10 Ups And 8 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (April 5)

by Scott Carlson

1. A New Challenger

aj styles number 1 contender.jpg

The jury is still out on whether AJ Styles versus Roman Reigns will be really good or really watchable for the crowd backlash €“ or both.Styles winning the #1 contender€™s match was incredible when you consider that six months ago, not many would have said they thought AJ would land in WWE at some point. But here he was Monday, earning a world title shot less than three months after debuting. On top of that, he got a bit of revenge by pinning Chris Jericho to win the match.

A feud between Styles and Reigns could be intriguing for a couple reasons. Both are faces (technically), so the dynamic is interesting there. AJ is a smart fan darling, while Roman is public enemy #1, so you know fans will be openly hostile toward the champion. Throw in that it€™s likely that Styles isn€™t going to topple the new champ in his first title shot, and you could see epic backlash.

So while it€™s a great moment overall, it could provide a trainwreck of a situation during the next several weeks.

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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 fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.