The show kicks off with an early BURN IT DOWN.
Seth’s promo have so much charisma right now, Seth claims he has some breaking news and then announces that he is going to face Big E at Day 1. Works the crowd a bit more after this talking about Day 1 being an appropriate name as it will the first day of his championship reign, felt like they should have put a New day comment in here seen as he’s going to be facing Big E.
Finn Balors music hits
He comes down to the ring and attacks Seth, he throws Seth around outside the ring and Finn gets his revenge for last week and hits Seth with the steel steps, he throws Seth back into the ring
The ref speaks to them and they both tell the ref to ring the bell.
Seth Rollins vs Finn Balor
Finn goes for an early Coupe de gras, but Seth rolls out the ring, Finn then follows up with a suicide dive through the ropes, Seth hits a superplex reloads it then hits a falcon arrow, very impressive to watch, Seth goes for the frog splash but Finn gets his knees up and turns it into a cradle roll up.. kick out at 1.
Finn gets up for his signature standing Coupe de gras type thing and pin, kick out then goes for a sling blade, Rollins counters and hits his own sling blade followed up by a schoolboy super kick with another pin and kick out. Seth then lines up for the stomp but Balor counters with his own sling blade and shotgun drop kick. He goes up too for the coupe de gras which Seth moves out the way of, he rolls up Seth for a kick out and then they hit each other and both drop to the mat….. and breathe.
What a match so far.
The ref gets to about 5 as they are both down in the ring,
This is the first time in a long time I’ve seen the ref count for this
Anyway they both get up and have some back and forth hits and hit each other with an enzuigiri each. There is a few reversals and Seth finally hits a stomp after poking Finn in the eye for the 123.
What a fantastic match to start the show off of, Finn and Seth complement each other brilliantly in pretty much every way, their chemistry is great and their similar move sets could be a brilliant storyline for a feud.
I think I’d rather watch this feud than Seth vs Kevin Owens or Big E, but like I have previously said a number of times, Seth doesn’t need to be in title contention to have a good feud.
This was an incredibly good match to start off the show and was a great showcase of both their talent.
Winner: Seth Rollins
Next up we have BIG TIME BECKS
WOAOHHHHH WOAOHHH
We go to break and when we come back we’re watching a Segment backstage with Vince McMahon and Austin Theory, where Vince tells Austin he is going to sit with him to watch the show and says if he ever steals from him again, he’ll kill him…
Back out to the ring where we’ve got a Becky Lynch and Liv Morgan contract signing
Becky starts to hit a promo on Liv asking whether she is going to “not hold back” and show some fire, it’s then announced the Championship is going to be next week on MONDAY NIGHT RAW!
Becky then goes to do her fantastic work to rile up the crowd like she usually does.
Liv tells her to please shut up to a big cheer and then goes on to wind up Becky about crying about Charlotte and has a ready-made video package of Becky’s interview after the Charlotte Flair match.
Liv says that Becky is the reason Becky’s friends are gone and that Becky’s big contract is the reason Livs friends are gone.
Becky goes on to announce
5v5 woman’s match
Team Liv vs Team Becks
Liv needs to improve on her ability to play on the crowd for her promos to go to the next level on that, Becky can play the crowd, Liv doesn’t really have that in her wheelhouse at the moment, but it will come with time.
We’re backstage with RKBro some peak, not too cringy comedy from Riddle.
I still love them, whoever thought of them is genius. Give him a raise or let him have some more creative control
Next up we have
RKBro vs Dirty Dawgs
For the Raw tag team championships
I really don’t like Bobby Roode and I’m not sure why
Dirty Dawgs attack as soon as the bell goes and hit an early tag team attack on riddle. They hit another one soon after and try to take early control of the match, Riddle gets a early hot tag from to Randy who goes for a draping DDT on Dolph but Roode pulls him away. Randy hits Dolph off the commentary table and Randy goes for another move and Dolph counters into a superkick.
