Monday Night Raw Review - February 14, 2022

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

The WWE Championship Elimination Chamber Combatants Interrupted Each Other

This was one of those typical opening segments where it was essentially a revolving door of promos, but everyone's mic work was solid as they stated their case for why they'll win the Elimination Chamber match. Granted, Brock Lesnar was the only one we didn't hear from, but he let his destruction of Austin Theory do his talking for him. None of the promos stood out at all, but the visual of Lesnar confronting his upcoming opponents in the Chamber while wearing a cowboy hat made this whole thing worthwhile.

The Street Profits def. The Dirty Dawgs

Angelo Dawkins was not a happy man coming out of the Bengals loss at the Super Bowl on Sunday, but at least he was able to get back on track here with a win over Dirty Dawgs. These two have had what has felt like a million matches against each other since late 2020, but it less about the match and more about Tommaso Ciampa getting into it with Dolph Ziggler at ringside after what went down between the two last Tuesday on NXT. I think Ziggler could benefit from a change of scenery that isn't Raw or SmackDown, though keeping him on Raw in the meantime is unnecessary.

United States Champion Damian Priest def. AJ Styles

This stemmed from Styles beating Priest in a Championship Contender's match last week on Raw. If they were going to do the title match after only one week, you'd think they'd give it more time than they did. I honestly think this went shorter than their original encounter, making the finish feel so abrupt as a result. What we got from them was fine, but it could have been so much more. Priest pinning Styles clean was notable, though.

Omos def. The Hurt Business in a 2-on-1 Handicap Match

I don't know whose coffee Cedric Alexander and Shelton Benjamin pissed in, but it's a shame seeing them treated like total enhancement talent. The actual Hurt Business breaking up last year was the beginning of the end for them, and although WWE had a chance to get them back on track by reuniting the group in its entirety, they never went all the way with it and had Bobby Lashley destroy them instead. This was literally over in about a minute. I was starting to think WWE had abandoned Omos' push because we hadn't seen him since the Royal Rumble, but they're clearly still high on him given the way he won here despite his in-ring limitations.

Raw Women's Champion Becky Lynch and Lita Signed the Contract for Their Raw Women's Championship Match at Elimination Chamber

Lynch has talked for weeks about how she grew up idolizing Lita and it would have been easy for her to do what she always does by acting cocky going into their match. Instead, she acted not only afraid but bothered that she'll have to put down one of her biggest inspirations. Lita's mic work was good albeit a bit basic, but Lynch's performance was especially stellar because of her delivery and how it wasn't what I was expecting from her.

Bianca Belair def. Rhea Ripley, Doudrop, Liv Morgan and Nikki A.S.H. in a Gauntlet Match to Enter Last in the Raw Women's Championship No. 1 Contender's Elimination Chamber Match

WWE has done Gauntlet matches before Elimination Chamber every year since 2018 I believe and they've all delivered. This was no exception. Needless to say, Ripley was the standout star by running through Nikki, Morgan and Doudrop before finally falling to Belair. I liked that Ripley vs. Belair was given as much time as it was because their chemistry is terrific. I expected the mystery sixth entrant to come out after Belair beat Ripley, but instead, we found out later on that it will in fact be Alexa Bliss. Hopefully she won't be doing the supernatural stuff anymore (despite still bringing Lilly to the ring with her), but I was disappointed it wasn't a bigger surprise such as a returning Asuka.

Raw Tag Team Champions Alpha Academy def. The Mysterios (Non-Title)

The Mysterios have been feuding with The Miz in recent weeks and thus it made sense for Miz to cost them the win here, especially with Alpha Academy being the Raw Tag Team Champions. This didn't last long at all, but it was a quality contest for what it was. Keeping Alpha Academy rolling was imperative as they've been the best part about Raw for weeks. We also found out that Miz will go one-on-one with Rey at Chamber this Saturday.

Seth Rollins def. Randy Orton

I think it's virtually impossible for these two to have a bad match together. They got a ton of time and it was entertaining and well wrestled as expected. With Rollins being in the WWE Championship Elimination Chamber, it made more sense for him to win than Orton, and I didn't mind Alpha Academy distracting Orton from the ramp to cost him the win. We found out earlier that RK-Bro will get their rematch for the Raw Tag Team Championship in two weeks on Raw.

Overall Show

As an Elimination Chamber go-home show, this edition of Raw was perfectly solid and did its job in building toward Saturday's pay-per-view (excuse me, "premium live event"). The Gauntlet match and main event provided some above-average wrestling and the contract signing served its purpose. Even the RK-Broga party backstage wasn't terrible television. Raw has definitely been better lately, but it remains to be seen whether it will translate to a strong road to WrestleMania coming out of Elimination Chamber.

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