Bobby Lashley has a match against Seth ‘Freakin’ Rollins tonight and will address Brock Lesnar’s most recent comments about him. Becky Lynch also has a new challenger to address in Doudrop, but WWE in their infinite “wisdom” decided the best build for their match is to make them team against Bianca Belair and Liv Morgan. And RK-Bro will attempt to bounce back from losing the tag titles… or will they?

I’m Amanda and this is the RAW review.

Match Results

Becky Lynch & Doudrop def. Bianca Belair & Liv Morgan

Kevin Owens def. Damian Priest

Austin Theory def. Finn Balor

Omos def. Reggie

Street Profits & The Mysterios vs Apollo Crews, Commander Azeez & The Dirty Dawgs

Seth Rollins vs Bobby Lashley – No Contest

The Show

♦ Becky Lynch kicked things off, ring-ready but there to talk. We’re less than two week’s from Royal Rumble and the RAW women’s division has never been hotter, and that’s down to her. She cited that as the reason all the legends were coming back, rather than the fact WWE have sacked so many people the women’s divisions of RAW and SmackDown combined aren’t big enough to fill a Rumble match.

She’s also responsible for Doudrop’s success apparently. She’s given her the biggest opportunity of her life because that’s what she does. She makes people better and then she beats them. She almost gave Doudrop props for her tenacity, but not quite, and sent a message that Doudrop would never be champion as long as she runs the industry.

Doudrop came out to have a word. She got herself the title match but if it was Lynch’s plan to face her over Bianca Belair, then it’s the biggest mistake she’s ever made. They told each other to stay out of the way in the match, then Bianca Belair joined them.

She’s not happy about Becky Lynch costing her the match last week, but she told her she only bought some time. Belair is entering the Rumble, and she’s planning to win it again and main event WrestleMania again.

The final competitor in the tag match, Liv Morgan, showed up and also officially entered the Rumble. She’s planning to win it, of course.

Doudrop pretended to snore and called for the ref before she got much further, and Lynch got in a couple of sneaky slaps then hid behind Doudrop while we went for a break.

Becky Lynch & Doudrop vs Bianca Belair & Liv Morgan started when we got back, and it didn’t take long for trouble to start. Lynch tagged herself in and told Doudrop to get out and listen to her, then got immediately dropkicked by Belair. Morgan gave Lynch plenty more trouble, and Doudrop had to break up a pin. Belair tried and failed to K.O.D. her. Lynch tried to pin Morgan with her feet on the ropes, but Morgan kicked out.

Lynch landed a Manhandle Slam but Doudrop broke that pin-up too. At the ref’s insistence, she dragged Lynch to the corner and got out of the ring to tag herself in, then splashed Morgan for the win. She dropped onto Lynch from the second rope for good measure as well.

♦ Chad Gable and Otis were all dressed up in graduation gowns in the locker room. Their tag title celebrations are later.

♦ Reggie asked Edge for advice for his match against Omos. He wished him luck but said he didn’t have a chance. Beth Phoenix congratulated Dana Brooke on her 24/7 title and told her she’s watched her bust her butt for years. They hugged and chatted with Damian Priest about how to win a Rumble match then left to discuss an invitation to the ring from Maryse.

After they’d gone, Kevin Owens approached Priest and told him he’s looking forward to their match. He wants a good clean match, maybe a technical one, but he doesn’t want to see Priest’s Damian side.

Owens had an announcement to make, via an episode of The KO Show, with Seth Rollins as a guest. As part of the recap of Rollins appearance on SmackDown, they chose to show Roman Reigns telling Rollins if he wanted to main event Royal Rumble with a megastar he would have chosen his wife, which was perfect.

Owens told Rollins he admires him, picking out his dress sense and his courage for walking into SmackDown. Rollins said Reigns is scared of him and laughed at the way he dodged The Usos on Friday. He went as far as to say taking the Universal Championship will be as easy as taking candy from a baby, and he’s bringing it back to RAW. Owens was excited because if Rollins brings that back to RAW, they can get rid of Brock Lesnar.

