Previewing The Battleground 2016 Undercard

Recently, the WWE has shown that they will go with certain things that wrestling fans might appreciate, but the general audience may not be able to. For the most part, I don't think they should do that. The feud between Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn is a rare exception I am willing to make. They just have a heated rivalry and a chemistry. You pretty much have to add another chapter to their story on the main roster. The brawls and interactions can get that general audience interested.

Problem is, this match for Battleground seems like a disappointment. I said that Natalya vs. Becky Lynch might have deserved some kind of stipulation, and I will say the same thing for Owens vs. Zayn. How can it not have a stipulation? They are treating this like it is the final battle between the two. It won't be, but how can you not add to the match to make it feel like a bigger deal? Last Man Standing? I Quit? You don't need the Extreme Rules PPV to have these matches. As for the winner, I feel this can go either way, but I will say Sami Zayn.

The brand split may have messed up The Wyatts. Nevertheless, they still have New Day at Battleground. Tag titles are not on the line. People complained last year when the WWE did not have Nikki Bella defend the title at some PPVs, saying they just wanted to have her walk her way to the record for longest run with the Diva's Championship. I don't see anyone complaining about New Day not having to defend the titles here. I'm sure they are out there, I just don't see them. As for this feud, I think it has been rather disappointing so far. There is a storyline with some potential. But the fact that the tag titles are wasted here and the WWE arguably failed to beat TNA at their own game with that segment recently just hurts my interest in it. It annoys me more than it entertains me. Bray Wyatt needs wins more at this point than New Day, especially when their tag titles are not on the line. Wyatts win.

Darren Young gets a title shot against The Miz. These two were drafted to different shows. It seems this feud will end at Battleground. You might say that Miz obviously retains to keep the Intercontinental Championship on Smackdown, but the WWE could have Darren Young and Zack Ryder win their respective matches, switching what shows the United States and Intercontinental Championships are on. Not likely. Miz retains, but what happens to Darren's push after? I am not going to say he started at the top, but this push pretty much started as high as anyone would have expected him to go. Will he be pushed properly in the midcard? Or become a jobber? That would be a waste of Bob Backlund. Will Backlund even last the year in the WWE?

Rusev defends the United States Championship against Zack Ryder. I already said it is unlikely the two midcard titles switch shows by having two lower-midcarders win them on the same night. And Ryder won't beat Rusev just to bring the title over to Smackdown. I can picture Ryder losing this and going back after The Miz and the Intercontinental Championship.

John Cena and Enzo & Cass vs. The Club. AJ Styles will not have his buddies much longer due to the draft. But this match will still happen. Either Anderson and Gallows will likely eat the pin in this match. Face team wins.

What happens to the feud between Cena and Styles after that? Now the playing field is cleared up. Enzo & Cass are not on Smackdown with Cena and Styles. Anderson and Gallows aren't there, either. It will just be Cena vs. Styles. That might make Summerslam their final encounter.

Battleground 2014 Preview: Part 1

Cameron and Naomi, former partners and friends, will face each other this Sunday. You have had 4 diva feuds being featured recently. Paige and AJ Lee are in a title feud. Stephanie McMahon has been making life miserable for Nikki Bella. There were issues between Layla and Summer Rae, which have since branched into a partnership between the two. And this feud. I don't even remember how many times you have had this many during the golden era. Obviously, the WWE will not be consistent with all these women. And these two women in this match are likely to eventually be lost in the shuffle again. This is only a kickoff match. Naomi wins.

Seth Rollins is good to go against Dean Ambrose. A lot of fans are excited for this match. I really don't care too much for it. Just my personal opinion. I think the feud between Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow after Sandow betrayed Cody last year and won the briefcase was more fun. They have had Dean Ambrose get beaten down a lot recently. Is this going to be a situation where the face overcomes and gets revenge against the heel that betrayed him? The story of this match could ruin the quality. I know a lot of fans would rather these two just go at it. You might have a story here where Ambrose is broken and trying to fight uphill all match. Hopefully, this feud continues to Summerslam and they can put on an even better match there, regardless of outcome and quality at Battleground. Seth should win this match.

You have a huge battle royal to crown the new Intercontinental Champion. And Barrett will be there to hand over the title. How great would it be if he drops some bad news on whoever wins the match and tells them he isn't injured anymore and is keeping the title? It would be a good way to set up a feud between him and the winner. Let's say nothing fancy happens. Who wins? Probably not Sheamus. He doesn't need it. It would be nice if Dolph Ziggler wins it. He can feud with Barrett down the line. I just feel like a heel should be holding it now. The Miz is a good choice. He just came back and it would be an easy way to keep him relevant without actually pushing him. It would also be nice if Cesaro gets it. The guy needs something. Without going through anymore names, I'll say Miz wins the title.

