Liv Morgan & Dominik Mysterio’s Connection Intensifies on RAW

Liv Morgan Makes Dominik Mysterio Submissive

Liv addressed the crowd at GIANT Center in Hershey, Pennsylvania, and fed into the heat reverberating from social media views, claiming ‘kissing Dom was the cherry on top’ for her. Dom eventually came out, and things fell off a bit for me. Dom claims he wants nothing to do with Liv and plays coy, but the situation only muddies when Finn Balor comes out. Liv Morgan made the point that while Finn was asking her to leave, Dom wasn’t, and he was not walking away, even when Liv began to get flirty.

A couple of things: one, and it is not about the Judgement Day, but it feels like making Liv’s new title reign connect directly to a ‘boy stealing’ program undermines her status as champ. If it works in the storyline, that would be great, but if it doesn’t, then you have to consider the optics. Right now, if you had a male character doing the same thing Liv is doing to Dom but to a female character, you’d seem out of touch to some and sexist to many others. Liv deserves better than this, but you must let the story play out.

Sidebar

Andrade seems disgruntled, at least according to the dirt sheets, but it all stems from a Tweet he liked and responded to on X of a fan asking why ‘all Latino wrestlers have to feud/work with one another.’ While Andrade is coming off as the problem to most, he does have a point. And with Dom Mysterio, who later told Balor in the back that it was ‘not his fault the ladies like him.’ It’s like Hispanic characters in WWE get typecast quickly as the ‘Latin Lover’ or something close to it—tropes in wrestling or weird creative hangups amongst WWE brass.

Non-Title Banger- For La Raza Or For La Casa?

A Puerto Rico vs. Mexico rivalry is fierce and legendary in boxing, and this week’s RAW, we had Rey Mysterio receiving a non-title match versus Heavyweight Champion Priest. Unfortunately, this match was only meant to further the issues between Carlito and Rey/LWO—even though they already fought and should’ve settled it. McIntyre came out after the shmozz ending—sad and wasted chance to elevate all involved without tired tropes.

Rey was so excited throughout RAW for his shot at Priest, and he vowed to get revenge for Dragon Lee. In that promo, he claimed that Judgement Day does not run this place, but it seems like they do after interfering in nearly half of the matches tonight.

You can’t fault booking completely. Rey was a bit off tonight and nearly botched a spot off the top turnbuckle. Still, his gear was fresh, and he had the momentum, but instead of a few near falls for the Lucha Legend, they took the ending from a 2004-2006 RAW/SmackDown. Priest hit the South of Heaven for the pinfall victory and was almost immediately attacked by McIntyre to close the show, but not before he took out the entire Judgement Day, a situation that Priest might not let go of by next Monday.

However, Priest would end up standing tall after McIntyre took a victory lap and was caught off guard and then sent through a table as the credits popped and RAW faded to black.

Tidbits

• The Zayn-Gable feud continued, and it did it at the expense of the Alpha Academy. After Gable made them read a hilariously degrading message that ended with Gable demanding Zayn give a shot at the title. Zayn addressed the Alpha Academy and gave them a real talking to, but things they needed to hear in way of standing up to Gable. The crowd started chanting Otis, the one member likely to make the big turn on Gable, and it was eventually up to Otis to take out Zayn once Gable attacked him from behind proving this was all a setup.
• Otis refused at first, and Gable started belittling him, but Takanawa stepped in, and when Gable turned his attention to him, Maxine Dupri stepped in; this was as good as TV gets. The crowd, the audience at home, we all wanted Otis and co to stand up to Gable, and just as it seemed they would once again coward, Otis got into Gable’s face in a major way. That gave Zayn enough time to attack Gable, but they eventually were slammed into Otis and Co., who were launched from the apron to the floor. Gable told Otis that Zayn did it, and Otis attacked him for it. After a brief but anticipated decision to make, he ultimately took it out on Zayn.
• Dragon Lee got some much-needed promo this week as a video package played before his match with Finn. Balor won, but Lee looked good. Hopefully, he has more opportunities coming. It was a great match. They protected Lee with an interference from Carlito.
• Bron Breakker got a ‘real match’ against Ricochet after Breakker interfered in his business on multiple occasions. Ricochet got some offense, more than anyone else Breakker has faced, but it was Breakker who looked like the unstoppable force. Breakker leaped up the ropes to hit the Franken-Steiner (glad that’s back) off the top turnbuckle, where a sitting Ricochet was launched forward, and all that was waiting for him was a spear to end it. Keeping up with the theme of Breakker, he attempted to ‘Hulk smash’ everything on RAW, including the stairs, which he launched at Dragonov, who came to make the save.
• Awesome Truth is the best thing on TV every week and with the shortest amount of time, but I think it might be time to talk about their place amongst the all-time great tag teams.
• The New Day divide attempt by Cross continued. It could get interesting, especially if Big E is needed in a non-action role, but just seeing them reunite against the odds of breaking up would be great.