Welcome to Wrestling Inc.'s weekly review of "WWE Raw," the show that these days experiences the return of Roman Reigns once every month or two! Not only that, but Rhea Ripley informed a very blue (literally and figuratively) IYO SKY that they'll be teaming together at Crown Jewel, Dominik Mysterio defended the men's Intercontinental title against Rusev, and Los Americanos ... uh ... now have individual names, apparently! Sorry, at this point the WINC staff has nothing whatsoever to say about anything related to El Grande Americano, but we have thoughts about pretty much everything else that happened on this episode!
As always, if you missed the show and just want the boring details, check out our "Raw" results page.If you didn't miss the show (or if you just live vicariously through us, and who can blame you) and want our rather more exciting opinions, here are three things we hated and three things we loved about the 9/29/25 episode of "WWE Raw!"
Last week's turn on IYO SKY was predictable and perhaps that's why I just felt meh about it. Don't get me wrong, I think the heel turn was smart, it just lacked the emotion I was looking for. This week's opening segment was really good and the story played out throughout the show. Rhea Ripley is fed all the way up with Asuka and Kairi Sane. She went so far as to challenge them. SKY came out to begrudgingly to admit her friend was right about Asuka and Sane. While upset about what happened to her, they're still her family. Asuka attempted to gaslight SKY by telling her that all she has to do is apologize and she'll be forgiven. She asked Ripley for some time. As she walked away, Ripley was jumped from behind. As she was helping her friend, Asuka misted SKY in the face.
The fans can visibly see that SKY is struggling with what to do. Fans can also see that Sane is afraid of Asuka without Sane saying a word. She goes along with her mentor, afraid of the repercussions if she does anything "wrong". Backstage, Sane tries to convince SKY, who is still covered in poison mist, to just apologize so they can be a family again. Sane is struggling with her friend leaving her alone with an angry Asuka, who will bear the brunt of her wrath, and knowing that Asuka is in the wrong.
Finally, we see SKY admit to Ripley once again that she is right. She informed Ripley that she asked for a tag match at Crown Jewel. Being the good friend that she is, Ripley makes sure this is what SKY really wants. She also asks if she can trust her in a match against her "family". SKY says she can trust her and that Sane is lost. Everything involving SKY moved this story forward in a satisfying way. It's the natural progression from what happened last week, but feels more connected. It's one of the most compelling stories in WWE at the moment.
Written bySamantha Schipman
Dominik Mysterio got a big win tonight over Rusev, and while that usually might not be something I loved, because a Mysterio title retention is more of a given at this point, he did it all by himself. That may sound silly, but he's had the help of Judgment Day's JD McDonagh and Finn Balor, as well as Ludwig Kaiser's El Grande Americano in recent weeks, and tonight, he proved he can do it all on his own, even if he did resort to heel tactics. And, despite how much we all love him and are still questioning how that ever really came to be, Mysterio still is indeed a heel.
He's attempting to embrace his EddieGuerrero-side even more, and he showed that tonight when he threw the title at Rusev and then laid down on the mat, despite the referee not having any of it. He won off the low blow, more like a mule kick, while he had the referee distracted, then rolled up the bigger man for the victory. While I'm sure it's going to lead to a rematch for Rusev, Ireally liked this tonight.
The crowd was super in to Mysterio, and while it made it more than noticeable that they weren't in to Rusev in the slightest, it's still super fun to hear. Now that I think about it, actually, a feud with Mysterio where he's leaning hard into acting like Guerrero in the ring could be really fun when compared to Rusev's serious demeanor. I'm not saying it could completely revitalize his character or anything, but I'm sure it couldn't hurt. Crowds already aren't responding to him, so a fun feud with Mysterio over the IC title absolutely couldn't hurt.
Mysterio said in an interview doing a commercial break (that we didn't see in the states, but I did catch on social media) that he's facing Penta next, who he brushed off by saying he'd beaten him "like five times" or something. I think Rusev gets involved there, leading to a rematch, or even a triple threat, andthatcould also be helpful for Rusev. This may seem like a relatively simple Mysterio retention tonight, but I'm hoping it can get the ball rolling on some other stories at the same time. Especially since he didn't need any help talking down "The Bulgarian Brute," which has me wondering if we could be once again heading down a road where a Judgment Day breakup is possible.