Obviously, Kevin Owens’ big announcement was that he’s entering the Royal Rumble match and when he wins they’ll get to give us the biggest WrestleMania match, Kevin Owens versus Seth ‘Freakin’ Rollins.

Damian Priest arrived on the stage and Rollins shouted at him. Priest shouted back and called them delusional idiots. No one believes Rollins can beat Reigns, and no one believes Owens will win the Rumble. And if Owens doesn’t want to see the Damian in him, he suggests he doesn’t wake him up. He’d got their match brought forward to after the ads as well.

Damian Priest vs Kevin Owens was excellent. A few blows in a row brought a hint of the Damian out, but Owens escaped the ring. When Priest followed and jumped off the steps, Owens’ kicked him in the face and frog-splashed him from the apron.

They were back in the ring after the ads and gave the crowd their money’s worth. We got a highlight reel of kicked out of finishers, but Owens’ ended up with an injury to his leg. The ref called for a medic and when Priest got close enough, Owens gave him a stunner and pinned him.

He was well away from the ring before Priest got up, but I suspect that won’t save him.

♦ The Elimination Chamber is paying Saudi Arabia a visit.

♦ Veer Mahaan is still coming to RAW, but it no longer says ‘Coming Soon,’ just ‘Coming.’

♦ Sarah Schreiber asked Nikki A.S.H. for her thoughts going into a match against her former tag team partner. She said it’s no different to any other time she competes. It’s clear she stands alone now and she couldn’t feel any better. Rhea should be down and out, mortified after proving she wasn’t the friend she thought it was.

When Schreiber said Nikki did brutally attack Ripley, she got angry and said Rhea was the one who broke up their team and flushed their friendship down the toilet. Ripley is the villain and she’s the closest the people of Tulsa will ever have to a superhero. They should appreciate her as the people’s hero and understand that sometimes heroes need to do things that regular people don’t understand. After tonight, Ripley will learn she needs a superhero whether she likes it or not. – Not a great promo, but it did the job.

♦ The Alpha Academy’s Graduation Ceremony was a thing that happened. Chad Gable patronised people about his master’s degree and called the whole city uneducated. He talked about what a good student Otis was, despite not knowing the last name WWE removed from him, and presented him with a diploma.

Riddle, in a multi-coloured graduation gown, interrupted Otis’ speech about how hard they were going to defend the title. He was there to deliver a speech. I’ve no idea whether there was a point, but if there was he didn’t get to it before Gable interrupted.

Gable challenged Riddle to an Alpha Academy Academic Challenge to earn the rematch, rather than a match. Otis didn’t look convinced by that one, but Riddle was all in and started babbling. Otis took off his robe and stalked Riddle up the ramp, which is when Randy Orton delivered an RKO to Gable. Riddle felled Otis at ringside and joined Orton in the ring where Orton borrowed Otis’ cap and gown to accept the challenge. – That’s going to be so weird.

♦ There was a nice tribute to Martin Luther King Jr. on Martin Luther King Day.

♦ Austin Theory visited Vince McMahon in his office before his rematch against Finn Balor to thank him. McMahon said if Theory doesn’t beat Balor tonight and beat him up, he’ll grab an equaliser and beat him up. He was quite graphic in his description, which ended with him sending a selfie with a bloodied and beaten Theory, to his mum.

So, Austin Theory vs Finn Balor started with a highly motivated Austin Theory. But Balor was after payback for the backstage beating and after a sling blade on the outside, things were going badly for Theory. I want to say the match was good, but I think most of it happened in the ads. Theory dodged the Coup de Grace and delivered an ATL for the win. Then, true to his orders, he took a selfie and gave Balor a tame post-match beatdown and another ATL.

♦ Sarah Schreiber asked Rhea Ripley about Nikki A.S.H.’s comments. She wanted them to remain supportive friends in their solo careers but Nikki made up her mind. She doesn’t understand how Nikki thinks she’s the villain of the piece, but she was going out there to remind everyone who Rhea Ripley is.

Rhea Ripley vs Nikki A.S.H. never started. Queen Zelina and Carmella came to the stage and gloated about breaking them up and destroying their friendship, then started the same mind games with Ripley that broke Nikki down. Nikki A.S.H. attacked Ripley before the bell while Vega was mocking her. She threw Ripley into the steps and was backed off by the ref.

