WWE RAW 1/27/2025: 3 Things We Hated And 3 Things We Loved

Welcome to Wrestling Inc.'s weekly review of "WWE Raw," where it's the last Monday before the Royal Rumble, and as a result, you will forgive us for spending most of our time here talking about the build to the Royal Rumble. No shade on the World Tag Team Championship match (which The Judgment Day lost) or the non-title match involving the women's tag champs (which The Judgment Day won) but we're actually not really going to be talking about matches very much in general this week, because the matches were very much not the focus of the show. The January 27 "Raw" was Logan Paul returning and Jey Uso yeeting with Quavo and the video game cover reveal. Even the main event was a promo segment. That's where "Raw" invested its time this week, and as a result those segments are where we invested our emotions — for better or worse.

As always, if you want a full objective rundown of everything that happened on the red brand, check out our "Raw" results page. If you're here for the opinions and analysis of the WINC staff, here are three things we hated and three things we loved about the 1/27/25 episode of "WWE Raw."

An opening segment is meant to set the tone of the rest of a professional wrestling show and get fans excited for what's to come in the hours that follow it. If that sentiment is truly taken to heart, then the opening verbal exchange between Seth "Freakin" Rollins, Logan Paul, and World Heavyweight Champion GUNTHER indicated that the couple of hours that followed it would be full of long, drawn-out confrontations that were not overly engaging or interesting to watch.

This segment was meant to create interest as to who Rollins and Paul would choose to face at WrestleMania 41 should they be the victor of 2025 Men's Royal Rumble whilst making it clear that GUNTHER was afraid of no challenger and didn't take either of them seriously. Instead, it came off as three grown men acting like children as they told each other "I'm a better wrestler than you" for what felt like an eternity. It wasn't enjoyable to watch in any way whatsoever, and didn't have much of a point to it, especially with what the original intention behind it was.

On top of that, while an interaction between just Rollins and GUNTHER would've made some sort of sense given their respective histories with the World Heavyweight Championship, the inclusion of Paul into the mix felt a little random. Paul has a lack of history with both men, having never faced GUNTHER in singles competition and only facing Rollins once at WrestleMania 39. There wasn't any reason to not give Paul an in ring segment of his own, with time easily available to have taken from this segment or the closing segment in addition to the loose end time that "Raw" has these days.

Written by Olivia Quinlan

The ongoing heat on the New Day's Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston after "breaking up" with Big E is still just as good as it was initially, and this week added another layer, complete with merchandise. It was a bit silly, in a good way, and overall enjoyable on a show that I thought was pretty tough to get through.

The fact that they first attempted to join forces with Ludwig Kaiser and Pete Dunne backstage, who would barely look at them and just walked away, was a nice touch. I'm really enjoying the ongoing story that even the biggest heels on the roster won't give them the time of day, like they're the most despicable people they've ever seen. It's such a fun twist after years and years of the positive New Day. It makes it seem like Big E was so beloved by everyone, both heel and face, that if and when he's able to return, either in the ring or in any capacity he can, it's going to be an even bigger deal.

If the other heels on the roster hating them wasn't bad enough, it was Woods' family who turned on the men tonight when Woods faced off against Rey Mysterio. Woods' mom, dad, and sister were meant to be ringside, and he mentioned how much he spent on the ringside seats, but they didn't show up until the match was almost over. When they showed up to sit alongside rapper Lil' Yachty, his parents were wearing "New Day Sucks" shirts. When Mysterio beat Woods, he went to celebrate with his family, and his sister, who was just holding her shirt, gave it to Mysterio to put on. I thought when his dad revealed what he was wearing that the shirt would be up on WWE Shop shortly after, and I wasn't wrong. It was a super cute way to introduce the merchandise, and even though it's a bit cheesy, it was fun.

I'm not sure where the New Day story is going, all I know is I'm certainly hoping Big E is involved in any way he can be, but for now, I'm alright with not knowing. They're not taking up too much time on the show, but it's just enough to be kind of funny and enjoyable. It's a great story, and Woods and Kingston are playing the parts so well. The fans are so invested, there's even merch now, and that's not something that can be said for all stories on the show.

