25 Greatest WWE Raw Moments Ever
Happy Mondays
Spoiler Alert: No beer bath. No DX army. No simulcast. No pipe bomb.
In case you missed the relentless advertising, Monday Night Raw is 25 years old. And a quarter of a century has thrown up more than enough moments to fill out a collection of favourites without those four.
Who needs 'em yet again anyway? Virtually every company-mandated poll ends with one of them winning by a landslide as it is. Though theres much to be said for Vince McMahon swimming in suds, Triple H working d*ck jokes into military parlance and another reminder that the contract does say 'McMahon', it's nice to pay tribute to some segments and spots that don't get anywhere near the love they already do. 'The Game' has already managed to push the prevailing narrative that his 1998 assault transformed the Monday Night Wars eventually won on that famous March 2001 night, and Stone Cold 'burning that son of a b*tch to the ground' has been well beaten into the exact same surface since 1999. CM Punk literally wore the shirt on the biggest night of his life.
Also absent within will be anything from the 25 Best Matches In Raw History. With over two decades of output ranging from the incomparable to the insane, why overlook a transcendent scene for another tired retread? The WWE Network archives all this stuff, so find your favourite here, then dive back in. There's a million DVDs gathering dust full of shots of trucks, tanks and Shane McMahon's turtleneck.
25. Bubba Ray Dudley Powerbombs Mae Young (13th March, 2000)
The majority of truly great Raw moments are not just fantastic as standalone segments, but superlative checkpoints in wider creative arcs. Bubba Ray Dudley loved putting women through tables and abusing Mae Young, but there's little - if any - requirement to contextualise one of the most insane visuals the company ever created.
It was a moment that could only happen in professional wrestling. Ray soared through the air from the Raw stage, scissored by Mae's legs as she crumpled in a heap through multiple tables.
A septuagenarian suffering a fate a trained stunt performer would balk at, with a post-carnage close-up on the perpetrator's orgasmic reaction. The only thing as barmy was how the incredible scene expedited a babyface turn for '3D' maestros.