7 Ups And 9 Downs From WWE Raw (Jan 20)

by Scott Carlson

1. Messiah And Disciple Capture Tag Gold

seth rollins buddy murphy
WWE.com

As much as you don’t want to see an established tag team like the Viking Raiders fall to a brand new tandem, you almost had to pull the trigger on Seth Rollins & Buddy Murphy as they challenged for the Raw Tag Team Championship Monday night.

Rollins & Murphy had a hard-fought battle with Erik & Ivar, as the Raiders were clicking on all cylinders and looked as strong as ever. But Rollins snuck in with a well-timed stomp on Erik, allowing Murphy to get the pinfall victory, crowning new champs.

You could argue that the Raiders paid the price for siding with Kevin Owens & Samoa Joe, but they simply were bested by a team that did just enough behind the ref’s back to grab the win. And for Murphy, it’s quite the turnaround from losing his feud with Aleister Black last week. It makes him look like the smartest man in the room.

And now, the stable has some gold (well, silver) to show off.

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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.