Written byDaisyRuth
I've been thinking tonight about a couple moments from this past summer. Remember when LA Knight picked up a singles win over Seth Rollins at "Saturday Night's Main Event" in July? At the time we (or at least a lot of us) thought the Rollins knee injury was legit, so the victory couldn't exactly be called "clean," but it still seemed like kind of a big deal for Knight, regardless of the circumstances. Then, of course, it turned out the injury was fake, and Rollins won the World Heavyweight Championship, and Knight's "SNME" win was largely forgotten.
The other moment I was thinking about came a little over a month ago, when Sami Zayn announced he was now on "WWE SmackDown" and was coming after the men's United States Championship. Since that announcement, Zayn is undefeated on the blue brand; he won the US title and has already defended it in four times in acclaimed matches against Rey Fenix, Carmelo Hayes, and Je'Von Evans not to mention getting in the ring one last time against John Cena. Arriving when "SmackDown" was at a nadir when it came to in-ring action, Sami immediately became the lone bright spot on Friday nights, anchoring a show that desperately needed a wrestler of his quality.
While not announced on TV, Sami's arrival was reportedly a trade of sorts, with Knight taking his place on "Raw." Unfortunately, in stark contrast to Sami, Knight isn't just out of his depth on the red brand he's stuck in reverse. He may have gotten some initial involvement with The Vision, including being part of a four-way world title match, and later with The Usos, but "involvement" isn't the same thing as "winning." Knight lost to Bron Breakker, lost to Bronson Reed, lost to Bron Breakker and Bronson Reed, and lost to Jey Uso after only getting to be part of Wrestlepalooza as a referee. In fact, until tonight, Knight hadn't won a televised match since coming to "Raw," except the tag match with CM Punk that they won by DQ; his last singles win was the fake knee injury match against Rollins.
Tonight, LA finally got off the schneid with a victory over Kofi Kingston. The match wasn't particularly exciting while Knight has a tendency to do his best work on big stages like WrestleMania, his TV work tends to be lackluster at best, and it feels like some WWE fans have even stopped pretending he's a good promo. He dabbled around the main event picture for a few weeks, got his ass kicked by pretty much everyone up there, and is now back to putting on mediocre midcard matches against other wrestlers who rarely win on TV.
In other words, I think it's safe to say Nick Aldis definitively won the trade. That's great in terms of making "SmackDown" more watchable, but it's really starting to drag down "Raw."
Written by Miles Schneiderman
I gave this a few weeks to make sure WWE wasn't going to pivot in another, more interesting direction, but this week, I can sadly say I hate where Bayley's new, split-personality character is going. Because, honestly, it's not going anywhere and her storyline centers entirely around friend, or sometimes friend, sometimes frenemy, Lyra Valkyria. And on "Raw," where there is a much better fractured friendship storyline going on with IYO SKY, the Kabuki Warriors, and Rhea Ripley, this is just not landing for me. I didn't want a fresh Bayley character to be all about her friendship with Valkyria again, but yet here we are, a place we've been since April at this point.
It's so disappointing to me, because her vignettes teasing this new character, or a combination of all her old characters, were so interesting, and none of them centered around Valkyria. I alsofeel like Bayley's split-personalities, or one of them, at least, should still be angry she was left out of WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and now, Wrestlepalooza if they're still trying to make that one out to be a big, meaningful show, while still keeping that topic relevant for Bayley. The other personality or character could just be happy to be here and getting matches, despite taking a loss like she did to Raquel Rodriguez tonight. She doesn't need to be hanging on to Valkyria and needing her approval or anything.
This all might boil down to me hating when WWE does too many similar storylines for its women's division, and that's partially how it feels here. It's all about friendship rather than the fact Bayley seems to be losing her marbles. Valkyria and Bayley were great together at the beginning of the year, but I feel like this storyline should have wrapped in the weeks at a few months, at most, after WrestleMania when it was revealed Lynch took her out. At this point, her character refresh feels really pointless.
