10 Things WWE Regrets About Fastlane
7. Too Fast Booking
With WrestleMania 32 booking plans waylaid by a huge injury crisis, there were few fresh, marquee matches to promote ahead of the biggest show WWE had ever presented.
WWE invited yet more staleness by lunging into a programme best saved for the occasion.
AJ Styles Vs. Chris Jericho was a sensible pairing, in theory; Styles, new to a WWE ring his spiritual peers (including Jericho himself) struggled to adjust to, found himself in a programme with the best performer to help with the transition. The issue is that Jericho, whether through management directive or hubris, performed as if in the same physical shape as his opponent. The match at Fastlane was bloody good in spite of the odd moment of hesitation, but hardly the sort of classic that demanded a sequel.
Stripped of its big match novelty, the treacly, clunky blowoff match at WrestleMania didn't even harm AJ Styles in baffling defeat - his subsequent series with Roman Reigns was solid in-ring gold, and it alerted Vince McMahon to his potential as a headliner in his own right - but this repetitive booking of a dynamic burdened by middling chemistry in so small part shaped 'Mania 32 as a very mundane show.
It was meant to be a celebration of the company's growth, but the party highlighted only its excess.