7 Ups & 4 Downs From WWE Raw (Aug 15)

1. A Main Event In Any High School Gym

Theory Dolph Zigler
WWE.com

Imagine going to Monday Night Raw knowing there’s a first-time-ever match between Bobby Lashley and AJ Styles. You’d be pumped, thinking that’s the main event.

Then imagine what goes through your head when it comes on at the top of hour #3, and then you get a women’s squash, followed by the main event of Dolph Ziggler versus Theory.

Sorry, what?

With respect to both men, but this was not the kind of match to main event a show, especially when there was no angle advancement, no surprise finish, no return or debut to close the program. It was just a match – a decent one at that – between two guys with no real stakes.

If WWE was looking to tank their third-hour ratings in an effort to nix that last hour of Raw, then this was brilliant. Otherwise, what were they thinking?

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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.