The WWE Raw Reaction for 02/10/20 by Kelly Dishnow
Welcome to the WWE Raw Reaction, where I offer my take on this week’s show from Ontario, CA. You can check out John’s full in-depth review of the show here.
The Raw opening video and pyro starts us off again this week. The announce team shills the matches scheduled for tonight and Seth’s crew comes out for promo time. Rollins goes on about being the chosen messiah and last week’s six-man elimination tag match before Kevin Owens shows up. Quick back and forth between Rollins and Owens before the Viking Raiders show up, ready to fight. The faces charge the ring to draw out the disciples. With Rollins alone in the ring, Samoa Joe locks Rollins in the Coquina Clutch, forcing the disciples to make the save. Rollins bails and the faces clear the ring with Don’t Call Me Buddy Murphy eating a stunner from Owens to end the segment. This was a good setup for the main event later tonight.
Becky Lynch is out for our first match of the night, the Raw Women’s Championship match between Becky and Asuka. Asuka comes out with Kairi Sane as usual. This is a rematch from the Royal Rumble. We get another great match from the two with a lot of hard-hitting back and forth action. The end was surprising as Becky won with a Rock Bottom like move instead of the Disarmher submission. After the match, Shayna Baszler shows up and attacks Becky. The attack ends when Shayna bites Becky Twilight style on the back of the neck. Shayna comes up all bloody from the “bite” and the blood was a bit much, but Becky sold it very well. Shanya leaves so the EMTs can attend to Becky, who steals the ambulance and drives herself to the hospital in it.
The 24/7 Champion Mojo Rawley and Riddick Moss are in the ring to take on The Street Profits in tag team action. Street Profits win easily in under a minute with their Cash Out finisher on Riddick. After the match, Mojo comes in to check on Riddick who rolls Mojo up to win the 24/7 title. Check your card and see if you had the Riddick/Mojo break up at three weeks for the win. Well, they at least did something with the 24/7 title this week.
MVP is up next with the VIP Lounge featuring Drew McIntyre as the guest. MVP goes over Drew’s Royal Rumble performance before he comes out. MVP talks about how they go way back and he wants to help Drew prep for his WrestleMania match against Brock. Drew declines the offer and Claymore kicks MVP into a couch to end The VIP Lounge.
Angel Garza is up next with Zelina Vega for his match against Cedric Alexander. After Humberto Carrillo attacked Garza and is taken to the back, Garza defeats Cedric in a vintage Three Minute Raw Special with the Wing Clipper.
NXT Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley shows up backstage and is interviewed by Charly Caruso. Rhea talks about looking for Charlotte’s answer and her upcoming Takeover match before Sarah Logan appears asking Rhea who she is, a la Bianca last week on NXT with Charlotte. Rhea tells Sarah her name and asks the same question back, which Logan does not reply to. Sarah Schreiber interrupts with Lashley and Lana babbling on about Ricochet before Rhea goes to the ring to destroy poor Sarah Logan while Charlotte watched from the stage. If only (Un)Creative knew what to do with Logan, but she’s stuck on the same show as Charlotte.
Ricochet and Bobby Lashley is up next and Lana’s really short dress may not be all that PG. Anyway, we get another great match between these two. Ricochet can bump real well for Lashley’s power moves. In the end, Ricochet picks up the win with the 630 splash. Maybe Rusev is taking notes and is learning the 630, since that seems to beat Lashley and makes Rusev look like a chump in that feud. Can we have Lashley/Brock please?
Randy Orton comes out to explain why he did what he did to Edge. Orton gets interrupted by Matt Hardy of all people, who goes through the entire history of him and Edge and Hardys/Edge & Christian. Hardy finally asked Orton “What the hell is wrong with you?” and blocked the RKO. Hardy ate the second RKO and ends his WWE contract (most likely) taking a conchairto from Orton.
Ruby Riott is backstage with Sarah Schreiber to explain her actions last week with Liv Morgan. At least Liv has someone talented to feud with now. Does this mean Rusev will finally get his payoff in all of this too? After that, Aleister Black comes out to slaughter Akira Tozawa. Props to Tozawa at lasting over a minute with Black before getting Black Massed into next week. Black cuts a brief promo after the match about bringing the fight to people instead of waiting for them to come.
We get a quick promo from the still bloody Becky Lynch on Shayna’s attack on her from earlier. Couldn’t they have put a drop of effort in and cleaned up some of the blood since she went to the “hospital” or “local medical facility” as WWE likes to say?
Main event time is the eight-man tag between Seth’s crew and Owens/Joe/Viking Raiders. The match was really good and hard-hitting. All of the spots were executed perfectly this time. The end came when Joe had Murphy in the Coquina Clutch and Rollins stomped Joe behind the ref’s back so Murphy could pick up the win for their team. I know Owens got two eliminations last week, but the faces really need some type of win soon or this may drag on for longer than it should. We don’t need 50/50 booking, but let’s not make the faces look like chumps.
Let’s look at tonight’s Highs and Lows:
The Highs:
There were three really good matches tonight: Becky/Asuka, Ricochet/Lashley, and the eight man tag. They were all well placed and kept the crowd engaged all night long. Both shows could use more solid in-ring action.
The Lows:
Let’s hope Vince hasn’t turned Shayna into a vampire and the whole neck bite gimmick was a one-time thing. The blood was way too overboard for what they were trying to accomplish.
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That’s all I’ve got for now, until next time.