6 Ups And 6 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (May 15)

2. For The First Time Ever…

Jeff Hardy Sheamus
WWE.com

Remember when “first time ever” matches were a big deal? Entire shows would be built around these “historic” matches, with the contests sometimes announced a week in advance.

But lately, we seem to be burning through these debut matches, seemingly as throwaway bouts to fill three-hour episodes of Raw. First, after a “first time ever” bout between Jeff Hardy and Cesaro last month, we got another first matchup between Hardy and Sheamus Monday night. And in both cases, those matches ended fairly cleanly and decisively, with Jeff winning both.

And then we had Seth Rollins square off against Bray Wyatt for the first time in singles competition. Again, another bout between two former world champions thrown together for Raw during the program. Why the rush? Why put these on like this rather than build some of them up as something special?

Yes, rosters are somewhat limited, but so are the number of truly unique matchups you can offer. You’re going to need to use some of them from time to time to keep the programming fresh, but burning through them weekly seems like a waste.

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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.