Keith Lee is a Future Star
The fact that Keith Lee even has the opportunity to earn a WWE Championship match against Drew McIntyre this early in his tenure on the WWE main roster bodes extremely well for him and says that Mr. McMahon is serious about making Lee into a star that is a major attraction on Monday Night Raw. Even if The Limitless One does not end up receiving a WWE Title match at Clash of Champions Gold Rush, he is still being made into a legitimate threat on Raw simply by interacting with the WWE Champion on a weekly basis.
Until Randy Orton is officially ruled out of the WWE Championship match at Clash of Champions Gold Rush, I’m going to assume that it will be Orton challenging McIntyre for the WWE Title on September 27. There’s a very good chance Orton might even win the WWE Title at the end of September; if not then, maybe inside Hell in a Cell on November 1.
Orton has built a whole lot of momentum as a dominant heel in 2020, starting with his incredible rivalry with Edge (which started the night after the Royal Rumble when Orton proposed that their tag team, Rated RKO, reunite). It is excellent, however, to see the company becoming serious about making Keith Lee into a star immediately, because WWE has struggled somewhat in recent years to create new stars.
It might be time for at least one member of Retribution to show their face, because otherwise the WWE universe is going to get impatient and simply start tuning out of Raw because they don’t understand where this storyline is headed. Retribution has served their purpose under the masks, but it’s time to show their faces and give them actual personas.
It makes sense why WWE keeps orchestrating Keith Lee’s matches so nearly all of them end in disqualification. Mr. McMahon is orchestrating these non-finishes so that Lee doesn’t take losses, and it’s working beautifully right now. The only match Lee has had that did not end in disqualification was at Payback on August 30 when he beat Randy Orton. There is still a very high chance that Mr. McMahon will orchestrate for Randy Orton to win the WWE Title on September 27 so he can begin a rivalry with Keith Lee within a month or two of winning the championship (maybe even immediately after winning the title).
Seth Rollins ensures the Future of Murphy; Dominik Mysterio develops himself Further
It might be safe to infer that Murphy is no longer a disciple of Seth Rollins – it will be a step in the right direction for him to branch out on his own and see how much potential he truly has. Physically, Murphy can keep up with anyone in the ring (going back to his days as Cruiserweight Champion). Hopefully, this breakup with The Monday Night Messiah will cause Mr. McMahon to think about giving Murphy his first name back to add legitimacy to his character.
Murphy has been the second (along with Dominik Mysterio) on what I’m sure will be a long list of names who are put over by Seth Rollins. Based on what Rollins’ general mentality is, he is very unselfish with a high degree of character. The Architect also cares a great deal about ensuring the future of the business and it is his primary goal right now to help build the next generation of WWE superstars.
Rollins’ character in WWE is firmly established; now he views it as his responsibility to aid other superstars so they can experience the same joys by giving them guidance on their road to becoming top WWE superstars who the company leans on just as they have with Seth. Seth has done all he can to give Murphy a springboard into superstardom, now Murphy needs to take the ball and run with it.
Nothing is ever orchestrated purely by accident in WWE, when one considers the amount of precision with which Mr. McMahon prepares each week. With that being said, Rey Mysterio’s daughter Aalyah now has to get involved in a storyline with Murphy and/or Seth Rollins for everything to have continuity and logic.
Aalyah Mysterio may start to become involved in a romantic with Murphy after she placed her hand on Murphy’s shoulder this week on Raw. Dave Meltzer has drawn the logical conclusion that Aalyah will become “hooked up” with Murphy in the coming weeks.
The wrestling business is now clearly a family affair for the Mysterio family. Rey started out in the business over 30 years ago because of one of his uncles, and he went on to become one of the greatest wrestlers of his time, producing his most fantastic matches in the late 1990s with superstars like Eddie Guerrero. It has to be extremely rewarding for Rey to be introducing his son and now his daughter into the business.
