It turned out the first post-WrestleMania surprise debut on Monday Night Raw was actually one of its most thoroughly announced.
Late last year, the WWE main roster started advertising the “coming soon” debut of Lars Sullivan, NXT’s “freak.” After a few weeks, that announcement became the debut of six different NXT stars, and Lars seemingly disappeared while the other five debuted and began competing on Raw and Smackdown. He was rumored to be involved in a “major” WrestleMania program with John Cena, which never materialized. The story became that he’d been sent home to deal with anxiety and depression issues.
Lars finally materialized on the Raw after ‘Mania, showing up to confront and attack WWE Hall of Famer Kurt Angle, of all people. Angle had made an appearance to attack Baron Corbin for beating him in his farewell match, and got lurk’d. You can check out a clip of the debut below.
Angle fell victim to Sullivan’s finisher, the “Freak Accident,” and a top rope flying headbutt. We can assume this was just a way to give Angle a better sendoff than losing to Baron Corbin and having 80,000 people chant at him about he sucks, and not the start of a feud a day after Angle retired. Unexpectedly debuting against Angle certainly worked for John Cena back in the day.
Place your bets on how long the “Sullivan” lasts, and how soon he’ll just become “Lars.”
