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Top 2 things that went right on the Jan. 24 episode of WWE Raw

By Christopher Jeter

Jul 18, 2021; Fort Worth, TX, USA; AJ Styles (black pants) and Omos (black attire) battle The Viking Raiders (gray trunks) for the Raw men's tag team titles during Money in the Bank at Dickies Arena. Mandatory Credit: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports
Jul 18, 2021; Fort Worth, TX, USA; AJ Styles (black pants) and Omos (black attire) battle The Viking Raiders (gray trunks) for the Raw men's tag team titles during Money in the Bank at Dickies Arena. Mandatory Credit: Joe Camporeale-USA TODAY Sports /
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This past Monday’s episode of WWE Raw represented the red brand’s last stop before Saturday’s Royal Rumble pay-per-view. Unfortunately, this episode wasn’t reflective of a promotion that felt the urgency to promote one of its biggest shows of the year.

Of course, this doesn’t mean this week’s show didn’t feature any redeeming qualities; even for a show like Raw, that would be difficult to accomplish throughout the show’s three-hour runtime. So, let’s discuss those high points.

These are the top two things that went right on the Jan. 24 episode of WWE Raw.

A pair of good matches with clean finishes

Yes, this positive falls into the “this is the bare minimum category”, but in the cases of the AJ Styles vs. Austin Theory and Randy Orton vs. Chad Gable matches, WWE deserves some credit for mostly staying out of the way and letting these world-class wrestlers do what they do best and ending things with a clean finish.

To be fair, fans did have to sit through a spelling contest to get to the really good Orton/Gable match and the lack of a reaction for the arguably overpushed Theory took a bit away from their otherwise excellent match, but that doesn’t change how refreshing it was to see WWE take a relatively straightforward approach with these matches.

Brock Lesnar/Bobby Lashley weigh-in

To start the show, WWE conducted a weigh-in between WWE Champion Brock Lesnar and number one contender Bobby Lashley ahead of their clash at the Royal Rumble. While the proceedings were largely ceremonial — WWE doesn’t enforce weight limits — it did get across the story of Lesnar slightly underestimating “The All Mighty” and Lashley being all consumed with besting a man who he’s been compared to for years.

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While the idea of Lesnar looking past Lashley is a bit dubious — especially if he’s beating Lashley clean at the Rumble — WWE has given more care to this feud than most of the other scheduled matches for the PPV and while this wasn’t the most exciting angle it could’ve done to build this match, it was effective enough and didn’t overstay its welcome.

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