Which brand won the Superstar Shakeup?

The Superstar Shakeup is now over. With the results naturally comes the question - "which brand got the better end of the deal?" Here are the official results:

To Raw:

• AJ Styles
• The Miz
• Ricochet
• Aleister Black
• Erik
• Ivar
• Andrade
• Zelina Vega
• Rey Mysterio
• Jimmy Uso
• Jey Uso
• Naomi
• EC3
• Lacey Evans
• Eric Young
• Cedric Alexander
• Samoa Joe (unlisted for now, but will be moved there shortly)

To SmackDown:

• Roman Reigns
• Finn Bálor
• Elias
• Bayley
• Ember Moon
• Kairi Sane
• Lars Sullivan
• Buddy Murphy
• Liv Morgan
• Chad Gable
• Apollo Crews
• Mickie James
• Otis
• Tucker

To see how these pieces fit together, let's take a look at each of the divisions and compare and contrast them.

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Tag Team Division

"Viking Experience" memes aside, there's no debating this one - Raw easily emerged the winner when it comes to tag team wrestling.

Between calling up the NXT Tag Team Champions, keeping Aleister Black and Ricochet together, and getting The Usos, Raw came out way ahead. Raw also still has teams like The Revival and the oddly popular (for now) team of Hawkins and Ryder (the champions, in case you forgot). The Authors of Pain will come back from injury eventually to hopefully be used correctly.

SmackDown's tag team division, on the other hand, still has a strong lineup, but there's no question that The Usos were irreplaceable - certainly not by the likes of Heavy Machinery. The Hardy Boyz, The Bar, and, when Big E comes back from injury (or when Kofi Kingston loses the WWE Championship), the New Day make a strong core, and Shinsuke Nakamura and Rusev are still around, but it won't be enough to match up to what Raw's division can potentially do.

The worst division in the company suddenly became potentially one of its best.

Women's Division

No debate here, SmackDown destroyed Raw in the shakeup as far as the women are concerned.

Charlotte Flair and Asuka remained as mainstays, along with the underappreciated Sonya Deville. Only now, they'll have Mickie James, Bayley, Ember Moon, and the most exciting NXT woman to be called up since Asuka, Kairi Sane, joining them. Liv Morgan was also sent over, which is good for her, since the Riott Squad badly needed to be disbanded.

In contrast, the only bona fide big name remaining on Raw as of now is Alexa Bliss, and she comes with her own problems. Natalya is a solid hand, if not the most exciting one, but elsewhere, Lacey Evans, the new priority, has clear limitations. Nia Jax is out for a year, and with her absence, any shred of relevance Tamina has fallen away. Dana Brooke and Alicia Fox still linger. Ruby Riott and Sarah Logan both need rebuilding, to say the least.

Naomi was a decent pickup for Raw, but comes nowhere close to the women that it lost.

There's simply no way to color it - Raw's division cannot match the match and feud combinations that SmackDown is capable of putting together.

For the red brand's sake, it better hope that Sasha Banks returns, Ronda Rousey's absence won't be too long, and that Shayna Baszler comes up from NXT fast. As if it weren't leaning that way before, it's obvious Becky Lynch will drop the SmackDown title first and come over to Raw permanently. It badly needs her to lead its depleted division.

Men's Singles Division

SmackDown lost its MVP, AJ Styles. It also lost Samoa Joe which is another big blow, along with the always dependable Miz. Andrade went over, and the Red brand also picked up Cedric Alexander. They join a solid core that boasts Seth Rollins at the helm.

On the other hand, SmackDown kept Daniel Bryan, Kevin Owens, Randy Orton, and Mustafa Ali, while gaining Finn Balor, Buddy Murphy, Elias, and most notably, Roman Reigns.

This one isn't as easy to decide.

Nevertheless, I'll pick Raw as slightly favored. Raw looks like it has better combination of potential matches. AJ Styles vs. Seth Rollins is the most obvious one, and is the running favorite for the Universal Championship match at SummerSlam, but other good combinations are waiting to be found - witness the mouthwatering prospect of Samoa Joe vs. Braun Strowman.

Ultimately, it will come down to writing, of course, but Raw has better ingredients to start with.

Overall - Raw wins

SmackDown trounced Raw in the women's division, coming out further ahead there than any other particular division in the shakeup. On the other hand, women aren't featured as much as men, even now, so that huge net gain only comes for a minority of the content.

For more content more of the time, Raw has a slight advantage - with its better tag team division and its slightly better men's division.

Writing will always make the difference at the end of the day, and SmackDown has shown more consistency than Raw in the past year, and it has the benefit of being two hours instead of three, so we'll need to see how it goes, but as of now, Raw has a lead, although a slight one. The 2019 shakeup was different from the previous two years, where Raw clearly won in 2017 and SmackDown clearly won in 2018.