Greg DeMarco’s Good, Bad, & Ugly – WWE Monday Night Raw (October 30, 2023)

Greg DeMarco is back with a detailed look at this week’s edition of WWE Monday Night Raw, using the Good, Bad, & Ugly format!

Daddy’s back, and I hope to keep this going! Take a look at my thoughts on this weeks edition of WWE Monday Night Raw–The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly!

The Good

• Rhea Ripley, Dominik Mysterio, & JD McDonagh Show Opening Promo – The promo served its purpose, even if it does seem repetitive. We’re right in the middle of a mega-run for The Judgment Day, one where we won’t even realize until a few years down the road that they’d become an all-time act in WWE. It set-up several things for the show, and led right into a match, so it was effective from all sides.
• NXT North American Champion Dominik Mysterio vs. Ricochet – Ricochet has become a major player in WWE over the past 12-months, especially since the WWE Draft and his program with Logan Paul. He’s working slower than ever–in a good way–and everything he does carries so much meaning. Dominik picked up the win (he should have), yet Ricochet was protected. AND he got his heat back right after. He’s been protected for months now, which means a lot.
• DIY Video Package – Very smart. Not everyone watching Raw today knows what these guys can do together. This just sets the stage for later tonight.
• Props to whoever had the “Wrestling Is Grrrrreat” sign. Good stuff right there.
• The Creed Brothers’ WWE main roster debut against The Alpha Academy – I’m wasn’t sold that the Creeds are ready for the main roster, but the sample size was obviously too small as it was only against NXT competition. Against The Alpha Academy they showed that they belong, proving that sometimes you need to move up to continue your development. I still believe Julius is a future WrestleMania main event level talent, but he along with Brutus are off to a good start on Monday Night Raw. Ivy Nile will be a good addition to the women’s roster as well. She could be a great partner for Natalya, and Natalya could be a great associate of Diamond Mine. Of note: When Otis does The Worm, there’s still a VERY LIGHT “W-O-R-M” from the crowd. I bet WWE could bring that back. After the show of respect at the end, I could see more interplay between The Alpha Academy & Diamond Mine. I would be down for a Survivor Series team of all 5 (including Tozawa).
• The New Day dressed as The Judgment Day for Halloween? – Just pure fun.
• The Miz hosts MizTV with Gunther – First off, upside down WWE logo pumpkin? That’s attention to detail. They didn’t carve it upside down–they turned a traditionally carved one upside down. Ludwig Kaiser calling The Miz a clown 🤡 was classic. The Miz came back strong as well. Overall great interactions before Gunther, exposed ankles and all, finally makes his entrance. The interaction here was great, as it immediately turned The Miz. It didn’t turn him babyface like many have said, but it turned him serious. It only takes two weeks to turn anyone’s credibility around in WWE, and they’ve started that with The Miz.
• Adam Pearce’s Tie – Glorious.
• Tommaso Ciampa & Johnny Gargano vs. Ludwig Kaiser & Giovanni Vinci – Hell of a Raw debut (technically, return) f0r DIY, against a great team in Imperium. Awesome of note: 3 of the 4 men in this match were part of the Cruiserweight Classic.
• World Heavyweight Champion Seth “Freakin'” Rollins vs JD McDonagh – It’s easy to overlook just how damn good the in-ring product has become in WWE. This match was a great example. JD looked great in a loss to the World Heavyweight Champion. Seth Rollins delivers as usual. The intersecting stories advanced. McDonagh avoiding the Pedigree over and over was great, along with Rollins turning JD’s Devil Inside finisher into a huge knee smash.
• Chelsea Green and Piper Niven’s costumes – Yes, these get their own entry. SO GOOD. Honestly, I’d be down with Chelsea making them “The Green Foundation” and continuing with the gimmick.
• Trick Or Street Fight: Chelsea Green vs. Natalya – Matches like this usually go to The Miz, and–in all honesty this is a serious compliment–Chelsea Green has The Miz potential in WWE. And Chelsea gets the win??? Love to see it. (Along with the Powerbomb into the Candy Corn. NOT THE CANDY CORN!!!)

The Bad

• The New #DIY Theme Song – Seriously, what in the hell is that? A combo of their two songs (Ciampa’s open merged into Gargano’s theme) would have been about 1000x better.
• CANDACE MICHELLE??? – Honestly, Michael Cole said it so seriously, I can’t even hate on it. There just isn’t much on this part of the list. And Wade Barrett’s response was amazing.
• Drew McIntyre Video Package – We get it, Drew missed out on having a crowd for his WWE Championship win. Get over it, the whole world had to deal with it. It’s just not acceptable, to me, as motivation at this point. And obviously Seth Rollins agrees with me based on his promo.
• Sami Zayn vs. Damien Priest – This was NOT a bad match–that’s not why it’s here. It’s just that we’ve seen this way too damn much. Would you believe that Cody Rhodes and Jey Uso got involved? And other members of The Judgment Day? (And that I wrote those comments before they even happened?) Honestly, Rollins vs. JD should have closed this episode of Raw. That was further driven home with Cody’s show ending promo really made it seem like Cody vs Priest was the Raw main event for Crown Jewel, and not Rollins’ defense against McIntyre.

The Ugly

• Rhea Ripley’s crotch chop in Ricochet’s direction – Why are we doing crotch chops in 2023? It’s annoying when Montez Ford does it, and it was annoying here.
• Candace LaRae vs. Xia Li – This was already headed to “Bad” territory, but then the headkick happened, and the finish (legit or not) was really clunky. Hopefully this was all storyline–if not, it’s even uglier.
• Cross Rhodes On The Table – Listen, the move is fine. But doing it on the table really exposed just how much of the impact is truly taken by Cody.

The Verdict

• Good – 11
• Bad – 4
• Ugly – 3

60% of the show as “Good” this week, and some of the Bad/Ugly was brief moments in time (as were 2 of the Good). Overall, I enjoyed Raw from start to finish. There’s a lot of Good going on, and I’d be irresponsible if I didn’t rate this show as such overall

The Final Verdict for WWE Monday Night Raw (October 20, 2023) – GOOD.