6 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE Raw (Sept. 12)

1. Right Call, Bad Execution

The moment the rematch from the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship tournament finals was announced last week, it felt like the outcome was a fait accompli. But that doesn’t mean it’s an automatic “up.”

Damage CTRL was set up to get a rematch for the tag titles against Aliyah & Raquel Rodriguez after the champs won by pinning the wrong competitor in the finals. It was kind of an unnecessary detour to get where everyone knew it was going to end up.

The match itself was nothing special, and it was seriously hurt when Aliyah apparently got injured midway through, seemingly hurting her shoulder. The match ground to a halt as the ref repeatedly checked on her, and then rather than targeting her arm, Dakota Kai went to… a chinlock.

The bout plodded along so Raquel Rodriguez could get her offense in, running through both heels before tagging out to Aliyah, who botched taking Kai’s finisher before being pinned.

If the injury was real and Aliyah gutted it out, good for her, but maybe they should have called an audible and gone to a finish, because the match was dull and anticlimactic. If she wasn’t really hurt, then they should have shortened the match down to Raquel running wild for two minutes, Aliyah tagged in and got pinned in 30 seconds. Everything else was bad fluff.