Raw Discussion 20/03/17

We don't do Raw or Smackdown discussions anymore. I like it though. Always good.

So they're doing Braun vs Reigns again? Strowman had better win this time. Still don't get why they booked him in a match with Reigns at Fastlane. I get Reigns winning as they want him going in strong for his match with Undertaker. So that makes sense. But it also makes no sense to have Strowman lose when they were building up how much of a monster he is. Could have been a huge thing, but not anymore. He needs to get a win back though and then get back on track to destroying everyone - even if they have the Taker dongs (man, that sounds wrong) to distract Reigns so it isn't exactly clean.

No Universal champion? They give him the title and they couldn't book him to appear on Raw for less than a handful of times before Mania? Cheers for that WWE. Title holder should always be on the show unless he's injured imo. They're the selling point of the brand.

Hopefully will be a good Raw though. Get some excitement going for Mania.

We don't do Raw or Smackdown discussions anymore. I like it though. Always good.

I thought I'd try and revive it and breed some discussion.

So they're doing Braun vs Reigns again? Strowman had better win this time. Still don't get why they booked him in a match with Reigns at Fastlane. I get Reigns winning as they want him going in strong for his match with Undertaker. So that makes sense. But it also makes no sense to have Strowman lose when they were building up how much of a monster he is. Could have been a huge thing, but not anymore. He needs to get a win back though and then get back on track to destroying everyone - even if they have the Taker dongs (man, that sounds wrong) to distract Reigns so it isn't exactly clean.

It's such a shame that it looks like Strowman, who's been the most improved in 2016 by far, is just probably gonna get a spot in the Battle Royale. Even if they gave him an opponent, there's just two weeks build. Hopefully, we'll see him in a more prominent role at WM34.

No Universal champion? They give him the title and they couldn't book him to appear on Raw for less than a handful of times before Mania? Cheers for that WWE. Title holder should always be on the show unless he's injured imo. They're the selling point of the brand.

Unannounced doesn't mean he won't appear. Wouldn't surprise me if he showed up unannounced and brawled with Lesnar.

I read somewhere that Goldberg is only booked in for the Raw before Mania. Would be nice if he showed up tonight as well though. The Champion needs to be on the show. Would help ratings as well.

It'll be bs if Goldberg isn't there tonight.

Nice of Goldberg to turn up wasn't it 😋

They continue their bad booking though. The other week they had Nia Jax in a match where if she won she was in the title match at Mania. She lost. Why does she get another opportunity? Two weeks before the PPV and they're changing a title match because they changed their minds.

Seems that they are pretty confident that Rollins will be available for Mania as well. I'm glad about that. Just hope that he is actually going to be medically cleared in time for it, and is right mentally. Wouldn't be good to see him being too cautious so as to not injure himself during it. So right medically and mentally and it should be a good match between the two of them.

Strowman is getting buried in this Taker and Reigns feud. Why is he even part of it? The way that they are going it seems like they'll keep Strowman off the card and have him interfere in the Taker v Reigns match at Mania. Last night they waited until he was about to be finished off before having Taker interrupt, then Taker chokeslams him and that's it for Strowman, the monster of Raw. So he was about to lose again (going by what it looked like) and then gets chumped out to Taker. Why are they ruining him? They did such great work with him previous to this whole feud. Part of me wonders whether they'll make it a Triple Threat at Mania. It could have been worse though, they could have waited until Reigns was about to pin Strowman before having Taker interrupt, so at least they saved Strowman a bit. Next week they should have Strowman make demands and then slaughter the Raw roster until he gets what he wants, like he did previously which was great.

Was a good chokeslam by Taker though, I'll give him that. They're usually quite poor against big men, but Strowman really jumped with it. It looked good.

Strowman is getting buried in this Taker and Reigns feud. Why is he even part of it? The way that they are going it seems like they'll keep Strowman off the card and have him interfere in the Taker v Reigns match at Mania. Last night they waited until he was about to be finished off before having Taker interrupt, then Taker chokeslams him and that's it for Strowman, the monster of Raw. So he was about to lose again (going by what it looked like) and then gets chumped out to Taker. Why are they ruining him? They did such great work with him previous to this whole feud. Part of me wonders whether they'll make it a Triple Threat at Mania. It could have been worse though, they could have waited until Reigns was about to pin Strowman before having Taker interrupt, so at least they saved Strowman a bit. Next week they should have Strowman make demands and then slaughter the Raw roster until he gets what he wants, like he did previously which was great.

Was a good chokeslam by Taker though, I'll give him that. They're usually quite poor against big men, but Strowman really jumped with it. It looked good.

Now I've only read spoilers... and see a clip that WWE put on their Twitter, but they saved Strowman there. Doesn't look too great for him, but they definitely saved him. It is odd though that they're persisting with Strowman and Reigns whilst going with Reigns vs Taker at Mania. I expect Strowman will be part of the Battle Royal that no one cares about, but can totally see him being part of the Reigns/Taker match at Mania. Triple Threat? Probably not. Interference? Totally.

Seems that the rumours of Foley taking time off were true as well. It has been building.

I read somewhere that Goldberg is only booked in for the Raw before Mania. Would be nice if he showed up tonight as well though. The Champion needs to be on the show. Would help ratings as well.

I've said that about Bray Wyatt the past couple weeks on Smackdown too.

I thought overall it was a solid RAW. Good crowd for the most part. Sure, it would have been nice if they focused more on the World Title feud but it wasn't a bad show. The Mick Foley stuff was pretty entertaining and I really enjoyed the Jericho segment (Owens ATE the list!). Next week is the Go Home show though, so we need to see everyone involved in a match on the RAW side actually in the arena.

The Owens promo was great with Jericho. It's a shame that they've booked him better in his feud with Jericho (from the moment he turned) than they did for his entire title reign. The guy is great, why couldn't they have him like this when he was champion?

Seems that Ninjak isn't the only person that feels the build up to Wrestlemania has been very poor. The viewership numbers are in and they aren't pretty.

--Monday night's viewership for WWE Raw is in and the number was alarmingly bad, with the show generating an average viewership of 3.04 million over the three hours.

-- That is actually the lowest audience for a Raw without any major sports competition since 1997, beating the previous record which was recently set in mid-February of this year.

-- Arguably the worst news is that the period immediately before WrestleMania has traditionally scored great ratings for WWE, often the highest rated shows for the entire year. The only consolation is that television viewership as a whole last night was soft, with only the O'Reilly Factor beating Raw on cable.