8 Brave Booking Steps WWE Have Already Taken In 2018

2. Shinsuke Nakamura's Rise

AJ Styles Shinsuke Nakamura WrestleMania Head To Head
WWE

Contrast the WWE Title match we'll likely get at this year's WrestleMania with the one fans in Orlando were given in 2017. It's like night and day. At 'Mania 33, Bray Wyatt and Randy Orton had a slow brawl interspersed with Bray's cartoonish mind games.

This year, it's serious pro wrestling on the menu as two of the world's best in-ring workers tangle for the most prestigious prize in the industry.

That point deserved a sentence to itself, because it's rare that WWE promise a match at WrestleMania like AJ Styles vs. Shinsuke Nakamura. In fact, Nakamura's whole main event rise is brave of WWE, especially when taking into account how horribly he was booked during that Jinder Mahal feud last summer.

WWE, to their credit, look like they're ready to push in-ring skill over amateur dramatics (like Wyatt's worm lighting last year) in time for WrestleMania. Will this work out? If you're a hardcore fan who has watched Nakamura tear up New Japan, yes. Casual fans might take a bit more convincing, and it's therefore courageous of WWE to try.

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Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.