5 Positives From Monday Night Raw
1. Dean Ambrose Joins Raw
Ambrose had done everything he could on Smackdown Live and after a lacklustre WrestleMania match, it was a good time for him to move brands and begin anew. His character has come into criticism recently and personally, I feel it is deserved. He is a mix of wackiness and stupidity. He needs to be made serious again and become a real threat to other superstars. The thing I absolutely love about Ambrose is the Dirty Deeds finisher; I don't think it has ever been kicked out of- which makes it credible and strong. I wasn't impressed with his opening segment on Raw however, Dean looked stupid and idiotic by attempting to be comedically wacky. But, it is positive he went over Kevin Owens clean in the main event to prove he is a strong Intercontinental champion and it will be interesting to see where he goes from here.
2. The Revival Beat The New Day
After they injured Kofi Kingston last week on Raw, he was missing off tv and this gave both teams comedic opportunities. Firstly, The Revival wore shirts mocking the 'death' of New Day's ice cream cart and Kofi's ankle injury. On the other hand, The New Day brought an inflatable version of Kofi Kingston to the ring which brought me to a small chuckle! The match was entertaining and having The Revival win clean was a great way to set them up for a new feud. They have now gone 2-0 on The New Day and this gives me hope WWE will push these guys hard.
3. Braun Strowman Attacks Roman Reigns Backstage
'I'm not finished with you!' yelled Strowman as the crowd went into utter meltdown at this beautiful segment. Some may say this was a taste of the attitude era. This was quite possibly the biggest babyface turn (in the eyes of the fans) I've ever seen! Strowman manhandled Reigns backstage before pushing his stretcher off the loading bay. But that wasn't all; Braun returned to Roman and tipped over the ambulance he was in. Now, if you ignore the obvious shadow from Reigns leaving the vehicle, this was incredible and was one of the best backstage segments in years! Strowman was made to look incredibly strong and this just shows how far he has come in the past year.
4. Elias Sampson Drifting
During the match between Nia Jax and Charlotte early in the night, keen eyed viewers may have spotted Sampson wandering through the crowd. This provided not only a great experience for the live fans, but also a bewildering comedic moment for us watching at home. Later on in the night, he also 'drifted' at the top of the ramp during the 8 man tag match. These two moments unveiled Sampson to the main roster crowd and was the perfect way to introduce him. Unlike most, I really like Sampson and I am very interested to see what he does on Raw in the future.
5. Alexa Bliss Debuts
It was amazing to see Alexa come over to Raw and to me, it makes me feel like it is a promotion for all her great work over the past 8 months. Alexa came out, interrupting Bayley and Sasha, to a raucous crowd who were enthralled to see her. This shows how well she has done. It will be great to see what feuds she can develop on Raw and hopefully she can get the title soon. In my opinion, she was the MVP of the last draft so it will be interesting to see if she can achieve that again- I have faith she can!
Raw Rating: 6.5/10