WWE’s Failed Raw Underground Concept Is Already ‘Done’

WWE is already throwing in the towel on Shane McMahon’s “Raw Underground” fight club.

According to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter (h/t Wrestling Inc), Raw Underground is already “considered done” despite just being introduced in August: “Raw Underground is ‘considered done’ for right now. The report noted that the segment was initially dropped for a few weeks due to the [company’s] Covid-19 breakout, and fear that extras in the crowd may have been exposed to the virus. However, that is no longer the case. Even with almost everyone involved in the Raw Underground team back to work, the word is that WWE will no longer produce the shoot-style fights.

It was only a couple of months ago that WWE shocked the world when McMahon surprisingly returned to Monday Night Raw and introduced the shoot-style fight concept that was dubbed “Raw Underground.” According to talkSPORT, McMahon wasn’t just the on-screen leader of the club, but the club itself was indeed “legitimately a brainchild of Shane McMahon and was “the company’s latest effort” to improve struggling TV ratings for Raw, which has been WWE’s No. 1 brand for most of its existence but had recently been surpassed by SmackDown in that regard.

The bad news for WWE: Raw Underground was never a big hit for WWE in any way, shape or form.

Raw Underground was supposed to boost the show’s viewership for its notoriously low-rated third hour, and though it indeed initially did just that, that didn’t last very long. Raw continued to be plagued by big viewership drops in its third hour even though Raw Underground was billed as a unique and innovative concept that would bring some realism and authenticity to the scripted world of WWE. That, in an unfortunate turn of events for WWE, didn’t happen, and Raw Underground instead became the laughingstock of pro wrestling circles, being viewed as a knockoff UFC and a halfhearted attempt to make pro wrestling seem “more real.”

WWE fans were having none of it, and former UFC and WWE star Ken Shamrock even offered the company help to produce more realistic “worked shoot” style fights. Raw Underground’s fights, however, continued to come across as desperate Hail Mary heaves to portray pro wrestling as legitimate, which unsurprisingly failed at a time when pro wrestling’s most diehard fans know that simply isn’t the case. Even WWE’s use of former world champions like Dolph Ziggler and Braun Strowman within Raw Underground left a lot to be desired, while the one legitimate star WWE seemed to be creating in the fight club—that being Dabba-Kato—was quickly buried with a lopsided loss to Strowman a few weeks ago.

That was essentially seen as the straw that broke Raw Underground’s back, and the concept disappeared due to a Covid-19 outbreak within WWE that appeared to temporarily put the concept on hold. That hiatus, however, now appears to be permanent as there has been no sign or mention of Raw Underground over the past few weeks, and WWE’s latest draft has reconfigured the rosters in a way that leaves very little—if any—room for the concept to truly thrive.

Instead, Raw Underground is just the latest shortsighted creative decision that WWE failed to deliver on, and the red brand will have to rely simply on booking consistent storylines to improve its audience on Monday nights moving forward.