Ryback: RAW Underground Is The "Worst Thing You Could Do On Your [TV] For Pro Wrestling"

When Shane McMahon returned to Raw recently, he brought a new concept with him. McMahon debuted Raw Underground last week and it helped provide a small ratings boost to Raw which also carried over to this week's Raw.

Ryback discussed the concept of Raw Underground and what the intended goal of it should be on "Ryback TV Shooting Blanks Wrestling Report With Raj Giri."

"I did see it. I'll never knock anything for trying anything and I don't know where it's gonna go, just knowing how things are from being there. My belief is that when you're going to debut something brand new ? and this may be the case but knowing how they operate it usually isn't ? is that you're going to debut this Raw Underground with the mission? Obviously you're not debuting Raw Underground to get over Raw Underground, I would think," said Ryback. "If you're gonna do this then you have a special talent you wanna get over to build Raw Underground as a way to display this new bad ass person. Then eventually this bad ass person comes onto the roster and Raw Underground is done.

"That would be, in my opinion, if you're gonna do something. I have a feeling they just threw that all together and we're gonna see what happens with it. The other issue is that Raw Underground is a worked-shoot situation on a show that's a worked-show. So, you are reminding people that they're watching fake, phony wrestling and I think that's a horrible thing to do."

Ryback made a comparison to watching a movie and then the movie stops and reminds you that you're watching a movie.

"Even if Raw Underground was a shoot, I think it's the worst thing you could do on your programming for pro wrestling. Especially kids and people, you're telling them, 'Why are those punches hurting and they're stopping it but then they're throwing these punches out in the ring?' You're just simply reminding people and I don't think it's a good thing," stated Ryback.

He added that the way WWE has produced Raw Underground, he questions if it's done to get over a specific talent as he talked about earlier.

"Like Dolph Ziggler? Why isn't Dolph like that in the ring," asked Ryback. "That's the problem with pro wrestling in general. Why can't those guys be more believable out there? That's what's missing and you're just reminding everybody of how bad the talent are at not doing that. I don't know," said Ryback.

"I give everything a fair shake but knowing how things operate, I think there's more negatives than positives. Even if they did have a guy in mind that was gonna be the star of Raw Underground, you're reminding everyone the whole time? I don't know. We'll see."

You can subscribe to the new YouTube channel for the Ryback TV Shooting Blanks Wrestling Report With Raj Giri by clicking here. If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit the podcast with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.

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