I like Valkyria a lot, as well, and her character also really needs to move on from this. That easily could have happened tonight, a clean break with Bayley wearing her merchandise then being all sad about their negative interaction backstage before her match against Rodriguez. Then, Bayley could have been beaten down by Rodriguez and Roxanne Perez after her loss, causing her to become even more unhinged. I feel like Valkyria at this point could have been shown backstage a little shaken by the fact she didn't let herself run out to make the save, but then shaking it off and moving on to the next opportunity. While I don't want to see her versus Women's Intercontinental Champion Becky Lynch again either, that's always a possibility, or Valkyria could step up to challenge Stephanie Vaquer after Crown Jewel.
I hope WWE pivots on this soon, because Bayley and Valkyria deserve more. Ipersonally want to see a lot more from Bayley's new/old character, and I feel like they've dropped the ball on it already.
Written byDaisy Ruth
WWE has made quite a few controversial decisions as of late, but sometimes, you have to give credit where credit is due.
Given that Cody Rhodes and Seth Rollins have such a rich, extensive on-screen history with one another, WWE was smart to select a match for the Men's Crown Jewel Championship that didn't need to have a ton of ongoing build due to the limited time frame and close proximity between Wrestlepalooza and Crown Jewel. Because of this, their choice to run a convoluted verbal exchange between the two men from tonight becomes all the more baffling and puzzling.
This promo exchange needed to pick one clear route and stick to it, but instead, WWE chose to take several different routes including whether it would be Rhodes or Rollins who was the future of WWE, Rhodes questioning which of Rollins or Heyman was truly running the vision, and their unlikely alliance to take down The Rock and Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 40 that happened well over a year ago at this point. It was all over the place, hard to follow, and clear that too much was trying to be crammed into one single segment. At the end of the day, a large portion of WWE's fanbase know the history between Rhodes and Rollins and they're simply facing off for a title that's gets defended once a year making this feel pointless and a way to eat up some time on their two and a half hour show.
Written by Olivia Quinlan
Quite some time has passed since what many would consider to be the heyday of The Bloodline, original taste. The drama, theendlessinterference, but the drama. For a while that became lost with the "New Tribal Chief" and then the "Original Tribal Chief," "YEET" and "No YEET," "OTC," "Big Jim" to "Main Event" "YEET Man" Jey Uso. The Bloodline cinematic universe hit its proverbial Phase 5, everyone going off to do their own thing that felt worlds apart from what they were doing even if that journey has had its fun parts spotted in between the not-so-fun parts.
I was very happy when Jey won the World Heavyweight title, I wasn't so happy when he lost it, but I got it. He had reached his ceiling in terms of what he could do as the cookie cutter babyface champion.
That chapter thrived in the chase and the celebration, but there was a call for something different when the confetti settled. This is not a story about him finally winning the title, this is a story of him proving that he is a habitual winner of the title, and it was out on display throughout tonight's "Raw." Jimmy Uso has made it abundantly clear he isn't feeling the way his brother has been handling business of late, and Jey told him straight to his face that he doesn't expect him to understand because he hasn't reached that level yet.
This was a seed planted in Jey by Roman Reigns not too long ago, with it turning out to be a moment where Jey understands what the "Tribal Chief" had been telling him all this time. Whether that's relapse or realization is yet to be seen, but Jey was sharper tonight and even in his interest there was a bite to the way he moved, the cadence of his walk, and the way he soaked in the reaction of the crowd.
He was feeling himself and he was playing the role he had been groomed for as the "Right Hand Man," and he was out to prove a point. The match pitting the Usos against the Vision itself was a fun human demolition derby, an affair that definitely put emphasis on, rightfully, making Bron Breakker and Bronson Reed look like relentless monsters. But the closing stretch saw that piece slide into place, Reigns emerging for the first time since he was sidelined by Breakker and Fatu to equalize things with his family.
Thus, the Usos got the win with Jey pinning Breakker. But the important layer came during the post-match sequence as the show went off air; Reigns acknowledging Jey, embracing his cousin and talking to him about their way of doing things, all while Jimmy looks on with a disdain last seen before he kicked Reigns' face off initially. Not to say The Bloodline is back by a long shot, but the growing arc between Jimmy and Jey as the "Main Event" mantle starts to take its toll, that has been really compelling and interesting TV and it has gripped me into wanting to see what's next.
Written byMaxEverett
