With what happened last night do you think they are going to change the main event to Bryan lesnar with a Rollins reigns under card or is this just another chance to laugh at the fans rooting for Bryan? I assume the latter
I would be shocked if they changed their plans. I think it's just their attempt to somehow get whatever rub Bryan has to offer onto Reigns. My assumption would be that Ziggler screws Bryan over to set up their Wrestlemania match as well.
Was Reigns cheered when he came out to help Bryan? Because I don't see this ending well.
ReplyDeleteOf course they're not changing it. HHH is still talking about how it's the fault of "heel cities" and how there's a portion of the crowd that just wants to boo whomever is getting pushed. As long as they keep telling themselves this stuff, they'll keep justifying whatever decisions they make.
ReplyDeleteRoughly 50 days from purportedly main eventing Wrestlemania and Roman Reigns has still not had a good one-on-one match.
ReplyDeleteI propose the following at Wrestlemania:
ReplyDeleteBrock ends Rusev's streak to win the US title.
Brock beats Barrett in 10 seconds to win the IC title.
Brock wins the Andre Memorial Battle Royal eliminating every single opponent.
Brock beats the Usos in a handicap match to win the Tag Team titles.
Brock stares menacingly at whoever the fuck is the Divas Champion and she gives him the belt.
Brock carries all the belts to the ring (plus the Andre trophy) and puts them all on the line against Reigns.
Brock squashes Reigns like the bug he is to remain the WWE World US Intercontinental Battle Royal All Gender and Tag Team champion.
ROLLINS CASHES IN! - Brock beats him too.
Brock smashes the ring up and throws Michael Cole into the crowd
PYRO DISPLAY
That would be well worth the £9.99 that, um, I'll be *cough* spending. Ahem.
Oh, and Daniel Bryan beats Dolph Ziggler.
This whole thing would've made more sense if there had been some kind of controversy w/ how Bryan was eliminated. As far as kayfabe goes, Rusev was the guy that was eliminated after Rock had assisted Reigns, so I guess he's the one that should fight Reigns at Fast Lane... or Curtis Axel.... or who cares.
ReplyDeleteSamesies.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to hold out hope...but the later seems more likely...
ReplyDeleteThey seem to be determined to let Reigns sink or swim as 'the guy'
ReplyDeleteHHH kind of talked around it last night but he basically said their belief is that you don't know if anyone is ready until you actually put them in the spot.
So I don't seem them changing horses at this point. At least, there's no chance of them changing based on the Philly reaction.
The only way they change is if Vince walks in one day and decides he's not feeling it with Reigns for whatever reason. It happened with Luger in '94 despite a year long build to Luger winning the belt and they went back to Hart.
Luger was bad at everything though. Reigns has a lot more going for him as a performer.
And if Reigns goes over and it's a disaster, they'll get the belt off him quick and go to Rolilns or back to Bryan or back to Cena.
The writing is doing him no favors, last night notwithstanding.
ReplyDeleteThis match up is certainly intriguing and is a fresh match up which could have headlined a show down the line (Summerslam?) so I'm sold on that BUT they've booked themselves into such a corner now. Look at the outcomes....
ReplyDelete1) Reigns wins clean - Bryan fans revolt
2) Bryan wins clean - they edge Reigns heel but the damage may already be done
3) Reigns wins via Ziggler Heel turn which doesn't legitimize Reigns in the slightest
4) Bryan wins via Interference which does nothing for him either
5) Add Rollins and have him eat the pin - also not he best option
Not sure what the best option is there but I think we have to have a clean pin in there.
Don't be ridiculous - this is the WWE, you need a sentence about how Cena comes in and beats him to claim all the titles at the end.
ReplyDeleteCreative is stuck in the unenviable position of having to turn chickenshit into chicken salad here, and it's their own damn fault. They're the ones who neutered Roman Reigns as an effective character by turning him into Cena-lite. They're the ones who programmed him with a slow and broken down Big Show, who does nothing to help Reigns prepare for the main event-style of matches that the WWE insists making their workers wrestle. Now they have a guy in Daniel Bryan who's more over than Reigns, who is going to outclass him in almost every way in Memphis, further driving a wedge into Roman's chest. And instead of elevating the guy, they're just going to lessen Bryan in some measure, thus helping no one and hurting everyone.
ReplyDeleteBang up job, dick licks.
The match with Randy at Summerslam was pretty good, but this was 6 months and one hernia ago.
ReplyDeleteI agree with HHH on that point. Yanking the rug out from under someone after you've already committed makes it even worse. WCW didn't do that to Goldberg...well not until after he became a star anyway. Its not them pushing Reigns so much as it is the way they are doing it that bothers me.
ReplyDeleteIn baseball, if a GM brought up the team's number one prospect way before he had enough time in the minors and immediately ruined him, that GM would be fired and pretty much tarnished for life as the guy who ruined the can't-miss prospect.
ReplyDeleteWithout similar consequences, these assholes will just keep saying things like "brass ring" and "sink or swim" and "vocal minority."
This is how they should've booked the Rumble in the first place. Having Bryan get eliminated like a scrub and THEN having Reigns come out was a recipe for disaster.Had Bryan stayed all the way till the end and gotten screwed by whomever they wanted him to feud with at Wrestlemania the fan backlash wouldn't have been nearly as bad.
