Welcome back to another Monday Morning Q&A where I toss out some questions to get a feel of how you guys and gals are feeling about certain topics.
So here are 5 questions I’d like to toss out for this week. I’ll give my answers, too, but the key here is that I want to know what YOU think! So make sure you chime in!
1) Bray Wyatt’s gone from WWE. Your thoughts? What is happening in WWE with these constant releases? Where does he go next?
I feel like a broken record saying I can’t help but to feel like all these budget cuts are for an impending sale, but when WWE is releasing major names even while AEW is proving itself a healthier product, there has to be a bigger reason than just bumping up performance numbers a little bit each quarter.
Wyatt was too big of a star and too built-in to the fabric of WWE to just write him off as another large contract. This is perhaps the biggest release of them all so far, and it’s really startling. It also gives me the impression quite literally everyone is on the chopping block and nobody is safe, so we might see someone like Seth Rollins, The New Day, Bayley, etc even booted out.
As far as where Wyatt goes, it depends on what he wants to do. If he’s still into wrestling and doesn’t want to just take time off, raise his kids and go into another path, I think he absolutely should and will go to AEW. He’s just too big of a name for them not to snatch him up, and he’s too well liked as a creative mind for them not to want to capitalize on that, too.
2) Who do you think Kenny Omega will face at All Out if it’s not Hangman Adam Page? When is Page getting that title shot?
I’m baffled if it’s anyone other than CM Punk or Daniel Bryan who fights for the title. Not even Sting makes sense to me, as there hasn’t been anything heading in that direction.
They’re running out of time to start properly building a contender with the people on the roster if it’s not Page. This is the biggest event of the year for them and they shouldn’t just go with Omega against “another guy on the roster”, no matter how good they are. For example, Omega vs. Sammy Guevara, while I’m sure it would be a great contest, just comes out of left field.
Ignoring what Dave Meltzer says about Page not being booked for All Out, I still can’t help but to think that the game plan is to do something where Page finds his way back into the title hunt before September. Maybe he’s willing to put his career on the line or something.
If not, then I feel like it has to be Bryan against Omega and Page will get the title shot at Full Gear or Revolution.
3) With Natalya injured, what do you think WWE will do with the Women’s Tag Team Championship and what would you LIKE to happen?
What I want to happen (and what I would do): If she’s able to wrestle again in a few weeks (as in, under a month), WWE should hold off on any kind of title situation. Tamina can wrestle a few people and just conveniently focus on other storylines, as this wasn’t important enough to have to go on the SummerSlam card as it was, anyway. Then, when Nattie is able to go, they should drop the belts to Nox and Shotzi. Of course, I wouldn’t have split the titles in the first place and never would have created an NXT Women’s Tag Team Championship, so we wouldn’t be in this situation if I had creative control.
What I think will happen: WWE will have Nattie and Tamina vacate the championships on Raw. Then, they’ll announce that there will be a Fatal 4-Way or something or other where new champions will be crowned. It will involve Eva Marie and Doudrop, Nia Jax and Shayna Baszler, Nox and Shotzi, and whoever else they can scrounge together. Either Nox and Shotzi will win and feud with Jax and Baszler after, or Jax and Baszler will win and the feud will still be against Nox and Shotzi.
4) Reginald is now “Reggie” and has dropped the sommelier gimmick, the French accent and so on. Are you into this or does it not move the needle for you?
This isn’t going to bump up ratings by any means, nor draw in the casuals, but I do like it. It’s a good means to reboot his character and take away the more ridiculous aspects of it while allowing him to continue to be just an athletic and entertaining person in the lower-midcard part of the roster.
He’s a great fit for the 24/7 Championship. While this is ultimately R-Truth’s baby, it wasn’t meant to be from the onset. It just happened to play out like that. Others have been able to put their own spin on things, like Drake Maverick and even Riddick Moss. Let’s see how well Reginald can do with it.
The Reggie name, though…I don’t like that. I don’t see the need to shorten his name even more. Can you ever see a marquee with just “Reggie” on it making any sense? Not that Reginald Thomas was a particularly enthralling name on the level of Macho Man Randy Savage and the like.
5) Generally speaking, what is your favorite thing going on in professional wrestling right now, no matter what company it is?
AEW is the overall best product. I don’t think anyone can really debate that. They have much more consistently fresh matches, the momentum is on their side with positive trends in the business instead of negativity and morale issues, and some of the feuds are among the best.
I don’t have the ability to watch Dark and Dark: Elevation just as much as I don’t have the time (nor interest) to watch WWE Main Event. At the end of the day, if you’re doing analysis of this as a job, you have to pick and choose what you focus on or else you’re living in this space 24/7, which is just impossible without getting too bitter. So I’m not excited about Rampage if it’s just going to be another show of matches and not much more other than Dark.
However, with WWE, I enjoy the NXT product far above and beyond anything else that I’m seeing. It’s a tighter time frame and has some of the most engaging characters without being problematic and overstaying its welcome. Raw and SmackDown have some good things, but it’s more about picking that out of a 2 or 3 hour window that feels like more of a drag.
My overall favorite thing at the moment is probably actually not even a storyline, but just the energy of feeling fans back in attendance at these shows.
Let us know your thoughts about these questions by answering them in the comments!