The Usos once again defend the tag titles against The Wyatts. And this is a 2-out-of-3 falls match. Just like I gave the WWE credit for upgrading the US title match between Sheamus and Alberto Del Rio on Main Event last week to a Last Man Standing match, I'll give them credit for making this match more than just a basic tag match. These two teams can put on a great match. This match type should make things more interesting. The Flying Eduardo Brothers should finally be winning the titles this time. Wyatts win.

From Taking Out The Trash To WWE Title Shot

Not happy with how the WWE has chosen to run with Miz. No, not because my prediction about him continuing his storyline of trying to take out those who held him back was wrong. I'll get to the reason. In any case, Miz won a spot to compete against CM Punk at TLC for the WWE title by defeating Randy Orton on Raw this week.

He took out R-Truth and John Morrison in two consecutive weeks, they treat it as an actual storyline, and they fail to really follow through on the third week. I heard them talking about it on Raw, but that is not the same thing. If anything, that makes it kind of worse. You talk about Miz taking out those he feels held him back, but you have him setting his eyes on the WWE title right away? CM Punk was never aligned with Miz. Alberto Del Rio and Miz were never friends. Even Randy Orton, the guy Miz got the win over to get into the title match, was never really a partner with Miz. That brings me to that pic I put up there. How hard would it have been by switching some of the booking around? Have the first match be Randy Orton vs. Alberto Del Rio. Del Rio could win the same way Miz ended up winning, through Barrett. That would leave Miz to take on Daniel Bryan. Those two actually do have a history together, even though it was a forced pairing. Back on NXT, Miz was Bryan's pro. Miz can then beat another guy he was associated with. Whether Miz cuts a promo on that or not, it would be something for the commentators to get into and it would keep the storyline going, or at least ease it to the wasteland a little smoother.

I don't even think Miz needed to be in this match. John Cena, Alberto Del Rio, Miz, and Dolph Ziggler are not the only guys on the Raw roster to have held a World title in the WWE. I'm not talking about Kevin Nash or Triple H. What about Jack Swagger? He held the World's Heavyweight Championship longer than Dolph Ziggler did. Why not have Swagger go out there with Vickie and Ziggler for that segment that started the show? They are already teasing tension in the heel duo Vickie manages, so why not push it up a notch to get Swagger into a main event? Considering Miz would be left with an interesting storyline in the midcard, I do not think it would hurt him. Just have Jack Swagger be the one going over either Randy Orton or Daniel Bryan instead of Miz. Jack Swagger would not fit a TLC match? Swagger won Money in the Bank. That was a ladder match. Miz could have still gotten a match to qualify for the TLC match, but just have the guy lose. CM Punk vs. Alberto Del Rio vs. Jack Swagger would have been fine, in my opinion.

What really bothers me, once again, is the lack of continuity and passing up a good chance of having an interesting angle in the midcard. It really is not even about making better use of Jack Swagger, rather running with Miz's angle. One of the last really good midcard storylines was Sin Cara vs. Sin Cara. It was a feud with a real storyline. They could have had something like that with Miz. Looking at Raw this week, the whole structure of the show reminded me of that night they tried to crown a new WWE Champion after CM Punk left. Almost every segment was devoted to that on that Raw. This week's Raw, almost every segment revolved around the main event. Even Kevin Nash's segments have to do with Triple H. That being said, there's main-event potential there too. Triple H could pop up and enter a feud with JTG, and it would still have a shot at being in the main event of at least Raw. In fact, the only match I recall on Raw that did not involve at least one former World Champion was the diva match. Where's your midcard picture? Dolph Ziggler vs. Zack Ryder? John Cena was sticking his nose in there a lot this week. The midcard was full of things that had major focus on title matters. Where are the interesting storylines? They could have had one with Miz. No title needed.

The End Of John Morrison In The WWE?

Off of just the segment involving John Morrison and Miz, there are two things I would like to talk about. Since I will probably want to spend some time on both, I will split it up. Right now, John Morrison.

The Miz attacked Morrison from behind and took out his knee before their match officially started on Raw last night. Morrison went on with the match anyway, showing some guts. He looked impressive in holding his own for a while, but got taken out again on the stage. Medics then stretchered him out.

