7 Ups And 9 Downs From Last Night's WWE Raw (Feb 1)
5. No One Wins
You have to have when you speak too soon. Last week, this column praised WWE for having Kevin Owens rebound from his hard-fought loss against Dean Ambrose at the Royal Rumble to defeat Dolph Ziggler in another highly competitive match. For Owens to look good and really be elevated above the Intercontinental Championship level, he needed to win a good match. But Monday, WWEs 50/50 booking returned, as Dolph and KO had a rematch, which ended with Ziggler overcoming a match-long beatdown to pull out the win, thus getting his win back. Knowing WWE, this likely will set up the companys favorite deal, the rubber match, at Fastlane between the two. (This wouldnt be a big deal if WWE didnt fall back on this crutch so damn often.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0I36uvDe30 Its hard to call this a major negative since it was a good match, and both men are pretty popular. But if one of them is going to advance above the mid-card, then one of them has to win more than half of their encounters.
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.
