Hot off the heels of Stomping Grounds, Raw comes to us from the Angel Of The Winds Arena in Everett, WA this week, on 6/24/19.
As advertised earlier, on the live broadcast, we’ll see a dream match-up between Ricochet, the newly crowned United States Champion, and AJ Styles, who is coming off an injury.
Kofi Kingston, will utilize the wild card rule and he’ll see singles action against Sami Zayn in a non-title bout.
Last, but certainly not least, Roman Reigns will be forced to compete in a two on one handicap match against Shane McMahon and Drew Mcintyre, after Reigns bested the latter last night on PPV.
Bobby Lashley and Braun Strowman will engage one another in a tug of war this evening as well. We see Strowman pulling a tractor trailer later in the show, an impressive, albit aided feat for sure.
Before everything unfurls, we start the show off with the Universal Champion, Seth Rollins, and his girlfriend, the Raw Women’s Champion, “The Man” Becky Lynch.
They celebrate their respective title defenses after Lynch interrupts Rollins and they share a laugh.
As expected and referenced via various social media outlets, this leads to interruptions from Baron Corbin and Lacey Evans and a mixed tag match is booked for Extreme Rules with both titles on the line in a winner take all situation.
If Corbin and Evans lose, they can never get near the titles again as long as Rollins and Lynch are champion.
An eight man elimination tag is scheduled for after the break. The hometown favorite, “The New” Daniel Bryan and Rowan, the Smackdown tag team champs, will team with the Raw champs, The Revival against The New Day and The Usos.
The Usos/The New Day defeat Daniel Bryan/Rowan and The Revival via pin fall as The Usos beat The Revival for the final fall.
Bryan and Rowan are eliminated first after Bryan becomes a house of fire and unintentionally collides with Dash and Dawson outside the ring. Wilder takes offense and he hits Bryan with a forearm which allows Xavier Woods to roll him up for the first fall.
The New Day then find themselves on the outside looking in as Woods gets nailed with the Shatter Machine and he’s eliminated before the break.
Great tag team unity sees a tag to Jey Uso behind the back of the Revival. Dawson hits a superplex on Jimmy Uso, but Jey comes off the back of Wilder with a huge splash for the three count and a potential future title shot.
MizTV is brought to us with the 24/7 champion, R-Truth, accompanied by Carmella and we see him regaining the strap at the wedding and expense of Drake Maverick via a Youtube clip.
Maverick eventually makes his way out and there’s some hilarious banter and even a “consummation” chant, as Drake stated that he couldn’t even properly celebrate his wedding and wedding night because of what happened. Miz is informed that a singles match for the title will take place after the break.
R-Truth defeats Drake Maverick via pin fall with the retain the 24/7 Championship.
As soon as this match is over, the superstars spill out of the back and give chase as Truth and Carmella make their escape. A very dejected Drake Maverick leaves in full-on sad sack mode and he even gets a “hey hey goodbye” chant from a savage Washington crowd. Brutal stuff here.
Baron Corbin and Lacey Evans are backstage getting unmercifully booed as they talk about Rollins and Lynch being the bane of their existence. They need to keep their head in the game. Evans says that even Superman has his krpyonite and in the case of Rollins, it’s Lynch. Who knows? Maybe they’ll become the new power couple after the PPV, or so Corbin would have us believe.
Here comes the Money! We saw Roman Reigns making his way towards the ringside area before the break, and the heels make their way out for the handicap match.
The pacing has been solid again this evening and there’s a focus on action. We’ll see how this one goes.
Reigns is informed that he’ll not only face both men, it’s Texas Tornado rules where McMahon and McIntyre will be in the ring simultaneously against “The Big Dog”.
Shane McMahon/Drew McIntyre against Roman Reigns is a no contest due to outside interference.
This is a glorified mugging as the steel steps are introduced early and the Big Dog barely gets out of the blocks.
McIntyre hits a Claymore Kick and then Shane spears Roman before a second Claymore meets its mark and Shane says its over. They don’t appear to be done.
