5 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE Raw (5 Dec - Review)

3. Why Dolph, Why?

Mustafa Ali Dolph Ziggler
WWE.com

It’s one thing to have an impromptu United States Championship match. It’s quite another thing to book it to have a DQ finish involving another wrestler not involved in a forthcoming #1 contender’s match jumping the champ.

Mustafa Ali talked his way into a US title match Monday night, but his shot went up in smoke when Dolph Ziggler of all people attacked Austin Theory mid-match, triggering a disqualification. This led to Ziggler and Ali having a shoving match, only for Theory to take both men out and leave standing tall.

Yep, if you’re paying attention, the heel champion (who won his title via banana peel) put his title up, defended it, then beat up two mid-carders chasing said title afterwards.

Why should we care about any of this? The worst part is Ali cut an impassioned promo on Twitter about what the title means, and rather than playing that to build him up, Kevin Patrick simply quoted it, which killed all the impact it had.

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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.