WWE Raw Results: Winners, Live Grades, Reaction and Highlights from August 14

WWE Raw Results: Winners, Live Grades, Reaction and Highlights from August 14

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Becky Lynch and Trish Stratus.WWE

Welcome to Bleacher Report’s live coverage and recap of WWE Raw on August 14.

After being bumped from SummerSlam, Becky Lynch and Trish Stratus finally had their big showdown this week, but this time, Zoey Stark was banned from ringside.

We also saw Shinsuke Nakamura address his attack on Seth Rollins from last week’s show, as well as more buildup for the upcoming Payback pay-per-view on September 2.

Let’s take a look at everything that happened on Monday’s episode of WWE Raw.

Sami Zayn vs. JD McDonagh

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After the announcers welcomed us to the show and ran down a few matches we will see, Judgment Day came out to kick things off. However, Finn Balor did not come out with the group.

Damien Priest questioned where Balor was, but JD McDonagh came out instead. He tried to give them a message from Finn, but Rhea Ripley said they don’t take orders from anyone who isn’t in Judgment Day.

Sami Zayn came out and started fighting with McDonagh in the aisle. Judgment Day made no effort to help McDonagh, but he was able to get the upper hand by attacking Zayn’s injured elbow anyway.

When we returned from a break, the match officially began. Zayn went right after the man who injured him but was still favoring his elbow quite a bit.

Zayn did a great job selling his injury while continuing to find ways to take McDonagh down, and the Irish Ace kept finding ways to attack his arm in return. This match was given two segments, so they had more than enough time to tell the story they were trying to tell.

Both men looked good and gave us a physical encounter to open the show. Balor pretended like he was going to attack Zayn as a distraction, but Zayn kicked out of the roll-up. Zayn knocked Balor off the apron before hitting the Helluva Kick for the win.

Winner: Sami Zayn

Grade: B

Notable Moments and Observations

Chad Gable vs. Giovanni Vinci, Gunther vs. Otis

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Gunther came out with Giovanni Vinci and Ludwig Kaiser to talk about being 25 days away from breaking the record for the longest IC title reign. Alpha Academy came out to trade some insults to hype up Chad Gable’s IC title bout against Gunther.

Kaiser had a long exchange with Maxxine Dupri that ended with her slapping him across the face before we got the match.

Vinci had a slight size advantage over Gable and he used it to take control early on. Master Gable used his superior grappling ability to counter and take him down with ease.

Both of these men are incredibly gifted athletes and wrestlers, so they had no trouble working together despite limited time in the ring together. Before this, most of their encounters were six-man bouts at house shows, so this was a first-time singles match.

After a great technical exchange, Gable scored the win with his rolling German suplex. As soon as the match was over, Gunther challenged Otis to a match so he could get revenge.

Winner: Chad Gable

Grade: B+

Otis got the crowd to cheer with some of his dance moves before he and The Ring General locked up. They fought for control and started trading shots.

This was two powerhouses trying to hit each other as hard as possible, and it made for a very entertaining encounter.

Even though Otis was still doing some of his comedy stuff, he was also being taken seriously as a competitor and portrayed as a threat, even to someone as successful as Gunther.

As expected, Gunther got the win, but the fact that he was able to powerbomb Otis to do it was what made it impressive. Gable hit him with a Geman suplex to send him out of the ring after the match was over.

Winner: Gunther

Grade: B-

Notable Moments and Observations

Matt Riddle and Drew Mcintyre vs. Viking Raiders

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Matt Riddle was shown interrupting a backstage interview to ask Drew McIntyre to be his tag team partner against The Viking Raiders. The Scottish Warrior did not seem excited at the prospect but promised to consider it.

Riddle looked almost surprised when McIntyre showed up to be his partner, but as soon as the bell rang, Erik and Ivar took control of The Bro.

He was able to fight his way out of the corner, but instead of making a tag, he tried to take on both Vikings by himself, which ended poorly for him as the show went to a break.

