ‘arse handed to you’ line…not so much.
RUSEV BEAT MARK HENRY
After a neat bit of emotional investment – Mark Henry trying for one last Hall of Pain run – Rusev cut a promo on Russian athletes being cheated out of the Olympics, and then something strange happened. Roman Reigns confronted him to mostly cheers from the crowd.
From the Universal Title to US title. That’s a hell of a step down in terms of geographical scope, but for Roman, it’s the best thing to get him over.
TITUS O’NEIL BEAT DARREN YOUNG
A few months ago, nobody would care about a Titus vs Darren Young match. Now, though, it’s hard not to get engrossed. Former tag team partners trying to prove their worth against each other. Even though Titus got the better of most of the match, he had to win by dastardly hooking the tights.
NIA JAX BEAT ARIEL MUNROE (JOBBER)
Nia Jax destroyed local competitor Ariel Munroe. She likes to do her knuckle crunching pose enough where it becomes awkward.
NEW DAY BEAT GALANDERSON
Big E got a ridiculously quick surprise roll up win on Karl Anderson. Of all the good booking that’s been happening in WWE recently, Galanderson have had none of it. Karl and Luke beat the New Day down afterwards, giving Big E a kayfabe injury.
CESARO BEAT SHEAMUS
Cesaro and Sheamus are both very unhappy about how they’ve been positioned in the draft, so Foley made a match between them with the winner getting a title shot. Cesaro had a very impressive delayed suplex spot here.
THREE’S A CROWD
Heath Slater turned up as the hottest free agent in professional wrestling – and he’s brought a friend: Jinder Mahal. Foley made a match between them with the winner getting a Raw contract, and Jinder sold out his bandmate quicker than you can say ‘Drew Galloway’.
SETH ROLLINS BEAT SAMI ZAYN
Rollins and Zayn had a really tight, competitive match. They managed the tricky feat of giving Zayn a lot of offence, but still made Rollins look very strong. He is the man challenging the Universe, after all. And now, the main event…
To see what Oli thought of Randy Orton turning up and attacking Brock Lesnar, and this episode ofRaw as a whole, watch the video above!
