10 best WWE RAW only Pay-Per-Views
When the original brand extension took place in March 2002, WWE continued to present all pay-per-views every month as featuring matches from both brands. It wasn't until over a year after the extension, in June 2003, that WWE decided to try out solo branded pay-per-views for RAW and Smackdown.
The result was a success, for the most part, considering shows were often light on major players. With ECW thrown into the mix, WWE decided to end the trend in 2007 and reverted back to multi-branded pay-per-views that year, and officially ended the extension in 2011.
Due to a great influx of talent from their developmental brand NXT, as well as other talent being brought in straight to TV, the brand extension was revived on July 19, 2016, when SmackDown began broadcasting live on Tuesdays.
This also brought the revival of single-branded pay-per-views, however, this trend would not last as long as the original. After just under a year and a half, WWE announced that the Elimination Chamber event in February 2018 would be the final RAW only pay-per-view, and Fastlane in March would be the final one for SmackDown and, thus returning to all pay-per-views being dual branded.
During both single branded PPV era's, we did manage to get some really excellent events, and here I will be looking at the top 10 best that came out of RAW.
#10 Taboo Tuesday 2005
Taboo Tuesday became a revolutionary event for WWE as it is the first time they experimented with the fans choosing some of the matches, well, match types at least. For the most part, it worked.
Taboo Tuesday 2004, was a pretty good event, while it was renamed to Cyber Sunday, also provided to entertaining cards. The best of the bunch came in 2005, with the second and last Taboo Tuesday event.
This was an event that was almost even more historic, as it was to feature the return of Stone Cold Steve Austin, who retired 2 years earlier at WrestleMania XIX. Austin was scheduled to face Johnathan Coachman. Due to Austin still in danger of being confined to a wheelchair should he have ever wrestled again, WWE pitched that he lose to Coach in a screwjob type finish.
Austin wasn't happy and backed out of the match just 2 days before the event, and would be replaced by SmackDown's World Heavyweight Champion Batista. Despite this big disappointment, we still got a good show.
Matt Hardy and, local boy Rey Mysterio were voted in to face Edge and, Chris Masters in the opening match. Edge backed out of the match last minute for no reason and announced Gene Snitsky as his replacement. They had a passable opening match considering Gene and Chris were less experienced. This would be Christian's last night in WWE for over 3 years and the live audience knew it. They chanted his name throughout the match.
In other happenings, Eugene and his voted tag partner, Hall of Famer Jimmy Snuka, defeated Rob Conway and, Tyson Tomko in an attempted comedy match, Mick Foley as Mankind beat Carlito in a short match, Big Show and Kane nearly squashed Lance Cade and Trevor Murdoch to lift the Tag Team Titles, Batista squashed Coach in a Street Fight and, Trish Stratus retained her Women's Championship in a 'Fulfil Your Fantasy' Battle Royal.
The best of this card came from a very fun and entertaining Steel Cage match, between Ric Flair and Triple H, where the Nature Boy retained his Intercontinental Championship over The Game and, John Cena defeated Kurt Angle and Shawn Michaels in an exciting main event. Give that match another 8 - 10 minutes and it could have been truly excellent.