There’s some pretty standard ring work until Randy tags in riddle and he hits some nice signature Matt riddle offence on both the Dirty Dawgs and THEN Matt hits some signature Randy Orton offence with a draping DDT on Roode.
Matt and Randy both do the Randy Orton slam the ground for a double RKO but they both get countered and Ziggler hits the Zig zag on Randy, he then goes to “tune up the band” for a superkick, gets countered into a RKO for the 123
AND STILL
A very good match that was given a decent amount of time, Matt Riddle and Randy Orton work so well together, I never would have called that. This was a very entertaining to watch match that had a satisfying finish with NO SHENANIGANS what more do you need.
Winner: RKBro
We go backstage to Seth Rollins who gets intercepted by KO
Kevin Owens tells Seth that if KO beats Big E tonight he gets added to the match at day 1, Seth isn’t happy.
YOU THINK YOU KNOW ME
Edge is back on Monday night Raw
But first we go backstage with Seth confronting Adam pierce about KO being added to the title match at day 1, Adam Pierce denies it to Seth saying Kevin Owens is lying and Seth is happy with that so leaves, Adam asks Sonya can she believe Kevin Owens is lying about this but Sonya thinks it’s a good idea for the match.
Back to Edge for an in ring promo he starts by bigging up Seth saying that he is operating on a different level. He tells no lies.
He then says that there is a bunch of opponents he can “sink his teeth into” AJ styles, KO, Finn Balor, Damien priest, big E, he’s interrupted by music hitting, AWESOME… The Miz is back and he’s brought Maryse with him, cue a video package of him on Dancing with the stars.
He starts by moaning about the fact that Edge got the big return and he didn’t and makes a big deal about his wife returning too. Maryse does a small amount of talking, she didn’t do great, stumbled over her words a lot.
Edge takes the mick out of the Miz finishing 9th and the Miz has a go at the crowd for forgetting to vote for him, edge says that the only reason Miz has come out during Edges promo is to put himself in the picture. Then has some crowd participation on getting them to say Miz sucks
Miz is annoyed that Edge didn’t mention the Miz when listing out opponents he wants to face and asks edge when the last time he held a big championship was…
Edge comes back at edge saying that
“You have people on other shows saying your name for a cheap reaction” and
“You Leave your partner high and dry to get fired”
They square up in the ring and Miz says “NO” denying any potential match tonight.
Edges music plays to close out the segment
Video package of the fire extinguisher incident from last week involving Street Profits and AJ and Omos.
Backstage promo with AJ and Omos and AJ is “blind” Omos leads him off in the right direction as AJ “can’t see”
Street profits are out next, and they want the smoke
Montez is wearing sunglasses mocking AJ and they come down to the ring for a match against the Alpha Academy
Aj and Omos come down to commentary with Omos helping AJ to the table.
The Street Profits vs The Alpha Academy
This was a fairly standard match with nothing out of the ordinary and nothing spectacular until AJ runs to the ring apron to interfere, but Montez fights him away and hits the impressive from the heavens on Chad Gable who is down in the ring for the win.
This wasn’t a bad match in any way, but it seemed a bit shoehorned in, it wasn’t given much time and the pay out that AJ isn’t really blind seems a bit short lived.
Winner: The Street Profits
We’re backstage with Vince and Austin Theory again for another strange segment with nothing of note really happening.
Damien Priest vs Apollo Crews
United States championship match
There isn’t really much to say about this match, a fairly standard match until Azeez pulls Damien priest off the second rope apron side, Commander Azeez gets ejected from ringside and Priest goes crazy and beats on Apollo gets him onto the apron, hits him with a chokeslam pulling him into the ring over the top rope with it, hits the reckoning for the win.
It’s nice that they’re booking Damien Priest strong, he’s a great wrestler and he’s got a great promo in him, but I’m not too sure about this gimmick he’s got currently.
I prefer the calm, confident Damien but that’s just my opinion.
