10 Wrestlers Without Direction For WWE SummerSlam 2017
Summertime Sadness.
As of writing, SummerSlam 2017 will play host to eleven matches. It includes seven title matches and features upwards of 27 performers in key spots. And that's without the anticipated go-home Monday Night Raw announcement of Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose's nailed on match with Tag Team Champions Sheamus and Cesaro.
It's a bumper card in keeping with WWE's new policy for their 'Big Four' shows in the Network era - more is always more. When even the bimonthly B-shows time out at over three hours, it's clear how willing the company will go to provide the type of supercard even New Japan Pro Wrestling would rather stretch out over a weekend.
How must it feel then, to be a superstar somehow frozen out of the wrestling's hottest August night? Despite several meaningful disputes emerging on both Raw and SmackDown Live!, SummerSlam has crept up on the company in many respects.
Distracted by huge recent storyline developments buried within the shows and external factors such as Brock Lesnar's immediate future, WWE have coasted with the careers of some popular acts, leaving enough major names out of action to justify an August 'Andre The Giant Battle Royal' equivalent. Robbed of storylines at one of the year's key checkpoints, these talents probably can't wait for a conclusion to their disparate endless summer.
10. Tye Dillinger
'The Perfect 10' has experienced a start to life on the main roster that smacks of stubbornness from management resentful of the brief hijacking that took place following his monstrous reaction at November's NXT TakeOver: Toronto.
It wasn't Dillinger's fault of course, but he wouldn't be the first performer punished for daring to get over in a manner not in keeping with WWE's longterm plans. The organisation acquiesced to rampant fan demand by affording him the #10 spot in January's Royal Rumble, leaving him on borrowed time for the remainder of his NXT run ahead of his post-WrestleMania call-up.
In hindsight, he probably should have stuck around in Full Sail one more year. Dillinger had built up unbelievable stock with the NXT loyalists, and having already established a superb rivalry with Bobby Roode ahead of 'The Glorious One's Title victory, could have been the perfect opponent to headline TakeOver: Brooklyn 3 in the absence of a genuinely established contender.
A nondescript afterthought on SmackDown Live!'s so-called 'Land of Opportunity', Tye has lost matches that barely mattered and won ones that mattered even less. It happened again when he returned to Toronto on this week's edition of the show, with his partner suffering similar indignity...