There was talk for a long time that John Morrison would not be staying in the WWE. When they gave him that win against Dolph Ziggler and looked to be pushing him again, it looked like things might have been settled or that the WWE was at least trying a little more to convince John Morrison not to leave. I guess it was not enough. John Morrison definitely looks like he has been written off. Looks like WWE may have lost him.

John Morrison is not the kind of guy the WWE would want to lose. Even if Rey Mysterio, Christian, Triple H, and whoever else were not out with injuries right now, or suspended because of the wellness policy, you still had dwindling star power, which was definitely being felt in ratings and other such indicators. Regardless of whether or not you even have a ton of talent or not, John Morrison is a unique performer. He can pull off a lot of crazy spots. Mistakes may happen now and then, but I feel it is a waste to even bring that statement up. Morrison was a solid worker in that respect. Some people may criticize his charisma and mic skills, but if you give this guy the room to do his own character his way, he can do fine. He definitely has the look too.

Judging by the fact that the WWE did not just terminate his contract and toss him out like garbage, they did not want to lose him. Did they do enough to try to keep him? Obviously, I do not work for the WWE and I am not going to be refreshing my favorite wrestling news site every 5 minutes for a report on the situation. I wouldn't blindly believe it anyway. Unless John Morrison himself cares to shed some light on what was going on with negotiations, I can only talk about what I can see myself. What did I see? A losing streak angle. You can make a lot of false promises and BS to your workers backstage, in the end, if their issue is how they are being pushed, not money or other such incentives, people can see for themselves whether or not the workers have a legitimate gripe. Again, a losing streak angle? Most of them lead to something good at the end, and Morrison's almost did, but I don't think they really did enough to convince this guy to stay. It looked like he would still be pushed around all over the place. Considering his potential, he deserved a push a lot more than some of the other guys.

The WWE made another dumb move. Not only would pushing Morrison better in his final weeks have been a good way to convince him to stay, it might have made for some good matches. In that way, even if Morrison still refused to stay, at least you got your money's worth out of him, or tried to. They just sent him out there in a lot of regular matches. He looked impressive here and there, but none of the really amazing spots you could usually expect from him when put in that kind of situation. When they announced what kind of match Miz vs. Morrison was going to be, I expected a spot that would work to write Morrison off, but I was also looking forward to Morrison being allowed to show some of that amazing ability of his that can really get fans interested. Nope. He showed heart in the story of the match, but no really cool spots from him. I can understand if the WWE does not want to treat Morrison as something too impressive, just to make fans even more eager to watch TNA, should he pop up there anytime soon, but was it really worth passing up an opportunity to make their own product look good? If this was their mentality, they might as well had released Morrison already, just sit him out until the contract expired, or have him end his run jobbing on Superstars. I understand that their decision was more for Miz's benefit than Morrison's, and I will get to that next time, but just in terms of using your workers properly to deliver exciting moments that can really draw the fans in, they could have done a lot better with Morrison in his final weeks.

To be fair, maybe the WWE never had a chance to really keep Morrison. Earlier this year, when I talked about the likely possibility that Melina would soon be released, the top reason I gave as to why the WWE may think twice about releasing her was her relationship with John Morrison. I am not going to talk about whether or not Melina has Morrison on a short leash, but the WWE did not seem to be giving Morrison any other great reasons to stay. If they had, he would still be there. Had Melina still been in the WWE today, maybe she would have convinced him to stay and continue to be stuck in the midcard. She was passionate about being in the WWE and did not want to leave. With no Melina and the WWE not providing any signs that great things are really to come, I could understand why Morrison might not want to continue there.

If some kind of other deal has been worked out and Morrison is just taking a short time off, that would be good for the WWE. If not, the WWE may have lost another good worker to TNA.

R-Truth Suspended

R-Truth has been suspended, which explains Awesome Truth breaking up on Raw this week. Same thing that got Evan Bourne. R-Truth will be out for a month.

