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Raw Beats SmackDown in Men's 5-on-5 Elimination Match at WWE Survivor Series
November 23, 2020
Team Raw scored a clean sweep of their SmackDown counterparts to win the men's five-on-five elimination match Sunday night at WWE Survivor Series.
The rot started for the blue brand when Seth Rollins "sacrificed" himself by dropping to his knees and allowing Sheamus to eliminate him. His actions did not go down well with his teammates, but Kevin Owens, King Corbin and Otis would all soon him follow him out of contention.
That left Jey Uso to face all five members of the Raw team, but Keith Lee got a blind tag in to AJ Styles, which went unnoticed by the remaining SmackDown competitor.
Uso thought he was going to land his patented top-rope splash on Styles but was caught by Lee instead, and The Limitless One turned the counter into a Spirit Bomb to put the finishing touches on Team SmackDown.
However, universal champion Roman Reigns berated Jey after the match:
Survivor Series was built on traditional elimination matches featuring not only some of the best talent WWE has to offer but also some strange bedfellows being forced to team together as well.
The 2020 men's match involved all of the above, after Superstars on Raw and SmackDown won qualifying matches to earn the right to be part of the pay-per-view.
On Raw, Styles was the first to qualify for the team and was followed by Lee, Sheamus, Braun Strowman and Riddle.
It was clear from the start that Raw would have some trouble getting and staying on the same page because of the differing personalities on the team. It also didn't help matters that Styles kept trying to dub himself team captain, which all other members rejected.
Additionally, the members of Team Raw wrestled against each other many times prior to Sunday. Strowman beat Lee and Sheamus in a Triple Threat match to get on the team, and the duo of Lee and Riddle later beat Strowman and Sheamus in a tag team match.
Styles claimed it would allow them to get their aggression out and get on the same page, but it only seemed to push them further apart.
On SmackDown, there was far less interaction between the members of their team ahead of Survivor Series.
Uso, Owens, Rollins and Corbin were the first four Superstars to qualify for the team, and then Otis rounded out the squad on the go-home episode of SmackDown.
There wasn't much camaraderie present, and there were undoubtedly some issues between the members of Team SmackDown. That was especially true of Owens and Uso, who had a match on the Nov. 6 edition of SmackDown after Roman Reigns told his cousin that KO was disrespecting him.
Sunday's match was a volatile and combustible situation, but Team Raw managed to overcome the chaos and stand tall, meaning they could be in line for a huge push with Survivor Series serving as a springboard just as it did for many Superstars in previous years.
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