We returned to see Erik and Ivar still dominating the match. When McIntyre finally got the hot tag, he went on a rampage.

This was a pretty standard tag match. It was nothing to write home about, but the live crowd seemed to be enjoying itself, so it definitely had people invested. McIntyre hit Erik with the Claymore to get the win.

Winners: Drew McIntyre and Matt Riddle

Grade: B-

Notable Moments and Observations

Indi Hartwell vs. Rhea Ripley

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Indi Hartwell got the video package treatment before she had a non-title match against Ripley.

Candice LeRae and Dominik Mysterio were both at ringside, but The Eradicator didn’t need any help to dominate her opponent.

Other than a short burst of offense from Hartwell, this was a one-sided affair that ended with Ripley getting the win with the Riptide.

LeRae attacked Ripley and they left the champion down in the ring as they left up the aisle. This wasn’t much of a match, but it appeared to set up a possible title feud between Ripley and LeRae, so that is something to look forward to.

Winner: Rhea Ripley

Grade: C

Notable Moments and Observations

Becky Lynch vs. Trish Stratus

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Nakamura gave an interview with Michael Cole to explain why he attacked Rollins. The Visionary came out and ended up granting him a title shot with no arguments. The segment ended with Nakamura laying him out with a Kinshasa again.

The next match saw Lynch and Stratus finally get their one-on-one match they should have had at SummerSlam had WWE not decided to cut it.

The first couple of minutes felt like a genuine struggle for both women to take control. Stratus kept using dirty tricks to take down The Man, but whenever she gave an opening, Lynch would capitalize on it.

Stratus was doing a lot of showboating whenever she had the upper hand, but Lynch was all business. After Stratus revealed that her face was fine, she discarded the mask.

Even though she is still in great shape, nobody expects Stratus to have the same kind of matches she had when she was a full-time wrestler. She and Lynch did a good job, but this bout definitely had some sloppy moments.

The match ended in a double countout when they started fighting in the crowd and didn’t even try to get back to the ring. They fought up the stairs and into the concourse area. They fought for a long time until Stark appeared to lend Stratus a hand.

This ending definitely deflated the crowd a bit. This feud should have ended here, so dragging it out even longer is going to be difficult.

Winner: Double Countout

Grade: C+

Notable Moments and Observations

Cody Rhodes vs. Finn Balor

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The main event of this week’s show saw Balor take on Cody Rhodes. These two have met before, but this was more personal than their last encounter.

The match started off like most normal bouts. They were locking up, running the ropes and wearing each other down with holds. They didn’t try to make this a brawl, which is kind of how it seemed like it would go leading into it.

Dom and Rhea showed up to provide a distraction as the show went to a break. Priest showed up after the break and tried to help, but Rhodes ended up taking out him and Balor at the same time with a suicide dive.

The ref caught Dom trying to pass a chair to Balor. When Priest tried to slide in his briefcase, Rhodes caught it and used it to get the win.

This was a solid main event, but all of the stuff with Judgment Day just felt repetitive. Zayn showing up at the end was a nice bonus for the Canadian crowd, but he probably ended up regretting his decision after Judgment Day beat him down and put him through a table.

Winner: Cody Rhodes

Grade: B

Notable Moments and Observations

The Final Word

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This week’s Raw was pretty “Business as usual.” We got some forward progression on a handful of storylines, a couple of fun matches,

The ongoing Judgment Day story is the main attraction on Raw these days, but Alpha Academy vs. Imperium has become a surprise highlight in recent weeks.

Otis vs. Gunther, and Gable vs. Vinci were both great and showcased how all four men are capable of putting on entertaining performances at the drop of a hat.

Piper Niven returning and declaring herself to be Chelsea Green’s new tag team partner was not only hilarious, but it opened up some interesting possibilities for Chelsea’s character.

Grade: B-