5 Ups And Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Jan 5th)

4. Ryback Looks Strong

Despite losing to Kane and Seth Rollins, Ryback went down swinging Monday night. Originally, the match was booked as Ryback versus Rollins, but Kane added himself because apparently ruining perfectly good matches is what€™s best for business. Instead of being a short affair or even going the route of Ryback pinning Kane (because let€™s face it, only John Cena can overcome those odds), Ryback put up a lengthy fight before succumbing. Even then, it took two curbstomps from Rollins to put the Big Guy down. Subtle things like having to hit your finishing move twice (which came moments after the announcers talked about Ryback surviving Big Show€™s knockout punch) to beat Ryback makes him look even stronger as he goes down for the count. Of course, now Ryback is fired, so any momentum is moot until he€™s brought back. But given that the Authority€™s €œforever€ stipulation lasted six weeks, Ryback could be main-eventing Smackdown for all we know.
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.