Sami Zayn defends WWE Championship against Cody Rhodes on Raw

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Raw airs tonight (July 6) with a live show emanating from Allstate Arena in Chicago, Illinois. This is the second episode of Raw during the five week build to SummerSlam, which takes place on the weekend of August 1. Sami Zayn won’t even last 10 full days as WWE champion WWE Champion Sami Zayn defends the title for the first time tonight on Raw, nine days after winning it at Night of Champions in Saudi Arabia. His opponent is the former champion, Golden Boy Cody Rhodes. Tonight’s event takes place in Chicago, where hometown hero CM Punk is rumored to finally return to WWE after being gone for over two months (and getting jacked). Putting these ingredients together is pretty much the worst case scenario for The Last Real Good Guy’s improbable title reign. That WWE is rushing this title match is a big warning sign that Zayn will already lose the belt. It doesn’t bode well for him that WWE didn’t save the match for SummerSlam (Aug. 1 & 2), Saturday Night’s Main Event (July 18), or an upcoming episode of SmackDown. It’s not a Raw championship, so the only reason to rush this title match for tonight’s Raw is because the show is in Chicago, and something huge is planned. Most people are assuming it’s the return of Punk, who could show up afterwards to challenge the WWE champion to a title match at SummerSlam. And the reality of the situation is that Punk vs. Rhodes is a much juicier match for selling tickets to a stadium show than Punk vs. Zayn. I suppose Punk could instead return to screw Cody over and set up a non-title match with him at SummerSlam, but that seems a lot less interesting without championship stakes. Can Sami Zayn somehow pull off another miracle and last 10 full days as WWE champion, or is his title reign already doomed because WWE wants to book Rhodes vs. Punk at SummerSlam? Tune into Raw to find out. The rest of the card Raw GM Adam Pearce is calling tonight’s show “Championship Monday,” because Zayn’s title is just one out of three that are on the line. With that in mind, Sol Ruca is back on Raw tonight to defend the women’s Intercontinental championship against Raquel Rodriguez. Raquel has the clear power advantage, but can she avoid or survive a devastating non-botched Sol Snatcher? The third and final title match tonight features Montez Ford and Angelo Dawkins defending the world tag team championship against The Vision’s Bron Breakker and Austin Theory. Will Joe Hendry be around just in case the Street Profits need him to stop YouTube douchebag Logan Paul from cheating? If WWE plans to kill off The Vision, is there a chance that Breakker abandons or turns on that dweeb Theory? Seth Rollins kicks off Raw tonight as the man who will challenge World Heavyweight Champion Roman Reigns at SummerSlam. Seth reminded Roman last week that he owns him on WWE PLE. Will The OTC send his personal assassin / lap dog Jacob Fatu to confront Rollins and violently demonstrate why things will be different this time? Finally, King Oba Femi will appear on Raw to address his upcoming Hell in a Cell match against Brock Lesnar at SummerSlam. Will Paul Heyman be there to interrupt and out-promo Oba on behalf of his client? Will Femi bring back his open challenge just for the sake of kicking someone’s ass after Brock kicked him in the dick last week? Other stuff to keep an eye on – Queen IYO SKY is challenging Liv Morgan for the women’s world championship at SummerSlam. After IYO was laid out by The Judgment Day last week, can she find someone to watch her back so that it doesn’t happen again? – Solo Sikoa hates The Bloodline and keeps showing up on Raw to attack The Usos. After LA Knight lost against Big Jim Uso last week, is he a little more open to the idea of working together with Solo to take down Roman’s family? Will Jacob Fatu finally get his hands on Sikoa tonight? – Intercontinental Champion Penta needs a challenger for either Saturday Night’s Main Event or SummerSlam, and the spot seems fairly wide open after Ethan Page lost against the legendary Rey Mysterio last week. Could it be time for Je’Von Evans to seek a rematch after failing to win the title back in May? – Now that Lyra Valkyria has tried to explain her recent heel turn, will Bayley respond tonight by punching her former partner in the face over and over again? – JD McDonagh and that little shithead Dominik Mysterio plan to make Danhausen’s life a living hell. Will they regret it when Danhausen finally unleashes whatever secret he is hiding under that sheet in his science lab? Will the big reveal happen when Danhausen fights JD at Saturday Night’s Main Event? – Maxxine Dupri had a rough go of it last week when she lost against Rodriguez and then got an earful from Austin Theory about potentially softening her stance on Chad Gable. Does Maxxine have to make a decision soon on whether or not she is truly embracing the dark side? – Is Becky Lynch skipping out on SummerSlam this year? The show is less than one month away and she has nothing brewing. – On last week’s SmackDown, Adam Pearce hinted that tonight’s event might be more like a supershow that also features some stars from the blue brand. Does that mean we’ll get to see Johnny Gargano laying around and being useless backstage to help motivate WWE Champion Sami Zayn to retain his belt? – Where the f*** is CM Punk? Can you imagine the rampant speculation that will run wild if he doesn’t actually return to WWE tonight in Chicago? What will you be looking for on Raw?