ReplyDeleteI agree that they don't plan on changing plans, but why do they even put themselves in this position? I saw the end of Raw and DB is clearly over with the fans. I think the YES chants will just get louder and more pronounced like last year. They're booking themselves into a position where either the fans at WM get to do the YES chant in unison as they watch DB claim his title back from Brock, or they'll turn on the match. Not sure why they're fighting it - sometimes you catch lightning in a bottle with a cool catchphrase and a guy that resonates with people, ride it out.
ReplyDeleteRemember, all of these things happened probably because Vince thought it was funny.
ReplyDeleteTrue enough, though at least they did make it clear that Bryan's case involved him not getting a rematch after never losing the title in a match, as opposed to anything that happened with him in the Rumble.
ReplyDeleteIf Bryan wins clean, I think the best course of action for Reigns is to destroy him after the match a la Diesel after losing to Bret at Survivor Series '95.
ReplyDeletePeople boo Cena on TV because it's fun. He still draws at houses, TV ratings favored his segments, his merchandise is #1... maybe everyone behind the scenes thinks people do it just for kicks? It's possible. Stupid, but possible.
ReplyDeleteI would love to know what their plans are with Rollins and the MITB briefcase.
ReplyDeleteI think the idea of this ending in a screwjob is laughable. This is going to be clean as a sheet and Bryan's going to do all he can to endorse Reigns afterwards, because he's a good company man.
ReplyDeleteHandshake, hug, raise Reigns arm and leave quietly as the crowd boos.
ReplyDeleteHow is this good for Reigns in any way? Best thing to do was to bite the bullet and let half the audience boo him and deal with it(tm) Reigns could get a 5 star megamatch pulled out of him and have Bryan applaud and raise Reigns hand and people will still hate him because he's the guy that's stopped Bryan from getting to the main event, the time for legitimising Reigns is over, and even if it wasn't...it certainly won't happen if you forcibly put him over the guy everyone loves.
ReplyDeleteLike they even know...
ReplyDeleteLook for Bryan to work heel in this one. I'm sure he sees it as a true test.
ReplyDeleteYeah, this. I'm not buying the idea that Reigns "isn't ready." The crowd was white hot for him after The Shield split, and if he had walked out of MITB with the belt I think it would have worked well. But since Summerslam the writing/booking has just killed his character, and he's gone from looking like a badass killer to somebody who doesn't really do much but throw out cheap lines and hit one move.
ReplyDeleteI'm not convinced that's true. I think, in their head, they were hoping for the mentality of the fans realizing that Bryan winning wasn't a possibility, so in turn they would embrace the prospect of Reigns winning when he made his entrance. I can even understand their mentality there. I think the fans would've been rabid if Bryan had been eliminated at the end and they realized Reigns was the only possibility.
ReplyDeleteThey knew Reigns was winning it the second Bryan went out. At least if you save it till the end the fans wouldn't have spent the whole time shitting on the match. I have no doubt they would've booed but the booking itself threw gas on the fire.
ReplyDelete"HHH kind of talked around it last night but he basically said their
ReplyDeletebelief is that you don't know if anyone is ready until you actually put
them in the spot."
This from a company that has used every excuse possible to not push guys as consistent main eventers because of one perceived flaw or another. What bullcrap.
They aren't and shouldn't go for the exact same story as last year with Daniel Bryan. Bryan himself may really just want to fight Ziggler and steal the show, go down the path of Mr. Wrestlemania Shawn Michaels instead.
ReplyDeleteYes, they really messed up Reigns push... But Reigns WAS over last spring and the same fans booing now would have cheered him winning the 2014 Rumble, or even perhaps MITB. His 16/06/14 Raw battle royal over Rusev had tremendous heat in all the right ways, strangely the exact opposite of Rusev and Reigns at the end of the Rumble. It's the same Vince-approved, fan-pandering, goody-goody crap that neutered Luger (93), Diesel (95), HBK (96) and later Cena (05ish-present), taking the edge out of their characters.
ReplyDeleteThey built Reigns perfectly with the Shield and for a short time after they split. Reigns as a quieter Goldberg type would have worked better... Less tightly scripted, I think his promos would improve for sure... Remember Lesnar is a shitty promo too, with an unusually high pitched voice, but they wisely covered it with Heyman (as a heel anyway, sorry, babyface Lesnar sucked). Reigns' injury hurt the push for sure, as did Bryan's; as with Bryan as champ until Summerslam, they could have held off the Shield spilt longer (the Shield as faces were really over, but didn't get much time in the sun), done Bryan/Brock, Cena/Brock wouldn't have been as repetitive... and Reigns kept simmering. Unfortunate and too late now, the only way to salvage him (as a top star) is with a Wrestlemania Heyman assisted heel turn as Jim Ross suggested. Keep him as a heel bad ass long enough, and he'll be recovered and turned face again by the fans themselves.
ReplyDeleteHell, they could of just taken Roman off TV entirely after his injury, and with a surprise (not really) return at the Rumble... Fans would have expected it, yah... Unless they pretended Reigns' injury was far worse than it really was... ala Cena 2008 Rumble. That would have got a big pop, may still get some boos, but we internet folk wouldn't have had months to stew the hatred, deprived of any 'sufferin succotash' / 'beliee dat' promos to piss n' moan about ;)
ReplyDelete