WWE Announces Two Matches For Next Week's Raw

It was announced during Raw that there will be two title matches on next week's "Season Premiere" of Raw: Nikki Bella will defend the Divas Title against number one contender Charlotte and The New Day will defend the Tag Team Titles against the Prime Time Players, who get a rematch since they are the former champions. The reason that Charlotte will face Nikki on Raw next week instead of at Night of Champions as originally announced is because Charlotte wants to face her just before Nikki's countdown clock expires for the longest Divas Title reign ever. It's set to expire during next week's Raw, so the match will likely take place in the first hour to create some drama. My guess is that Charlotte wins the match by disqualification when Team Bella interferes, which would lead to a rematch at Night of Champions where Charlotte wins the title. That way they can say Nikki broke the record before she lost the title.

They are doing the Tag Team Title match on Raw because Titus O'Neil and Darren Young haven't received their rematch since losing the titles at SummerSlam. The winner of the Tag Team Title match will also face The Dudley Boyz at Night of Champions on September 20. It would be a surprise if The New Day lose the titles to PTP. They are great champions that have a feud brewing with the Dudleys, so there's no reason for them to drop the titles one month after winning them. A big reason why WWE is trying to load up next week's Raw is because NFL Monday Night Football kicks off and will likely have an audience of 15-20 million people for their double header next Monday. WWE calling Raw the "season premiere" is weird because there's no offseason, but it's something they have done for a few years now. There could be more Raw announcements in the coming days because next week's show is considered to be an important one.