The biggest winners and losers of last night's Raw (January 21)

Last night's Raw was the red brand's go-home show before the Royal Rumble this Sunday. For the first 90 minutes, WWE did its part in building up the key matches and players, and some of it was novel, which should be commended. When the six man tag team match began though, things began to drag.

Who looked the best heading into the Royal Rumble? Who got the least out of the show last night? What will last night tell us about Sunday and beyond?

The Road to WrestleMania is well underway, and nobody wants to get left behind. Here's what we learned about who might take center stage in MetLife Stadium.

Winner: Braun Strowman

If you were watching carefully, you'd see that Braun Strowman got the most out of this portion of the show. Nobody expects Finn Balor to beat Brock Lesnar on Sunday, even though he looked very good in last night's segment, tired old "David and Goliath" promo and the needless presence of Vince McMahon aside.

Braun Strowman had a good match with Balor, but he was protected by the interference of Brock Lesnar, who hit the F5 on the latter and caused the match to end in a disqualification.

This essentially preserves Braun Strowman from taking another big loss against Lesnar, with the Monster Among Men making it clear that somehow, someway, he would get to Lesnar and the Universal Championship.

Does this leave open the possibility of a WrestleMania confrontation between the two? If so, it would be a year too late, but the fact that Strowman is back in the hunt at all is significant. It lessens the odds of Seth Rollins emerging from Sunday as the Royal Rumble winner, which can either make the match more exciting or turn it into a train wreck.