Results c/o Dylan Kaplan who estimates a crowd of 400
– Patrick Clark beat Dan Matha
– Nikki Glencross beat Liv Morgan
– Josh Woods beat Bronson Mathews
– Mojo Rawley and Hugo Knox beat Alexander Wolfe and Sawyer Fulton
– Noah beat Oney Lorcan (the former Chris Girard/Biff Busick)
– Alexa Bliss beat Adrienne Reese
– Austin Aries beat Wesley Blake
NXT returns to Fort Pierce on July 7th.
Submitted by Chappell Guthrie
– R-Truth vs Tyler Breeze
Truth came out first and got a loud pop. Breeze had little reaction. Started out as comedy match, then Breeze took control until run-ins by Fandango and Goldust. Truth won with a roll up after about 8 minutes.
– Cesaro vs Primo
Cesaro came out first to a really loud pop. Primo had no reaction until he cut a local promo. Epico wasn’t there. Back and forth match, Cesaro hit all his spots, and won with the Sharpshooter after about 10 minutes.
– AJ Styles did a local backstage video promo. Hard to understand, but the crowd was heavily booing throughout.
– Karl Anderson vs. an Uso (not sure which)
Anderson and Gallows came out first to medium boos then one of the Usos came out to a huge pop. The other Uso wasn’t there. Anderson won with a roll up after Gallows distracted Uso.
– Baron Corbin vs Dolph Ziggler
Corbin came out first to little reaction. Dolph has one of the biggest pops of the night. Crowd wasn’t really into except six little kids relentlessly chanting for Ziggler, Baron eventually zeroed in on them and started saying each punch was for them and the like. This got the crowd more into it. Ziggler won by DQ after about 14 minutes when Corbin used a chair. Ziggler then came back in and kicked Corbin in the nuts, and hit the Zig Zag.
– WWE Women’s Champion Charlotte vs Natalya
Natalya entered first to a pretty good reaction. Charlotte got a really loud reaction, probably 70% negative. They worked the crowd before the match and got the crowd all on Natalya’s side. Crowd was probably most engaged in the near falls of this match than any other, besides the main event. Good match, eventually Charlotte started working the leg. Ended when Charlotte pinned Natalya, but ref missed Charlotte’s feet on the ropes.
– US Champion Rusev vs Sin Cara
Rusev got a lot of boos. Sin Cara got an ok reaction, but it was obvious that crowd was wanting Kalisto, who wasn’t there. Crowd couldn’t decide between chanting “USA”, “We want Lana” (who wasn’t there), or “lucha.” Rusev wins with the Accolade after about 9 mins. After the match, Rusev cut a promo until Titus O’Neil entered the ring and eventually hit a spinebuster.
– WWE World Champion Roman Reigns vs Seth Rollins vs AJ Styles
AJ came out first to almost entirely boos, even though I saw quite a few people with his t-shirt on. His reaction was definitely not as strong as the other two guys. Rollins out next, and his reaction was about 70% boos. Finally, Reigns came out to by far the loudest reaction of the night. I would guess 80 to 90% cheers. Rollins started as cowardly heel, sitting out until he found a spot.
Really fun match, eventually Seth and AJ teamed up, and Seth teased tapping “too sweet” hand signal with AJ, but eventually turned on him. They kinda went back and forth working with Reigns, until everybody hit their signature moves (forearm, Superman punch, and Pedigree). Roman eventually won with a spear on AJ after about 17 minutes.
Submitted by Josh Baker
They’re showing videos before the show starts. Every time time Roman Reigns is show, he got booed.
– No Way Jose beat Angelo Dawkins in a fun opener
– Elias Samson vs. Andrade Cien Almas ended when Samson legit hurt his ankle. The ref stopped the match, but Almas refused to have his arm raised. Samson got a supportive “Drifter” chant from the fans as he was being led out.
– Tye Dillinger beat Tino Sabatelli in a decent match. Tino seemed nervous, but looked okay.
– NXT Tag Champions American Alpha beat The Revival to retain. Great, great match, and exactly what you’d expect from these guys. Gable and Jordan got huge pops for everything they did.
– Nakamura vs. Buddy Murphy was after intermission. Nakamura got an absolutely deafening reaction when he came out. The match was good as Murphy is underrated. Nakamura won with the Kinshasa.
– Carmella and Bayley beat Peyton Royce & Darla. Fun match, but not much to it. Bayley was very over.
