Two new matches have been announced for next week’s Raw.
A strap match between Jaxson Ryker and Elias will take place. A final Raw Money in the Bank men’s qualifying match has also been announced, with Randy Orton, AJ Styles, and Drew McIntyre battling it out in a triple threat match after all three lost qualifying matches on tonight’s show.
Ryker and Elias have been feuding ever since Elias abandoned Ryker in a tag team match, effectively ending their alliance. The two have faced off in singles matches on Raw for the last two weeks, but both times Elias opted to walk out of the match, causing Ryker to win by count out.
Orton, Styles, and McIntyre all took part in qualifying matches for Money in the Bank tonight. Styles lost to Ricochet after The Viking Raiders interfered, taking out Styles’ tag team partner Omos. McIntyre lost to Riddle after a roll-up, and Orton lost to John Morrison after Riddle came out on his scooter to chase The Miz around ringside, causing Orton to become distracted.
Two new matches, including a Tag Team title match, have been added to this week’s WWE Raw.
AJ Styles & Omos will defend their Raw Tag Team titles against Elias & Jaxson Ryker on Raw this Monday night. A singles match between Randy Orton and Xavier Woods has also been added to the show.
Ryker defeated Styles on last week’s episode of Raw after Elias interfered and attacked Styles. Omos emerged after the match and confronted Elias, sending both him and Ryker away.
Orton will face Woods after Riddle managed to defeat Woods on last week’s Raw. Woods has been feuding with RKBro in recent weeks after Orton attacked both Woods and Kofi Kingston unprovoked following an eight-man tag team match where RKBro and The New Day teamed together.
A number one contender’s match with Drew McIntyre facing Kingston has already been announced for this Monday’s Raw. The winner will challenge for Bobby Lashley’s WWE Championship at Hell in a Cell on Sunday, June 20. McIntyre and Kingston’s number one contender’s match has a stipulation where — if Lashley or MVP interfere or even come out to ringside — Lashley will be suspended without pay for 90 days.
Shayna Baszler vs. Reginald is also set for this Monday’s Raw. Plus, The Miz will return to host a Miz TV segment with Raw Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley and Charlotte Flair. It will be Miz’s first appearance since losing to Damian Priest in a zombie lumberjack match at WrestleMania Backlash earlier this month.
Carlito wrestled tonight on Raw for the first time in ten years.
He teamed with Jeff Hardy to take on Elias and Jaxson Ryker. Hardy scored the win for his team, hitting the swanton bomb after Carlito laid out Elias with the backstabber. Carlito’s previous match on Raw took place on April 12, 2010, in a losing effort against Evan Bourne.
Carlito made a surprise appearance at Sunday’s Royal Rumble event, competing in the men’s Royal Rumble match. He entered at number 8, and was eventually eliminated by Elias, which led to tonight’s match.
Signing with the WWE in 2003, Carlito won the United States title from John Cena in his first televised match on SmackDown the following year. Throughout his WWE career, he would eventually win the Intercontinental title as well as the WWE & World Tag Team titles with his brother Primo.
Carlito was originally advertised for the Legends Night edition of Monday Night Raw that took place last month. However, he didn’t appear at the event.
After first being introduced on WWE Main Event, Elias and Jaxson Ryker’s partnership made its way to Raw on Monday night.
Ryker stood alongside Elias as Elias performed on Monday’s Raw. Elias introduced Ryker as someone who knows the universal truth — that WWE stands for Walk With Elias. Ryker said Elias’ music has changed him and he’s been reborn by hearing the universal truth. Ryker called Elias a visionary. He said that — for far too long — Elias has been interrupted, disrespected, and attacked. Ryker said he’s here to stop that.
R-Truth then interrupted Elias’ performance. R-Truth apologized for interrupting Elias on Main Event and claimed that he’s not an interrupter. Elias asked R-Truth if he understood that he was interrupting him right now. R-Truth didn’t want to say anything because he didn’t want to interrupt.
