5 Ups & 8 Downs From WWE Raw (Dec 20)
Vince likes firing people, Lashley's face turn continues, AJ/Omos break up.
Welcome to Raw is Meaningless!
Sorry, but it was really difficult to consider this episode of Raw anything short of filler. Stuff happened, but most of it only served to set up matches for next week, a show between Christmas and New Year’s, which typically isn’t a highly viewed program.
We saw one tag team implode, two makeshift squads manage to co-exist(!), a championship feud that made the challenger look like a chump, and an impressive feat of strength from Bianca Belair.
We also saw Vince McMahon make a “joke” that easily can be read as insulting and denigrating toward the dozens of wrestlers released this year. Even if it wasn’t intentional, the fact it made it to TV shows a certain level of deliberate ignorance and/or heartlessness.
Nothing that happened was of great significance Monday night, save possibly for Bobby Lashley’s continued ocean liner-like slow turn towards babyface. It remains to be seen if we ever get there, if Bobby becomes a tweener, or if he just slides back to being a villain. But it’s an interesting thing to watch.
As Raw limps to the finish line of 2021, it’s disappointing to see so many talented wrestlers forced to slog through some of this stuff. Even the stuff with potential gets weighed down by the crap.
Let’s get to it…