TV Preview – WWE Battleground

Hey! Battleground is right around the corner. Let’s establish a few things:

This is not a “pay-per-view” anymore, this is a WWE Network Event. Michael Cole only drilled this over and over on Monday Night RAW. Couple that with ordering the damn Network to watch “the Life and Times of CM Punk” which they also drilled over and over during television. Did they really scrape the bottom here to throw up the CM Punk story in a desperate pitch to gain subscribers?

• The undercard got more hype than the main event. Think about that.
• Yet another Battle Royal for a vacant title, half of which are jobbers who would likely job to me if paid a dollar more than minimum wage.
• Damien Sandow.
• I want Seth Rollins vs. Roman Reigns vs. Dean Ambrose as the main event for SummerSlam.
• Sting.

Major Update on Jeff Jarrett and his progress on GFW: More 8x10s available of his wife.

NXT has been killing it with every episode, and we see some new fresh faces with a lot of potential, the issue right now is the main roster is terribly overcrowded and with more hot talent entering the scene, one has to wonder what on Cybertron is Triple H going to do with all this talent? I anticipate Sami Zayn is going to be brought up to the main roster soon. But with Alexander Rusev, Bo Dallas, and Adam Rose having recently been brought up from the minors, I just cannot see another influx of NXT talent so soon.

It is over. As of 7/17/2014, CM Punk is officially no longer employed by WWE. His contract expired, obviously no intent to renew. Well, for now. Never say never when it comes to the wrestling business. Check out a passionate and very well written column by Bill Bodkin, and why, like the Disney song we should just “Let it go.”

Let’s get to Battleground! The matches no one cares about. Naomi vs. Cameron. Dumb feud which WWE had to reenact three times to get the point across, the Funkadactyls were no more. No one cares. We know Naomi is the one who can wrestle and Cameron is about one step above Eva Marie. Done.

The rest of the card looks very solid.

Chris Jericho vs. Bray Wyatt – Although it seemed as if the Wyatt Family stalled following an encounter with John Cena, they have rebounded as a whole unit. Starting with Bray, he has chosen to flex his magic of the mouth with another verbal connoisseur in Jericho. Y2J is no stranger to feuds focused on the mic, but having openly admitted to never encountering someone like Bray Wyatt must be a true-to-life nod of respect. The Bray Wyatt character continues to have high-level feuds, regardless whether a title is involved. Believe me or not, but a feud with Jericho is likely a step up, not down, from his recent battles against John Cena. Everyone could come out looking like a winner, as I imagine we will get more than one confrontation out of this. I believe Jericho, unlike Cena will take a single’s loss to the former NXT standout.

The Wyatt Family vs. The Usos – WWE Tag Team Championship in a Best 2-out-of-3 Falls Match

The fact it is a “best of” situation just made this match a possible show-stealer. We have seen for months how any combination of Jimmy and Jey, along with Luke Harper and Erick Rowan have consistently delivered a solid and entertaining match. Harper has surprised watchers with the agility of a cruiserweight combined with a brute force of someone like Sheamus. Lately Rowan has been displaying an improvement in ring maneuverability which has also been positively noticed. The Usos are who they are, and each and every time they combine mat-based techniques with high-risk and high-impact moves. I have no doubt this will be a straight-up war, and like Jericho and Bray, there will be no losers here, although I want to see Harper and Rowan walk away with the titles. It would certainly raise eyebrows.

The Intercontinental Championship Battle Royal – Raise more eyebrows would be someone no one expects to win. How about the final four come down to Heath Slater, Zack Ryder, Bo Dallas, and Xavier Woods. Or it could come down to The Miz, Alberto del Rio, Cesaro, and Dolph Ziggler. The truth is, there are a lot of wrestlers I could see winning. I actually want to cover each one, but broken into different categories. Nope, Hope but Nope, Hear Me Out, and Potential Winner

Nope: Adam Rose, Khali, Fandango, Sin Cara, Diego, R-Truth, Xavier Woods, Curtis Axel, Ryback. Looking at the jobber fodder right here.

Hope, but Nope: Big E. Langston, Rob Van Dam, Kofi Kingston.

Hear Me Out: Damien Sandow, Heath Slater, Zack Ryder, Titus O’Neal, Bo Dallas. None of these guys are expected to win, but that is just it. If one of these guys won, it would be the shock of the night moment for sure.

Potential Winners: Cesaro, Sheamus, The Miz, Dolph Ziggler, Alberto del Rio. Here are your top contenders. I doubt they will pull the title unification and have Sheamus win. It would seem very surprising to remove a mid-tier championship, considering how crowded the roster is right now, they could certainly use it. Interesting post-match reveal, Bad News Barrett will personally hand the championship belt over to the winner. This could set up the feud upon his return.

WWE Divas Title Match – Paige vs. AJ Lee: They have been doing this “Frenemy” bit, and merely using this word makes me want to vomit all over the place. The gimmick is not working, as evidence by the past two weeks of Paige faking respect and AJ faking everything. What does work is when they wrestle. You read that right. Wrestle. In the ring. Moves. They can do it. They can do it well. While Paige is relatively new to the WWE main roster, her time in NXT was well spent. AJ has become the top Diva, considering Tamina and Natalya are injured or busy with NXT, AJ is the standard for current Diva wrestling, and believe me or not, she deserves her second title reign. Could be a good and surprising match, or a dud.

