7 Ups And 6 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Jan 23)

Fans get more part-timers than they bargained for, and it was awesome.

Brock Lesnar Goldberg Taker
WWE.com

Go big or go home. Why can’t it be both simultaneously?

WWE was very clearly “going home” Monday night, giving us a hard sell for the Royal Rumble on Sunday. We got Goldberg as advertised, complete with a busted-open skull from head-butting the locker room door. But while that was cool and all, we got two other surprises that brought down the house, lending to the surprise element of the Rumble itself.

With Goldberg, Brock Lesnar and Undertaker all announced, unless there is a free agent or independent performer who hasn’t gotten a chance in WWE yet, then any big surprises would likely come from NXT. Either way, the possibility of who could enter the Rumble each year makes for great, wild speculation.

We saw that Roman Reigns should be OK in a truly 1-on-1 situation with Kevin Owens on Sunday. We saw the cruiserweights matches dominated by Alicia Fox and sped through in a matter of moments. We saw more people announce for the Rumble in a futile effort to win a WWE championship match at WrestleMania (there are likely only 2-4 possible winners, and none are named Xavier Woods).

With that said, let’s find out what drew #30 and what pulled #1 and doesn’t have a prayer. Let’s get to it…

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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.