Category: Predictions

WWE Super Showdown 2019 Predictions & Analysis

So I’ve said a few times now so far this year that main roster WWE is yet to put on a bad Pay-Per-View…time for that to change.

I usually try to be as optimistic as possible when going into these predictions because at the end of the day, I never want any of these shows to be bad, but sometimes it’s an unavoidable truth that it will be. I don’t know this for certain of course, but Crown Jewel shattered any and all remaining faith I had that these Saudi Arabia shows could be anything fun to watch.

Once again, I’m not going to make any comments about the political controversy surrounding the Saudi Arabia & WWE deal because I don’t have the desire or the knowledge to get involved in that discussion, there’s just wrestling going on, on Friday and I’m here to predict the winners; so let’s do that.

The Usos vs The Revival
(Kickoff Show)

So this feud has had two phases throughout its time on our screens, there’s the “stupid shit Vince thinks is funny” phase and the “not on TV” phase, and it seems weird to have this blow off match amidst the latter. Either way, this could be a decent match if these two teams are given a little bit of freedom, and aren’t made to pretend their crotches are on fire or whatever bollocks Vince comes up with.

I also think it’s a pretty easy one to pick, The Revival beat The Usos on Raw a few weeks ago, so it only makes sense that The Usos pick up the win here. Not to mention, The Usos need to move up the card and win those titles ASAP, because the fact that the Raw Tag Titles have barely been on Main Event since Wrestlemania is an absolute disgrace.

The Lucha House Party vs Lars Sullivan
(3 on 1 Handicap)

We are gathered here today, to mourn the passing of The Lucha House Party.

Seriously, there’s no other way this goes down, Lars Sullivan is going to destroy these guys. LHP will probably get in a good few licks along the way, but it won’t take long for Sullivan to take out all three of them, probably simultaneously. I really don’t know what the future holds for Lars, it feels like we’ll likely get a Braun Strowman Lite rise, but I doubt it’ll have much staying-power while Strowman is still around. Not to mention how the fanbase at large despise Sullivan for many of his past online comments.

What I do know, however, is that Sullivan is walking out of this match with barely a scratch.

Braun Strowman vs Bobby Lashley

Welcome to the directionless section of the Pay-Per-View.

Has there been any reason for these two to fight? I know they’ve been interacting a bit since the match was announced, but were there any hints of animosity building between these two before it was randomly announced? I don’t see what any of the plans are for either of these men this summer apart from maybe fighting with each other over and over again until we all go and do something more fun, like jamming forks into our eyes.

This match might have one or two cool looking spots, especially if the match is given a more vicious tone of two big dudes who want to flatten each other, but other than that I’m really not expecting much at all from this one. Realistically it could go either way, but I think Braun Strowman is the more likely winner because everyone still loves watching Strowman flatten people and he hasn’t got any notable wins in a little while now.

Roman Reigns vs Shane McMahon

Do you think the whole Crown Jewel thing was just a long plot so Roman can say he beat the best wrestler in the world?

Once again, if you’re having trouble picking a winner to this one, you must be new to wrestling, because there’s really only one way this could go. I know Elias and Drew could get involved and I wouldn’t be overly surprised if we got some kind of boring DQ finish were Roman gets beaten down only to trash everyone, but Shane is in desperate need of some comeuppance right now.

This is one of those matches where I’m not really expecting a great deal from it but could surprise me with how intense it ends up being; which describes almost all of Shane’s major matches to be perfectly honest. I feel pretty confident in saying Roman Reigns is going to win though and hopefully this will be a one and done.

50 Man Battle Royal

Anyone got a 50 sided coin I can flip?

I really don’t know what to say about this one, there’s been basically no build other than us being told it’s happening, it doesn’t even have a section on the WWE.com page for the show so clearly management doesn’t give a shit about it either.