Jack Swagger vs. Alexander Rusev: You might think this is going to be a squash and Swagger will get crushed. But, you need to remember so horrifying facts. Rusev has already defeated Big E. Langston and Rob Van Dam, clean. No interference, no shenanigans, no screw jobs. Clean. The fact they had RVD job to Rusev while hyping the feud with Swagger is to get the following point across: Swagger > Rob Van Dam = Big E. Langston = Zack Ryder. Yep. I just put RVD and Big E. on par with Zack Ryder, but only in the context of this feud. Now, WWE might have zero plans for Swagger, or this could be the start of something big for him and Zeb Colter. Keep in mind, while a heel, the “We the People” gimmick was always over with the fans and barely slowed down, even while Swagger got busted last year which derailed any shot he had to become a champion. Hell, a victory for Swagger would be the surprise since Rusev has yet to be defeated in singles competition. Out of this feud, I would like to see Swagger get his push back. The guy has huge potential and he is an outstanding in-ring athlete. His mic skills suck, but he has Zeb Colter to do the voice-work for him.

Dean Ambrose vs. Seth Rollins: Nothing on the line here, but this is a 99.99% guaranteed show-stealer of a match. We are getting CM Punk vs. Daniel Bryan here. Two of the top independent wrestlers in the world showing off for the world on grand stage. In a WWE ring. The world will be watching. Interesting focus on Dean Ambrose this week on WWE.com. They do something which would have been a job-terminating offense years ago, and talk about his extreme past with Combat Zone Wrestling and some other extremely dangerous situations he put himself through before coming to WWE. It is a good read, and definitely interesting. They are pushing for Ambrose as a top star, and reading something as graphic as this article will certainly put the image of a “Lunatic Fringe” in your mind. As for Rollins, he is cunning, quick, and damn awesome to watch. The guy can fly and can ground-and-pound. I kid you not about my earlier statement, this is Bryan vs. Punk. We will see two wrestlers put on the match of the century, if WWE allows it. There is not much else I could say about this, it will be awesome. I promise you that.

Last but not least, the Fatal Four Way WWE World Championship Match pitting John Cena, defending his title against challengers Randy Orton, Kane, and Roman Reigns. Here is the obvious: Kane and Orton will start off working together but inevitably one will turn on the other and Triple H will watch as “Plan A” breaks down. Kane winning his unlikely, but would be a surprise and would still fit in with Triple H wanting the title with The Authority. Orton is still stale, so even as champion he plays the character of Triple H’s puppet. It is John Cena time! Does Cena retain or lose it? Well, if he retains everyone will do the “oh, of course he wins, he always wins!” routine, but if he loses its “Well, of course he had to lose, FINALLY WWE listens to the fans (Reigns)” or, “well great, now he has just one more win and he becomes the next Ric Flair.” I love what the internet has done to wrestling fans. Could we get any more cynical, or stupid? If Cena always won, then he would not be a 15-time champion, now would he? Even Cena loses sometimes. So which will it be? Do we want Cena to become a 16-time champion, or would we rather him hold the title? Roman Reigns would be the fans’ choice for champion. He is very over right now, but WWE does not always toss a title onto the new trend just because fans want it. However, to keep Reigns in the spotlight, he needs a major match to carry into SummerSlam. Once again, my thoughts for a big SummerSlam main event.

Michael’s Plan A:

Reigns wins in the fatal four, and is then beaten up by both Kane and Orton. Triple H calls for his “Plan B” and Seth Rollins rushes down to cash in and win the title. Next night on RAW, Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose both demand a title match, let’s just say Ambrose defeats Rollins during the event, so we get a Broken Shield main event for SummerSlam, a Triple Threat.

Michael’s Plan B:

Reigns wins the fatal four, and still beaten up by The Authority as Triple H enacts his “Plan B” for Seth Rollins to cash in. Unfortunately, Cena and Ambrose wind up interfering, and amidst the chaos, the cash-in is unsuccessful as Reigns spears Rollins and pins him. Triple H then brings in “Plan C” in the form of Paul Heyman and Brock Lesnar. Lesnar takes out Cena.  Reigns goes in as champion in my dubbed Broken Shield main event Triple Threat for SummerSlam.
You must be wondering why I brought up Brock Lesnar. Well, in case you missed it, a week before Money in the Bank, our wonderful online retailer Amazon.com posted a pre-order for the 2014 SummerSlam DVD, and on the cover was John Cena facing Brock Lesnar. Don’t bother searching, it has been taken down. This could mean Cena will then defend the WWE Championship against Brock, or perhaps they will have a simple one-on-one match. The last time that happened, Brock fell over the top rope and nearly concussed himself. What? You don’t remember their horribly boring and completely uneventful match from Extreme Rules 2012? You are better off.

So, everything I have just said could be worthless since it is coming down to Cena vs. Lesnar once again. We could still get Reigns vs. Ambrose vs. Rollins in a Number One Contender’s match…