Superstar Shakeup Part 1 – A Raw Recap for 4/16/18

Tonight’s Raw comes to us from the XL Center in Hartford, CT.

Super Grand Slam Champ

Before Kurt could announce one of the many Superstars involved in the Shakeup, Sunil Singh came out to announce the Monday Night Maharaja is here and he brought the US Championship with him.  You see, Jinder is a little perturbed that he didn’t get the limo that he thought he was promised.  He wants the same benefits of Brock Lesnar.  Kurt isn’t buying it and immediately puts Jinder in a match with Jeff Hardy.

Hardy wins becoming a Modern Grand Slam Champion.  He’s also already had the European and Hardcore Championships.  He basically already was one.

I think Jeff takes this US Championship back to SmackDown tonight instead of switching the Intercontinental back to SmackDown.  I think this was a vehicle to get Jinder on Raw than switching the brand of the belt.

Dolph Ziggler, Version 293

Dolph is back on the red brand after spending almost 2 years floundering on the Blue Brand.  Before he really has a chance to introduce himself, Titus Worldwide shows up to offer him a spot on their team, extolling the benefits of being on a jobber stable.  Turns out Dolph wasn’t alone!

Drew McIntyre shows up from under the ring and decimates Titus and Apollo.  Ziggler picks up Apollo and sets him up for a Claymore/ZigZag combo.  If these guys are going to be a tag team, it’s kind of weird but I think it will somehow work.  That tag team combo move was great.

More importantly, I’m excited for Drew and Roman to confront each other.  One former “chosen one” to the current one.  There’s a lot of possibilities with Drew on Raw.

A Mizerably Glorious Goodbye

We have an episode of Miz TV where he unveils two of the latest signees for Team Red and it’s Sami and KO.  I’m a little bummed by this.  I was hoping they’d play out this “fired” thing some more.  KO followed Progress and they welcomed him to slide into their DMs.  There was two spots left in their Super Strong Style Tournament next month.

Anyway, they went over Kurt’s head and got a letter form Stephanie.  In retaliation, Kurt is sending The Miz, at Bryan’s request, to SmackDown.  And the Miztourage are not welcome.

For one final sendoff, he’s putting the 5 men from Miz TV into a 10-man tag against Finn, Seth, Lashley, Braun, and…the GLORIOUS BOBBY ROODE!  I think Bobby’s run on SmackDown has been underwhelming.  He needs a fresh start.

Spoiler alert, the Miztourage deny a hot tag from The Miz and allow him to be destroyed by Strowman.

Welcome back to SmackDown Miz!

Overall Thoughts and Full List of New Raw Superstars

After last year’s raid of SmackDown Live with no logic to it, I think all these moves make sense.  Everyone they moved needs a little refresher or, in the case of Riott Squad, makes more sense on Raw.  I do think the Women’s rosters are extremely lopsided.  They’ll have to rectify that tonight.

Here’s the full list, including superstars announced on YouTube/WWE.com:

1. Jinder Mahal
2. Ruby Riott
3. Sarah Logan
4. Liv Morgan
5. Kevin Owens
6. Sami Zayn
7. Zack Ryder
8. Fandango
9. Tyler Breeze
10. Natalya
11. Dolph Ziggler
12. Drew McIntyre
13. Baron Corbin
14. Konnor
15. Viktor
16. Bobby Roode
17. Mojo Rawley
18. Mike Kanellis
19. Chad Gable

Everything Else

• Did you think Bayley and Banks would have an actual real match on Raw?  Yes?  Well, you’ve never watched pro wrestling, have you?  It was really just an excuse for the Riott Squad to make their presence known.  Ruby and crew would break up a Banks Statement with Bayley on the verge of tapping out.  Welcome to Raw.
• Authors of Pain defeat Slater and Rhyno with a Last Chapter on Rhyno.  Good effort, former SDL Tag Team Champions.  It just wasn’t good enough.
• “Woken” Matt and Bray Wyatt defeat The Revival to win the Tag Team Eliminator.  They hit a sweet assisted Twist of Fate for the pin. They are headed to Saudi Arabia to face The Bar.
• Ember Moon defeated Mickie James with a sweet Eclipse.  Mickie probably sold that better than anyone.
• Corey Graves accidentally mentions the Bullet Club.  It was amazing.
• Natalya takes on Mandy Rose, wins, and gets beaten down by Absolution.  Apparently Nattie helped train Rousey, so she actually has a friend.  Ronda basically came out and wrenched Sonya Deville’s arm out of her socket.  It’s only a matter of time before Nattie turns on Ronda.  I guess that’s a fine, easy feud for Ronda.
• The Fashion Police showed up on Raw to immediately issue tickets to The Bar.  Sheamus and Cesaro were infuriated and challenged them to a match later that night.  And the Fashion Police got a resounding win!
  • While I think it’s a good move for The Fashion Police, I do think this signifies a move to SmackDown for The Bar.  They lost the championship to a child and now they’ve lost to The Fashion Police.
• Samoa Joe confronted Reigns again.  The segment was fine only because Joe is excellent on the microphone.  It was really just more of the same from last week.  It seems to reason that Roman is going to win in Saudi Arabia and Joe and Roman will be battling for Universal Championship at Backlash.