50 men in one ring also seems like it’s going to be a pretty big clusterfuck. At least with a 50 Man Royal Rumble there are pacing and storytelling opportunities over the length of it, but with all 50 guys starting in the ring all at once? There’s barely going to be any room to move, let alone tell a story. It’ll probably get exciting once we get down to the last 6-8 guys, battle royals always do, but I’m not expecting a great deal of anything from this match.

Also basically anyone could win it, sure the Greatest Royal Rumble last year was won by a top guy in Strowman, but WWE could easily flip it to be a joke thing or even worse a lower mid-card thing that will never amount to anything, like the ARMBAR at Wrestlemania. So I’ve decided I’m breaking all the rules and going with what the betting odds are saying because I honestly don’t care about this match. Surprisingly they have Ali to win with 1/1 odds, so I guess that’s my pick.

Finn Balor(c) vs Andrade
(Intercontinental Championship)

Oh wow, a match that probably won’t suck!

Once again it falls to the Intercontinental Championship to give us a small ray of hope in an ocean of shit, I’m hoping for great things out of this match. Balor & Almas have a handful of great matches on Raw & Smackdown since Wrestlemania and it seemed in those like they were really getting to grips with the chemistry they had, so with any luck that will be on full display here and make for a refreshingly good match in the middle of what promises to be a boring ass show.

Unfortunately, I don’t see Andrade picking up the title here, as much as I want him too. Balor hasn’t had that long of a reign with the title yet and there are still tonnes of great opponents for him to fight for the title with on Smackdown and regardless of any of that, Finn’s going to be The Demon, so there’s no way he’s losing, Finn Balor is retaining.

Kofi Kingston(c) vs Dolph Ziggler
(WWE Championship)

Oh great, another boring heel Dolph Ziggler return this is gonna su- Wait, what do you mean he’s been cutting good promos and has been entertaining to watch? That can’t be right…*checks notes*…well I’ll be.

A month ago I would’ve groaned and rolled my eyes at the thought of this feud, but now I’ve watched it play out in front of me, I’m actually feeling alright about this match. The promos Ziggler has been cutting this month has been great stuff, probably because it’s based in some small level of genuine frustration he’s had at some point in his career and when you think about it, it’s entirely possible that Ziggler could’ve done the exact same thing as Kofi had things turned out differently.

I’m quietly hopeful that this match will be good but you can never quite tell when it comes to Dolph Ziggler, for every great Miz vs Ziggler match there’s a boring as hell Ambrose vs Ziggler match, so this could go either way. Plus there’s the possibility that we get some sort of non-finish to tide the feud over, which will put a huge black mark on the match no matter how good it is.

When Kofi won the WWE Title I was expecting to be constantly worried he was going to lose it in every defence. Like last month at Money in the Bank, I picked Kofi to win, but I wasn’t confident, however here I am pretty confident that Kofi Kingston is going to retain this time, because if there’s one person less likely to get the WWE Championship in 2019 than Kofi Kingston, it’s a heel Dolph Ziggler.

Seth Rollins(c) vs Baron Corbin
(Universal Championship)

Nothing fills 60,000 seats like a Baron Corbin world title match.

I suppose this was a match we were always going to end up getting at some point, so we may as well get it out of the way as early as possible. I don’t Baron Corbin like I do many other wrestlers like Bobby Lashley or Lars Sullivan, I think Corbin fills a necessary role on Raw and a lot of his promo work is actually quite good; his in-ring work however…leaves a lot to be desired.

As long as he doesn’t spend too much time on offence doing the standing still method of wrestling and “wearing him down” with weak ass rest holds for 5 minutes, there could be a pretty fun match in this; it is Seth Rollins we’re talking about after all, who can get 4 star matches out of damn near anyone.

I think if any match is likely to have a non-finish or DQ ending, it’ll be this one. Corbin is anything but a fair fighter and I would not be surprised at all if he got pissed off with not being able to win and did something dirty to end the fight prematurely. That said, there’s no way he’s picking up the title and be it by pinfall or DQ, Seth Rollins is winning this match.