♦ Dana Brooke gave Reggie a pep-talk backstage, to run through their battle plan against Omos. Reggie had a wobble, but she talked him round. R-Truth, Tamina, Akira Tozawa, and a ref were watching in the background eating popcorn. After Brooke and Reggie left, R-Truth speculated she must hate him because she just told him to “go get got”.

Omos vs Reggie, with Dana Brooke, was immediately interrupted by Tozawa, Truth, and Tamina. Brooke ran off to save her title. Tozawa was tossed from the ring by Omos, Truth got levelled, and Tamina left of her own free will. Reggie came off the top, Omos caught him and threw him down and pinned him with a foot on his chest.

♦ Maryse told the crowd she was there to clear up her husband’s mess and invited Beth Phoenix to come to the ring alone. She brought Edge with her, so Maryse stopped them halfway down the ramp and asked them to stay there.

Maryse wants the mixed-tag cancelled, Beth offered to hear her out. First Maryse said no one wants the match, but that backfired and any minimal crowd sympathy she had was gone by argument two, which was that they come from the same generation of wrestlers and should be best friends, not opponents. She suggested dinners and playdates and coffee instead of a match.

Phoenix told her to shut up and that she wasn’t buying it, suggesting Maryse takes acting lessons from her husband. The match is on because she’s not missing a chance to tag with her husband for the first time and she’s not missing the chance to Glam Slam her through the canvas.

Maryse held her ground when Phoenix suggested a preview, which should have rung alarm bells. Miz tried to attack Edge on the outside and when Phoenix turned to look, Maryse hit her with her clutch bag.

On the stage with Miz, she revealed the bag had a brick in it.

♦ Before Street Profits & The Mysterios vs Apollo Crews, Commander Azeez & The Dirty Dawgs, Dawkins and Ford were joined by Rey and Dominik Mysterio for a chat about who’s winning the rumble. The match was fun and chaotic, as an eight-man tag should be. It’s Rumble season, so there were bodies flying over the top rope everywhere. Montez Ford got the pin on Apollo Crews with one of those enormously high and far frog splashes.

The Mysterios tipped Ford and Dawkins over the top rope after the match, then Rey chucked Dominik out too.

♦ Bobby Lashley told After the Bell that Brock Lesnar is an exciting person to fight because he has no soul. That was the lead-in to the joint career retrospective. Another of WWE’s great video packages.

♦ Backstage, Kevin Patrick asked The Miz and Maryse. Miz boasted that it only took one shot to make Beth Phoenix require medical attention. He also revealed it’s Maryse’s birthday next week and he’s throwing her a party.

♦ Alexa Bliss’ therapist said he had fewer breakable things in his office this week and he was going to keep seeing her. They did a word association exercise, but the only word Bliss could find was Lilly. His final word was imaginary, but she didn’t say Lilly to that one, she stood up and stared at him and he fled.

♦ Bobby Lashley, with MVP, vs Seth Rollins was great. Rollins slithered out of an early Hurt Lock and successfully delivered two suicide dives. Neither took Lashley off his feet and, on the second, Rollins took a suplex. When he did have control, Rollins focused on trying to destroy Lashley’s knee. He worked it long and hard, and when Lashley got back up and into it, it hadn’t slowed him down one iota. He was favouring it in downtime moments, and it was obviously hurting, but he pushed through.

They tore each other down. Rollins missed a Stomp but countered a spear. Lashley took a Pedigree and kicked out. Lashley brought Rollins down from the top turnbuckle by throwing him across the ring but was attacked by Cedric Alexander and Shelton Benjamin before he could capitalise. Rollins watch from the corner, confused, as they beat on him until he turned around and beat them both up.

While Rollins watched the aftermath of Lashley putting Benjamin through a barricade, the Usos snuck into the ring. When he turned around, they superkicked him.

That was the only logical end to the show. You can’t have either challenger lose that match with only one more show until Royal Rumble. It felt a little like a go-home show tonight. The Rumble is such a big deal that everything is heavily geared towards it. That’s not a criticism, but it does get a little repetitive.