A group of wrestlers then came down to the ring chasing after R-Truth’s 24/7 Championship. Ryker laid out Gran Metalik and threw Akira Tozawa outside of the ring onto Drew Gulak, Erik, and Lince Dorado.
Prior to last week’s Main Event tapings, Ryker (real name Chad Lail) had been off WWE television since being criticized by fellow roster members after tweeting “Thankful for the @POTUS we have! God bless America. Built of freedom. Forgotten No More” on June 1. Dave Meltzer wrote about the situation:
The Forgotten Sons were about to be programmed with the New Day for the Smackdown tag titles when Ryker made a tweet that offended a lot of the locker room (including both [Wesley] Blake & [Steve] Cutler publicly referencing it and disassociating themselves from him) and all were then taken off television. The tweet in question was Ryker praising Trump on 6/1 about an hour after protesters were tear-gassed to clear the way for him to go to the church. Wrestlers, who rarely break ranks among themselves in a public forum, including Blake, Cutler, Owens, Ricochet, Ali and Zayn immediately were critical of the statement although Ricochet was a little more careful just saying he hoped it was a bad attempt to get heat and not something he really believed.
Blake & Cutler, Ryker’s former stablemates in The Forgotten Sons, returned to WWE TV on SmackDown earlier this month and have aligned with Baron Corbin as his Knights of The Lone Wolf.
Jaxson Ryker emerged during tonight’s WWE Main Event tapings, aligning himself with Elias.
A tweet shortly before Raw started showed Elias and Ryker together during tonight’s Main Event tapings. According to a report on Fightful Select, Ryker’s appearance on Main Event is seen as a ‘dry run’ in order to see if the pairing worked.
Ryker had not been seen on television since May. After he and the rest of the Forgotten Sons debuted following WrestleMania 36, they were taken off television after Ryker voiced support for President Donald Trump on social media during the George Floyd protests earlier this year, which led to several upset people in WWE to respond.
Steve Cutler and Wesley Blake, who were also taken off television, were brought back this past Friday on SmackDown. They helped King Corbin even the odds against Murphy and the Mysterio family, helping Corbin score a win over Murphy on the show.
In an era where politics seemingly dominates every form of culture and conversation, the past several weeks have seen that go fult tilt due to civil unrest in the U.S. and worldwide. To no surprise, the pro wrestling industry isn’t immune due to a recent tweet by Jaxson Ryker and conservative leaning t-shirts worn by the Undertaker sparking more discussion and outrage.
While this isn’t a regular political podcast by any means, I asked Jason Powell of ProWrestling.net to join me to help talk through whether politics and wrestling can co-exist in today’s social media era and whether wrestlers will think about protecting their brand over sharing their true feelings. (For those assuming we take a side, this is about as middle of the road as possible.)
We also talk about some other topics of the week including:
Jason’s question to Paul Levesque about whether WWE is doing COVID-19 testing
Whether he likes the cinematic match era and an idea that could give closure to fans of a certain Rattlesnake
How “The Greatest Match Ever” tag is unfair to Edge and Randy Orton going into Sunday’s WWE Backlash
The impact of MLW’s streaming deal with DAZN
Click below to listen and check out their spring sale where you can get a month for just 50 cents.
The Forgotten Sons have been called up to the main roster.
They made their first appearance on SmackDown tonight, facing Gran Metalik and Lince Dorado of The Lucha House Party. After a back and forth match, Wesley Blake and Steve Cutler picked up the win for the trio, with Cutler pinning Gran Metalik.
Blake and Cutler, along with Jaxson Ryker, were put together as a trio and made their NXT debut as The Forgotten Sons back in August 2018. They made it to the finals of the 2019 Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic, but lost to Aleister Black and Ricochet in the finals. At this year’s tournament, they lost to Imperium in the first round.
Ryker, who signed with the WWE in 2017, is most famous for his run in Impact Wrestling as Gunner. Blake, who joined WWE in 2014, is a former NXT Tag Team champion with Buddy Murphy. Cutler also signed with the WWE in 2014.
