5 Ups & 8 Downs From WWE Raw After WrestleMania (April 4)
Cody gets passionate, Reigns punts, Elias repackaged, stips mean nothing, Veer comes!
Sorry, just had to check the calendar… this was the Raw after WrestleMania 38, right?
Because it sure as hell didn’t feel like it. Yeah, the crowd was molten and there was a lot of packed activity on the show, but where were the surprise debuts/ returns? Where were the new feuds? Where was the excitement?
When your main event interview segment is literally your new, unified world champion telling everyone to turn into SmackDown on Friday to hear anything of consequence, that’s when you know you’re getting hosed.
Yes, Cody Rhodes’ impassioned promo was mint. And Bron Breakker winning back the NXT Championship was a cool moment for him. But this really was a lame episode of Raw by post-Mania standards. Veer Mahaan came after building up for six months, but the only other notable return/debut was Elias returning cleanshaven in trunks pretending to be his younger brother Ezekiel.
Don’t get it wrong: Stuff happened. Former tag champs broke up. MVP ditched Bobby Lashley. Bianca Belair gave a good promo in the wake of her awesome Raw Women’s Championship victory, but she really didn’t say anything groundbreaking, and no new challengers stepped up, so it just felt like something to fill time.
But this episode didn’t feel like an epic reset or seismic show. It was just… there. Not terrible, but not Mania-adjacent.
Let’s get to it…