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RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA - JUNE 27: Sami Zayn celebrates with fans after winning the Undisputed WWE Championship during Night of Champions. | (Photo: Rich Freeda/WWE via Getty Images) I made a mistake. So did a lot of wrestling fans, and so did my colleagues. In fact, one of my colleagues just repeated that same mistake. We all counted out Sami Zayn. Despite most of our staff wanting to pick Zayn in the triple threat match for the Undisputed WWE Championship at Night of Champions against champion Cody Rhodes and Gunther, we unanimously predicted anyone but Zayn would win. Then, in an upset, Zayn pinned Rhodes to win his first world title. Not even ten days removed from his improbable victory, Zayn defends his title tonight on Raw against Rhodes in a rematch. In his preview for the show, Cain A. Knight dismissed the new champ’s chances of retaining, writing, “That WWE is rushing this title match is a big warning sign that Zayn will already lose the belt.” Me? I’m not making that mistake again. Instead, I’m calling it right now. Sami Zayn will retain the Undisputed WWE Championship. I can’t tell you how. Hell, I don’t even want to know how. That’s what tuning in is for. But by hook or crook, Zayn is walking out of Chicago with the title. And if, nay, when that happens, it’s the right call. Looking at the World Heavyweight Championship picture, it appears WWE is saving champion Roman Reigns for an eventual showdown against Oba Femi, whenever those two meet. With one title seemingly on lockdown, that only leaves the Undisputed WWE Championship in play. And as our Night of Champions predictions post indicated, most of us assumed that Rhodes would retain the title heading into SummerSlam. But now Zayn is the champion, and few expect him to hold the title for long. For that reason, Zayn is the perfect guy to hold WWE’s richest prize for the foreseeable future. Former WWE star Stevie Richards recently complimented Zayn on his podcast, The Stevie Richards Show, for the interest and speculation Zayn’s brief run has already created. But what makes Zayn necessary sounds like an insult, given his spotty win-loss record in recent months. “Sami can get beat because… he has been beat almost to dust,” Richards said. By having a “beatable” champion, Richards pondered if that might entice fans to subscribe to ESPN to watch WWE’s premium live events on the hope of seeing a title change because Zayn is someone who can and will lose. Richards went on, saying that beatable champions are usually heels, which Zayn’s current character as “The Last Real Good Guy” borders on. That assessment calls to mind the Honky Tonk Man, who had one of the greatest title runs in WWE history. Like Zayn, Honky’s Intercontinental title win over Ricky Steamboat in 1987 was viewed as an upset. Many predicted that it was only a matter of time before he lost the title. Instead, Honky frustrated fans and gained more heat as he continued to outmaneuver stars such as Randy Savage, Jake Roberts, and Brutus Beefcake to hold on to the gold. In the process, Honky had one of the longest I.C. title reigns in company history, which led to a star-making performance at SummerSlam 1988 when the Ultimate Warrior smashed him in under a minute. Similarly, Zayn’s unlikely title reign could do the same thing for someone else the longer it goes on. If WWE leans into him as a heel, fans may give the person who beats him a hero’s reception as they did for Warrior. Conversely, if WWE rides with Zayn as a plucky underdog and fans embrace him fully as a face again, the despicable villain who ends this fairy-tale story should earn full contempt from fans, setting that person up for either a long run or for positioning someone else for a crowning moment. Zayn, as champion, gives WWE options and buys them time as they figure out what to do next. More importantly, Zayn brings uncertainty into storylines at a time when WWE’s booking seems predictable. The longer his run goes on, the more people may want to tune in to see who ends it, how, and when. But it won’t be Cody Rhodes. At least not tonight.

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This week’s episode of Monday Night Raw in Chicago was supposed to be headlined by Sami Zayn defending the WWE championship against Cody Rhodes. Then GUNTHER, who had been sent home for a confrontation with SmackDown General Manager Nick Aldis but was in town apparently for a meeting with management about said confrontation, attacked Rhodes backstage. He bloodied the former champ and beat him up just enough that Cody was no longer medically cleared to compete. Zayn celebrated, thinking he was getting off scot free, and surely dreaming up new social media posts with his precious title. Instead, Raw General Manager Adam Pearce informed him that he promised a WWE championship match for the fine folks of Chicago, and damn it they were going to get one. He may as well have announced CM Punk’s return right then and there. Sure enough: CM PUNK IS BACK!!! 😱🔥 Sami Zayn’s mystery opponent is THE BEST IN THE WORLD!!! pic.twitter.com/6qXZ4yL19l — WWE (@WWE) July 7, 2026 Punk vs. Zayn had only ever happened, at least as a singles match, once before this. They went out and tore the house down with a match that wouldn’t have been out of place in the Federation in the 1980s. Zayn survived most of Punk’s offense, then tried to put him away the same way he did Rhodes at Night of Champions. It didn’t work. So he used the GTS, Punk’s own finisher. That didn’t work either. Next he hit another GTS and followed it up with a Blue Thunder Bomb. That, too, only got a two count. Punk’s response was to steal Sami’s stuff, hitting the Helluva Kick before following up with a GTS. That was what did the trick. CM PUNK IS UNDISPUTED WWE CHAMPION!!!! 🏆 CHICAGO HAS ERUPTED!!! pic.twitter.com/FFKaN4zk7o — WWE (@WWE) July 7, 2026 Sami Zayn’s reign ends just nine days after it started. CM Punk is the WWE champion once more. Another Summer of Punk incoming? How do we feel about CM Punk winning the title from Sami Zayn | Cageside Seats Get complete Raw results and coverage of this week’s entire show by clicking here.