WWE Raw: Results, Highlights, Analysis, and Grades for March 19

No, Mickie, the arrest bit was the first segment, put your hands down. (Photo Source: WWE.com via Twitter)

Alexa Bliss (w/ Mickie James) vs. Asuka

Result: Asuka defeated Alexa Bliss via countout

Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars

As is often the case, the WWE production crew put together a heck of a video recapping everything leading up to this match. It’s followed up by Mickie James looking like a million bucks as she channels Bull Nakano’s overall aesthetic, with a bit of modern club goer thrown in.

Oh, and Alexa said a bunch of words about Nia Jax, but it’s nothing that wouldn’t be expected – even if it went a bit over the line. It’s a tremendously personal storyline – you have to be either really close friends or the worst enemies on the planet to go through this script. I get Alexa is the “mean girl” of the promotion, but “dropping 300 pounds of sad pathetic loser”? Yeesh. I’ve legit smacked people for saying waaaaaaay less about me – family members, too!

Once that promo was finished, you knew Jax was going to have some kind of impact on this match before all was said and done. Before that, though, it was two segments worth of “can Asuka overcome the two on one disadvantage to keep her streak heading into WrestleMania?”

By now, I’ve written that this focus on The Streak™ is taking away from Asuka’s matches more times than I can count. I think the world understands the concept of undefeated – we don’t need a reminder every nine seconds. Regardless, the match mostly delivered. I think the added time between the Reigns/Lesnar opener and the actual start of this match helped a great deal – the crowd had some extra time to breath and regroup.

Honestly, my only real complaint about this match was Alexa constantly bailing out too soon on Asuka’s attacks. You can chalk it up to “cowardly heel” a bit, but not to the extent it happened. A count out victory is akin to eating a nice dinner at a mid-level restaurant, then your dessert order is replaced by a Christmas fruitcake, too – not a great finish. But the sunset flip bomb was near perfection, so it wasn’t all bad.

But out comes super fire babyface Nia, and I’m pretty sure the crowd popped louder for her pursuit of Alexa than they did during large parts of the Reigns/Lesnar fracas. Amazingly, we’re 2/2 on storytelling heading into Mania. Uncharted waters, friends…