SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
WWE MONDAY NIGHT RAW PRIMER
OCTOBER 18, 2021
SACRAMENTO, CA. AT THE GOLDEN 1 CENTER
AIRS ON USA NETWORK, 8:00 p.m. EDT
BY FRANK PETEANI (@FrankPeteani), PWTORCH.COM CONTRIBUTOR
Announcers: Jimmy Smith, Byron Saxton, Corey Graves
Match Results from Last Week and Exclusives
- Xavier Woods defeated Ricochet to advance to the King of the Ring semi-finals.
- Cedric Alexander & Shelton Benjamin defeated Mustafa Ali & Mansoor.
- Shayna Baszler defeated Dana Brooke to advance to the semi-finals of the Queen’s Crown tournament.
- Omos defeated Raw Tag Team Championship co-holder Riddle.
- Austin Theory defeated Jeff Hardy.
- Jinder Mahal defeated Kofi Kingston to advance to the semi-finals of the King of the Ring tournament.
- Raw and Smackdown Women’s Champions Charlotte Flair & Becky Lynch (respectively) and Bianca Belair & Sasha Banks wrestled to a no-contest.
- Doudrop defeated Natalya to advance to the semi-finals of the Queen’s Crown tournament.
- Smackdown Tag Team Champions the Usos (Jimmy & Jey) defeated WWE Champion Big E & Drew McIntyre via count out.
Arena
WWE continues its tour of the west coast as they pull into the Golden 1 Center in Sacramento, CA. The five-year-old arena first hosted WWE events in October of 2016 beginning with No Mercy and held the infamous PPV where Seth Rollins and The “Fiend” Bray Wyatt wrestled to a no-contest in a Hell in a Cell match.
Five matches are advertised for tonight.
Raw Women’s Championship: Charlotte Flair (champ) vs. Bianca Belair
Tonight, Bianca Belair challenges Charlotte Flair for the Raw Women’s Championship.
Bianca will be a busy woman this week since at Crown Jewel, she will challenge Becky Lynch along with Sasha Banks for the Smackdown Women’s Championship. Things have been hectic with these women as they were on opposite sides of the tag team match that started as a brawl, then went to a match, and ended in a no-contest. Two weeks ago, they went one-on-one and that ended in a DQ when Becky Lynch got involved in the match.
Becky is sure to be lurking around. Here she is in a WWE exclusive:
Frank’s Analysis: Logic would dictate that Bianca wins the title tonight since she’s on Raw, and Charlotte is ticketed for Smackdown, right?
Queen’s Crown Semi-Finals: Doudrop vs. Shayna Baszler
Doudrop goes one-on-one with Shayna Baszler for the right to face Zelina Vega in the finals of the Queens Crown tournament which will take place at Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia this Thursday. Zelina qualified this past Friday on Smackdown by defeating Carmella.
Apparently, Shayna is anxious to get to Saudi Arabia. To each his/her own:
It’s been awhile since I’ve been to Saudi Arabia. Long overdue for a return trip……
— Shayna Baszler (@QoSBaszler) October 12, 2021
Frank’s Analysis: You can make a case for all three women winning this tournament. Given how the Queen’s Crown and King of the Ring are perceived, I would not be high on the winner’s future in WWE.
King of the Ring Semi-Finals: Xavier Woods vs. Jinder Mahal
Xavier Woods will take on Jinder Mahal for the right to face Finn Balor in the finals of the King of the Ring tournament, which also takes place at Crown Jewel this Thursday. Last week, WWE teased the possibility of Woods facing Kofi Kingston in this week’s match, but Jinder defeated Kofi with Veer and Shanky at ringside.
Xavier and Kofi (New Day) as well as Jinder and Shanky are ticketed to officially start on Smackdown this Friday. Here’s Xavier in a WWE exclusive and Jinder on Twitter:
King Jind, read em’ and weep. #KingOfTheRing
— The Maharaja (@JinderMahal) October 9, 2021
Frank’s Analysis: It’d be more interesting to see a match with Xavier and Finn, but I’m guessing they’re going with Jinder. That’s not inspiring at all.
WWE Champion Big E & Drew McIntyre vs. Dirty Dawgs (Dolph Ziggler & Robert Roode)
Big E and Drew McIntyre will pair up again this week to take on Dolph Ziggler & Robert Roode in a rematch from two weeks ago. That contest was won by Big E & Drew.
The match came about after Drew challenged Big E to a WWE Championship match. Ziggler and Roode came out and Ziggler discussed his history with both men. Big E came to the main roster in late 2012 as Big E Langston and was Ziggler’s “heavy” so to speak. Drew returned to the WWE in 2017 after being let go three years prior. After a brief stint in NXT, where he defeated (ironically) Roode for the NXT Championship, he came to the main roster in essentially the same role with Ziggler. They had a stint as Raw Tag Team Champions, and Drew helped Ziggler win the Intercontinental Championship briefly in 2018. Ziggler said there would be no Drew or Big E winning Money in the Bank without him.
Last week as I mentioned earlier, Drew and Big E lost to the Usos via disqualification. Like what happened in the women’s tag match, things broke down at the end. They fought on the outside until the referee counted them out. This Thursday at Crown Jewel, Big E puts the WWE Championship on the line against Drew, who hopes to begin his third reign as champion. Here’s a little sarcasm from Drew on Twitter:
Well I am a sucker for first-time matches https://t.co/Qbk11M62NW
— Drew McIntyre (@DMcIntyreWWE) October 16, 2021
Frank’s Analysis: I’d complain about repetitive matches, but what’s the point? Seeing Drew’s tweet, at least we’re not the only ones thinking it. It’s hard to see last week as anything but a way to build tension between upcoming opponents. The problem with this is that they’ve shown respect towards each other, so why would I think there’s tension? Just because they have a match coming up, I’m to believe they have issues with each other. Do the Dodgers and Braves hate each other because they’re in the NLCS, or the same for the Red Sox and Astros in the ALCS (there actually may be something there but I digress). The way they were both presented last week was awful, and to be honest it made me less interested in the upcoming match (as if I was looking forward to it in the first place but again, I digress).
Non-Title Match: Raw Tag Team Champions RKBro (Randy Orton & Riddle) vs. Street Profits (Montez Ford & Angelo Dawkins)
RKBro will take on the Street Profits in a non-title match as the Profits make their return to Raw. They were drafted to Smackdown last fall but drafted back a few weeks ago. They were the Raw Tag Team Champions from February of 2020 until being drafted to Smackdown where they did a title switch with New Day, the Smackdown Tag Team Champions at the time.
RKBro will defend their titles against A.J. Styles and Omos at Crown Jewel.
Frank’s Analysis: Who else can see the Profits being added to the match to make it a triple threat?
Follow Frank on Twitter @FrankPeteani. Thank you for reading!
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