7 Ups & 4 Downs From WWE Raw (17 Feb - Results & Review)

3. Just A Match

WWE Raw AJ Styles Dominik Mysterio
WWE

AJ Styles’ first match on Raw in two years should have felt like a big deal, a triumphant return to the ring, as this was only his second televised singles bout in WWE since June 2024.

The Phenomenal One had the right opponent in Dominik Mysterio, who has proven over time to be a perfectly effective heel in these types of situations, but for some reason, it wasn’t there. Maybe AJ is so smooth that doing the extraordinary looks ordinary, but the match came across as bog standard, an abbreviated play-the-hits contest with a decent finish.

Sometimes matches that look one way on paper don’t translate in the ring. That might have been the case here. And both wrestlers have proven themselves (Styles obviously more so) to not treat this as any more than an aberration. Having AJ back is clearly a net positive for WWE, and hopefully his new rivalry with Bron Breakker will be more fruitful.

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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.