WWE Stock Report: Finn Balor and Elias are hopeless without Braun Strowman

Some places do power rankings. Here at Cageside, we do a stock report.

In this weekly series, we identify three Superstars (or groups of Superstars) who are on their way up, and three that are moving in the opposite direction. After a busy week that included one of the worst episodes of Raw in recent memory, a lot of fortunes were changed.

With that in mind, let’s see whose stock has increased the most this week:

Stock Up #3: Samoa Joe

Samoa Joe has this pattern where he talks a big game and sounds incredible on the mic, but then predictably comes up short in the big fight. I don’t know if that pattern is going to repeat itself with Jeff Hardy, but Joe absolutely killed it on the mic this week on SmackDown while discussing Hardy’s past demons.

Stock Up #2: The Usos

The Usos are on quite a roll, defeating both The Bar and New Day in November, while also being responsible for the only SmackDown win at Survivor Series (even though their match didn’t count). All of these victories have led to Jimmy and Jey competing for the tag titles at TLC 2018.

Stock Up #1: Asuka

The Empress of Tomorrow has struggled with iffy creative ever since her undefeated streak ended at WrestleMania 34, despite the audience always erupting in loud cheers for her. But this week on SmackDown, Asuka stormed back towards the top of the women’s division by winning a Battle Royal to earn her way into a TLC match for the SmackDown Women’s Championship.

Now let’s see whose stock has decreased the most this week:

Stock Down #3: Bayley & Sasha Banks

Their open forum segment wasn’t quite as bad as the Dr. Shelby segments from earlier this year, but it still shows a perplexing inability for WWE to book to the strengths of Sasha and Bayley. Bayley’s line about Alexa Bliss going back to hell was a complete dud. Sasha and Bayley came off more like low card wrestlers doing low card things, as opposed to important superstars who demand our attention going forward.

Stock Down #2: Elias & Finn Balor

Several babyfaces on Raw were booked to look like garbage week, and nobody exemplifies that better than Finn Balor and Elias. It’s very clear that these two guys are equivalent to disposable pawns on a chess board, who are meant to be sacrificed to the heels until Braun Strowman comes back and saves the day. When this lackluster booking of hopelessly ineffective babyfaces coincides with way too much TV time for Baron Corbin and his horrible acting skills, it makes for really really bad television.

Stock Down #1: Ronda Rousey & Nia Jax

Considering Ronda Rousey’s star power and the audience’s passionate disdain for Nia Jax, their feud could easily be the most compelling story on Raw. Instead, both Rousey and Jax delivered a terrible trainwreck of a promo segment on Raw this week. All it takes is one disaster segment like that to completely take the buzz out of a feud, and that might be exactly where Rousey versus Jax is at right now.

There you have it, Cagesiders. Whose stock do you think has changed the most this week?