WWE Stock Report: Karrion Kross hits rock bottom again

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 Natalya taking Rhea Ripley to the limit, Austin Theory beating Sheamus again, and LA Knight left off TV for SmackDown at MSG, a lot of fortunes were changed.

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

Stock Down #3: Shinsuke Nakamura

When Nakamura returned to WWE TV nearly two months ago, it looked like he could be in line for a push after being away for so long. But now he’s quickly settling into a role of putting others over, as he did with Damian Priest on this week’s episode of Raw. The King of Strong Style has now failed to win each of his last four matches on Raw, going back to the start of June.

Stock Down #2: Indi Hartwell & Tegan Nox

Indi Hartwell’s main roster in-ring debut occurred during the women’s tag team turmoil / gauntlet match on Raw, but her team (with Candice LeRae) jobbed out in less than two minutes. Hartwell did nothing to stand out during her brief ring time, which is pretty much the exact opposite of what a wrestler wants for a debut.

The turmoil match was also Tegan Nox’s first action on Raw since she was drafted there a couple months ago, and she was eliminated during a commercial break.

I don’t know which one is worse.

Stock Down #1: Karrion Kross

Karrion Kross and AJ Styles have been going at it for a couple months, with their rematch on last night’s SmackDown being built up as a potential blow off to their feud. But the whole thing was completely rushed through, probably because The Bloodline’s Tribal Court segment went much longer than planned. The end result is that Karrion’s entrance wasn’t even televised and then he lost the match in less than two minutes.

Just like that, Kross is back to being a bottom rung jabroni who just can’t get a win when he really needs one. There’s a lot of competition for WWE TV time with SummerSlam coming up, and Kross could find himself squeezed out of the mix after his latest failure.

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

Stock Up #3: Chelsea Green & Sonya Deville

It’s not often that a heel team runs the gauntlet from beginning to end, but that’s exactly what Chelsea and Sonya did on this week’s Raw when they defeated four other teams in separate falls to become the number one contender to the WWE women’s tag team titles. This result is even more surprising when you consider that Green and Deville rarely ever won as a team prior to the gauntlet/turmoil match.

Stock Up #2: Maxxine Dupri

Dupri is making the most of the lower card comedy material WWE is giving her to work with as part of Alpha Academy. She won her debut match this week on Raw and the live fans were completely behind her, especially when she did Chad Gable’s “Thank you!” shtick. Just wait until she successfully pulls off Otis’ popular Caterpillar/Worm move.

Stock Up #1: The Bloodline

Nearly half of SmackDown’s TV time this week was dedicated to The Bloodline storyline, including a Tribal Court segment that saw Roman Reigns pretend to hand over the position of Tribal Chief to Jey Uso. By the end of the show, Jimmy Uso was in the hospital, Solo Sikoa’s interest in being the next Tribal Chief was teased, and Jey Uso issued a challenge to Reigns for a championship match, which will presumably be the main event of SummerSlam.

The Bloodline angle is only getting stronger months after what many people thought was a significant booking misstep when Cody Rhodes lost to Roman Reigns at WrestleMania.

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