Shane McMahon takes to the top ropes and Shane is ready to hit the Coast to Coast when THE GONG HITS!
“The Deadman” has risen! The Phenom himself, the legendary Undertaker, is on Raw and he comes to the aide of “The Big Dog”. He catches Shane with a chokeslam that sends him straight to hell and he dumps McIntyre over the top rope with a clothesline.
“The Reaper” rakes the hand across the throat, signaling for the end as the appropriate fan chant rings out. An unlikely savior here this evening as Corey Graves says and a very unexpected appearance from the legend. A tag team affair for Extreme Rules perhaps? We shall see.
The tug of war takes place after the break as both Braun Strowman and Bobby Lashley make their entrances.
Lashley looks to win, but Strowman quickly recovers and pulls Lashley across for the victory. Lashley attacks and he chokes Strowman out with the rope, raking it across the eyes. Lashley rushes Strowman outside the ring, but Strowman fights back.
Lashley recovers and hits a knee to the back, dropping Strowman outside the ring and he celebrates getting the upper hand after the tug of war loss. Their story will continue and they immediately hype the Kingston/Zayn and Styles/Ricochet matches for later tonight.
“The Phenomenal One” is backstage and he’s ready to get back in the ring. He is quickly interrupted and asked why he’s challenging Ricochet on his first night back. He says Ricochet is the best that the WWE has to offer. For some odd reason, the music of No Way Jose begins playing and he walks around the corner to see the Good Brothers in the Conga line.
Styles says they talked about this and they have a match with the Viking Raiders later tonight. He asks where the fire is? Where is the Gallows and Anderson he met in New Japan? What happened to those guys?
Gallows says those two guys are gonna go out and prove him wrong after the break.
The Viking Raiders defeat The Good Brothers via pin fall with the Viking Experience.
This isn’t a squash. Gallows and Anderson put in a honest day’s work and give a good account of themselves.
They hit the Boot of Doom on Erik, but a bit of showboating sees a comeback and Ivar uses some incredible athleticism on Gallows before launching himself onto Gallows outside the ring.
The Viking Experience spells the end for the legal Anderson as a dejected AJ Styles watches on before his own match with Ricochet.
Alexa Bliss is pacing backstage, upset after losing last night. Nikki Cross enters the segment and apologizes, but Bliss cuts off her apology and says they can move on. She says that Bayley is the cause of all this and they need to come up with a plan.
Cross leaves and Bliss goes back to thinking of what to do next.
Cross has a run-in with Naomi and Natalya backstage and they try to tell her what type of person Bliss is. Bliss walks in and asks Cross why she’s talking behind her back. Cross defends Bliss and it evolves into a singles match for later between Bliss and Naomi.
Mojo Rawley and Heath Slater are set for singles action, but it doesn’t get underway as R-Truth runs through the ring escaping superstars.
In the ensuing melee, Heath Slater, Cedric Alexander and Ec3 all win the title before Truth regains it by pinning Ec3 as Carmella distracts Carter III. Happy to at least be able to type out that those three solid hands have won gold tonight.
Truth is making magic with this belt and they are at least able to feature underutilized talent.
Ricochet is backstage for an interview and he’s all smiles. He doesn’t know how it all feels because it’s all still sinking in. It’s a feeling that he doesn’t want to go away. It took all the fan support and friends and family to get where he is. He says it’s an honor to face AJ Styles here tonight and he’s set to prove that he’s worthy of defending the title.
We see the World Champion himself, pancakes in hand, Kofi Kingston, and he and Sami Zayn will see singles action up next.
Kofi Kingston is interviewed by Charly Caruso and “Not Renee” is quickly interrupted by Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens before the match. They aren’t out there to throw softballs.
The questions, why are you here? Who do you think you are? Why don’t you get the hell out of here?
