4 Ups & 10 Downs From WWE Raw (June 14)

6. Does Anyone Watch Their Own Product?

Piper Niven Eva Marie
WWE.com

Sooooo, we’re supposed to pretend that the Raw announcers have never watched NXT UK, correct?

Eva Marie made her return to Raw on Monday night and was scheduled to square off against Naomi, but instead, she brought another wrestler with her who immediately got in the ring and started the match… and proceeded to squash Naomi like a bug. (You’re telling us they couldn’t just use Lana – who’s still under WWE contract for another two-plus months – in this role?)

The only problem? The mystery woman was easily identifiable as Piper Niven from NXT UK (and the Mae Young Classic). But the announcers proceeded to play dumb the entire time, as no one knew who she was, or seemed to care, despite knocking off a former multi-time women’s champion in seconds.

You’d think they’d at least follow up later in the show on this to show there was at least some interest over the course of a three-hour show to identify this mystery woman, but WWE has the attention span of a gnat.

Here’s hoping Piper isn’t massively mishandled going forward.

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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.