– NXT Champion Samoa joe beat Finn Balor. Good match, ended with Joe pinning Balor with his feet on the ropes. Balor sent Joe packing afterward to send the crowd home happy.
Results c/o Wayne Mason who estimated a crowd of 200
– Josh Woods beat Noah
Woods was able to score the win via submission.
– Cezar beat Bronson Matthews
Cezar wins with an inverted stomp facebreaker.
– Adrienne Reese beat Mandy Rose
Good match. Reese hit the off the top rope stunner for the win.
– Nick Miller beat Alexander Wolfe
Both men had their tag partners in their corner. Miller picked up the win with a sit out powerbomb.
– Hugo Knox beat Tucker Knight
Hugo was back to being a heel tonight and got the win with a spinning neckbreaker.
– In ring interview with Mada from Tough Enough. He mentioned wanting to be NXT champion and then becoming the first ever Egyptian-born WWE champion.
– Steve Cutler beat Chris Girard
Cutler takes this one with a lariat in a hard hitting match.
– NXT Women’s Champion Asuka beat Alexa Bliss and Nia Jax in a three-way to retain.
Great match. Bliss would try to pick her spots and not get involved when Jax had control. Asuka was able to submit Bliss with the Asuka Lock.
First reported in this week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter: Rusev and Lana have set a date! The couple known in their real lives as Catherine Jo Perry and Miroslav Barnyashev have announced that they will be married on September 2nd. With Perry joining the cast of Total Divas for the next season, it would have to be assumed that the wedding will be a big part of that show, as weddings generally are good for ratings to that audience.
Lana will be known as CJ on that show and will not use the accent that she floats in and out of on RAW and Smackdown. The couple announced their engagement earlier this year at the time that Rusev was injured and Lana was linked in storyline to Dolph Ziggler. The announcement forced plans to change and it was acknowledged on RAW that the two were engaged. The push of Lana seemed to stall after that point and it’s only been recently when she’s appeared with Rusev onscreen.
From this week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter:
“The Rusev and Lana wedding, actually Miroslav and Catherine, will be on 9/2. It would be almost a lock that their wedding would air on Total Divas since that show, aimed at the women’s audience, is all about engagements and marriages.”
Sign up now and read this week’s full issue: June 6, 2016 Wrestling Observer Newsletter: More details on WWE brand split, Jimmy Snuka found incompetent
The New Era overload continues as Aiden English boasts that leaving the New Day laying “singlehandedly” on RAW proves, once and for all, that the “New Era” reflects the “Bygone Era”, whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean. Simon Gotch then introduces English’s “pre-emptive eulogy” for the New Day’s tag team titles “in the form of song”. English makes a unbelievably terrible World’s Fair reference before singing for a little while until Enzo & Cass interrupt.
Enzo does his “couple of haters” line, prompting Gotch to ask, non-rhetorically, if he remembers Payback. English reckons that the little man’s head is “S.O.F.T.” after the concussion he sustained on that particular Sunday. And then, Big Cass if forced to recite a line so awful that it almost matched the cruddy material he was given on this very show a few weeks ago. Cass threatens to beat their “rusty pipes….back into Prohibition” so they won’t be able to “speak easy”. Wow.
The usual 12 minute opening match, four minutes of which is (fortunately) lost to a commercial break. Gotch and English got the heat on Enzo for an absolute eon. Nobody cared. Eventually Cass did his brief hot tag schtick before setting up Enzo for the silly-looking Rocket Launcher.
Viktor, now kitted out with Darth Maul-esque face-paint, delightfully poses the question, “Where’s your ‘woo woo’ now?”, during the heat. His smugness doesn’t last long however, with Ryder wrapping this one up in under five minutes. The finish saw Viktor get cut off while perched on the top rope. Ryder then hit a ‘rana, followed by the Broski Boot and an Elbro Drop.
Looks like I wasn’t the only one who appreciated Ziggler’s over-exuberant contributions to the announce booth on last week’s show. Despite having no connection to any current Women’s division storyline, he’s back again to lend his thoughts on Banks’ first televised match since April 18. Ziggler does however reference his history with Summer Rae, which is a nice touch.
Summer cuts a promo before Banks’ entrance, following up a mention of the brand extension with a hilariously apt slip of the tongue: “New Error”. She reckons that the entire WWE Universe is wondering which show she will end up on. Meanwhile, all three announcers are laughing openly.
