Predicting Every WWE Premium Live Event Main Event Until WrestleMania XL
Will Roman Reigns still be WWE's top guy when WrestleMania XL rolls around? Probably...
WWE, in the WrestleMania 39 headline acts, accomplished something so atypical of the sports entertainment brand - and that was good sports entertainment fun.
Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn vs. The Usos, and Cody Rhodes vs. Roman Reigns yielded fundamentally sound pro wrestling interspersed with unequaled story-driven, three-beat narratives that acutely encompassed Owens, Zayn, and Rhodes' corresponding oppressions from the mountaintop of WWE. In doing so, it put the Undisputed Tag Team titles on par with the Undisputed Universal title in WWE's first authentic attempt at fabricating the illusion that they do value the doubles titles, a manifesto they're often slandered for; rightfully so, considering this was the b*llocks oozing from the tag team division just four years ago that involved the very defending champions in the night one headliner.
WWE now finds itself in a disorderly state though, creatively run by Vince McMahon one week and Paul 'Triple H' Levesque the next, and their buyout by Endeavour doubtlessly altering how the company looks, feels, and works. It won't become UFC-lite, however, WWE won't be the same sports entertainment-brandishing monster it once was.
Achieving the same sumptuous Premium Live Event main events that WrestleMania 39 offered will be a leviathan task - but it shouldn't stop them trying...
12. Backlash - Rey Mysterio And Bad Bunny Vs. Dominik Mysterio And Damian Priest
Dominik Mysterio's metamorphosis from a bland-as-bland babyface into a genuinely abhorred heel has been one of WWE's biggest success stories this decade. His transformation was instinctive, natural, and, truthfully, necessitated. Dom was rotting away as a babyface, but a swift kick to Edge's Edge-O-Matic and an authentically stiff Lariat to his own father breathed a youthful heelish semblance into him.
There was an argument to be contested that the Mysterio family drama, which has largely followed WWE's habitual melodrama blueprint, should have reached its climax at WrestleMania, but here's the thing: any related content is popping impressive YouTube numbers. A segment from the 7 April SmackDown, in which Dominik was showered with jeers, achieved 297,000 views in ten hours. Everything else uploaded on this day was averaging <50,000 views.
Dominik, and by association The Judgement Day, is a draw.
But will he still be one at Backlash?
Dominik and Damian Priest vs. Rey Mysterio and Bad Bunny is happening. Every report indicates as such. Bunny's embroilment in the saga on the 3 April Raw after his chain-snatching involvement at WrestleMania wouldn't have been done had WWE known he wasn't wrestling. He didn't get physical at 'Mania mind, despite WrestleVotes affirming that he'd undergone a spot of training with Priest and Jamie Noble. Was this just for the post-'Mania Raw beatdown or is there more to it?
The latter, ideally.