Monday Night Raw bounced back from nearly reaching the lowest ratings in the show's history, thanks to an appearance from Mr. Money in the Bank Brock Lesnar on Monday night, according to Wrestlingnews.co.
Brock's win on Sunday shocked everyone, reportedly even the other contestants in the ladder match as no one was told he'd show up. And the WWE Universe was not happy about it - or so it seemed.
However, WWE teasing that The Beast Incarnate could show up to Raw to cash in on Seth Rollins prompted a spike in ratings. Fans were also made to wait on the unveiling of the new WWE 24/7 Championship, something that, coupled with the above, saw 2,521,000 viewers tune in.
The show started with 2,681,000 viewers and retained most of the viewership for the second hour with 2,583,000. The third hour, though saw a significant drop (2,299,000).
WWE has already set next week's Raw up well by revealing that Lesnar will return to the show to disclose when he plans to cash in his briefcase and which title he will choose.
The MITB holder and manager Paul Heyman kicked off Monday night's show and the two were confronted by current Universal Champion Rollins, who dared Lesnar to cash in on the spot. Kofi Kingston would join the fray and also dare the briefcase holder after Heyman claimed that Brock might want to cash in on the WWE title instead.
Heyman would tease that the Beast could do so at some point during the show but, of course, he did not. The duo's now set to return next Monday to announce their plans.
What This Means
While hardly anyone was happy to see Lesnar walk away from MITB with the coveted briefcase, we have to admit that ratings follow the former Universal Champion whenever he decides to actually show up.
Fans were probably just hoping to see him cash it in but the man draws viewers nonetheless. So we probably don't know what we're talking about; Vince McMahon knows what he's doing (sighs).