For Raw, another week, another great outing for Seth Rollins. This week, he defended his championship against Kevin Owens and these two put on a great match. These two have had past bouts before so they are both very familiar with each other. This was a great match from start to finish and Rollins ended up winning after hitting his curb stomp. It’ll be interesting to see what is next for Rollins as he puts on a show every week to show why Raw is his show.
For Smackdown, we finally got to see the debut of Andrade Almas on Smackdown. He faced a local jobber and beat him within minutes. Almas’ associate, Zelina Vega, then delivered a solid promo about how they are there to take over Smackdown live. Almas does have the talent to be a top superstar for the future of Smackdown, but it will all depend on how WWE decides to use him.
The Bad
For Raw, we had a six women’s tag match that featured the Riott Squad, Natalya, Sasha Banks, and Ember Moon. This match felt like filler because it didn’t progress anything between Sasha Banks and Bayley and Ember Moon is the only one in the women’s money in the bank match and she wasn’t even part of the finish of the match.
For Smackdown, the royal celebration with Carmella fell flat. She tried to get the crowd riled up by making fun of them, but they didn’t respond much. Along with that, Paige interrupted the celebration to announce that Asuka will be facing her at Money in the Bank. While Asuka does deserve to eventually get a championship match, she didn’t really do anything to deserve the match and it feels like WWE just threw her in there. Overall, this whole ordeal didn’t flow properly.
The Final Verdict
Both shows were decent this week. They both helped fill out some of the remaining spots for the money in the bank ladder matches. Along with that, each brand is building up important one on one matches that don’t really have any meaning other than it is personal between those superstars, which always makes for good rivalries. Both shows though, do lack challengers for their brands tag team championships, which is worrying. With that said, I will have to say that Raw had the better show this week. Both shows opened up with brawls, which is always a good way to get the viewers intrigued. But, where Raw had the better show was they had a great intercontinental championship match along with a solid main event. In conclusion, Money in the Bank is starting to look like a solid PPV, but WWE has to do their part in proper buildup.
Mia Yim made her return to WWE during Monday Night RAW following her release from the company back on November 4th, 2021, during a segment between The O.C. and The Judgment Day, by attacking Rhea Ripley.
AJ Styles, Luke Gallows, and Karl Anderson had been looking for some help as they battle with the faction, and Ripley has been a factor in their battles. Now, Yim joins them to help neutralize Ripley.
Yim commented on her return during a backstage interview, and made reference to the former Retribution stable that spelled the end for many promising runs.
“Oh my gosh, it feels so good to be back. It took me a year to try and find myself but now I’m ready. I’m ready to go. I’m ready to kick some ass and get my retribution. But the boys are waiting on me so I’ll see ya later.”
Following the walkout of Sasha Banks and Naomi, who were at the time the WWE Women’s Tag Team Champions, details have been mum on what would go on with the vacated titles, but now there finally are some details to share.
With rumors that both Banks and Naomi will be returning to the company with Vince McMahon now in charge, the Women’s Tag Team titles are now back in the spotlight after going off the radar at the time of Banks’ and Naomi’s departures.
WWE has officially announced a new tournament to crown new Women’s Tag Team Champions that will finally begin on Raw this upcoming Monday.
While it seems to lineup the returns of Banks and Naomi, no official word has surfaced as of yet.
For Raw, the main event between Kofi Kingston and Daniel Bryan in a Wrestlemania rematch was a good way to end their show. With this new “Wildcard Rule” being introduced at the beginning of Raw, this led to two Smackdown superstars main eventing a Raw show. While we will look into the “Wildcard Rule” later, the match between these two was back and forth and ended with Kingston retaining his championship. Kofi has all the momentum going into the Money in the Bank PPV, which is great considering he is the WWE Champion.
For Smackdown, after the Hardy Boyz had to forfeit their tag team championships due to injury, the match to determine the new champions was great. After Shane McMahon originally was going to give the titles to Daniel Bryan and Rowan, the Usos interrupted and stated that they should at least get the opportunity to earn them. Daniel Bryan and Rowan ended up winning, which is a positive sight moving forward because it will bring more attention to the division with these two as champions.
The Bad
For Raw, even though things were good for the Usos on Smackdown, they were really bad on Raw. They came out during the Revival’s match and told them that they put Icey Hot on their ring attire. This led to bad acting and just an attempt at humor, which didn’t go well.
For Smackdown, while the Aleister Black promos have been good so far, they are starting to over welcome their stay. This has been going on for about a month, so hopefully we see him in the ring before he loses all momentum.
The Final Verdict
Both brands had interesting shows this week because this new “Wildcard Rule” was introduced. This “Wildcard Rule” means that four superstars from Raw will be on Smackdown and four Smackdown superstars will be on Raw every week. This idea does seem like a bad one though because it will take time away from superstars in their respective brand. Along with that, this is right after the Superstar Shakeup, which now feels completely pointless. As to who had the better show this week though, Smackdown had better matches and was still able to help put good build towards Money in the Bank. In conclusion, Money in the Bank is still about two weeks away, but proper time has been put into it and all the matches gain momentum in build week by week.
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