5 Ups And 6 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Dec 1st)

Seth Rollins is right: Bring back the Authority. Please. NOW.

Welcome to Raw Is Painful, where everything gets thrown at the wall and nothing sticks. OK, that€™s a little harsh, and tonight€™s Raw had a few things going for it. But while the negatives weren€™t fatal flaws, there still were a good number of head-scratching moments Monday night. Coming out of Survivor Series, WWE entered a period where the company seemingly treads water until ramping up for the road to WrestleMania, which officially begins at Royal Rumble. For fans, that generally means a period of lackluster, lazy booking as the writers try to maintain some semblance of momentum without actually going anywhere. (The taped Raws at the end of the year don€™t help matters.) It also doesn€™t help that the Tables, Ladders & Chairs PPV is three weeks after Survivor Series. That then compresses everything down to a fallout from Survivor Series Raw, a setup Raw and a go-home Raw. Monday€™s setup Raw did just that, and the booking for the most part is logical in the wake of Survivor Series. But there are some things that just didn€™t make sense or left fans frustrated. So what went right? What went off the tracks?
Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fortunately became a fan in time for WrestleMania III and came back as a fan after a long high school hiatus before WM XIV. Monday nights in the Carlson household are reserved for viewing Raw -- for better or worse.