The Main Events
– Daniel Bryan says no to surrendering his WWE World Heavyweight Championship. Stephanie shows Brie Bella putting her hands on Steph a few weeks ago and says Daniel Bryan needs to make a choice: surrender it or have Brie fired.
WWE Payback will be when Bryan makes his decision. I understand WWE dragging this along a bit. It was smart to give his decision a bigger spotlight, but I wonder if WWE realizes that a feud for the World Champion circled around a Diva is not "Best For Business." He will surrender it and then WWE will find a way to make Brie seek payback while he is out. I just do not like how much involvement she has with this storyline. Daniel Bryan makes things more exciting every night, but Stephanie fell flat a bit and the final decision does not specifically focus on Bryan. It is more about his wife and her future.
Score: 5/10
–Bray Wyatt targets the Cenation and then focuses his attention on the announce team. JBL ends up trying to fight for Lawler, who is singled out by Bray. JBL takes a clothesline from Harper and Lawler gets into the ring. Bray talks about how Lawler has fed the fans about John Cena being a good guy and never questioning his morality. He is about to hit Sister Abigail onto Lawler, but Cena comes out. He gets beaten down and then The Uso's come out. Wyatt's finally retreat and Cena cuts a serious promo.
I enjoyed this segment. There needed to be another piece involved and WWE decided to go with Lawler. When did Lawler and Cena become best friends? Little details like that surprised me. Also, JBL is a heel commentator. They did not need to involve him. Stick with what you know and stick with what works. This worked and helped Wyatt get a little more heat. People never cheer Lawler getting beaten up or in danger.
Score: 6
Contract Signing
-Evolution and The Shield sign the contract. They end up brawling to close out the show. Triple H gets a sledgehammer and Evolution stands tall once again. A repeat button must have been stuck because we have seen time for 3-4 weeks. The Triple Powerbomb onto Reigns was very good. He took the bump and the intensity of the closing segment saved the fact that this has been done time and time again. I am excited for WWE Payback, but are you?
WWE really gave us a ton of crap on Raw. From fast matches to meaningless feuds, WWE did not put enough effort into building a solid foundation for WWE Payback. Yes, a few matches will sell and be good. The problem is that three hours of too long and it is hard to make garbage into gold.
Score: 6/10
WWE Raw Score: 4/10
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