Depending on your point of view, Monday Night Raw either represented a triumph in energetic, surprise booking from WWE, or it was the desperate actions of a desperate promotion.
WWE pulled a rare bait-and-switch with its advertised Undisputed WWE Championship match that actually paid off to both the live crowd and the viewing audience, with Cody Rhodes being taken out in the opening moments for Raw, leading to a show-long angle of whether he could get cleared and then who would take his place in the main event.
Raw’s location Monday night – Chicago – would serve as a dead giveaway for who would be called in off the bench to wrestle for a world title, but that didn’t diminish the response from fans. They simply grew louder as the main event arrived, and then exploded once they were rewarded for their faith.
Beyond that story threaded throughout the program, Raw was at best a mixed bag of middling action, a boring show-opening promo from Seth Rollins, and a mind-numbing heel turn to “bolster” the ranks of The Vision.
But if you were wowed by the world title scene, Raw actually was an unqualified success, with everything else just treading water.
Let’s get to it…
