As is the norm lately, several last minute changes were made to Monday Night Raw this week.
The match between Drew McIntyre and Dolph Ziggler was originally advertised as a WWE title match. The plan was to have Randy Orton come out and challenge McIntyre to a match at SummerSlam last week, however, the segment ended up being scrapped. The WWE felt that it would take away from the Ziggler and McIntyre title match this week if they were already promoting McIntyre’s next title defense against Orton.
Sometime between tapings they changed their minds and decided to have Orton come out this week and go through with the challenge for SummerSlam. Orton challenged McIntyre directly and made no reference to Ziggler as a possible opponent. The decision was made to make the match between McIntyre and Ziggler a non-title match so that the focus stayed on the SummerSlam match.
Also changed, Asuka was originally set to feud with whoever took out Kairi Sane to set up a SummerSlam match for the WWE Women’s title. In the end, WWE decided to use Sane’s beatdown as a way for Asuka to lose the Raw Women’s title without being pinned. While Bayley was the one who took out Sane backstage, Sasha Banks won the title from Asuka.
(Credit: f4wonline.com)