WWE Raw takeaways: A bad case of the Mondays

Jul 21, 2026 - 12:25

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WWE Raw on July 20, 2026, took place at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit, and featured a singles match between LA Knight and Jacob Fatu.

This week's show was the first programming after Saturday Night's Main Event at Madison Square Garden, and it was probably the worst show of the year. There were zero matches with stakes attached, and no storylines advanced significantly. It was a straight-up filler episode, which, in the TKO era of WWE, is incredibly rough to digest with all of the advertising.

Here are the top takeaways from this week's show:

None.

I wish I were joking, but I'll expand.

It was a terrible episode of Raw. As mentioned above, none of the matches mattered. I knew we were in for a stinker when Raw finally started an episode with a match – which, according to some historians on Twitter (or X if you actually call it that), was a first in SEVEN MONTHS. The Vision, the tag team champions, faced Dragon Lee and Je'Von Evans, and yet the titles weren't on the line. Why?

There were head-scratching moments, like during an in-ring promo, Seth Rollins superkicked Jacob Fatu, and exited the ring. They crossed paths backstage later, and they just...talked? Fatu from just a few weeks ago would have crashed out on Rollins – even if the orders from Roman Reigns are to be hands off. Fatu is now letting kicks to the face slide. No gas, all brakes.

The only thing that resembled something significant in the storyline was Sikoa offering to have Rollins' back at SummerSlam, just because that revolves around Rollins' match against Reigns.

The main event between Fatu and LA Knight, which ended up being a teaser for the 6-man tag match at SummerSlam, literally began during a commercial break. It doesn't matter if it was just a few seconds. What are we doing here when a main event plays second fiddle to ads?

If you watched this episode live, I'm sorry you sat through endless ads, recaps of SNME, vignettes, and other video packages. Filler episodes will need to happen from time to time, but this was completely unwatchable for live viewers. This was a prime example of why I watch Raw after it's over to skip the nonsense.

Match rundown

Here's each match that took place on this week's show:

The Vision def. Je'Von Evans and Dragon Lee - non-title tag team match
Oba Femi def. JD McDonagh
Chad Gable, Penta def. Ethan Page, Rusev
Joe Hendry def. Dominik Mysterio
Jacob Fatu def. LA Knight

Again, there were no real big takeaways from anything tonight.

That's not to slight the talent involved, because the matches were fine, and the effort was there. I mean, Bron Breakker quite literally moved the ring when doing his super speedy spear on Otis.