Winner: Damien Priest
We again go backstage with Sonya and Adam talking, to be interrupted by Seth saying that KO is still spouting rumours and lying about being added to the match at Day 1 and Adam says that it is no longer rumours and if KO beats big E tonight he will be added to the match at Day 1, Seth is fuming about this
The Mysterios Vs The Hurt Business
Dominik and Shelton start in the ring with some nice back and forth. We have a decent tag team match that culminates in Cedric being hung up on the second rope and Rey tags in Dom for the double 619
Shelton comes in the ring in an attempt to stop it but also gets hung up on the second rope. We all know what’s coming here!
The 12.2.18 as one of the commentary quite nicely put it. Shelton falls out the ring and Rey hits a seated senton on him outside the ring and Cedric who stayed in the ring gets a frog splash that is preceded by a shoulder wiggle homage to Eddie for the win.
Winner: The Mysterios
A decent match and like always say there is nothing wrong with a tag team hitting both their finishers and getting a clean pin. I was fully expecting an after match brawl or some sort of post-match Shenanigans but I’m glad there wasn’t, it’s not always needed.
Every time I watch Dom I think that he needs to change up his gimmick, I think he should go down the Lying cheating stealing gimmick as according to WWE storylines from way back when he is actually eddies son remember. He currently has the same move set as Rey and in my opinion it just doesn’t suit him.
We know that tall Luchadores can work as I’m sure we’ve all seen the quite incredible Lucha bros in AEW but it just doesn’t seem to suit Dom.
He needs to change it up to go to the next level and not just be Reys son.
After a small video package of the “contract signing” earlier we have
Liv Morgan, Nikki ASH, Rhea Ripley, Bianca Belair and the 24/7 champion Dana Brooke come out to the ring to Livs music for the 10 women tag team match.
10 Woman Tag Team Match
To start in the ring we have Liv and Becky
Liv starts the match strong hitting some nice offence before Becky gets a reversal to hit a move and tag in Carmella, Carmella carries on with the attack on Liv before she starts mocking Rhea Ripley… Liv then tags in Rhea.
Carmella sprints away and tags in Zelina who doesn’t look thrilled to be in the ring with the physically imposing Rhea. She then runs and tags Carmella who tags in Becky who tags in Piper who tags in Tamina (only saw this last Tag after going back and watching again) They all come into the ring and surround Rhea; she starts to fight them all off but gets overwhelmed.
Tamina has control until she goes for a Samoan drop which Rhea gets out of to then go and do the same shtick Becky’s team did and tag their whole team one at a time with Bianca being the last tag, the commentators actually comment on the fact they are in the ring for much longer than 5 seconds.
Bianca goes for the KOD on Tamina, but the rest of Becky’s team hold Taminas legs to stop this from happening.
Becky’s team regroup on the outside of the ring and Liv’s team taunt from the ring
We come back from break with Piper and Nikki ASH in the ring and Piper is in control she tags in Carmella who continues to attack until Nikki tags Rhea back in. Rhea takes out the members of team Becky in the and we have a nice little sequence of members of the teams of each team coming in the ring to take each other out culminating in just Rhea and Carmella in the ring with no one on the apron to tag in, Rhea goes for the riptide, Carmella wiggles out and hits a superkick for a 2 count
We come back from break with Tamina and Dana in the ring, Dana almost instantly tags in Liv Morgan who takes out a couple of team Becky and hits some nice offence on Tamina, Tamina then reverses and takes out the members of team Liv, Liv hits a face breaker for a 2 count and Becky breaks up the pin.
There is some team brawling on ringside with a nice spot of Dana Brooke being thrown off the top rope onto Rhea Nikki and Bianca who are ringside. Liv Morgan takes out Zelina, Carmella and Becky to be hit with a superkick from Tamina who gets a 2 count, she goes for another Samoan drop which Liv reverses and is able to hit her Oblivion facebuster for the 3 count. Becky comes into the ring to attack Liv and we have all 10 women brawling culminating in Liv hitting oblivion on Becky and team Liv celebrating in the ring!