Kingston mocks a zit on KO’s face. Zayn asks why Kofi is a paper champion and only succeeds with help from his friends? Kofi calls their bizarre love/hate friendship doesn’t mean that’s how it works with New Day. It’s a brotherhood and a bond that nobody can break. Kofi says he beat KO at MITB and Ziggler last night.
They banter further and Kofi says he’s going to beat Zayn tonight and we get the match after the break.
Kofi Kingston defeats Sami Zayn via pin fall with a bridging roll-up.
The pacing starts off slowly, as KO interferes outside the ring, but the action soon becomes frenzied, fast and furious.
Kingston mounts some strong offense before Zayn cuts him off at the pass. Kingston fights back, coming off the top where Zayn dodges and hits a Michinoku Driver for two.
There is a great spot where Kingston hits a springboard, but Zayn catches him with a perfectly timed boot at the last second.
They continue and the end comes after Kingston counters an offensive attempt with a rollup and a half bridge for the three count.
Before Kingston can celebrate, Kevin Owens grabs a mic and calls him out and says if he’s such a great champion, how about he face him next? Kofi hesitates, but decides why the heck not? That’ll happen after the break.
Kofi Kingston defeats Kevin Owens by count-out.
This was shorter than the prior match as expected. KO was giving it to Kofi early on, capitalizing on him being tired from the bout with Zayn.
After scoring with a few superkicks, the action spilled to the outside where Kofi gave KO the SOS on the entryway ramp, ouch! Kingston beat the ten count back in the ring for the victory.
He has not lost a bout since he won the strap at ‘Mania. Fifty/fifty booking hasn’t reared its ugly head towards Kofi and I couldn’t be happier. Kingston hit his over the top rope plancha variant and celebrated atop the ramp.
We seemed to have questions about who Kingston’s next challenger would be. The question was answered, former US Champ, Samoa Joe, attacked Kofi savagely from behind, ultimately putting him to sleep with the vicious Coquina Clutch in a great visual.
If this is the next story between these treasured athletes, sign us all up.
Alexa Bliss defeats Naomi via pin fall with a DDT.
This was relatively short as well. Bliss and Naomi traded offense, but on the outside, Naomi accidentally hits Nikki Cross with a baseball slide dropkick and while she was distracted, Bliss hit the spiked DDT for the three count.
After the match, Bliss puts the boots to Naomi and invites Nikki to join in. Cross is hesitant to do so as Natalya runs down and joins the fray and it leads to a tag team affair after the break.
Alexa Bliss/Nikki Cross defeat Naomi/Natalya after a Neck-breaker from Cross to Natalya and a Bliss pin.
Cross got a satisfactory amount of offense and it seems like she’s allowing beauty’s wicked wiles to steer her motivations as she’s following Bliss. The faces got their licks in, but Cross caught Natalya with a spinning neck-breaker as Bliss tagged herself in for the pin fall.
After a tough loss last night, Bliss, and Cross for the matter, look strong this evening.
AJ Styles defeats Ricochet via pin fall with the Phenomenal Forearm in a non-title bout.
This was an extraordinary main event.
Raw should be built on quality contests like this each and every week. The talent is there, and they are willing and able to commit to this.
The final commercial was taken after Styles sent Gallows and Anderson back to the dressing room, telling them that they weren’t going to ruin this match-up with a cheap finish.
They went back and forth for a good twenty or so minutes it felt like and Ricochet flew all over the building. He hits a springboard moonsault, the running hurricanrana and a suicide dive to get the crowd behind him.
Styles had a smattering of blood set upon his face from a blow during the match, and he carried his own weight during the match with a well-placed pele kick and a savage series of strikes, a combo flurry if you will.
Ricochet went up top for the 630 splash, but he rolled through after Styles moved. Styles connected with a forearm shiver and like a bolt of lightning, he was immediately up onto the ropes with a springboard and he crashed into Ricochet with the Phenomenal Forearm for the victory.
After the match and the non-title victory, Styles picked Ricochet up and celebrated their competitive bout as the show went off the air, sending the fans home happy.
