WWE Raw results, highlights (July 21): Roman Reigns and Jey Uso reunite
Well, the "Original Tribal Chief" has rekindled a positive relationship with his old Bloodline stablemate, Jey Uso.
🫂Reunion of the Night
It's not surprising, but it feels wrong for Uso, of all people, just to forget the past shared between him and Reigns throughout The Bloodline's saga. Yet, here we are.
Before that, however, Paul Heyman noted that Rollins will be out for an extended period, offering to mend the fence by inviting him to join his group. So, this is actually a perfectly slimy Heyman thing to do, and seed planted to dissolve Rollins' group as soon as he returns. He should be livid with Heyman for suggesting such a thing after their history.
Reigns rightfully wasn't keen on the idea, claiming Heyman was the one to ruin The Bloodline. That's debatable, Reigns, but I get where you're coming from. Meanwhile, it's hilarious to see Breakker try to take over the old "Big Dog" moniker Reigns sported through his worst years. I'm not sure that's an advisable decision, WWE, considering how it went with Reigns.
Things broke down after that, which led to Uso making the save and presumably setting up a SummerSlam tag team match. This all admittedly feels like a very strong pivot from whatever was initially planned for Rollins before his injury. I don't love it because of the Reigns-Uso element, but let's see what WWE can salvage out of the unexpected change.
💭Epiphany of the Night
CM Punk laid out the biggest problem with WWE's current schedule, and I had started to notice it, but not realize it until his promo at the start of this "Raw."
First and foremost, he and Gunther delivered their words in vintage fashion. They were strong and confident, but ultimately substanceless for their match — because there will be next to no build with SummerSlam in two weeks. And that's the problem. The amount of time, or lack thereof, between PLEs is so short that some of these title matches don't have any story outside of a contender match being won. Punk won last week's gauntlet match to earn his title shot — the only match he's had since losing his other title shot to John Cena. Oh, and in that five-person match, he only had to beat one person.
Listen, the match will be great. However, there's no way to be invested in it unless you know both are good wrestlers. That's good in pure sport. This, however, is not that, and when you think about it, there are only a select few long-term stories going on in WWE right now. Coincidentally, one of those does involve Punk. It just isn't with Gunther. Even when he had some history with Cena, that was also rushed and short-lived.
Gunther overall feels like a somewhat directionless champion, only meant to be a great wrestling champion. Meanwhile, Punk's recent existence has been largely about losing because of Seth Rollins, or simultaneously preventing Rollins from winning.
🗑️Volcanic Boiling Trash of the Night
The Women's Tag Team title match between the champions The Judgment Day and challengers Bayley and Lyra Valkyria might be the dumbest thing I've seen in WWE in a long time. Even if you pretend to exist in the kayfabe world of this story beat, it still doesn't make any sense. And it was almost as if WWE knew it and played into it by having Valkyria question it to Bayley. Then there's the fact that they have literally been the opposite of a team, wrestling each other as recently as last week.
This. Was. Dumb.
Let's start with the non-kayfabe perspective and what happened on "SmackDown" last Friday. Alexa Bliss and Charlotte Flair were officially booked to challenge The Judgment Day at SummerSlam. Earlier in the week, Valkyria — off her win over Bayley — earned her title match at SummerSlam against the Intercontinental Champion Becky Lynch. So, if Valkyria and Bayley became tag team champions, that would then mean Valkyria wrestles twice at SummerSlam. Sure, it could have theoretically been possible, but it was utterly absurd to remove Raquel Rodriguez and Roxanne Perez from the second biggest WWE event of the year.
I'm going to rip my hair out the more I think about this.
In the end, The Judgment Day won because duh. And with shenanigans. Just get rid of this stupid tag team "division" concept, Triple H. You clearly do not care about it whatsoever. It's being used as a joke.
Before this, Lynch and Valkyria had a brief promo, which was fine. It added the countout and no DQ stipulation to their match, along with a Valkyria loss, meaning she can never challenge for the Intercontinental title again. The whole tag team title match booking overshadowed the promo and match entirely, though. It was a mind-numbingly dumb idea.
🤬DQ of the Night
Don't make a match if you don't want someone to lose, Triple H. Nothing was more predictable than a DQ in the Iyo Sky vs. Stephanie Vaquer rematch.
This "Raw" was designed to frustrate me, folks. Because this match, as should always be expected, was phenomenal — until the finish. More Sky wrestling is always good, and it was a pleasant little surprise to see these two go at it again. You can really tell they have fun working together, and it was a straight-up wrestling match to start. They are such an excellent pair, and we need a proper resolution to a match between them at some point.
Vaquer got the win by DQ when attacked by ... The Secret Hervice and Chelsea Green. This was the ultimate buzzkill to a flawless match.
Naomi and Rhea Ripley eventually showed up to even the odds and have something to do on this show. But man, the repetition of this type of match ending is so unbelievably lazy.
👑 Uncrowned Gem of the Night 👑
There was a lot that went on with the tag team triple-threat title contender match. Generally, WWE doesn't have three wrestlers as the active members of their teams in multi-team matches like this. So, that was an interesting, but pretty fun wrinkle. And while this match wound up overbooked as hell at the finish, it fully highlighted the winners, the LWO, but mostly Joaquin Wilde.
Wilde's hot tag, which ultimately led to his team's win, was awesome. The way he glided around the ring to take everyone out was gorgeous. This was an unexpected move, and surely, the LWO will lose their title match due to the storylines that were woven into Ludwig "El Grande Ameri-kaiser."
👍MONDAY NIGHT MONEY👍
1. Naomi interrupted Vaquer's backstage interview to tease their potential match at Clash at Paris. This encounter was short and sweet, further highlighting how great this version of the Women's World Champion is. Unfortunately for her, I can't imagine we'll see that match, but this was a nice little tease.
2. Sheamus beat Rusev with the Brogue Kick in their rematch after the great match they had a few weeks ago. So, this match was good enough to be an overall plus, despite the parts I didn't like at the end, particularly Rusev's attempts to cheat to win. Michael Cole's criticism of Rusev's previous win as "controversial" was also lame. That was a brilliant finish, and I'll entertain none of that silly slander.
3. The only good thing about the Women's Tag Team title match was that it continued the hilarious antics between Dominick Mysterio and AJ Styles, with his several disguises. The match is on for SummerSlam.
🤷IT HAPPENED🤷
Karrion Kross beat Sami Zayn in their rematch, with the help of his steel pipe when the referee was distracted by Scarlett. It's great that Kross won by any means, but this felt like a moment of little significance.
👎RAW DEAL👎
WWE no-showed Kross' entrance. He's got one of the best in the business, man. Come on.
👑Awful booking killed this show. I give this show a Crown score of: 4/10.👑
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