Sasha eventually interrupts, but is quickly cut off by Summer, who mocks her for failing at Wrestlemania. The Boss tells Summer that, despite her thoughts to the contrary, Summer “wouldn’t be Women’s champion at Wrestlemania…..you can’t even hold my mic!”. I guess that’s supposed to be a burn in the writers’ universe, but Summer ruins it by catching the thrown mic! The three announcers again laugh uproariously, with Dolph selling the catch like it was the greatest thing he’s ever seen: “BUT SHE HELD IT!”.
The match itself was short, at six minutes, but perfectly acceptable. Sasha’s comeback kicked off with running double knees into the face of Summer Rae, with The Boss hanging on for a subsequent pinfall attempt (Dolph: “It would be hard for me to kick out of that, King”). More knee-based offence got cut off by a vicious-looking DDT from Summer, before Sasha caught a spin kick attempt and transitioned straight into a Banks Statement. Summer tapped with both hands, which caused Dolph to lose his bowel contents again: “Double tap, TP!”. The final line uttered, as the show went off the air, was also Ziggler’s: “I love this so much!”.
Final Thoughts
As weird as it is to say, Dolph Ziggler’s announcing saved this show. I’m as surprised as you are. The guy’s overconfident, handsy, depth-free promos bug the hell out of me, but he appears to have an aptitude for this; more of an aptitude than he has for stand-up comedy, at least. Meanwhile, everything the Vaudevillains touch continues to turn to ice, as Enzo & Cass are finally involved in a segment so badly scripted that even Enzo’s delivery can’t save it.
Image c/o Maryann Mason and results c/o Wayne Mason who estimated a crowd of 300.
– Tucker Knight beat Josh Woods
Knight stole this one with a roll up.
– Alexa Bliss beat Liv Morgan
Bliss wins it with the Sparkle Splash. The Tampa crowd was giving Morgan the business for being from Jersey but she rolled with it.
– Dan Matha beat Steve Cutler
Crowd is all over Matha lately, calling him “Mr. Clean” due to his white trunks and shaved head. Big Dan won it with a big boot.
– NXT Women’s Champion Asuka and Adrienne Reese beat Mandy Rose and Nia Jax
Asuka Lock on Rose for the win.
– Noah beat Cezar Bononi
Big sit-out slam by Noah for the win.
– In ring interview with Brazillian talent Adrian Jaoude, the Ollympic hopeful who is still working at the Performance Center.
– Sawyer Fulton and Alexander Wolfe beat Mojo Rawley and Hugo Knox
Hugo is back to being his happy dancing face persona to team up with the hype man Rawley. However they were no match for the power of Fulton and Wolfe.
– Austin Aries beat Wesley Blake
Pre match, ring announcer Mike Rome introduced Blake as “Murphy” to set him off and continue the ongoing break-up story. Aries wins it with the Last Chancery to send everyone home happy.
By Chris Roberts
– No Way Jose d. Tino Sabbatelli with the full nelson slam
Crowd loved Jose and was into him. A perfect performer for a good opener.
– Carmella d Peyton Royce with her triangle choke
This was okay, a cool down from the previous match. Some “How you doin’” chants early on.
– Tye Dillinger d Buddy Murphy with The Perfect 10 neckbreaker
Before the match, Dillinger talked about Regal finally giving him a match for TakeOver. Crowd was into chanting 10. Murphy mocking Dillinger most of the match. Good, but lots of stalling.
– NXT Tag Team Champions American Alpha d The Revival with Grand Amplitude
Easily the best match on the show. Started fast, had some very close nearfalls at the end. Not as good as the Dallas match, but very very good. I would say it was better than any of the matches on the main house show they had 3 months ago too.
Intermission
– Andrade Almas d Angelo Dawkins with a running knee into the corner
Almas didn’t have a titantron, not even his hype-up video, so most people had no idea who he was. Dawkins could not keep up and it was pretty ugly. He was the worst possible first impression opponent, but Almas showed signs of brilliance with his flying and got an okay reaction after the match.
– Bayley d Daria Berenato with the Bayley to Belly
Bayley is really popular with the fans. This was disappointing because Daria needs some work, and Asuka was advertised for the show but didn’t show up. Strange that she nor Nia Jax were on the show, but Bayley is but supposedly out with injury in storyline. Also kinda just okay, but Bayley was able to shine through with her offense at the end.
– Shinsuke Nakamura and Finn Balor d Elias Samson and NXT Champion Samoa Joe
Nakamura pinned Samson with the Kinshasa. Nakamura had the biggest reaction of the night. Samson with the most heat. Joe with a mixed reaction, and Balor with the 2nd biggest entrance pop. Very good 15 minute match. Balor and Joe story was told well with Joe ducking out and Balor getting into his face even while taking care of Samson.
