Solo Sikoa confronts Roman Reigns on WWE Raw

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Spellbound THIS YOUR WARNING SHOT 👏 pic.twitter.com/KXxh1RZdQH — WWE (@WWE) August 18, 2026 So, about Solo Sikoa joining The Bloodline. I wondered how WWE might spin this. Solo is over as a face, so putting him in a tweener group made no sense. To say nothing of repeating Jacob Fatu’s story where he too found himself forced to acknowledge Roman Reigns and join The Bloodline. As a great thief once said, you don’t do the same trick twice. Thankfully, Solo’s Bloodline membership lasted all of two hours, give or take. Raw built to the final moments of the show where Solo faced Roman. The opening moments served as a reminder that Roman is the same bastard no matter how many times he professes otherwise. He’s trying to do things differently in the ring but outside of it, he’s the same cat. How do I know? Look no further than the way he humiliated Solo. And that was before Jacob Superkicked Solo into oblivion then locked on the Tongan Death Grip. None of that happens without Roman’s say so. There’s an interesting story here that WWE explored a bit earlier this year, which is seeing all of this through Jimmy & Jey Uso’s eyes. They went through this. They still have the battle scars and whiplash from the constant back and forth with their cousin. Roman called it tough love but it was absent any warm fuzzies at the time. The oppressed are now the oppressors, and seemingly take no issue with that. In fact, Roman rewarded them with black ula fala’s that not only matched Roman’s Oreo Air Jordan 6s (I see you, son) but apparently signify their newfound captaincy of the good ship Bloodline. LA KNIGHT BFT TO ROMAN REIGNS!! 🙌 Sikoa and Knight stand TALL!! pic.twitter.com/Cn2mTAgVro — WWE (@WWE) August 18, 2026 I don’t think this is Roman buttering them up as I was on the fence about for a while; he truly respects “the twins” and sees them as equals. Ish. Despite everything else, that’s a big step forward for a guy who fashions himself a modern day Michael Corleone. But let’s get back to Solo. He proved himself to LA Knight. Mr. Yeah came to understand that this guy truly is what he says he is; he wants nothing to do with The Bloodline. Fittingly, LA made the save because, well, he saw Solo laid out in the middle of the ring and foresaw only more bad things coming Solo’s way. And then Solo made it official. Rather than execute LA and firmly align with his family, he hit Roman with the Tongan Death Grip. That was it. He made his bed and not only slept in it, but rolled around dirty in it without taking a shower. This is his mess and he’s happy to handle it his way. Solo’s never looked cooler than he did pulling out his finger guns and pointing them squarely at his brothers. It also proved Solo’s stronger than his siblings. On the whole, it took them several moons to wiggle out of Roman’s clutches, only to come right back. Solo didn’t need that long to know this is as a bad look for him. Not to get too nerdy, but it’a almost akin to how Luke handled the dark side’s temptations vs. has his dad handled it. Raw ended with Roman face down after a BFT, the Twins huffing and puffing, and Jacob standing back in the cut observing everything. All because the youngest Uso took his solo shot. B-Sides I really do like watching JD McDonagh in the ring. They haven’t done much with him outside of the ring other than being in Judgment Day and sometimes comic relief. But in the ring? The man is crisp, believable, and always delivers. That rang true in his match against Je’Von Evans, who of course was his usual awesome self. The thing about Je’Von, if there is a criticism, is that most of his matches follow the same pattern. That’s not inherently wrong because it’s all about giving the crowd what they want; wrestling is a populist business. It just means it’s not hard to predict how his matches will flow, including this one. What makes it work is his athleticism and his opponents. That said, NXT’s version of JD vs. Je’Von would really excite me. That JD was all about dissecting opponents. He was obsessed with the human anatomy and knowing which buttons to push to inflict maximum pain. That guy taking on a high flyer like Je’Von, who is all reckless abandon. His newfound aggression would clash with JD’s. As for this match, we did get a Dirty Dom interference, which didn’t play into the ending but did trip up Je’Von’s momentum early on. Pun fully intended, you’re welcome. Eventually, the OG Cutter put JD to bed. Big Cass is back! He attacked Je’Von post match. Je’Von showed some life this time after the initial sneak move and beckoned the big man back to the ring for a fair fight. What Je’Von failed to remember was Judgment Day still lurking. That made the fight decidedly less fair as the Dirty One and JD lent a helping hand to a 7 ft. tall man, because if there’s anything a man that tall needs, it’s help. Cass is building heat, no doubt, but I’m still not sold on the guy when it comes to the work he has to do outside of the ring. The ensuing match with Je’Von hopefully goes a long way to answering that question. One thing