WWE Monday Night Raw comes waltzing back into our lives tonight (Feb. 5, 2024) from St. Louis’ Enterprise Center, featuring all the latest build to the upcoming Elimination Chamber premium live event scheduled for later this month in Perth, Australia — and for WrestleMania 40 a little farther on down the road.
Advertised for tonight: Cody Rhodes faces off with his old nemesis Shinsuke Nakamura in a Bull Rope Match, just days after The Rock changed his story for WrestleMania. GUNTHER will celebrate extending his record-setting Intercontinental championship reign to 600 days as Imperium tries to move closer to a Tag title shot in a 4Way with The New Day, DIY & The Creed Brothers.
Plus, Women’s Tag champs The Kabuki Warriors give Kayden Carter & Katana Chance a rematch, The Miz goes one-on-one with JD McDonagh, Ivar & Valhalla take on Alpha Academy’s Akira Tozawa & Maxxine Dupri in mixed tag action, and a whole lot more.
Come right back here at 8 pm ET when the Raw live blog will kick off once the show starts on USA Network. It will be below this line here. Reminder: GIFs and pics allowed, but no links to illegal streams, please.
Sean here. Did I politic my way into Claire’s main event spot? Check the dirt sheets, smarks. Now let’s Raw.
The episode starts with a replay of SmackDown’s closing scene. Perhaps you’ve heard some chatter about it. From there we go right to World Heavyweight champion Seth Rollins’ entrance. Michael Cole and Pat McAfee discuss the Rock/Cody Rhodes controversy as he enters, saying people spent the weekend talking about all the possibilities that can only happen in one place — the WWE.
Rollins lets the St. Louis crowd sing his song and scream his name, then starts to talk about the interesting week WWE’s had. At the mention of The Rock’s catchphrase, the boos start and the camera pans out to show a sea of “We Want Cody” signs. Seth says he wants Cody too, and after Friday he has more questions than answers… so Cody Rhodes, come on down!
The American Nightmare shakes hands on his way to the ring, then asks Rollins and the crowd what they want to talk about. They pause as a “Rocky Sucks” chant goes around the arena, to which Cole asks if it’s 1996. Rollins says he didn’t expect to hear it. The crowd switches to “We Want Cody”, and an emotional looking Rhodes poses for them.
Rollins again makes his ‘Mania pitch, putting over his title and saying he needs to know if he’s a better man than he was two years ago. St. Louis clearly wants him to say no, but before he can answer we hear a Claymore being drawn and some bagpipes… Drew McIntyre is here!
Drew thinks he speaks for everyone when he says, “What the hell?” He set things up for everyone perfectly. He took out Punk, so McIntyre and Rollins should have been starting to the build to their WrestleMania match tonight. He even had t-shirts made for them (with a version of him laughing at Punk’s ‘Mania grave on it). Drew’s wearing his, Seth’s XS is in the back. McIntyre implores Rhodes to finish his story, and even brings up Dusty.
The World champ tells Drew not to be a prick. It wasn’t going to be them anyway, because they’ve already done that and McIntyre lost. Drew fires back that Cody’s beat him three times. Things break down, and the Big Scot breaks them all the way down when he hits Rollins with a Glasgow Kiss. Rhodes comes to the champ’s aid so McIntyre bails, wondering if maybe it should be him vs. Cody at WrestleMania…
New Day starts with Ciampa and gets some nearfalls of double team moves. Imperium isn’t even on the apron (anyone can tag in anyone in this one) at the start, but when they are Ciampa tags in Vinci. Kaiser joins him, they send Kofi into the ring post, and Imperium’s in control as we go to a break.
Kaiser and Kofi are both down when we return, and quickly make tags to their partners. Woods is a house afire, putting Ludwig down, and then Brutus Creed too when he tags in. Johnny Gargano gets involved and puts X down with a slingshot spear! The #DIY duo take out the Creeds and give themselves a round of applause. Imperium stops Kofi from charging up for a dive, and things get crazy as everyone gets involved. We get some spots Bret Hart would hate as Julius Creed cannonballs from the top onto a bunch of guys on the floor, then Ciampa hoists Woods on back to White Noise him into the same group of dudes.
After more commercials, Gunther’s boys have Tommaso alone on thetop turnbuckle, but The New Day show up and turn it into a Tower of Doom situation. Everybody’s down as Brutus rolls in to hit a moonsault of the top onto Kaiser. Vinci flattens one Creed with a crossbody, then takes a running knee from his brother. Guys are filtering through and hitting moves, until eventually Britus gets Vinci in an ankle lock. Julies runs interference on everyone trying to break up the hold, including pulling Ciampa off his brother’s back and suplexing both New Day members! But the numbers prove to be too much and Kaiser gets through to break the hold before his partner taps.
Imperium and New Day’s battle spills to the floor, and the brawl in front of the announce desk. Brutus Bomb onto them, the Creeds set-up to finish off Vinci, but Cole tells us Ciampa is the legal man. He isolated Vinci, Meet in the Middle, Tommaso realizes he needs to cover so he pulls Johnny off and gets the three count!