Written by Daisy Ruth

At risk of this sounding a bit dramatic, I will say I was fully prepared for the first episode of "Raw" on Netflix to have quite a few celebrity cameos. But now, it hasn't stopped for three straight weeks, and I'm a bit sick of celebrities being shown in the crowd just waving. While it probably doesn't eat up that much time, on a night like Monday night, it certainly felt like this two-and-half hour show took a lot longer with unnecessary segments. I love Jey Uso and his entrance wholeheartedly, but I'd be interested to see just how long it took him and Quavo to get down to the ring and for Uso to finally catch his breath and address the crowd — all to just declare for the Royal Rumble. While I'm sure that's really cool for the fans in attendance to "YEET" along, maybe that could have started, or at least continued, throughout a commercial break?

Whether or not smiling and waving celebs or long entrances, or even video game cover art announcements take too much time or not (though shout-out Drew McIntyre for saving that last bit), I really thought "Raw" moving to a streaming service with wiggle room was going to leave more time for different stories. I suppose CM Punk and Cody Rhodes attempted that to the end show, but the way the show awkwardly went to break, came back for a second with a Roman Reigns behind-the-scenes video of the "WWE 2K25" cover shoot, THEN went back into Rhodes, post Helluva Kick from Sami Zayn, and his promo with Punk — I was just confused and tapped out at this point.

I thought maybe with the extra time and wiggle room we'd be getting "smaller" (for lack of a better term) stories to compliment the bigger things going on on the show. Kind of like what Ivy Nile and Lyra Valkyria teased for the Royal Rumble and Nile possibly getting a future Women's Intercontinental Championship shot. It would have been nice to work in some mini-feuds between competitors going into the Royal Rumble, but it seems like everyone declared too late for the match this year for stories to even be put together.

I suppose all of this is a rant to say that "Raw" needs to be timed better and get its priorities in order. I'm sure stars of Netflix shows need to be shown in the crowd, but it's truly getting old quick. Maybe after the Rumble, on the Road to WrestleMania, we'll get some other stories and feuds going on to keep my interest. But overall, the pacing of this show wasn't it.

Written by Daisy Ruth

Paul Heyman came out to reveal that Roman Reigns — and Heyman, nestled in the corner — will be the cover athlete for the upcoming WWE 2K25 video game title, which was in itself cool if nothing overly spectacular for an episode of TV, but served some narrative purpose as the "Wise Man" addressed Reigns' intentions for the Royal Rumble. Heyman went into great length about how Reigns desires to regain his title and they spent however many years on top, and it was very much par of the course until Drew McIntyre emerged before Heyman could escape.

This was where things got interesting, with McIntyre imposing himself against the much smaller Heyman and delivering every word with a cold sense of foreboding over what he could do next. He explained to a bemused "Wise Man" that he was the "Daddy of The Bloodline" because it was he that won the Royal Rumble in 2020, eliminating Reigns in the process, went on to defeat "The Beast" at WrestleMania 36, in turn causing Heyman to be cast into the ocean of obscurity. The very best of McIntyre's promo work is the fact that, spun to suit his narrative or not, a lot of it is rooted in factual basis and genuine call backs to the established — yet often forgotten — canon, drawing upon history and layering it into his current motivations. It really helps to convey the idea that he is sadistically obsessed with those he has vengeful eyes for. He continued in that vein as he demanded an apology from Heyman, who acquiesced but dropped a very well-timed "You're crowding me" to set the conflicting tone.

I was fully expecting McIntyre to lay Heyman out, and you'd be forgiven for thinking that Heyman felt the same purely judging from his expressions, and he sustained that atmosphere throughout the segment by treading that line. He never crossed it, rather dropping a cold line to Heyman asking him to warn his client that he's going to destroy them at the Rumble; Heyman said he would pass that message onto Reigns, and McIntyre turned to clarify that he meant CM Punk. McIntyre remains one of the most compelling characters on WWE TV because he remains true to his arc as a character. He hasn't just forgotten about Punk because their feud was blown off, and the Rumble will be the best opportunity for him to kill several birds with one stone as he steps in the ring with both Reigns and Punk, as well as Original Bloodline rivals Sami Zayn and Jey Uso. It's almost guaranteed at this stage that if "Raw" is going to have a great segment, it will likely involve the "Scottish Psychopath," and it was more of the same this week.

