Monday Night Raw Review - January 29, 2024

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Drew McIntyre Attacked CM Punk

Needless to say, this was easily the best promo Punk has cut since returning to WWE. It's just such a shame it had to come under such circumstances. The fact he'll miss WrestleMania 40 (where he was virtually guaranteed to challenge Seth Rollins for the World Heavyweight Championship) is a massive bummer, but like he said, there's always next year. McIntyre played his role perfectly in this segment (continuing to do the best work of his entire career), and Zayn going after McIntyre was logical given their own history. A strong segment to start the show.

Undisputed WWE Tag Team Champions The Judgment Day (Finn Balor and Damian Priest) def. #DIY; Judgment Day Attacked R-Truth and The Miz

It was a wise decision to have this be the first match of the night, especially with the first hour being commercial-free. They absolutely killed it. #DIY will usually come out to nearly no reaction only to get the crowd behind them during their matches and this was no different. This was tag team wrestling at its finest, and I'm okay with holding off on their eventual tag title win. The post-match angle with Judgment Day beating down Truth and Miz was terrific. Will Awesome Truth be the ones to ultimately beat Judgment Day for the belts?

Zoey Stark and Shayna Baszler def. Chelsea Green and Piper Niven

Another week, another women's tag team match that the crowd sits on their hands for. All of these women are talented and deserve better, but they're not over and that's not going to change if they're all facing each other. The matches themselves are decent, but what was the point of this? To give Stark and Baszler a win? Okay, but after they fail to win the WWE Women's Tag Team Championship, then what? The booking is formulaic and nothing to get excited about.

World Heavyweight Champion Seth "Freakin" Rollins Confronted Cody Rhodes

It looked like Rhodes was going to make his WrestleMania match with Roman Reigns official before Rhodes attempted to convince him to choose him instead. Rollins made some logical points, but he also came off as desperate, knowing his 'Mania match with Punk is off and Rhodes might be his only ticket to the main event (in addition to never having beaten him before in storyline). This was a wonderful segment, though. They clearly want to kill time with Rhodes since WrestleMania isn't for another two months, so I appreciate the approach they're taking.

Jey Uso def. Bronson Reed

In a vignette two weeks ago, Reed teased coming after a certain champion in WWE. We haven't heard anything about it since, and considering Elimination Chamber will be emanating from Australia and Seth Rollins is now hurt, we can only assume that was who he was talking about and the match is off. Uso beating him decisively here likely means WWE doesn't have a backup plan for him, which is unfortunate. This was a good back, but the start-and-stop pushes are making it difficult for Reed to build real momentum.

Intercontinental Champion Gunther def. Kofi Kingston

I don't think anyone thought for a single second that Kingston would actually beat Gunther for the belt, but I appreciate that this was as competitive as it was with Kingston even coming close a few times. This exceeded my expectations and ended up being a top-notch match. Then again, I shouldn't have expected anything else from a Gunther title defense. Imperium again got the better of The New Day afterward, but I think it's leading to Jey Uso coming to their aid, not Big E. Jey can contend for the Intercontinental Championship soon and Jimmy can cost him the win to rekindle that rivalry for WrestleMania.

WWE Women's Tag Team Champions The Kabuki Warriors def. Natalya and Tegan Nox (Non-Title)

The Miami crowd at last Friday's SmackDown was loud for Kabuki Warriors vs. Katana Chance and Kayden Carter, but this Tampa crowd couldn't have cared less about this match. There was nothing technically wrong with it, but the Nox and Natalya pairing just hasn't clicked and the fact they've lost a lot lately hasn't helped. On the bright side, it looks like they're about to split up, and hopefully Nox can get a renewed singles push.

Nia Jax Attacked Women's World Champion Rhea Ripley While Damage CTRL Looked on

It was explained that SmackDown Superstar Bayley was on this show because she won the women's Royal Rumble, but it wasn't explained why she was on Raw the week before the pay-per-view. It's not worth getting annoyed about at this point. Bayley teased challenging Ripley at WrestleMania in this segment, but we all know it will end up being IYO SKY, and instead, Ripley will defend against Jax at Elimination Chamber.

Drew McIntyre def. Sami Zayn

I'm actually surprised we got this match on this show since at one point I thought it'd be saved for WrestleMania. They could definitely do a rematch there, but this marked McIntyre's third win over him since the fall (not to mention all the times he beat him in 2022), so they'd need to heat up the feud before then and make people want to see Zayn finally beat him. This was another entertaining outing from them as they have great chemistry together.

Overall Show

This was an excellent follow-up edition of Raw. They started off on a high note with the Punk and McIntyre segment along with the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championship match. McIntyre vs. Zayn, Gunther vs. Kingston, and the Rhodes and Rollins segment all held my interest as well. It was an important episode and they filled the three hours effectively. Andrade signing with Raw was another notable development. Hopefully this is a taste of what more we can expect from the red brand on the road to WrestleMania, even with the injuries.

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