rolling Jericho calls The New Day trap queens 2016

nah the early Reigns elimination is just some fantasy booking shit, it'll never happen. they've been very up front about the story they're going to tell here. don't agree that the drama will build the longer he's in though, that's exactly what everyone expects to happen. if he were to go out after 25 mins or so i think the intrigue levels as to what happens next go through the roof. but yeah w/e, not happening.

tbh i think the best way to make this "Reigns vs the world" story work would be to have Lesnar come out at #2 and stay with Reigns the whole way through. there's some fucking high stakes jeopardy for you, none of that artificial Kane / Big Show bullshit. actually give the guy some odds to overcome.

in other words, don't make "Reigns dominates" the story of a third consecutive Rumble. run with "Lesnar dominates and Reigns is barely surviving".

Eliminating reigns (and hhh) would create the most suspense because they are far and beyond the favourites to win. Then it gets opened WIDE UP. Not likely to happen though.

I really am not excited to watch Reigns hug a corner or bottom rope for 10 minuted at a time. In fact im really bored of the 'guy goes long' narrative for a while. Punk's last night was especially bad viewing, he was in for like an hour and only actually worked for about 3 minutes.

Does Taker turn up?

What the fuck is wm gonna be?

I think its the open question that excites me. Sure i know they can realky fuck it up with ease (only match more boring than taker-kane is taker-sheamus folks... fuck me that though just depressed me) but what if they actually did the bestest wm ever? No orton, so a brother can dream

all I want is a kofi win is that too much to ask

I was going to put a bet on the Rumble but then I saw the odds for Triple H and I was like, screw that.

Feel like "smashing through the barricade into the timekeeper's area" spots are a little passe but that bowling ball from Owens was tight

Francesca II!!

one of those pretty damn good usos matches

yeah this has been a great show so far. i can't decide who i love more out of Xavier and Big E

i am not usually at all into that spot where a guy wrestler grabs a girl wrestler and kisses her against her will, but all the same, god bless you Ric Flair you crazy old bastard

oh shit that pop for THE BOSS

face Becky, heel Charlotte, TWEENER Sasha, all with reasons for fighting each other, fighting over a title belt, getting PPV time and promo packages, awesome awesome awesome awesome why haven't they been doing this all along?

ok the finish to that match was dumb as shit, i will forgive it because post-match shenanigans were the best

this PPV is one good Rumble match away from being a very very good show indeed imo

this Edge and Christian show looks awful

pretty savage boos for Roman right out the gate. this is gonna be FUN!

we have a Styles sighting! and that was a MEGA POP!

clever having KO eliminate styles.

yeah, they used Owens very well tonight.

i could watch Brock Lesnar run around hitting jumping knee strikes on bigass dudes forever

good job Lesnar's in this, it's gone a bit flat, you can see the last few guys coming a mile away, Wyatt and Sheamus will be here soon

ha so yeah

the story is going to be all about Reigns going the distance and overcoming the odds. The League of Nations are going to make things difficult for him but he'll win through. The New Day will probably get a spot early on to do some comedy stuff. Lesnar will enter at some stage and fucking clean house, eventually to be eliminated by some combination of the Wyatt Family (probably all four of them). Triple H will return right at the death and get revenge on Reigns and take home the title. NXT guys will probably get a showing given they're in Orlando

they've actually done everything that everyone's been predicted for weeks.

it's been a really great Rumble! just a shitty main story. how on earth does taking Reigns to the back for the majority of the match make him look like a deserving good-guy champ?! Kevin Owens could barely walk and he stumbled out to give it his best

Hunter got his eyes on those 16 title reigns

Behold the King, the King of Kings!

