Drew comes out and hypes up Raw and points to the Mania sign. Drew talks about the Rumble and Edge comes out and Drew says he’s always been a mentor to him. Edge takes offense to having smoke blown up his ass and tells Drew that as a Rumble winner, he of all people should know that makes him an immediate threat. Sheamus comes out and basically calls Edge lazy for sitting out so long with a torn triceps. He puts over Drew for carrying the company through the pandemic era and Edge tells Drew that he’ll let him know who he’ll face later – but no matter who he faces, he’s leaving Mania as champion. Edge has always been a great promo as a main event-level act, but he’s at another level during this run.
Drew poses with the belt before Sheamus FINALLY boots his head off while Joe explains just why Sheamus feels he had to do this. Sheamus says that he wants the WWE Title back. Gulak gives him his bags – so we’ve got Drew vs. Sheamus coming up and Drew will go through Gulak to show Sheamus he means business – solid stuff. Riddle faces off with Lashley in a short match when Lashley kicks too much ass and has the Hurt Lock on in the ropes and won’t break. MVP tells him to break and Lashley gets pissed at him. Women’s Rumble recap airs before Bad Bunny shows up. Riddle is met by officials and has no recollection of what happens.
Orton is chats backstage and says that Edge made him a liar last night – so he wants him tonight. Kofi and Woods chat about Ali being upset over Kofi getting his push two years ago. Woods faces Ali, with Woods using Brodie’s offense for near-falls. He counters an Ali cradle with his own cradle to win. Bad Bunny is here with Damian Priest – making his main roster debut. MizTV time with Miz saying Bad Bunny could learn a lot from him, like Daniel Bryan did. We get some horrible singing and comedy before Danian comes down to fight Miz and beats him quickly. The Broken Arrow gets 2 before Bad Bunny gets involved and Miz eats the Reckoning to end it.
A Fiendish Bliss video airs to set up her match with Nikki Cross tonight. Cedric and Shelton face the Lucha House Party in a solid, but unspectacular match. Metalik got a few hope spots in, but fell to Paydirt. Asuka warns Charlotte backstage to not mess up again. They face off against Manda and Dana and Naomi and Lana tonight. Charlotte hits Natural Selection, but wouldn’t you know it – Ric and Lacey come out and Asuka gets tagged in while Charlotte leaves. Naomi hits the rear view and wins – giving her team a title shot. Charly chats with Drw and says he’d love to face Edge, and if Sheamus wants to throw away their friendship for a fight – okay. Carlito is back on Raw and teams with Jeff Hardy to face Ryker and Elias. Carlito’s backstabber set up the swanton win and Jeff’s random tag team run continues.
Edge says he went bell to bell last night, but he has to take out Orton one last time tonight. Alexa faces Nikki in another wacky transformation match. Bliss wins after a Sister Abigail DDT – so basically Velveteen’s finish. Edge did way more here than I expected for a TV match after going an hour. They paced this out perfectly with him going for sudden flash knockouts early, but Orton avoids defeat and counters a spear into a powerslam. He works over the arm a bit before Edge fires back with a flying lariat and avoids an RKO by turning it into an Edge-O-Matic. They brawl on the floor and Orton lands a back suplex onto the announce table before Orton hotshots him into the bottom rope and lands a draping DDT. Orton does the snake strike bit, but Alexa appears on the turnbuckle and a dark liquid pours from her mouth to distract him – giving Edge the win via spear. Fantastic TV match and the best match on Raw in a long time.