Overall I thought it was just as good if not better than the 2/28 main roster house show. With the smaller arena and the more active crowd, it was a pleasant experience.
– Air Date: June 2, 2016
– Location: BMO Harris Bank Center in Rockford, IL
– The Big News:
AJ Styles is a full-fledged heel and won a match with the Styles Clash. Also, it appears the MITB ladder match will just involve the six guys already announced.
– Show Recap:
The New Day came out to a big reaction. They mentioned the Vaudevillains robbing everyone of the opportunity to see Stephanie McMahon dance. Xavier Woods seemed particularly bummed about this.
What was more notable to New Day though was the attack by Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows. New Day were about to remind us that they are our WWE Tag Team champions, but Anderson and Gallows interrupted. The Club said the New Day didn’t exactly look like champions on Raw, and the Club would be the champs soon.
Woods wondered what kind of “club” they actually were, and figured they meet in a treehouse. Big E said they definitely weren’t the hair club for men. New Day challenged them to a fight but figured they wouldn’t accept without their papi AJ Styles with them. That brought out Styles.
Styles was a full-fledged heel. He said this wasn’t a new day, it’s “our day,” and the WWE belonged to the Club. New Day reminded them who the tag champs were. Styles called Kingston a joke for being in an act like New Day after all these years. Kingston reminded Styles that he was a multiple time IC, U.S. and Tag Team champion, and what was really funny was how long it took AJ just to get to WWE.
Styles reminded them what happened on Raw and challenged Kingston to a match, which he accepted. Good segment. Styles and Kingston both came off well.
They announced a tag match between Dean Ambrose and Sami Zayn vs. Alberto Del Rio and Kevin Owens.
Like JBL, Lawler is not a fan of what Charlotte did to Ric Flair, although he doesn’t seem as disgusted by it. Brooke provided a distraction two minutes into the match allowing Charlotte to take over going to commercial.
They went back and forth after the break leading to Lynch trying an armbar as Mauro Ranallo let us know she trains in Brazilian jiu jitsu. Charlotte powered out, though, and hit a powerbomb. Charlotte went for a moonsault but landed on her feet as Lynch rolled out of the way. Lynch applied the Disarmer but Brooke tried pulling Charlotte out of it so the referee called for a DQ.
Brooke finally pulled Charlotte out of the ring, but Natalya cut them off on the ramp. Natalya and Lynch tried to apply their submission moves on the heels but they escaped through the crowd. The action was fine but the finish was crap. The crowd liked Becky.
Backstage, Renee Young interviewed Zayn and Ambrose. With Ambrose standing right there, Zayn tipped his hat at Renee. Zayn said he and Ambrose have a good track record as a team despite Ambrose’s comments on Monday.
Ambrose was skeptical of Canadians because of Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho and the border patrol guy. Zayn told Ambrose he shouldn’t have tried to bring nunchucks into the country. Owens and Del Rio interrupted. Owens tried to convince Ambrose that Zayn was manipulating him. After Del Rio added some insults of his own, Ambrose said they should just fight right now but the heels left.
Tyler Breeze and Fandango sat in Breeze’s lounge at ringside. Truth rapped a new song on the way out, and they had the lyrics on the screen. Lawler called it terrible, and he’s right. During the match, Breeze jumped on the apron to take a selfie, so Truth knocked him off. Goldust was distracted, so D-Von pushed him into Truth and used a school boy for the win. Breeze and Fandango made bad jokes afterwards. This was not good.
They ran a video package for, of all things, Baron Corbin and Dolph Ziggler. Outside of the arena, Renee said Corbin requested for interview time. She asked why they were doing it outside, and Corbin said the crowd doesn’t deserve his presence after they cheered what Ziggler did on Raw. Corbin said the next time he enters an arena it would be to end Ziggler.
Ranallo plugged Raw in Oklahoma City and Lawler namedropped “J.R.” They showed a graphic for the MITB ladder match and there was no seventh mystery guy, just the six guys who already qualified.
There were some “Ole” and “Let’s go Ambrose” chants early on. There was a dumb spot during the heat where Del Rio hit a version of his double foot stomp finisher and never went for the cover. They double-teamed Ambrose on the outside so Zayn hit a flip dive to take out the heels.