Thanks for coming, everyone.

aside from kalisto consuming the soul of sin cara the undercard was great, rumble was fun until the wyatts eliminated everybody and grim inevitability set in. maybe picking holes in wrestling logic is a fool's errand, but the two determining factors for the rumble matchup were pretty annoying - if it's been established that you can hang around outside the ring for as long as you want, why not do that? and if it's been established that you can help your buddies beat up and eliminate their enemies whether you're (still) in the match or not, why not do that?

that was exciting at the end there, but fuck

i know wrestling is dumb but vince mcmahon should probably know to tell his lackeys to actually formally eliminate roman from the match

also they need to stop calling him the boss, that's gimmick infringement

xp

tbh there should be countouts in battle royals

that was booked a zillion times better than last year though, except yeah the main story

Yeah, the Rumble had lots of fun stuff in it (Lesnar had a great run of suplexes on huge guys, not to mention those awesomely scary flying knees on Strowman), but the main angle didn't make sense either in or out of storyline.

In-storyline, it makes no sense that the League of Nations didn't eliminate Reigns after they beat him up, and that none of the other participants in the match dragged him in to throw him out either. And it's also weird that Reigns didn't just get back into the ring after HHH eliminated him to help his friend Dean Ambrose win the title. Why play fair against the guy who abused his power to take you out of the match, and put himself in it at the easiest possible position? Why not get in there with your ex-Shield comrade and do some teamwork, which is what you made your name on in the first place?

They could have still had the same result, even--just have Reigns come back in, which brings the LoN back in, so now it's 4-on-2 (5 if Barrett is back there somewhere) and HHH still wins. But that way at least Roman tried! Sometimes WWE seems to have this strange idea that, outside of tag matches, only heels should help each other.

Out of storyline, it's odd that they had Reigns sit out so much of the match in the back. That seems counterproductive if they're really trying to get the crowd on his side. I could see that sort of approach working with an underdog type, but Reigns is not Sami Zayn.

They're trying to have Reigns be a face, aren't they? So I guess I can understand why they didn't have him come back in to help Dean, since that would be "unfair" or whatever.
It's still bullshit, though.

AJ Styles and Sami Zayn got more chants than Reigns in his home state.

lol that was the best rumble in years and yet they still have no fucking clue with roman.

its like they are intentionally messing up every bit of story or interaction he does. really reminded me of summerslam when the fans chanted about roman being asleep.

i love sasha banks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8FrpWIWj9o

gr8 song

aw man that was fucking sweet. when given something good to work with, styles can be so great. if he is against say owens & ambrose for the next couple months, it'll be some beautiful viewing.

Styles Clash is going to be interesting, p. much everyone he tried it against looked way too big. So glad they haven't fucked with him though - the name, the look, the gimmick, the finisher - they've basically just parachuted the 2015 wrestler of the year into their main-event scene - I like this strategy! Also that song is dope

it's been a really great Rumble! just a shitty main story. how on earth does taking Reigns to the back for the majority of the match make him look like a deserving good-guy champ?!

This was exactly the thought in this house while watching it. Reigns basically sat out all the difficult opponents - Show, Henry, BROCK - and ran back out half an hour later when the pickings were easier. That's a chickenshit heel move, through and through. But looking at the way Cena's been handled for years, WWE doesn't know how to book a top face anymore.

(Difficult in battle royal terms, obv - not easy throwing those big fellas over the top rope.)

But looking at the way Cena's been handled for years, WWE doesn't know how to book a top face anymore.

tbf Vince has always had a funny way of booking his top face. Hulk Hogan essentially worked heel while being presented as a face throughout his entire run on top and look at how well that worked for them. he was always cheating in his matches, acting like a spoilt child throwing a tantrum when Sid eliminated from the 92 Rumble etc. etc.

i don't see any great inconsistency between Hogan's dickishness, Michaels', Cena's and now Reigns'. Vince is an immature prick, can't help but book his top face to also be an immature prick.

