8 Ups And 5 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Nov 12)

The battle for Brand Supremacy leads to surprisingly strong show.

becky lynch
WWE.com

Pop quiz: Who was the biggest star on Raw Monday night?

If you don’t know right away, you absolutely have to watch the last 15 minutes of the show. Let’s just say that WWE has a huge star on its hands if they want to actually make one, or they can do what they usually do: stick their fingers in their ears and follow the blueprint drawn up a while ago.

Raw’s go-home episode for Survivor Series actually was a pretty solid show, but it still is leading to a show that is all about vagueries like “brand supremacy,” “momentum” and “bragging rights.” And while that can work at times and actually is a great motivating factor in at least one of the matches, it’s such a flimsy concept for an entire PPV with nothing else on the line.

We saw several superstars step up, with Ruby Riott delivering a decent promo, Ronda Rousey firing up, Braun Strowman standing up to Stephanie McMahon, Elias looking strong in defeat, and Drew McIntyre and Dean Ambrose jockeying for position as the top heel.

We also saw stupidity in the ring and behind the commentary desk and a decimation of an entire Raw division – and no, not what happened in the main event.

With that said, let’s find out what dominated and what meekly crawled away. 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.