Triple H vs Randy Orton

You know what I really wanted from this PPV? A repeat of one of the most boring Wrestlemania main events of the last 10 years, thankfully WWE has me covered with this match.

There really isn’t a great deal to say about this match, it’s not like it’s going to have any bearing on future events in WWE unless Cody Rhodes and Ted Dibiase Jr are planning on returning any time soon. This match could be a fun watch if they just decide to go out there and have a fun match, but I’m not overly confident that’s going to happen. It’ll likely be that exact boring Triple H vs Randy Orton match you’re thinking of right now and no-one will be talking about it come Saturday.

As for a winner, I guess it could go either way. Triple H has been winning all of these recent nostalgia matches against Undertaker, Brothers of Destruction and Batista so I guess it makes sense for him to win here, but Randy Orton is still a semi-active competitor in WWE, so surely he should win instead? My gut says Triple H, but I’m going to ignore it just this once and say Randy Orton is winning.

The Undertaker vs Goldberg

Take the match that everyone’s wanted to see since Goldberg became a big star, add 20 years and a hip replacement to each man and here you have it.

If this match goes under 2 minutes it’ll be awesome, if it goes over it’ll suck. All this really needs is for these two guys to hit all their big moves on each other, and one of them to pin the other because let’s face it, that’s all anyone wants to see, even the people who are really excited for this match. However, if this gets dragged out to 15 minutes it’s going to be awful, Goldberg can’t do long matches at the best of times, but add age and a battered Undertaker and you’ll end up with a match similar to the main event of Crown Jewel.

Does it really matter who wins? It’s not like either man is going to wrestle outside of these bi-annual Saudi Arabia shows – or occasionally a Wrestlemania – anymore, so does it actually matter for either man? Once again, I can make a case for both men, on the one hand, Goldberg is still somewhat fit and can likely go for a few more years than Taker can at this point, so he should win. On the flip side, it’s The Undertaker, so he should win, not to mention that this is technically another WWE vs WCW match, and the WCW guys can never win those, plus Undertaker hasn’t won a match in over a year, so I’m going with The Undertaker in this one.

Those are my predictions for WWE Super Showdown! Thank you so much for reading, a share would very much be appreciated, and let me know what you think is going to happen in the comments below or on Twitter @10ryawoo, and make sure you come back this weekend for my review of the show!

WWE Money in the Bank 2019: Predictions & Analysis

Let’s not sugar coat this, WWE TV this past month has been awful.

Raw is currently the worst it’s been in a long time, thanks to the superstar shakeup being rather underwhelming and taking 3 weeks for everyone to get in the right places. Then one week later we’re told that actually, it didn’t matter because the “Wildcard Rule” means people could just come and go from either show as they please. Smackdown’s been better, with at least a couple of fun and entertaining segments a week, but it’s still not as high a quality show week to week as it used to be.

That said, WWE are yet to produce a bad PPV so far this year, and Money in the Bank is one of those gimmicks that has a fairly high base quality. Rumour is that WWE are actually planning to make a star of the Money in the Bank winner this year, rather than burying them 6 feet under like they have done for the past couple of years. The rest of the card looks hopeful too, with what will hopefully be done dream matches.

Not all of them though, so let’s take a look at them all, break down the storeys and pick a winner.

Daniel Bryan & Rowan vs The Usos
(Kickoff Show)

The article on WWE.com doesn’t make it clear if this is a title match or not, but given it’s on the pre-show, I’m going to assume it isn’t.

I could sit here and complain that the best tag team in WWE, the best wrestler in the world and his friend who’s improved a surprising amount of the past few months are slumming it on the pre-show, but honestly, I’m just thankful Daniel Bryan can still wrestle after his injury scare following Wrestlemania.

