5 botches and outrageous moments from WWE Raw (January 8, 2018)

With both the Royal Rumble and the Mixed Match Challenge nearing closer, Monday's Raw set in motion several events that will lead to those shows. The Bar found out they'd be finally getting their Tag Team Title rematch at the Rumble while both Asuka and Alicia Fox discovered who their male counterparts were soon to be for the Facebook Watch-exclusive tournament. Inside the ring, a cruiserweight Championship was defended and the Balor Club was back at again but most important of all, there were botches.

The moments that WWE maybe wishes they could have back this week include a monster spot from Braun Strowman that didn't appear too harmful when looked at a little closer, a sketchy timeline from an insult by Finn Balor, and an early contender for bloodiest botch of 2018. If that's not actually a category for any year-end awards, it should be.

First up this week comes from a segment that involved a fib about WWE's resident undefeated star from Japan.

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#5 No English for Asuka?

When Nia Jax seemingly caught her on again and off again friend Alexa Bliss in a lie, criticisms immediately arose against her. The Raw Women's Champion whispered something terrible into the ear of Nia that Asuka said in an apparent attempt to manipulate her. Jax then called her bluff by proclaiming that Asuka doesn't speak English.

Wait...what?

Asuka's English may not be great, but we just saw her inform The Miz earlier in the night that they'd be tagging together in the upcoming Mixed Match Challenge. She may not have said much, but the entire segment was in English and she appeared to comprehend it all. Also, she says the phrase "No one is ready for Asuka" all the time, which also is in English.

Maybe she's not perfectly fluent, but Nia's claim here is simply false.

#4 Finn's timeline was off

When Finn Balor delivered the above burn to Jason Jordan, it got a good reaction from the crowd. They repeatedly tried to get a "who's your daddy?" chant going during this segment, so kudos to him for reading the crowd correctly when he cracked this joke. It was humorous, but that doesn't make it entirely correct.

For starters, only he and Karl Anderson's time in NJPW dates back to a start of a decade ago. Luke Gallows didn't come until 2013. And when Gallows did join his pals, Bullet Club was at that point only a relatively new faction. At best, this trio's only been running together for about five years.

#3 Falling truss, no impact

Braun Strowman decided to join in on the battle between Brock Lesnar and Kane as they spilled into the backstage area. He took things to a monstrous next level when he randomly found a tool that Batman must've dropped out of his utility belt, using it to pull down a lighting truss. It fell on top of his upcoming Royal Rumble opponents, crushing them flat.

The problem with this spectacle is that the truss clearly didn't fall on Brock and Kane. It bridged just over the top of them, giving them ample space to stay safe. When paramedics pulled Brock out from underneath, nobody had to even lift the structure because he had plenty of room to crawl out on his own.

Also, why did none of the medical attendees care about Kane's injuries? Brock was loaded onto a gurney and taken to a local medical facility without hesitation, yet nobody said as much as "walk it off" to The Big Red Machine.

#2 Being the elite

We're only one week into a reunion of Bullet Club OG's Finn Balor, Karl Anderson, and Luke Gallows and WWE is already giddy about dropping the super-snarky references. Did anybody catch how times did Corey Graves worked the word Elite into his commentary? Here's what he said while the trio entered the ring together for their match...

"Countless tours of Japan together, long hours on the bus, sharing hotels, training in dojos together - all with the common goal of being the elite. And to this day: often imitated, never duplicated, there is only one original Balor Club."

If you happened to be a member of another Elite trio from New Japan's Bullet Club, you could interpret those words as shots being fired.

#1 Enzo's injury

This one got gruesome.

Cedric Alexander finally got his chance at Enzo Amore's Cruiserweight Championship after some delays and it did not go quite how he wanted.The planned storyline ending to this match involved The Certified G getting counted out due to an ankle injury. However, a very real cut above Enzo's eye made things far more interesting.

As seen above, Alexander got a little too snug with this kick after a handspring off the ropes. Amore got busted open and started gushing everywhere. The gash was so bad that Enzo needed stitches to close the wound. Since Cedric technically won the match (but not the title), expect these two to meet again in the near future.