10 WWE Payback 2020 Impulse Reactions
7. Big E Vs Sheamus
Big E is getting serious about this singles run. Do you get it? Did you get that? Did you? Are you listening? Are you watching?
That, for the better part of 12 minutes, was the real experience being felt underneath that WWE 2K20 audio mix blaring out of the ThunderDome. E and Sheamus worked precisely as hard as you'd expect, with the latter taking most of the match thanks mostly due to the layout being centred around if The New Day man could take things seriously. This could become a problem in a hurry.
People want a Big E singles push but - and in keeping with his impassioned defences of knowing himself better than the WWE machine on recent editions of Talking Smack - they don't want him to have to compromise all over again to get it.
He was punished for doing a celebratory thrust half way through the match, with the implication that it was time to get serious instead. As good as that did him several years ago. He won here, because that's the predetermined bit that can be booked and executed. Losing what's currently so real could be disastrous. How he wom - and the on-the-nose labelling after the fact - offered worrying echoes of others that have come before him. Here's hoping his fate isn't quite as doomed.