9 Ups And 7 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Jan 21)
1. The Real Victim Here
You’ve got to feel for Braun Strowman here. Even if the decision to pull him from his Universal Championship match was to protect him against another loss to Brock Lesnar, it still feels like he’s being throttled down once again.
Strowman lost his title match last week, but showed up Monday night to get in Brock’s face. After calling Lesnar lucky to avoid a beating, Braun pledged to get his hands on the Beast if he emerged from Sunday with his title intact.
The problem here is that Braun simply said he’d find some way to get back to facing Brock… while the answer is right in front of his face. Sunday is the Royal Rumble PPV, with the eponymous match guaranteeing the winner a title shot at WrestleMania. And yet Braun didn’t announce he was entering the Rumble to win a title shot. Does that mean he’s not entering it, or was he too absentminded to mention it?
Either way, that doesn’t bode well for the man whose Mania match last year consisted of teaming with a 10-year-old to win the Raw Tag Team Championships.