3 Ups & 9 Downs From WWE Raw (May 24)

by Scott Carlson

1. Riddle Infected With Viper Venom

Riddle Xavier Woods
WWE.com

Who would have thought that the partnership of Riddle and Randy Orton would lead to the Original Bro sharpening his edges?

But after being a joking, goofy doofus for months, Riddle seems to be adopting some of Orton’s hardness into his persona, which served him well on Monday night. Riddle squared off against Xavier Woods in a hard-hitting affair that featured both men trading power moves and stiff strikes. Woods hit an incredible suplex, hoisting Riddle from the ground, leaping into his grasp and then dropping Xavier.

The match devolved into a slugfest, but then Riddle suddenly hit an RKO on Woods to pick up the win, clearly absorbing some of Orton’s aura as he knelt there seething afterward, before snapping back to the Riddle we’ve seen for months.

If Riddle is going to get an edge as a result of his teaming with Orton, then there are worse things in the world. It didn’t hurt that his match with Woods was pretty damn good as well.

Advertisement
Contributor
Contributor

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.