EA’s Weekly RAW YouTube Report (7/23/18)

As we all know, social media and other outlets have become a huge means of drawing in interaction and viewers for WWE. Most people will point to television ratings like they did during the Monday Night Wars in the late 1990’s, however that can be skewed with so many various means of watching today that do not include cable television.

As you’ve become accustomed to, here is this week’s RAW YouTube Report (2:30 PM EST, 7/25/18):

1. Stephanie McMahon announces WWE Evolution pay-per-view – 1.8 million views
2. Roman Reigns vs. Bobby Lashley – 1.2 million views
3. Jinder Mahal looks to help Braun Strowman with his anger – 864k views
4. Kevin Owens gets a match against Braun Strowman at SummerSlam – 652k views
5. Seth Rollins & Finn Balor vs. Dolph Ziggler & Drew McIntyre – 622k views
6. RAW Tag Title Match: The B-Team vs. The Deleters Of Worlds – 578k views
7. Bayley & Sasha Banks vs. Karen Lundy & Samantha Simon – 358k views

After it was revealed over the weekend that RAW Commissioner Stephanie McMahon would be returning to make a historic announcement, the rumor mill was spot on with what said announcement would be. Therefore, there was never any doubt in my mind what would be this week’s number one in our YouTube Report with Ronda Rousey off for another week. I’m not going to get too deep into all the people saying, “Well, TNA/Shine/Shimmer/insert non-drawing company here have been doing it already”, because those people just want to misinterpret or misunderstand no matter what. I’ll just use the same comparison I’ve been using…when Danica Patrick began with NASCAR it was a big deal. When she raced for any other smaller, lesser known racing series’ it was not. Pretty simple.

Sliding in at number two is the red brand’s main event to determine who would face Brock Lesnar at SummerSlam for the Universal Title. Whether a shot at Lesnar was on the line or not, I would have expected this Extreme Rules rematch to pull good numbers because…well, because Roman Reigns. Add that stipulation on top and it’s no surprise where it places in our rankings.

Numbers three and four revolve around ‘Mr. Monster In The Bank’ Braun Strowman, who continues showing he can be a player on YouTube. For one, he’s entertaining as all hell and pretty good on the mic, which is all we really got with number three. He seems to have the ability or at least the leeway to ad-lib on the stick and it shows. Dude is funny, which is something most of the Superstars will tell you if you were ever to have the chance to ask. Number four is merely the follow-up to number three.

The fall of Seth Rollins on YouTube continues at the fifth position where he, along with Balor, Ziggler and McIntyre fail to pull in even 700k. Since losing the Intercontinental Championship, it’s seemingly been nothing other than a downslide for ‘The KingSlayer’ as he continues losing momentum, at least on YouTube and to be frank, I’m not sure how you explain it. A lot of people believe he should be in the Universal Title picture and while I don’t necessarily disagree, you could argue that his drop in YouTube interest is a reason why he shouldn’t be in that picture. Or, perhaps people are just tired of this rivalry and want to see something new.

Rounding out this week’s report is another case of the weekly, “It’s better than anything else RAW gave us”, in my opinion. The B-Team certainly cracks me up, but comedy acts have never drawn except for say, The Rock & Sock Connection. Plus, unless you were expecting a title change here there wasn’t much to tune into the RAW Tag Title rematch for. Lastly, we get ‘Jobber City’ as Bayley and Sasha’s stop-start feud comes in at number seven against a couple of enhancements. Personally, I’ve been over this whole angle for some time as the booking has been flat out awful in my book and by the looks of things, I’m not alone on that. If there was ANYTHING else of note on RAW, I doubt they’d make the top seven.

Continue following TheChairshot for all the latest skull smashing opinion, news, reviews and so much more! @theCHAIRSHOTcom on Twitter
Always #UseYourHead