Plus, this match is still going to be great even if it doesn’t get tonnes of time. Bryan & Rowan have formed a lot of chemistry together since they began their partnership in January, and I think they were the perfect team to have carry the titles once Jeff Hardy suffered his leg injury. It’s entirely possible that The Revival use this match as an opportunity to get some petty revenge on The Usos for filming them shaving each other’s backs and making their balls itch…yeah, wrestling’s shit sometimes…

Given that The Usos are on Raw, Daniel Bryan & Rowan are definitely winning this match, whether it’s for the titles or not. If it is for the titles then they won’t lose the belts this quick to someone on the wrong show, and if it isn’t for the titles then I can’t see the newly crowned champions losing a match on PPV so soon after winning the titles.

Tony Nese(c) vs Ariya Daivari
(Cruiserweight Championship)

Guess who’s actually been watching 205 Live this past month and a half.

I decided to commit to watching 205 Live on a regular basis following Wrestlemania, and honestly, I’m glad I did it, there’s a lot of good matches on there every week and some pretty interesting minor storylines, unfortunately, I wouldn’t really describe this as one of them.

Don’t get me wrong, both these guys are great wrestlers and I’m sure the match will be just as good as the Cruiserweight Championship matches always are, but this build has been super generic in its premise. Ariya Daivari has been on a winning streak as of late, this has been rewarded with a title match and now Nese and Daivari have been passive-aggressively watching each other’s matches and staring down after every single one.

I like a simpler build from time to time, but this is just a bit too basic for my taste, especially if this is going to be what all of Nese’s title feuds are going to be like until someone like Oney Lorcan comes along and spices things up. Regardless, I’d say Tony Nese is a pretty safe bet here, he looked really good in victory over Buddy Murphey at Wrestlemania and it would be a really bad decision to have him lose the title this quick so this will be a solid defence for the new champion.

Samoa Joe(c) vs Rey Mysterio
(United States Championship)

A United States title match? On a Pay-Per-View? Well I never…

After the absolute destruction of the US Title that came at the start of the year, Samoa Joe has done a pretty good job so far of showing bringing some level of prestige back to the belt. A solid defence of the title at Fastlane followed by beating Mysterio in under a minute at Wrestlemania has been great for both Joe and the title, and hopefully, that momentum will keep on rolling through Money in the Bank.

Admittedly the justification for the rematch was a little lazy, given that Rey pinned Joe in a non-title match on Raw, which we’ve all seen hundreds of times. That said, since then we’ve seen a pretty decent build, getting Rey’s son Dominick involved didn’t seem like it’d be a great idea at the time, but Joe’s promo ability and confrontations with both Rey and Dominick have done a good job of adding some animosity to the build so hopefully this one will get a bit more time than it did at Mania and we’ll get a good match.

I’m going back and forth on the winner though, because as much as I think Joe should win, Mysterio is one of those guys like Jeff Hardy, who could realistically win a secondary title at any point. The thing is, there are a lot of face champions on Raw and Smackdown right now, in fact, the US, Women’s Tag and Smackdown Tag titles are the only ones currently being held by heels so I don’t see Samoa Joe losing his title until that changes.

Roman Reigns vs Elias

Roman Reigns’ move to Smackdown is a great one as far as I’m concerned, with Seth as the Universal Champion there wasn’t going to be any room for him in that title picture for quite a while, and even though he probably won’t be challenging for the WWE Championship for a good few months yet, the mid-card on Smackdown are generally much better wrestlers who can put on great PPV matches with Reigns, and not be hurt too much by losing.

As for this feud in particular, it’s been a bit up and down up until this point. The introduction on the night of the superstar shakeup was great, seeing Vince McMahon get punched in the face will never stop being fun and using Elias and Shane as a proxy has made for some pretty entertaining promos. On the flip side, it has also brought out the worst in Reigns’ character, with him beating the B-Team two on one, despite the fact Elias was there as an extremely biased referee.

This match should be ok, Reigns is a perfectly solid wrestler and Elias is always surprisingly good on the rare occasion he actually wrestles, so as long as this doesn’t fall into the trap of spending 10 minutes of the two men “wearing each other down” using rest holds it should be pretty entertaining. Roman Reigns is definitely winning though.