Ambrose hit the rebound clothesline and went for the hot tag, but Del Rio knocked Zayn off the apron. Ambrose used a neckbreaker and went for the tag again but Zayn was still down. Del Rio tried a running enziguri on Ambrose, but he ducked and Del Rio nailed Owens instead. Zayn made the hot tag and immediately hit Del Rio with the Helluva kick for the win. Really good finish.
An enraged Owens grabbed Saxton’s headset and said he was sick of his partners costing him matches and he would show them what will happen at MITB. Owens grabbed a ladder to go after the briefcase, but Cesaro ran out and gave him a springboard uppercut – while wearing in his suit. Cesaro climbed the ladder and grabbed the briefcase, sealing his fate. Ambrose and Zayn appeared nonplussed.
Lana introduced Rusev, and her accent was about 20% as strong as usual. As Swagger made his entrance, Rusev attacked him and tossed him into the steps. The referee asked Swagger if he was ok to start the match and he said yes. I feel like they’ve done this exact angle with these two before.
Rusev tried a superkick immediately but Swagger caught him for the ankle lock. Rusev escaped to the outside and cut off Swagger with a clothesline and took control. Swagger did get some offense but Rusev won with the Accolade. He refused to break the hold, so Titus O’Neil made the save, and Rusev bailed.
They actually plugged that after a break they would show the crap angle with Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns. And then they did. Also, there was another dumb segment with Darren Young and Bob Backlund. Basically, Backlund wants Darren to walk, not run. Literally.
They had a quick back and forth exchange and they both did a kip-up at the same time to face off, because wrestling is fake and choreographed. Just kidding. It’s fine. Styles got the better of Kingston with a couple of arm drags and posed with the Club.
Kingston got the better of the next exchange, which led to a corner dropkick accompanied by Woods playing the trombone. The Club and New Day all jumped in the ring but they were held back from fighting. This led to a commercial break, which was only two minutes into the match. Keep in mind they had already gone to commercial break after the entrances.
Anyway, after a while, Woods, Big E, Gallows and Anderson all got in each others faces outside the ring. Kingston was distracted so Styles ran him face first into the steel post. Crowd chanted for Kofi as Styles had control. As the announcers discussed Styles’ attitude, Saxton asked why AJ didn’t just show his hand in the first place, to which Lawler replied, “You’ve obviously never played poker.”
Kingston came back with a monkey flip, dropkick, clothesline and leg drop. Styles ducked the Trouble in Paradise and hit a fireman’s carry into a neckbreaker. Styles went for the Styles Clash but Kingston (sort of) countered and eventually hit a double knee attack for two. Styles set up for the Phenomenal forearm but Woods distracted him with the trombone, allowing Kingston to use an S.O.S. for a near fall.
Anderson attacked Woods on the outside, so Big E tossed Gallows into the barricade. Anderson lept at Big E, but Big E caught him and hit a belly-to-belly onto the announce table, which was cool. Gallows booted Big E, so Kingston took out Gallows with a crazy flip dive. As Kingston stepped back into the ring through the ropes, Styles caught him with a Pele kick and nailed the Styles Clash for the win. Fun stuff.
– Final Thoughts:
AJ Styles as a heel with The Club is cool and freshens things up. Tonight’s main event was pretty good but this was an otherwise normal Smackdown show.
With the wrestling world still speculating on how WWE will handle the July brand split/extension, much of the discussion has been about how the championships should be structured in this new era — most importantly, what should be the biggest prize in the game.
As reported in a recent Wrestling Observer Newsletter, the current plan is that the brand extension will lead to the world title being once again split in two. Of the many rumours that have flown around the Internet, it’s the prospect of once again losing a single world champion that has most upset hardcore fans.
It’s not hard to see why. Since John Cena and Randy Orton unified the WWE and World Heavyweight Titles in December 2013 at TLC, the world title has been far stronger than it was previously. It has once again become the focal point of the promotion with Daniel Bryan’s chase of the WWE title proving far more of a money-drawing storyline than his previous World Heavyweight Title reigns. The flip side of this development is that tug of war between the hardcore fanbase and Vince McMahon about who should be world champion has intensified now that the promotion can’t split the difference.
Despite this, one can understand why the WWE is tempted to revert back to having two world titles.
As Brock Lesnar’s previous title reign proved, the WWE’s mantra of promoting sports entertainment and focusing on telling stories is remarkably hollow. The promotion is actually incredibly dependent on the world championship to provide meaning to its main event picture. When Brock Lesnar was away, the twenty-eight strong writing staff was bereft of ideas about how to justify Cena and Seth Rollins facing each other that they turned the Money In The Bank briefcase into an ersatz world title.