That's fair, I didn't think back far enough - Hogan was a terrible cheat, but you don't really dwell on that stuff when you're 11 years old, you just think the Ultimate Warrior is cooler.

pretty entertaining show top to bottom even though the finish they were working towards was what everyone expected - the Rumble at least felt fun and smartly booked to elicit "good" sympathetic disappointment at the eliminations, rather than another triumphant return to Botchamania for King Boo

some of the interference logic was kind of screwy though yes, above all else I can't buy Rampaging Blood God Lesnar getting cheated out of the match and slowly shuffling away crestfallen while the sad Charlie Brown piano plays, surely he should have overturned the ring with everyone in it

Also Bray being too crazy to not try and take HHH down for fun is a far more interesting direction for him at this point than another feud where him and his buddies ruin the matches of a guy the crowd likes watching, before getting decisively beaten by him

speaking of interference: it got lost in the shuffle after he got taken out for the majority of the match, but for some reason roman kept attacking guys who were on the verge of taking someone else out?

yay wwe babyfaces

Best Rumble (and Rumble undercard) in years. Ambrose is the MAN for going 20 minutes in a war with Owens, and then lasting 30 minutes in the Rumble itself and almost winning.

They did a good job at setting up future matches, but yeah, so many storylines make no sense at all. Lesnar went apeshit and got "suspended" after getting screwed out of the title at the last WM, here he gets screwed out of the title again by the Wyatts and he just walks off like a sad panda? And Reigns taking a half hour break in the middle of the match made him an even bigger heel than he already was.

HOLY SHIT that pop for Styles' entrance. I seriously don't know how much longer they can keep pretending that Reigns is the guy to carry the company when guys like Ambrose and Styles are getting the reactions they're getting.

with the camera oddly focused on Roman's reaction I actually thought there was some atmospheric loud buzzing noise as part of the entrance theme and then it cut straight to him on the ramp like whoaahh

everyone knew it probably had to be tonight or tomorrow but even so, it's so weird/nice to see a 90s style Big Debut where the guy's reputation, name and the resultant surreal vibe of it all are intact

can they pull off a Nakamura debut that does him justice?

was hoping owens would take back the IC title so he'd have something to fight sami over at WM (darn), now that dean kept it i sincerely hope he keeps it for the majority of the year and defends it regularly, before finally going up to WHC tier. 90s style.

also at some point brock has to stop getting distracted by supernatural shit and demand a WHC match. they can only keep him from it for so long.

hhh unbuttoning his jacket to show the belt was boss

lot of good matches tnite. aj styles v jericho was great. becky v sasha was great. kevin owens v ziggler was great.

i feel like botchamania etc. is going to get a lot of mileage out of vince starting raw with saying "i confess i love that you are all miserable". is that why the show sucks so regularly?

can't argue with those heel tactics.

Reigns basically sat out all the difficult opponents - Show, Henry, BROCK

yeah it's amazing that after the buildup we didn't even get to see roman and brock in the ring together

can they pull off a Nakamura debut that does him justice?

Nobody knows who Shinsuke Nakamura is. I love him too, but come on, let's be realistic about this. He's going to NXT after his physical, if he really is WWE-bound, and getting the Balor treatment at best. And there's nothing wrong with that.

yeah it's amazing that after the buildup we didn't even get to see roman and brock in the ring together

I feel like that was deliberate, like their booking plans have either moved beyond their feud (so they didn't want them rekindling anything in the Rumble), or they have something sketched out for further down the line (so they didn't want to pull the trigger on Sunday). Either way, their execution of it sucked.

why would the authority spend all this time stripping roman of the belt only to put him in a qualifying match to face HHH for the championship? like i understand they want roman to be the heavyweight champion but surely there's a way to orchestrate it that doesn't require stephanie being an idiot?

Yeah that doesn't make any sense. There's a conflict between the 'we need to screw him' idea in the Austin-McMahon dynamic they're fixated on, and the 'oh shit he needs to be in title contention or the kids won't buy it' thing. Makes everyone involved look like a sap.

Also, disregard my theory above about keeping Reigns and Brock separate, 'cause they've only gone and booked them in a triple threat at Fastlane.

what could save reigns at this point? obv they want to, and obv they need to. only thing i can imagine working his him withdrawing from competition for a bit only to return in a sting-like role (possibly w/ sting)