6 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE Raw (7 Oct - Results & Review)

2. Cut To Nothing

For the next three months, Raw will be cut back to a two-hour program. While this will be a welcome change for fans (and critics) who were worn out by the end of the third hour, there also will be challenges in compressing their stories and matches.

Case in point, the Intercontinental Championship match between Jey Uso and Xavier Woods clocked in at under seven minutes, with about half of it taking place during the commercial break. As a result, fans mostly saw a bunch of punching, a fight on the apron, more punches, two superkicks, and a splash. The end.

While the bigger story with Woods was not the match itself but the aftermath, the abrupt nature of the match made Woods look like a geek. It also did little for Uso in his first title defense.

However, there’s praise to be had later for what came after the bell.