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The final edition of Monday Night Raw before Money In The Bank took place last night from the Verizon Arena in Little Rock, Arkansas. The show was bookended by two Fatal-4-Way matches for the women and the men consisting of the participants in their respective ladder matches for this Sunday's pay per view.
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The stage is now set for Money In The Bank on June 17th live from Chicago, Illinois. There are a total of 10 matches on the card, and some of the major matches involving the Monday Night Raw roster include the two ladder matches, Nia Jax v. Ronda Rousey for the WWE Raw Women's Championship, and Elias v. Seth Rollins for the WWE Intercontinental Championship.
Monday Night Raw this week was better overall, but almost the same as last week with a strong open and end, but everything in the middle was just average at best for the most part.
The card for Money In The Bank is very solid, so hopefully, that will kickstart some great editions of Raw going forward as we approach SummerSlam in two months.
As with all of my report card articles, the best grade a segment can earn is A+; while the worst is an F. Let's kick off this week's Raw with the male and female competitors who will be in the ladder match.
#1 Opening segment and Fatal-4-Way for the Raw women Money In The Bank competitors
The evening kicked off with all eight Raw Superstars who will compete in the ladder match at Money In The Bank. Each of the four male and four female WWE Superstars was standing on their own ladder inside the ring holding a microphone.
Kurt Angle would then come out and welcome us to Monday Night Raw before being interrupted by his new constable Baron Corbin (who's sporting a new shaved head look).
Everyone would chime in about how they are going to win Money In The Bank, but it really seemed like a cluttered mess of a promo. It was a cool visual, but once everyone started arguing, it really didn't add much value to the segment.
GRADE: C
When Raw came back from the first commercial break, the Raw Money In The Bank women were in the ring to start their Fatal-4-Way Match. This was a great way to start Raw as the women put a lot into the match.
One example of the great action in this match was a suicide dive through the middle ropes by Ember Moon crashing into Sasha Banks on the outside where both women landed pretty hard.
Another point of contention in the match was Alexa Bliss' fake leg injury and Natalya's real (storyline) injury. In the end, both Bliss and Natalya were in the ring with Nattie applying the Sharpshooter onto Bliss and she had nowhere to go.
It was an amazing match with several near falls. The match itself took just over 20 minutes, and it was great to see the women get this amount of time.
GRADE: A
#2 Elias performs for Little Rock but loses a work of art
The feud between Elias and Seth Rollins only started a couple of weeks ago, but it has been a good feud and this WWE Intercontinental Championship match is one of the non-ladder matches that I'm looking forward to the most.
Elias performed a song for the WWE Universe in Little Rock bashing his Money In The Bank opponent. After the song, Elias broke out a new guitar that was supposedly given to him by music superstar John Mayer.
The guitar was hand-painted and customized with Elias' name and the WWE Intercontinental Championship. Elias stated that he isn't going to bless Little Rock with a performance on that guitar, he's saving that for after he defeats Rollins.
After that statement, Rollins came out and Elias bailed. As Elias was most of the way up the ramp, he realized he left his custom guitar in the ring. The WWE Universe was chanting to smash the guitar and then chanted "burn it down" as Rollins delivered a stomp right through the guitar.
This feud has had a better story and progression than feuds that have been going twice as long or even more.
GRADE: B+
#3 Ronda Rousey and Nia Jax meet face-to-face
During the past month, the feud between Nia Jax and Ronda Rousey was better when it came to actions and not words. Tonight's segment was no different.
The sit-down portion with Jonathan Coachman being the moderator was pretty rough. The dialogue between Rousey and Jax didn't seem to flow at all.
Once the two women were done talking about stood up to face each other, things were a lot more interesting. Rousey didn't wait until Money In The Bank to prove that she will able to get the armbar on Jax, making her tap out in the middle of the ring.
Is it a precursor to Money In The Bank?
GRADE: C-
#4 Sami Zayn sets up an obstacle course for Bobby Lashley
Simply put the feud between Sami Zayn and Bobby Lashley has been terrible. It'll be a tough task for another feud to top this one for worst feud of the year.
With that said, this week was actually the best segment of the entire feud. At the end of last week's promo, Zayn had questioned if Lashley was really in the Army and decided to set up an Army-style obstacle course to make Lashley prove it.
Lashley finished the course with an impressive time, but just as soon as he finished, Zayn blindsided him with a cheap attack that would eventually be broken up by the referees.
I had flashbacks to the original NXT as a competition show and was afraid this would be yet another terrible segment, but this one was not completely horrible. You can tell that Zayn and Lashley are doing the best with what they're given.
GRADE: C
#5 Quick grades for other Monday Night Raw segments...
Dolph Ziggler & Drew McIntyre get back on track against Breezango - GRADE: C+
It was a squash match, but another great promo by this duo. I fully expect them to win the WWE Raw Tag Team Championships from The Deleter of Worlds at SummerSlam.
Roman Reigns v. Sunil Singh - GRADE: C-
I've enjoyed this feud a lot more than I expected to. There wasn't much to this segment as Roman destroyed Sunil to nobody's surprise followed by Jinder Mahal's sneak attack immediately after the pinfall.
The B-Team continue their undefeated streak - GRADE: C-
The B-Team stayed undefeated (since being called The B-Team) by beating Heath Slater and Rhyno after only a two-minute match.
After the match, Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt appeared to cut a promo that was highlighted by Matt saying that they are going to "eat you and delete you."
Ruby Riott v. Bayley - GRADE: B
The women had a second great showing on Monday Night Raw this week when a couple of competitors who are not in the ladder match squared off.
The numbers game caught up to Bayley as she didn't have any backup to combat the Riott Squad. These women were given 10 minutes and produced a very solid match.
No Way Jose v. Curt Hawkins - GRADE: D+
No Way Jose's entrance took up most of this segment. It was cool at a Takeover when he'd take people out of the crowd to do a conga line, but now it's just a carbon copy of Adam Rose's entrance.
The only drama here was Hawkins briefly making us think he outsmarted someone in order to break his 200-match losing streak; however, No Way Jose wasn't fooled.
#6 Fatal-4-Way for the men competing for Raw in the Money In The Bank Ladder Match
The evening started with a great Fatal-4-Way for the women, and also ended with a great men's Fatal-4-Way Match with the four competitors in the ladder match, Braun Strowman, Kevin Owens, Bobby Roode, and Finn Balor.
Throughout Raw, Owens talked to Roode and Balor and tried to get them to work with him to take out Strowman. Surprisingly, they all did work together to try to take the Monster Among Men down.
The action would spill to the commentary table area; which led to this amazing frog splash by Owens onto Strowman:
The remaining three men would battle in the ring until Strowman made a miraculous return. Balor, Roode, and Owens actually all hit their finishers or signature moves onto Strowman, but it wasn't enough. Strowman would get the win with his running powerslam of Owens right on top of a ladder.
The main event went a total of 26 minutes and was really well done.
GRADE: A
Do you agree with the grades for this week's RAW? Sound off in the comments section below!
