Sometimes, plans change. For WWE Raw, it’s been happening quite often as of late, and it appears that might be the case for tonight’s episode from San Jose.
The show had been promoted with a match between Jey Uso and Damian Priest as one of its big hooks. Alas, the official WWE.com preview for tonight now has nary a mention of that bout, so it will be interesting to see if it needed to be shelved for some reason or the wrestlers involved will be used in some other way.
Instead, the featured segment is now a contract signing between Gunther and Tommaso Ciampa. The Ring General has tried to keep Ciampa at bay using his Imperium minions, but they proved unfit for the task. Now Gunther has basically no choice but to put his Intercontinental Championship on the line, presumably this weekend at Fastlane.
Becky Lynch already successfully retained her NXT Women’s Championship at No Mercy, and The Man promised Tegan Nox she could have the next shot. That is still being promoted for tonight, but there are reports that Lynch isn’t medically cleared to compete, so we’ll be watching to see if that bout gets rescheduled in a way that grows out of what we’ll see in San Jose.
Also, for some reason Miz TV is welcoming Drew McIntyre back for a second consecutive week. Did The Miz fire his booking person? And what new if anything will the Scottish Warrior have to say this time?
The uncertainty means there could be some cool stuff that isn’t being advertised for tonight’s show, and we’re always down with that. Let’s see what we’ve got.
WWE Raw results from San Jose:
(scroll down for full details on any match or segment in bold)
- Nia Jax and Shayna Baszler are supposed to have a match to start the show, but the broadcast begins with them already brawling; they’re soon joined by Raquel Rodriguez and Rhea Ripley, and tons of security and refs have to pull them all apart
- Rhea says The Judgment Day needs to talk, but after she gives Dominik Mysterio an ultimatum, Jey Uso and Cody Rhodes cause more trouble … and end up with a title match for Fastlane
- Imperium (Giovanni Vinci and Ludwig Kaiser) def. Alpha Academy by pinfall
- Highlights are shown of the Becky Lynch-Tiffany Stratton Extreme Rules match at No Mercy
- Pearce tells Tegan Nox that he has to postpone her title shot since Lynch isn’t cleared to compete, but Nox suggests she take on a not so helpful Chelsea Green and Pearce makes it official
- Bronson Reed def. Cedric Alexander by pinfall
- Pearce ends his phone call to speak to Drew McIntyre, who doesn’t want to do Miz TV a second week in a row and asks Pearce to tell The Miz to leave him alone when he says what he wants to say tonight; he also notes that no one did “the right thing” when The Bloodline was beating him down
- Tommaso Ciampa and Gunther meet for their contract signing and end up agreeing to have their match tonight
- Priest is upset about having to defend the titles at Fastlane, but together, Ripley and McDonagh are able to convince him that it could help drive a wedge between Uso and his (few) allies
- Xavier Woods def. Ivar by pinfall, but he and Kofi Kingston are both beaten silly by the big man after the match
- A hype video is shown for the Seth Rollins-Shinsuke Nakamura Last Man Standing match at Fastlane
- Shinsuke Nakamura proves to still be one step ahead of Seth Rollins in a very painful way
- Lynch tells Nox she better be ready for a fight once she’s cleared; she turns and runs into Natalya, who says she has a different level of respect for Tegan now and believes she’ll make good on her title opportunity then she gets it
- Tegan Nox def. Chelsea Green by pinfall
- McIntyre rants on what he sees as weakness and hypocrisy in those forgiving Jey Uso, which brings out an unhappy Miz to get in some taunts at Drew for playing both sides of things; McIntyre wants a fight, and while Miz looks like he’s going to walk away, he runs back to the ring to assault McIntyre from behind, which eventually leads to officials separating them
- Drew McIntyre def. The Miz by pinfall
- Trick Williams introduces himself to the world ahead of his rematch for the NXT North American Championship on NXT, but Mysterio, Ripley and McDonagh arrive to taunt him a bit
- Rhodes wasn’t anticipating getting after the tag team titles with Jey Uso, but he’ll be ready to go this weekend at Fastlane
- Gunther def. Tommaso Ciampa by submission to retain the WWE Intercontinental Championship
- Imperium hits the ring to beat on Ciampa, but Johnny Gargano returns to make the save