WWE will take over the Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, tonight with the latest installment of “WWE Raw.” The episode, which will be the first episode of “Raw” to take place at the venue since August 2019, will have an added Canadian flavor, with two Ontario-born WWE Hall of Famers advertised to be in the house. Edge and Trish Stratus
The element of unpredictability has seemingly returned to WWE programming under the Triple H regime.
Fans who watched last night’s “WWE Raw” are still buzzing about a bizarre backstage segment involving Kevin Owens, Doudrop, Nikki A.S.H. and a car accident in the backdrop.
The aforementioned accident occured just as Owens, in an interview with Kevin Patrick, gloated about injuring Ezekiel and sending him away on a stretcher before their match even started. Just as Owens was being interviewed, a black car in the background drove directly into a structure in the parking lot, prompting a ‘what just happened?’ reaction from Doudrop and Nikki A.S.H. who stood inches away from the site of the crash. This was followed by Doudrop, Nikki A.S.H. and several WWE officials inspecting the crashed car.
Interestingly, WWE camera crews cut back to the interview with Owens as if nothing happened in the background.
A little later, when Alexa Bliss and Asuka were interviewed at the same backstage spot, the crashed car was being loaded onto a tow truck with a bunch of police officers sprinting towards the scene.
WWE’s announcers did not acknowledge the incident at all, which added to the bizarre nature of the segment. Some believe it was done in such a way so as to leave viewers guessing and wondering about the person who caused the accident.
The main event of Raw saw AJ Styles defeat the Miz. After the match ended, a commotion began in the crowd. When the camera panned over to it, fans could see Dexter Lumis being dragged away by security. Commentary, in disbelief, questioned whether they did in fact see Dexter in the crowd.
Following the main event bout between AJ Styles and The Miz on the 8/8 “WWE Raw” episode, cameras cut to cops detaining someone that resembled Lumis.
Immediately after the segment, Indi Hartwell, the former kayfabe wife of Lumis, reacted on Twitter with a thumbs-up emoji. NXT announcer Wade Barrett also seemingly confirmed that the debuting Superstar was Lumis.
The return of Lumis has been widely expected since Triple H was appointed as WWE’s Head of Talent Relations and Head of Creative last month. Earlier on Monday, Fightful Select confirmed that WWE was interested in bringing back Lumis.
Since his WWE release last April, Lumis has kept himself busy on the independent scene under his past ring name Sam Shaw. He also appeared at the NWA’s Alwayz Ready pay-per-view back in June, where he competed in a four-way match for the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship.
Since the start of the Triple H era, the likes of IYO SKY, Karrion Kross, Scarlett and now Dexter Lumis have returned to WWE. Another former NXT Champion Johnny Gargano is rumored to return soon.
WWE has announced that a Women’s Tag Team Title tournament will begin this Monday on Raw to crown new champions.
WWE has officially made a decision regarding the Women’s Tag Team Championships. They are not going away and, in fact, WWE has announced that a tournament to crown new Women’s Tag Team Champions will start next week on Monday Night Raw.
Michael Cole and Pat McAfee first shared the news during Friday’s episode of SmackDown, and WWE official Adam Pearce then confirmed after the show in a WWE exclusive video that the tournament would kick off this Monday night. Pearce said, “I am proud to be the bearer of some breaking news.” He added, “Beginning this Monday, live on Raw and emanating from Cleveland, Ohio, I’m happy to announce a tournament to crown brand new Women’s Tag Team Champions.” He then explained that both the Raw and SmackDown women’s rosters are in the process of putting together teams.
There will be plenty of questions heading into Raw. Who will comprise the teams? Which current stars will work together? Which stars might return? And, on the heels of Dakota Kai and Karrion Kross and Scarlett being brought back by Triple H, who else might be an unexpected entrant? One of the bigger questions will be whether Sasha Banks and Naomi are part of the tournament as rumors are swirling that WWE might have a deal in place to bring both stars back.
If that’s the case, it would explain why the tournament is happening and one has to wonder if Banks and Naomi will be the favorites to win considering the titles were last held by the duo before they relinquished the belts and walked out of Raw. Neither has been seen on WWE programming since.
WWE bringing back the championships is good news for the Women’s Division and one can only hope the tag team belts are pushed under Triple H’s creative direction. He’s been making a number of fan-pleasing decisions of late and if he makes those titles mean something, that will be another plus that the WWE Universe will be thrilled about.