In my opinion, this is much worse that Evan Bourne being suspended. Even though Evan and Kofi Kingston have the tag titles, Miz & R-Truth were the top tag team in the WWE. They were higher up the card, were being given more interesting storylines and feuds, and had a lot more potential. The real problem here is that the WWE actually broke up the team. They did not have to do that at all. Have the two heels try to attack Cena. Have Cena take care of them both. Considering that this is Cena, it would have been completely believable. Then have Cena put R-Truth through the announce table, or something like that. Use that to write R-Truth off with a kayfabe injury. Treat it as Cena being enraged at what The Rock had done to him at Survivor Series. This can then branch off to Miz seeking revenge for his tag partner being taken out by Cena. Did I mention tables? Table Match at TLC between Miz and Cena. Don't want to use tables? Even though there is a possibility that Big Show and Mark Henry might take the chairs, have Cena take out R-Truth with several chair shots. Have Miz attack Cena from behind with a chair the following week. Chair Match at TLC between Miz and Cena. Since the announce table has been used in the feud between Big Show and Mark Henry, you could easily continue in that direction to have their match be the Tables Match. In the end, Awesome Truth would not be broken up. In terms of storyline and creativity, the WWE could have handled this better.

There is one last point I want to make, which relates back to what I talked about yesterday about CM Punk still being outside the main event, despite winning the WWE Championship. This segment with Cena and Awesome Truth was the closing segment. Was it worth it? I believe not. Cena's promo was dull. I am not knocking his promo skills, but what he was out there to do was just not too exciting. He basically put over The Rock. After that, the way he led to Miz and R-Truth splitting up was also dull. Unless the WWE pulled the trigger on suspending R-Truth and writing him off like they did without much time to prepare, this was not a good promo for a closing segment. How about the attack on R-Truth itself? Once again, not too much. Had the WWE done more to develop these two guys, their eventual split and turning on each other may have been something epic enough to warrant closing the show. The way things turned out, I would have switched Punk's match with Cena's promo with Awesome Truth. That's right, demote Cena out of the main event segment for at least a night. After Punk defeated Dolph Ziggler, have Alberto Del Rio come out and either attack Punk, try to attack Punk and fail, or just stare him down from the stage. Hype the rematch. That would have been a smarter way to close Raw.

Alex Riley Feuds With Dolph Ziggler

I am not much of a fan of Daniel Bryan or Zack Ryder, but there is one guy getting some attention recently who I do like. Alex Riley reminds me a little of a younger Randy Orton. Randy Orton has gone in so many different directions over the years, but that is another topic.

Dolph Ziggler, the United States Champion, comes out to cut a promo. Alex Riley comes out to start the development of the feud. I like that. I take it as a good sign that they may actually make this feud something good and that they do care about Riley. How hard would it have been to start the feud by having Riley pin Ziggler in a tag match? Riley could have then won a #1 contenders match, get attacked by Ziggler after, and things continue on from there. Some diva feuds follow some kind of variation of this, especially when the feud may lack a centerpiece. If you are not getting the mic and time to show your character, the WWE may not care that much about you.

To me, Alex Riley is still fresh. He turned face a few months ago, feuded with Miz, looked very impressive, and did not get buried when he eventually did lose to Miz on Raw. He may not be competing for the right to face one of the WWE Champions or teaming with John Cena, but getting good attention in the midcard may be worth more than being overshadowed against main-eventers. I was thinking the WWE would downplay him like they did Kofi Kingston after his feud with Randy Orton many years ago. After Kofi lost to Orton at TLC in 2009, Kofi started to be pushed back down to the midcard. People can say that the whole "Stupid! Stupid!" thing with Orton and Kofi is what cost him the push, but Orton was already booked to go into a feud with Sheamus over the title before that incident, John Cena was still around, and then toss in Triple H and Shawn Michaels still being around at that time. Where could Kofi had possibly have gone? He went on to win multiple midcard titles. And what has happened with Riley is not too different. Although he beat Miz, Miz is the one in matches against Rey Mysterio and the one getting upper-midcard hype. Alex Riley is the one feuding over a midcard title. Pretty much the same as Kofi back then. Major difference is, Riley is still pretty new. This would be his first title in the WWE. That is, if and when he wins it. That is why giving him the title would be something fresh rather than handing Kofi more and more midcard titles. Kofi simply was not really being pushed to break into the main event in 2009. And Alex Riley was not being given that same push a few months ago with Miz. Develop him in the midcard. I like that.

Alex Riley Walks On His Own

Last week, Alex Riley attacked Miz. This week, he got some of Miz again, as well as Michael Cole himself. More importantly, he got a good reaction. He also did his beatings better than Layla did against Michelle McCool a few weeks ago.

It is no surprise that I am loving this. I love seeing new, fresh wrestlers getting pushed. I don't have anything against Alex Riley. I rolled my eyes a little when the WWE was blatantly using him as an extension of Miz to make him look like a stronger heel and more of a threat to overcome, but that is more of a criticism for the WWE, not Riley.

