8 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE Raw After WrestleMania 40 (8 April - Results & Review)

7. New Stars Step Forward

WWE Raw Ilja Dragunov
WWE

As mentioned earlier, match quality often is not the focus on the Raw after WrestleMania – the actual participants are the precious cargo.

In this case, NXT Champion Ilja Dragunov, NXT Women’s Champion Roxanne Perez, and Jade Cargill were the hot new acts that got the spotlight treatment Monday night, showing up to dominate established talent Shinsuke Nakamura, Indi Hartwell, and Chelsea Green, respectively.

The NXT stars are an interesting case, as Dragunov retained his title against Tony D’Angelo at Stand and Deliver on Saturday, while Perez regained her title at the same show. If both are indeed being called up to the main roster, it would mean that three current NXT Champions (Bron Breakker is the other) would be on Raw or SmackDown while holding an NXT title. That’s not unprecedented for one or maybe two champs, but three?

Still, it was good to see fresh faces, and all three picked up convincing wins, so that’s a net positive. None of their appearances were blow-away great or will be indelibly etched on fans’ brains, hence the moderate “up” here.

Advertisement
 
Posted On: 
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.