Things are naturally going to start feeling pretty different now Vince McMahon has retired and Triple H is head of creative. In fact, some of those changes have already started to show through, perhaps a little earlier than expected. Monday’s Raw was effectively the first show during which The Game had full creative control since he is sort of able to hit the reset button on everything McMahon put in place following SummerSlam.
It seems a lot of fans were interested to see how a Triple H-led Raw would look. As reported by Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics, this week’s Raw pulled 2.23 million viewers. That’s the highest rating the show has achieved since the start of the pandemic. The last episode that bettered that number was on March 16, 2020. The first show of the pandemic era when fans were keen to see what exactly a Raw in an empty Performance Center looked like.
An impressive 2.433 million viewers were watching when Raw got underway, and that number naturally declined as the three-hour show progressed. Perhaps one of Triple H’s next moves will be to dial Raw back to two hours, although the amount of ad revenue generated by that third hour makes that unlikely, even without McMahon at the helm.
This post-Summerslam episode and the first Raw since Paul Levesque took over creative, is the highest total viewership since March 16, 2020, the first Raw without an audience due to Covid.
The good news keeps on coming for WWE when breaking down who exactly was watching Raw on Monday. Total viewership is all well and good, but that key demographic is 18 to 49-year-olds. 796,000 of those watching Raw fell into that age group, translating to a rating of 0.61. The next best rating for a show on at that time was Better Call Saul with a 0.36. Honestly, that the Breaking Bad spinoff was on at the same time just makes all of the above numbers even more impressive.
Even though some of the changes Triple H and his team have made so far have been plain to see, there still hasn’t been anything too drastic. Most will be subtle and will hopefully improve the quality of WWE’s product and increase the number of people watching on a regular basis over time. This was also the Raw after SummerSlam which is almost always guaranteed to do a good number. Now The Game needs to see if he can keep those new and lapsed fans tuning in every week.
As we noted earlier this weekend, it looked like top WWE star Becky Lynch suffered a shoulder injury during her match against Bianca Belair at SummerSlam this past Saturday. Tonight’s episode of WWE “Raw” confirmed that news shortly after reports emerged online that Lynch’s injury was legitimate. Becky appeared in a sling as she walked down to the ring in all black on tonight’s show, and through evident emotions, she told fans that she had two choices when she realized the injury had occurred: give up or keep fighting on.
That made her realize who she was deep down — not someone that needs constant validation or fancy clothes. Instead, she will focus on grit, determination, and defining what it means to be the man. Lynch promises she is starting a new era with the most impressive comeback in WWE History.
Becky would then invite Bianca Belair to the ring and express her admiration for the EST of WWE before telling her to “hold it down” while she is away. Bianca supported the idea that Becky is “The Man” and explained that she couldn’t pass up the opportunity at SummerSlam to become allies with Lynch. That’s when she was interrupted by a live feed from a backstage camera. Bayley, IYO SKY, and Dakota Kai, seemingly named “Control” as a group based on recent social media posts, were shown attacking an injured Becky in the backstage area as her arm was still in a sling. Bayley had caught her arm in the chair and was on the offense as Bianca Belair retreated from the ring and ran to make the save. IYO, Dakota, and Bayley fleed as soon as Bianca approached, leaving Bianca alone to console a hurt Becky.
As noted, Lynch was leaving the arena at WWE SummerSlam with the medical team while keeping her arm close to her body. Lynch noticeably started favoring her shoulder after taking a Glam Slam from Belair during their WWE “Raw” Women’s Title match.
A report from Fightful said they couldn’t give a timetable on Becky Lynch’s eventual return, and it is a 50/50chance whether or not Lynch would have to have surgery.
Becky Lynch is expected to miss at least several months of in-ring action, WWE announced via a tweet Monday.
Coming out of WWE SummerSlam, the red brand saw returns, debuts, and even a celebrity having his first one-on-one match in company history.
Most notably, Triple H, in his first couple of weeks in charge of creative, clearly sought to shake things up in the women’s division. With the “Raw” Women’s Championship staying around the waist of Bianca Belair for now, her next major challenge became apparent when a returning Bayley made her way down the ramp before stopping, allowing two other wrestlers to join her in shocking fashion — Dakota Kai, who was released back in April from “NXT,” and Iyo Sky, formerly known as Io Shirai, also making her return from injury and having seemingly signed a new contract. The trio entered the ring and faced down Belair, who was unexpectedly backed up by Becky Lynch, whom Belair had just defeated for the championship.