Therefore, both promotions will clearly need their own singles title for their main event picture to be built around when the world champion isn’t there. Furthermore, considering that both shows will largely conform to the WWE house style, each champion will play a pivotal role in defining the brand to viewers.
However, there’s no reason why that role can’t be played by a secondary champion exclusive to each brand if these titles are properly protected. And there would be added value in having a WWE title above them. An undisputed world champion that can perform on both brands would stand out as a special attraction that would help highlight key television shows as must-watch and could drive extra business for the biggest shows of the year.
The key would be not to expose them. If they were to appear weekly, let alone twice a week, they would quickly cease to be a special attraction. Worse they would undermine the ability of the two promotion-specific secondary champions to be taken seriously as headliners. This would naturally be a role for Lesnar, who could storm into either brand for a month-long residency before his latest title defence and then disappear again. It would also solve the problem that the WWE has of struggling to provide meaning to Lesnar’s matches.
Back when the NWA World Champion would tour alliance members, the individual territories still retained their own national or promotional champions. This was because the promotion couldn’t grind to a halt when Ric Flair or Harley Race was elsewhere; they still needed something to build their everyday main event picture around. If WWE was to give Lesnar a floating WWE Championship, each brand would be in the same situation. They would need championships to build their weekly programming around.
The temptation would be to suggest that the Intercontinental and U.S. titles could be repurposed for this role with each brand getting one of the secondary titles. This was exactly the approach originally planned for the first brand split with the I-C strap having been pegged to be the premiere title on RAW. Triple-H rightly vetoed this idea due to the belief that the title had been clearly defined as a secondary belt and wouldn’t be taken seriously as a prize worthy of main eventers. This is even truer today. While either belt can gain the illusion of respectability when placed around a headliner’s waist, they quickly slide back to their previous irrelevance.
It’s not helped that the names of the championships are literally meaningless. This is not the 70s where it was perfectly logical to have a national champion underneath the world champion. The same problem existed when there was a WWE and a World Title. The names are such generic buzzwords that they do not indicate what the titlist is champion of. The championships being meaningless is yet another barrier to fans taking them seriously.
It would be far better for the WWE to start again by crowning RAW and Smackdown champions, and actually calling them that. That way fans know that the person who holds the RAW title is recognised as the best wrestler on RAW, and the person challenging for the Smackdown title wants to be recognised as the best wrestler on Smackdown.
As reported in the Observer, the current plans are for Reigns and Cena to be the champions of their respective brands. While both men have their problems with connecting with the fanbase, putting the new belts on them would be a clear statement of intent that both titles are of equal worth and will be properly protected.
One of the things that most embittered fans about the last split in the championship was how Triple-H walked out with the big gold belt and proclaimed himself world champion. For all the talk of RAW having always been the ‘A-Show’, it took years the stench of that introduction to leave the title with his matches for the belt being of secondary importance to the WWE title matches as late as 2004. It’s therefore crucial that the new championships are properly introduced. Given that the aim of these moves is to create a big splash to help Smackdown’s ratings, it would make sense that everything builds to big matches for the shows on July 19-20.
Making Brock Lesnar the undisputed world champion should be relatively straight forward. Just have The Beast appear in the next two weeks to destroy Roman Reigns and Seth Rollins, insert himself into the WWE title match at Money In The Bank due to both men having screwed him out of the world title he never truly lost inside the ring. It’s a rematch of the unannounced main event of Wrestlemania 31, and provides a way for Lesnar to regain the title without pinning Reigns. It also allows the Reigns vs. Rollins programme to continue with neither man once again conclusively beating the other. This would then justify leaving Lesnar out of the draft.
The new RAW and Smackdown champions should be crowned in big matches on the first shows after the draft. The easiest way to do this would be to have the type of multi-man matches that are usually reserved for pay per view. RAW could have a special Money in the Bank-style ladder match for their world title and Smackdown could have an Elimination Chamber match. Such multi-man matches would naturally feed into the draft, with the six men drafted for each brand being the ones entered into its championship match. Assuming the twelve men were picked on the 11th July Raw, the promotion would have a week to promote two huge title matches for the first week of the new era.
Will Cooling is a freelance writer who writes on combat sports for Fighting Spirit Magazine, pop culture for Geeky Monkey and politics at It Could Be Said!FSM is available in all good British newsagents and internationally. In this month’s issue he writes about the rise of Ronda Rousey and argues that intergender matches destroyed Chyna’s career.