5 Biggest Winners & Losers From WWE Raw (August 1)

3. Winner: Rusev

Rusev’s biggest win came over the weekend when he and Lana finally tied the knot, but he had a quietly productive night on this week’s Raw too. The Bulgarian Brute was fed another hapless American patriot in Mark Henry, but it was an entertaining hoss fight, and a lot more worthwhile than Rusev’s recent clashes with Zack Ryder and Titus O’Neil.

After the match, Rusev got on the microphone, laid into Mark Henry, and claimed that the United States were rigging the Olympics by getting Russia’s “real athletes” banned and eliminating the competition. Nobody can defeat him for the United States Championship, he said, because he is the Super Athlete. Out came WWE’s resident doghouse dweller, Roman Reigns. The two fought after a brief stand-off, and WWE’s SummerSlam US Title match is seemingly in the book.

Not only was this a perfect use of Roman Reigns, but it elevates Rusev immensely. For all his recent troubles, Reigns remains one of the most talked-about competitors in WWE today, and Rusev will now benefit from a man who’s been working constant World Title feuds for the best part of a year.

Assuming Reigns’ demotion is set to continue (and there’s little reason to think otherwise), a SummerSlam victory for Rusev would do wonders to not only establish him as one of Raw’s major players, but also go a long way to rehabilitating the struggling US division.