jcmmnx

Harper and Rowan not getting a run was bullshit. I'd take them over every team Matt D mentioned besides the first two.

Bray was really over with last year's Mania crowd. I suspect they are going to get behind the guys they want WWE to push, and I expect Bray to be one of those guys. I'm going on record saying Bray will be more over in that match, and Sting/HHH will be a no heat disaster if it goes past 15.

At this point Mania may just be 4 hours of the fans taking a shit on the product. I'm not sold on the crowd going nuts for Sting or Taker. In fact I think there's a good chance they prefer Wyatt in that match.

The crowd gave less than a fuck about Reigns in that main event. I can't imagine what the post Mania feud with Show will be like. Vince must be shitting bricks.

If they're hell bent on Reigns being a face then yes Rusev should go undefeated until Summer Slam when they have that match. They could have a great little feud between Ambrose and Rusev that leads to Rusev trying to kill Ambrose, and Reigns making the save. Of course that may get Roman an actual face reaction so Vince will scrap it. I think the biggest draw for the Summer is Bryan chasing a heel Reigns. They can do Reigns/Cena or Reigns/Rock at Mania next year.

Yeah he missed a ton of time, but what a great run. Outside of Cena I can't think of too many guys I'd put up against Rey in that span. Jericho, Bryan, and Punk are the only names that come to mind. Rollins has a match with Orton, and was just on the Daly Show doing an angle with Stewart. That may be the biggest main stream angle they have this year.

Have Dean Ambrose win a ppv match.

After Rusev and Bray job at Mania I'm not sure they'll have a credible heel for Reigns to work. Which is why the only move is him turning, and joining up with Heyman. There will be a much better group of faces for Reigns to work coming out of Mania. Maybe they'll just do the tweener thing, but I hope they finally let him ditch the Shield gimmick, and find his own character as a heel.

The best worker of the past 15 years, and the most over guy in a decade doesn't have a decent Mania match this year because? At this point I just want Bryan to go to NXT and work Owens, Zayn, Neville, Balor, Itami, and Breeze.

I can't think of a better timed spot in the history of pro wrestling than Arn's spinebutser(especially the one on Taker). As for variety Arn has incredible bloody brawls, some of the best tag work ever, and plenty of great straight up wrestling matches on his resume. Waltman would rank high on my best of the 90's list, and he was the best underdog high flyer around until Rey came on the scene. If Arn vs Waltman had happened sometime in the early 90's it would've no doubt been a great match. Just think if Waltman was in Bagwell's role in 1992 WCW it would've been an even more incredible year for them.

Chael would be a great pro wrestler imo. He probably walks in no worse than the third best promo on the active roster. I wouldn't trust Wandy in a worked environment.

IDK there's so many guys I enjoy watching on the main roster who are getting the chance to put on good matches on a weekly basis. Then you factor in the 10-15 people I really like in NXT, and the roster is just loaded with talent. It's too bad the writing and booking are no where near the level of the in ring talent.

Has there ever been anything close to what's going on with this Mania where we have the two most over babyfaces in the company booked against each so the fans can "get them out of their system"? What does Cena do post Rusev? He feels so out of place now with Bryan back as the most over face and Reigns as the most pushed face. They have no heels whatsoever if they job Rusev and Bray at Mania. Bryan needs that Rusev match more than Cena, and there's a chance people will be into it enough not to crap on everything else. They will most certainly crap on the main event, but Bryan/Rusev might keep them from shitting on everything else.

I agree with everything stated here, and hell I'm probably one of the people you're talking about(though I certainly can't sit through a 3 hour Raw) who's not going to start following other promotions. I love NXT so I guess that may count as another promotion, but half of the fun in watching NXT is seeing if they'll fuck up with the people I actually like on the main roster. I look at it like having a favorite sports team. Yeah you still watch them when they suck, but you're always thinking of things the team should be doing to improve themselves. Bryan was basically a Kurt Warner story the guy who went from bagging groceries to winning the Super Bowl. Only in this case Vince went back to the scrub QB Warner replaced because he didn't have da look. Another issue is the WWE fans have been conditioned to expect a certain match quality in main events that Reigns doesn't bring to the table.

Are they booking that Bryan/Ziggler "let's steal the show and have a 5* match" bullshit just to appease the smarks? Do they not realize Bryan is over with everybody, and having a meaningless midcard match with no story still sucks? Let's face it in this day and age we see good to great matches with no story behind them every week. Seeing one at Mania is no big deal.

He'll just be canon fodder for Reigns. Wasn't Dean's hoodie the #1 seller on their website? Reigns is the guy who needs to turn. There's a ton of people he could work on the face side(Cena, Bryan, Ambrose, Ziggler, Orton, a face Rollins) that draw a lot of interest. Bryan vs Corporate champ Reigns this Summer would be a huge draw.

I don't see any way Reigns gets over as a top of the card face. The fans know what's going on, and they are outright rejecting it. This overpush has caused Reigns to lose the adult male fans, and I don't think he ever had the younger audience behind him the way Cena and Bryan do. All that he'll have left is 30 fat chicks screaming for him. They may as well change his gimmick to the fat chick thriller.

I don't see how Bryan can be blamed for a low buy rate when Brock/Cena didn't draw at NOC. The ppv business is dead besides some stubborn people who still pay full price for Mania. I'm wiling to bet most of the pre Rumble bump they got in subscriptions were people wanting to see Bryan finally get to win the match he got screwed out of last year. How do you think those people feel right now? They used Bryan to pop a rating for Smackdown's move to Thursday, and they used him to sell the Rumble knowing they were going to shit on him the whole time. It's pretty sickening that they hate their own fan base for choosing a guy who doesn't have da look. I don't want to hear about his neck injury being a reason to keep him down. Austin's neck was far more screwed up, but they pushed him back to the top because WCW would've kicked their ass otherwise.

I was telling my brother the Rumble match was the worst booked match of all time, and that was before Mizdow got dumped in 30 seconds, and Kane and Big Show made all the faces look like dopes. Nothing tops that gem. I'll go with Booker T/ HHH at Mania for obvious reasons. Also Austin turning heel at 17 that was basically the end of an era.