is clear to me though: The dude needs a mouthpiece. WWE doesn’t really do managers anymore outside of Paul E., but Cass might present a great test case. There’s some cognitive dissonance with Lyra Valkyria. She looks a hot mess or like who shot John when she’s not wrestling. And I love the disheveled look that makes her look like a loss member of Raven’s Flock. Or like me after two days at The Roots Picnic this past May. Then she gets in the ring and looks completely clean. That halfway committing to character reflects how management is treating her as well. Lyra, the first Women’s Intercontinental Champion, the same Lyra who decimated Bayley in front of a live audience, is essentially a non issue in WWE at the moment. How do you destroy someone with Bayley’s legacy, someone Michael Cole called a “legend” and have no meaningful follow-up material? Plus she took. an L! Sol Ruca snatched her soul in the middle of the ring. That puts Lyra one step closer to a rematch for the title she was screwed out of, and puts Lyra in front of a catering table. The whole thing with Lyra is puzzling. Almost as puzzling as Sol not getting or asking for an automatic rematch due to all the shenanigans in her championship match. Actually, no, it’s more puzzling. Even more weird is Lyra’s pre-match promo where she mentioned getting nothing after defeating Bayley. The match was solid but everything happening with Lyra overshadowed it for me. I’m never a fan of “Future of (fill in the blank)” matches or stories. Wrestling doesn’t always handle meta storytelling well, and there are very few who can do it even adequately. CM Punk being one of them. Bron Breakker and Oba Femi are not CM Punk. That doesn’t mean this thing between them will fail but there’s a cleaner way to do this match without making Bron look like a petulant child who needs daddy to tell him he’s great. There’s nothing wrong with Bron wanting to be better than Oba or even feeling salty about Oba’s meteoric rise. But doing it in a way where he actually asks Paul E. who is the future, which opens up the door for Oba to drop the accent to do a spot on imitation of Bron, just makes him look like a spoiled brat. My many qualms aside, this match is finally a go for Sunday Night’s Main Event. That gives the territory about two weeks to put more meat on this. Paul E. is the wildcard for me. Does he join Oba? Does he stay semi-aligned with Big Bad Booty Nephew? Or does he stay neutral and side with the winner? That last one sounds like what will happen. The crazy thing is, Bron needs Paul more than Oba does, which isn’t something I didn’t think I’d ever write after watching them both in NXT. Or maybe none of that matters and we get a Dusty Finish since neither man should lose. No shock to me at all, but Rey Mysterio and Chad Gable wrestled a dope match. Who saw that coming. I loved the opening moments where they shook hands but both went for kicks to the gut. That spoke volumes; their respect for one another never got in the way of gaining an advantage. This was a match purely about competition putting over the Intercontinental Championship, while putting a nice bow on Chad’s stories with Lucha Libre. Who better to face than Rey Mysterio? This wasn’t an easy win by any means for the champ, and he got out by the skin of his teeth. But it was an excellent back and forth with reversals, psychology, and the wrestling equivalent of a photo finish. It could’ve went either way but Chad was the better man this week. Rey congratulated him at the end and gave the champ all of his props. I hope they have more big matches in store for Chad now that he’s made amends, in and outside of the ring. Speaking of Lucha, Dragon Lee is one step closer to challenging the Tribal Chief. Dragon defeated El Hijo del Dr. Wagner, Jr in a slowed down version of a usual Lucha match. I gotta admit, I’m not a fan of the slower matches although I understand that’s to make them more palatable for the larger WWE crowd. Dragon Lee will take on Ray Fenix next week. The Judgment Day started Raw with Stephanie Vaquer and The Judgment Day continuing their drama. Liv Morgan, Raquel Rodriguez, and Roxanne Perez didn’t come off the greatest initially as it never looks great when one person gets the better of three. Even if it’s for a little bit. Things evened out once Becky Lynch showed up. She wasn’t there for Stephanie though. I like this dynamic between them where they both want the same thing but Becky just can’t help but tell Stephanie how she’s doing everything wrong to get it, which in turn shows she doesn’t deserve the title. Stephanie gets Roxanne next week and as Becky pointed out, La Primera is a fool if she thinks she’s getting a fair fight. Raw started a little wobbly but rounded into a pretty consistent episode. The final segment killed and instantly made The Bloodline more interesting for me. The matches were solid, the show had a nice flow to it. Raw always has at least one bright spot for me as of late, so it was refreshing to have multiple as the territory sets itself up for Sunday Night’s Main Event. And as a reminder: Raw airs at 6 p.m. ET, 3 p.m. PT next week. Why? Well…