Also on the “Raw” side of SummerSlam, Logan Paul made his singles debut when he took on The Miz, busting out moves that we had not seen the social media influencer perform prior to this match. Miz had Maryse and Ciampa at ringside to start out with, but later into the match, AJ Styles came out to help fight off Ciampa, leaving just Maryse in Miz’s corner. Paul defeated Miz using Miz’s own move, the Skull Crushing Finale.
Bobby Lashley has now beaten Theory in back-to-back PLEs at Money in the Bank and SummerSlam, retaining his United States Championship over Mr. Money in the Bank in fairly quick action. Theory would be seen again in the main event of SummerSlam, attempting to cash in during the main event between Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns, but Lesnar hit Theory with an F-5 before Theory had the chance to cash in, and he left the arena still holding the battered briefcase Reigns used as a weapon to help put Lesnar away.
In the last “Raw” match of the night, the Mysterios went 2-0 over The Judgment Day’s Finn Balor and Damian Priest as the father and son team secured the win off of a returning Edge’s help.
As of early Monday morning, nothing has been promoted for “Raw,” but you can certainly expect fallout from SummerSlam, likely in all four of these storylines.
The biggest party of the summer will have to party on without one of the marque matches.
During today’s episode of “WWE’s The Bump,” Kayla Braxton broke the news that Riddle is currently dealing with a brachial plexus injury. The injury occurred when Seth Rollins brutally attacked him on Monday Night Raw, leading to their WWE SummerSlam match having to be postponed. The injury was described by Braxton as “a really bad stinger that’s resulted in some weakness,” and Riddle is “medically disqualified” until he’s strong enough to return.
The brutal attack by Rollins sent “WWE Raw” off the air Monday night, as Rollins hit Riddle with his patented Stomp on the arena floor and the ring steps. The show closed with Rollins laughing at an injured Riddle, with commentary stating “How will Riddle be ready for Saturday?”
It’s unclear at this time whether or not the Riddle injury is legitimate or part of a storyline, but it’s hard to imagine a star as big as Rollins not having any involvement in SummerSlam this Saturday. This weekend’s event is still set to feature eight matches, headlined by Roman Reigns vs. Brock Lesnar in a Last Man Standing Match for both the WWE and Universal Championships, which Reigns unified by defeating Lesnar at WrestleMania 38. The card will also see both “Raw” and “SmackDown” Women’s Champions defend their belts, and will include Logan Paul’s first match since signing his WWE contract.
BREAKING: @WWERollins injured @SuperKingofBros with a vicious attack on #WWERaw that resulted in a brachial plexus injury (a stinger). Riddle is medically disqualified until full strength returns.
New information has started to trickle out regarding the postponement of the match, not all is as it seems.
According to Fightful Select, Riddle’s injury is in fact not a real injury, but a kayfabe one, written to explain why the match will not be taking place this weekend. Sources told Fightful that there are still plans to do the match down the line, and that the change was made due to “creative adjustments.”
Fightful would go on to reveal that Rollins and Riddle were informed of the change Monday before “Raw,”which saw Rollins attack Riddle at the close of the show. As of now, the tentative plan is for the two to wrestle at WWE’s next Premium Live Event, Clash At The Castle, in September, but those plans aren’t final due to the changes that have occurred in WWE over the past week, with Paul Levesque, fka, Triple H, taking over as new head of creative and EVP of Talent Relations.
Despite this, fans can still expect to see Rollins this weekend, as Fightful noted the former WWE Champion is expected to travel to Nashville for SummerSlam weekend and is still booked for certain media obligations before the event. Fightful had no information regarding whether Riddle would also be traveling to Nashville or would remain home to sell the injury.
Even with Rollins vs. Riddle now off the card, SummerSlam will still feature eight matches, headlined by Roman Reigns defending the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship against Brock Lesnar in a Last Man Standing match. As always, the Premium Live Event will air on the Peacock streaming service.
The company announced Monday morning that Levesque “will assume all responsibilities related to WWE’s creative”. This follows Vince McMahon’s resignation/retirement as the company’s CEO, Chairman, and Head of Creative amid an ongoing company investigation into hush money allegations.
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