I don't really like the recent booking. If they had Chris Jericho get the win at Wrestlemania, why not have him feud against Reigns for the title? Jericho is a veteran. He has the credibility of being a former World Champion. He had momentum from coming off a win at Wrestlemania, something no one else involved in that main event on Raw could say. He is a jobber to the stars, so losing to Reigns would not matter. And he also happens to be a heel, which would make for a smooth feud. People were negative towards Nikki Bella for saying in a promo that wins and losses don't matter. The WWE's booking sometimes says the same thing. I am not saying they should never have a person that loses a feud end up getting a better push than the person that actually won, but this is a situation where I would have liked to have seen the guy with momentum coming off of Wrestlemania get the push. He might seem more worthy. For the sake of not being predictable, you might sometimes have sloppy booking. Reminds me of TNA.
Instead of just complaining about what could have been, let's look at the feud that is here. Roman Reigns vs. AJ Styles. This feud is suspicious. The obvious reason why is that it is face vs. face. Some people say that Styles is just here to be fed to Reigns. Well, you could have picked a heel to do that. Even with injury issues and whatever else, there were still options. I mentioned Jericho. Both Sheamus and Alberto Del Rio are former World Champions, as well as being heels. Their feud with The Wyatts is another issue. It did not need to happen. Instead of choosing a heel, the WWE went with a face. Both Roman Reigns are in interesting positions that makes this feud even more suspicious.
First, you have Roman Reigns. He is the new centerpiece of the company. Much like the previous centerpiece, he has issues connecting with the fans. Some might say Reigns is worse than John Cena. What is the WWE thinking putting him against someone his haters love? Reigns will be shredded by smarks even more. The obvious thing to say is that they will turn Roman Reigns heel. He has been acting a little more cocky this week. He's not a bad guy. He's not a good guy. He's just THE guy. I'm sure the WWE will be slapping that on T-shirts. If they don't fully turn him, this new character might just ruin him further. Smarks will continue to hate him. Some of the fans that do like him may sour on his cocky character and start disliking him. If the WWE can think they can give Roman Reigns a heelish face character that smarks will be drawn to, it may backfire.
AJ Styles has also been in an interesting position since debuting. The WWE obviously wants him over. They are not hiding that fans like him. They often promote it in an awkward way. Even though wrestling fans view him as a wrestling god, I am not sold the wider audience loves him as much. He is definitely not as hot as Daniel Bryan was during his peak. Is that the level of overness they hope to recapture to try to spark their declining product? No, they didn't want none when they had Daniel Bryan two years ago, but they might feel they need to manufacture that now. If advertising that fans like AJ Styles is not catching on with other fans to make him hotter, what can you do? How about act like you are holding him back like you did Daniel Bryan? The WWE had AJ Styles lose to Chris Jericho at his first Wrestlemania. Jericho himself has said he "buried" AJ Styles. Just great heel work or a new character trait for Jericho? Many fans also feel Roman Reigns will "bury" AJ Styles. Reigns himself is talking like Styles can't beat him. Is this all to make Styles seem like the underdog the company wants to hold back? It would not be as organic as what happened with Daniel Bryan.
It has only been a week. It is too soon to say what direction the WWE is going. But this is a suspicious setup with two men in interesting positions. Are they going for a heel turn? Is this to help one of these guys get to another level in terms of overness? Will they use this feud to debut certain individuals? I doubt the WWE just wants to treat this as filler. Let's see how they continue it.
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