Written by Max Everett

Now I'm cognizant that I'm breaking the format a little bit here given that I had such high praise for the promo between Drew McIntyre and Paul Heyman in itself, but it'd be remiss of me not to give credence to the fact that much of it was showered with "We want Roman" and "We don't care" chants, and that is something WWE was asking for by building a segment around someone who wasn't going to be there. I get that Roman Reigns has reached the enviable position of working lesser yet more significant dates, and that it makes sense to leave Reigns for the pay-per-view this weekend, but when you're revealing the cover star it just feels right to have the actual star present.

At least, that's certainly what the fans in attendance must have taken for granted, and it resulted in a fairly disrespectful snubbing of the men in the ring who actually turned up for the fans. It feels like you could have easily circumvented all of that by omitting the cover reveal and just booking the promo segment between Heyman and McIntyre as transpired. The fans are always going to want the biggest star, so when you can't provide that it just feels like it would be kinder to all involved not to dangle their existence like a carrot on a stick when it can't be delivered. The 2K25 cover reveal could have been done on social media and it still would have reached those who are likely to buy the game, and once again I understand that there are eyes to be drawn on Netflix globally, but with Reigns literally present this weekend (where they will most probably plug the game anyway) it just felt like a way to fill time and check boxes, and it would appear that sentiment was shared by those in attendance. We all want Roman (unless you don't, I suppose) but there is a whole host of other stars who deserve their chance to shine, and it was just a shame to watch a chance clouded on the go-home show.

Written by Max Everett

While I wasn't necessarily the biggest fan of any of the individual segments teasing potential men's Royal Rumble winners on the "Raw" go-home show this week, I'm a massive fan of how unpredictable the men's Rumble — and the men's world title picture in general — looks this year.

At this point almost half the men's Rumble has been officially announced, and there are a few people who probably have zero shot at winning — Chad Gable, LA Knight, and Rey Mysterio don't seem like likely candidates for world title pushes in the short term, nor do singles champions Bron Breakker and Shinsuke Nakamura or even new WWE signee Penta. Even with those six crossed out the list, however, there are still eight names currently announced that have a legitimate case for winning the whole thing. WWE is leaning into its greatest strength at the moment, which is its preponderance of main event talent, and Paul Levesque's creative team is skillfully weaving many of them together week after week, teasing a wealth of potential WrestleMania world title matches. Adding to this is the sense that, while World Heavyweight Champion GUNTHER is temporarily free of title defenses, Cody Rhodes' WWE Championship is very much in jeopardy as he puts it on the line against Kevin Owens in a match that doesn't involve pinfalls and in which interference from any or all of Rhodes' numerous enemies is perfectly legal. Even assuming Rhodes retains the championship, he could realistically headline WrestleMania with Drew McIntyre or CM Punk (both of which were previewed on "Raw"), as well as complete a Mania trifecta with Roman Reigns or welcome back the returning John Cena. Seth Rollins would also be a natural choice for Rhodes' WrestleMania opponent, though this week's segment teased a match with GUNTHER, who also has ready-made challengers in the form of Logan Paul, Jey Uso, and Sami Zayn — who, as it happens, would also be the natural choice as the challenger for a defending Owens. There are any number of potential combinations, and that's without thinking of potential surprise returns from the likes of AJ Styles, Randy Orton, and yes, maybe even The Rock.

The downside to WWE putting in the time to set up all these potential directions is that some of this stuff we're watching now might not go anywhere. It's very possible Punk never ends up challenging Rhodes for the championship, and where does that leave the segment we saw Monday night? Still, a lot of these interactions will likely pay off — Owens and Zayn don't need the title to continue their storyline, and the same is true for the likes of McIntyre, Rollins, and even Cena. Only one of these wrestlers can win the Royal Rumble, but there are seemingly more good options than ever, and even the guys who lose are already laying the groundwork for a WrestleMania program with one of their fellow main-eventers. In the mean time, a match whose winner often feels pre-ordained actually seems like it could go at least a half-dozen different directions this year, and that should make the Rumble itself extremely fun.

Written by Miles Schneiderman