Tamina and Natalya to appear on Alexa Bliss’ Playground
WWE Raw advertised fallout from WrestleMania Backlash after Bobby Lashley retained the WWE Championship in a fantastic Triple Threat Match against Drew McIntyre and Braun Strowman.
Raw also advertised Alexa’s Playground with new women’s tag team champions Tamina and Natalya.
WWE Raw viewership was down slightly with 1.820 million viewers.
- May 10, 2021—1.820 million
- May 3, 2021—1.872 million
- April 26, 2021—1.774 million
- April 19, 2021—1.907 million
- April 12, 2021—2.026 million
WWE Raw—Key Competition
- Cable News Programming
- NBA Monday Night Slate
Pro Wrestling Bits—AEW Theme Music is the Best Money Can Buy
WWE Raw Total YouTube Viewership Last Week—6,523,326 views (Down from 8,213,470)
- Most-Viewed: Drew McIntyre vs. Bobby Lashley (1,626,217 views)
- Least-Viewed: Angel Garza Continues to Stick it to Drew Gulak (94,780 views)
- Median Viewership: 428,126
WWE Raw Results—Monday, May 17, 2021
Opening Segment Featuring Bobby Lashley
Bobby Lashley’s entourage weren’t the typical skinny blondes that WWE uses when it recruits women as extras, these women were voluptuous and “thicc” in the best way.
Even though he didn’t get pinned, Drew McIntyre answering Lashley’s open challenge was quite greedy considering he’s received two world title shots in the last two months.
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AJ Styles def. Elias by Disqualification
This match ended in disqualification, the way every match between Elias and AJ Styles ends if the plan isn’t for AJ to win.
AJ Styles was doing most of the heavy lifting in this match whether he was on offense or defense.
Alexa’s Playground Featuring Tamina and Natalya
Tamina was the best part of this segment, looking around in confusion and frustratedly asking if they could leave.
WWE feels like it’s buying its time with Alexa Bliss and doesn’t even know who her next opponent will be.
Angel Garza def. Drew Gulak
Angel Garza no longer waits until mid-match to rip his pants off in a spot that has proven to get over with crowds. Instead, WWE continued its signature homogenization of talent by having him remove his pants before the match.
Gulak was not fighting Angel Garza with the urgency of a man who had a rose shoved up his butt.
Corey Graves advocated for Angel Garza to sodomize Drew Gulak for a second time after this week’s victory.
R-Truth lost the 24/7 Championship for the 52nd time. This also marked the end of a record-breaking reign, which is how WWE pronounces “we forgot about this title for several weeks.”
Kofi Kingston def. Randy Orton
The New Day won this match due to distraction, which makes me hope WWE will eventually pull the trigger on a long overdue heel turn.
WWE is quietly building up viable men’s tag team divisions on both brands.
After the Charlotte segment that followed this match, the story of tonight has been privileged, sore losers in Triple Threat matches demanding one-on-one rematches.
Tamina and Natalya def. Nia Jax and Shayna Baszler
It’s looking more and more like Shayna Baszler will be Alexa Bliss’ first victim.
Tamina and Natalya won this match with a Hart Attack, and it would be awesome if that was their new finisher.
Sheamus def. Ricochet
WWE is going out of its way to make Ricochet into just another guy by dressing him in street clothes and forcing the great high-flyer to brawl.
The referee messed up the three count, giving Ricochet the chance to win the match with a Brogue Kick instead of what would have been last night’s finish.
If Sheamus wanted to declare himself the baddest man in WWE, based on his number of wins as U.S. champion, I might believe him.
Asuka def. Charlotte Flair
Asuka took some crazy bumps in this match as it didn’t seem like Asuka and Charlotte were on the same page throughout.
Charlotte Flair appeared to suffer through a wardrobe malfunction during this match. She might have suffered a second wardrobe malfunction after attempting a Spanish Fly, where WWE cameras were fixated on Asuka sitting on the top rope for way too long.
Damian Priest def. John Morrison—Lumberjack Match
John Morrison dedicated this match to “the memory” of The Miz, which means to this point we were to assume that he was eaten by zombies.
Damian Priest was described as the talk of the WWE Universe. I guess any press is good press.
WWE decided to have another Lumberjack match without zombies, which makes it seem like Damian Priest made a horrible mistake last night and is trying to correct it.
Morrison slipped shortly before taking a superplex on the Lumberjacks, but the spot still looked great, if not painful for Morrison.
Nikki Cross stole his whole match.
Kofi Kingston def. Bobby Lashley
WWE unceremoniously sent Kofi back to the tag division, with no WWE Championship rematch, and I was still excited for this, right up until WWE pulled a bait-and-switch.
The WWE carnies spent three hours promoting Bobby Lashley’s open challenge for the WWE Championship only to announce that, no, this will not be a WWE Championship match.