Asuka retains the Raw Women’s Championship against Mickie James in a solid Match with a sloppy finish that could be Salvaged by transforming it into a Storyline
This was most likely Mickie James’ final opportunity at the Raw Women’s Championship (considering she’s 41 years old). Unfortunately, she does not have nearly as much momentum right now as Asuka. The match itself was a little awkward to say the least. Neither of the two superstars seemed to know what was going on, same thing with the commentary team. One way this could be salvaged is by turning this mishap into a storyline between James and Asuka.
Mickie is still extremely talented as an in-ring performer and looks about 10 years younger than she is – she could easily be placed higher on the card and produce a quality championship feud with The Empress of Tomorrow.
The Street Profits have a significant amount of momentum in WWE right now
The Street Profits defended their home turf of Monday Night Raw against the SmackDown Tag Team Champions Cesaro and Shinsuke Nakamura (The Bar 2.0. Cesaro has been tag team champions with 3 different partners: Tyson Kidd, Sheamus and now Nakamura) as part of the quarterly brand-to-brand invitational. It’s smart of WWE to do something like this every three months to give fans something new. The first time WWE did this was back in June when King Corbin came to Raw to challenge the WWE Champion Drew McIntyre (which McIntyre won).
Perhaps the next time this occurs WWE might want to orchestrate for someone from Raw to come to SmackDown and challenge someone from that brand. The man or woman from SmackDown could get the victory as well because it has happened the other way around both times WWE has done it to this point.
Fresh start for Strowman
Braun Strowman is a massive acquisition for Raw and an equally massive loss for SmackDown. It’s somewhat surprising that Strowman – a former Universal Champion – was moved from the bigger network in FOX. This move goes to show that SmackDown will be heavily reliant on the feud between Roman Reigns and The Fiend Bray Wyatt (with Alexa Bliss potentially getting involved as a mouthpiece of some sort for The Fiend, maybe even as the human embodiment of the spirit of Sister Abigail) to carry the brand as its top storyline moving forward.
This move for Strowman makes sense within the framework of his storyline, as he was funneled out of the Universal Championship picture. He lost the championship at SummerSlam to The Fiend and subsequently was thrown into with a triple threat Universal Title match with The Fiend and Roman Reigns at Payback, where The Big Dog became Universal Champion as a heel for the first time. Strowman has successfully been funneled out of that storyline, so he needed a fresh start – opening the door for him to switch brands.
Cedric Alexander defeats Ricochet, continuing his momentum on Monday Night Raw after joining The Hurt Business
Personally, I would say that I envision Ricochet turning into a bigger star than Cedric Alexander, but Alexander clearly has much more momentum right now having just joined The Hurt Business. Ricochet and Alexander formed a tag team immediately after WrestleMania 36 in April, which seems like each in history now considering it was only a few months ago.
The other three members of The Hurt Business aside from Alexander are all in their 40s, so it’s a positive thing to inject some youth into the stable. MVP is unselfishly using his history with WWE to elevate underutilized superstars, and it’s working to perfection.
There may be more to the Match between KO and Aleister Black – with the lights Flickering on and off – than Meets the Eye
Aleister Black speculated on Raw talk that Kevin Owens could be the leader of Retribution. This might make sense because Owens is currently not involved in a major storyline – and to be honest he hasn’t been since ‘Mania. Owens is currently involved in a confusing, makeshift storyline with Aleister Black at the moment.
This storyline appeared to come to an end on Monday night after Owens defeated Black. Owens seemingly began this rivalry as the babyface who was simply trying to help Aleister, who wanted absolutely no part of it. It would be an interesting wrinkle to the storyline if Owens had a hidden agenda to hide his true intentions, because people would least suspect him to be the leader of Retribution if his intentions seemed pure on the outside.
This is genius because the average fan watching Raw would simply dismiss the match between Kevin Owens and Aleister Black as meaning nothing, but great storytelling is always in the subtlety. No one suspects that anything is going on, and one day they are hit with some major storyline development out of nowhere.