3 Ups & 9 Downs From WWE Raw (Jan 25)

4. Wrestling-Free Commercials Return

Remember that edict from months back that there couldn’t be any wrestling during the commercial breaks, so we got all these gimmick matches like 2-of-3 falls, or DQs and count-outs leading to match restarts.

Well, they’re back!

At least that seems to be the case, as two encounters led to bouts stretched over multiple segments, but halted at the commercial breaks. First, Charlotte Flair and Shayna Baszler had a match that ended abruptly with a DQ, then turned into a six-woman donnybrook. When we came back from a commercial break, they started a six-woman tag match, which then ended with a very dumb-looking count-out loss. And then we went to another break, after which the match was restarted by Adam Pearce.

Fast-forward to later in the show, when Sheamus and John Morrison were battling. That match ended with a White Noise, but Miz immediately challenged the Celtic Warrior to a 2-on-1 handicap match, right before a break. Come back, and that match began.

These restarts and multiple permutations of matches is just stupid and lazy… and pointless. They don’t advance any storylines, they don’t naturally flow into something bigger or more meaningful. They’re just “artful” ways to have multiple matches covering longer stretches of time with fewer wrestlers and without competing during commercials.