Winner: Team Liv
What a match, I don’t usually like big sided tag team matches unless they are elimination matches. But this one I really enjoyed. It managed to show off most of both teams to some good effect and showed off the quality of the women’s division as a whole, as well as putting some plot points and storytelling in there as well. None of the people in active feuds got pinned which furthers all the feuds happening and we had a satisfying finish. A fantastic match to watch.
And again, we are backstage with Austin Theory and Vince.
Vince keeps Austin to expect the unexpected and nothing else of note happened.
These segments are really odd, I wonder if we’ll get some pay-out from them?
Next up WE ALL WANNA GO BIG, we’re backstage with an interview with Big E reacting to the news about Kevin being potentially added to the match at Day 1
He replies in his usual charismatic quite funny way.
Now THE MAIN EVENT
Big E vs Kevin Owens
With Kevin Owens being added to the title match at Day 1 if he wins
Big E and KO are in the ring, the bell is about to ring
BURN IT DOWN
An unhappy Seth Rollins comes down to commentary
The bell rings and the match starts and Big E is in control for the early part of the match roll up reversal and KO hits some decent offence he’s attacking big Es leg that was injured at Survivor Series there is some back and forth and KO gets thrown out the ring he punches Seth trying to bait him into attacking him so that he wins by DQ, no dice
Big E is back in control and hits an apron splash, he throws the top of the steel steps off and goes to hit a move on KO but he reverses and hits a DDT onto the steel steps, the camera goes onto E who has blood all round his lips we go to break,
Back in the ring and there is some back and forth
Seth creates some gold when he’s on commentary he really does.
KO hits a superplex for a 2 count, big E soon gets a reversal and does his signature triple Belly to belly, he goes for the standing splash but KO gets his knees up, KO then goes for his standing cannonball but Big E gets his knees up big E goes on to his standing splash. Big E goes for the big ending but KO reverses, he then hits his corner cannonball for a 2 count after he gets up and they have some back and forth punches KO hits a superkick, he goes for another corner cannonball but big E reverses with a Uranage for a 2 count, he again goes for the big ending KO reverses into a roll up, big E then goes for what looks like he’s going for a hurricanrana which gets reversed into a pop up powerbomb for another 2 count.
KO attacks Seth Rollins again and comes back in the ring,
He then goes for a stunner which big E pushes him away KO hits another superkick big E comes off the ropes and hits a heavy clothesline on KO, this time Seth has taken the bait and attacks KO he wildly swings at KO on the ground and goes for a stomp but KO rolls out the way, Seth hits a schoolboy superkick and stomp on Big E instead.
Winner: Kevin Owens by DQ
Which means Kevin Owens is added to the match at Day 1
This was a very good show in my opinion. Like I often say there is a time and place for shenanigans and it isn’t in nearly every match, and there wasn’t in this show.
Every match was great to watch and the only one that came close to being sort of pointless was the Street Profits match but even that was okay.
There wasn’t anything in this show that made me audibly sigh like there often is,
The only thing that was a bit strange was the Austin Theory and Vince McMahon segments, but they will be fine if there is a payout to them at some point, is Austin going to become Vince’s golden boy or something? That remains to be seen.
I’m genuinely excited for the feuds that are being built on Raw and hope the storylines have some payout which as we know they quite often don’t.
I would happily watch the matches in this show again.
A solid 8/10 show for me.
There was a couple of mentions in some of the promos of what had been said in AEW and acknowledgements of people released by WWE and it felt like we are getting past this old adage that WWE don’t acknowledge any other promotion or anything that has happened that they aren’t particularly proud of.
This good in a way as there’s nothing wrong with some healthy competition, since AEW has become a viable competitor to WWE it seems like they’ve raised their quality in my opinion.
The only thing that felt a bit off was them “blaming” Becky’s “greedy” contract for people getting released and the Miz “leaving his partner high and dry to get fired”
I suppose it was their way of trying to put some heat on the heels of the show, but when these things were said it was to almost no crowd reaction.
I’m not sure if this is a good or bad thing.
As usual, if you have any thoughts or comments on this find me on Twitter @Sly1495 and use the hashtag #RechargeWrestling
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