The only question now is whether Riley is just being built up so Miz has something to do, or is this thing the start of something great for Riley? If Riley was not getting that reaction he was getting, I would say that he was just being built up to feed to Miz. But there are a whole lot of spots for someone like Alex Riley to be pushed, unlike the divas. I am not predicting he will be beating John Cena for the WWE title in a few months. I doubt he will get the kind of big push Eddie Guerrero got. But the WWE can really freshen up the midcard with how they use Alex Riley.

Morrison Is Feuding With Cena & Miz?

With John Cena moving to Smackdown from Raw and to Raw from Smackdown, with Miz holding the WWE Championship and doing his thing in his promo, and with both Cena and Miz as part of Raw's main event, it might be easy for some to forget that there are supposed to be 3 men in this feud.

If the flopping around last week was not bad enough, the Raw before the PPV does not even feature proper build for John Morrison in this match. When R-Truth first got placed into the title match, I was interested to see how they would build him as a main-eventer. That got screwed over. John Morrison takes his spot, but he isn't even getting built into a main-eventer himself. All he did on Raw was attack R-Truth after his promo, which probably lasted even longer than Taker's usual entrance. Almost? Instead of getting built to be on the same level as Cena or Miz, Morrison stays at the same level as R-Truth. Together, both are gaining no new ground.

I would be very surprised if Morrison does win the title. I didn't really have hopes for either him or R-Truth winning the title, but I was hoping for a better build for them in the feud to take them to a new level. So why is Morrison in the match? The lack of build for him makes it even more clear to me that he is mainly there to do his fancy spots to help make the match possibly match of the night, if not at least better than TNA's triple-threat cage match for the TNA World title this month. You can say he might also be there to job, but R-Truth could have easily have done that, or any other guy. Morrison is there for his unique abilities.

In the end, there are not three men in this feud. There are three men in the match. This whole feud is still Miz and Cena. It is the extension from Wrestlemania. Just like the mediocre build for John Morrison when he faced Miz earlier this year, this match will be just another chapter in the story of John Morrison coming close to becoming World Champion after showing he can perform more than adequately in the ring. If he should win the belt inside that cage, it still leaves me wondering why the poor build. His character will still look like a midcarder (or upper midcarder), but he will be holding the WWE Championship instead of Cena, who is still on Raw.

R-Truth Out, Morrison In

R-Truth and John Cena were the two contenders to face Miz for the WWE Championship. That was last week. This week? John Morrison defeats R-Truth for the spot in Raw's main event, which will be a cage match.

Do politicians flip flop as often as this? If changing contenders was not bad enough, R-Truth seems to be going heel. He has been face ever since he returned to the WWE, so a heel turn may be refreshing in some sense. Then again, he was getting a main-event push. He was hanging with John Cena this week. No offense to John Morrison, who I have said many times deserves a better chance, but I was actually looking forward to seeing them try to build R-Truth into a main-eventer. Instead, Sin Cara gets a rub from Cena and The Miz tonight. Sin Cara should be proving his worth in the midcard. Knowing the WWE, it is only a matter of time before he ends up like a Sheamus anyway. Push him hard at first, then turn him into a mediocrity for at least a little while after.

This is once again another chance for Morrison to look good. It was only a few months ago when he faced The Miz for the WWE title. A few months before that, he faced Miz and Daniel Bryan for the U.S. title. Now he finds himself in another triple threat. Given his style and abilities, a steel cage match can make for some great spots, which was surely one of the ideas of wanting him in this match. Will he win the title or just be used as the guy who steals the show, yet comes up short at the end? Let's see how WWE builds it.

Speaking of build, the WWE is doing a poor job hyping Extreme Rules. You usually get lazy booking in between Wrestlemania and Backlash/Extreme Rules. A lot of rematches and easy reworking of feuds already going on. Raw's WWE title match is basically Cena's rematch against Miz, but with another guy added in. Smackdown's title match was supposed to be Edge vs. Del Rio, which would have been another Wrestlemania rematch, but Edge has now been replaced with Christian. No surprise there. Christian was already an element in the feud even before Wrestlemania. Even before Del Rio won the Royal Rumble, he was the one who injured Christian. Since Christian was already a part of Del Rio's feud with Edge, the switch has been a simple reworking of the feud. What other feuds has the WWE really been working on? Most are either continuations of Wrestlemania feuds or stupid, like Eve vs. Brie. Unless the WWE can really turn it around on Smackdown this week and the build before the PPV next week, I don't think they should be expecting gigantic buys.