Becky Lynch(c) vs Lacey Evans
(Raw Women’s Championship)

The first of two title defences Becky will be taking part in on Sunday, this is the one where I really don’t think the result is in question.

Evans is still pretty untested when it comes to big matches in WWE. In the matches she had on NXT, she was fine, but she never had a big singles match at a Takeover and she hasn’t competed nearly enough since coming to main for us to really have an idea of what she’s like. I think she’s good enough for Becky to carry her to an entertaining match though, partly because Becky’s great, but also anyone who can have a halfway decent match with Natalya has got to have some talent behind them.

Like I said at the start though, I have no doubt about who’s walking away from this match victorious. Becky Lynch is not losing that Raw Women’s Title anytime soon, for two reasons. Firstly, there’s a good chance she could lose the Smackdown Women’s Title sometime soon, and secondly, the women’s division on Raw is pretty weak right now, and Becky needs to be at the top to anchor it until a certain Queen of Spades shows up.

Shane McMahon vs The Miz
(Steel Cage)

Who would’ve thought that this would end up being the best-built feud coming out of Wrestlemania?

I honestly don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that this has been the most interesting storyline on TV week to week the past month or so. We all know The Miz is one of the best promo guys around, and when he gets fired up as a face he can do some incredible work, and I think we all knew Shane would be great once he finally turned heel, given how hateable he was as a face. The two of them colliding each and every week has been great fun to watch.

That said, I’m sure how great of a match this is going to lead too. Steel Cage is generally one of my least favourite stipulations, and neither Shane nor Miz are wrestlers who can really benefit from this environment. This leads me to think it’s going to be full of interference from all corners of the roster, it wouldn’t surprise me if Reigns and Elias both got involved, maybe even Bobby Lashley will show up to try and screw Miz in the process. If that happens then it might be a fun watch, in a chaotic sense, because if it’s just a straight match the whole time, I don’t think it’s going to be anything to write home about.

I feel pretty confident in saying that The Miz is going to win here though, since I don’t really see any benefit to Shane winning again, even by accident. It seems to me like Shane is going to fade back into being less of a wrestler and more of an authority figure over the summer, and Miz will probably Samoa Joe’s next challenger, so Miz needs the win a lot more than Shane does here.

Women’s Money in the Bank Ladder Match

This lineup is quite a hit and miss one, on the one hand, there’s Bayley and Ember Moon, on the other hand, there’s Natalya. It makes it a little easier to predict (I hope), but I’m not sure if it’s going to lead to an entertaining match. There’s probably going to be some sort of crazy spot from someone, probably Ember, but a Money in the Bank ladder match needs to be more than that. Either way, let’s look at each of the competitor’s chances, shall we?

Natalya – This past couple of years I’ve gone right off Natalya as a wrestler. She used to be able to hold her own and even stand out as a competitor, but in this era of women’s wrestling where WWE has some of the best female competitors on the planet, she just can’t keep up. It’s entirely possible that Natalya will hold championship gold again before she retires, but something like Money in the Bank wouldn’t rest well on her shoulders.

Carmella – Since losing her Smackdown Women’s Championship last year, Carmella has come on leaps and bounds as a wrestler. Her character turned out to be much better suited to being a face than a heel and this turn has also allowed her to loosen up her wrestling style a lot more, without having to rely on crap like James Ellsworth to get victories; not the mention the Code of Silence is a great looking finisher. I think she’s destined to hold a championship again in her career, but given the landscape of the women’s division now I don’t think it’s going to be for a while, so she’s not picking up the briefcase here.

Dana Brooke – No.

Naomi – Naomi is someone who has all the makings of someone who could potentially carry one of the women’s divisions in WWE at some point in her career. I know she’s already been champion before, but I never felt like the creative team were fully behind her, but it certainly wouldn’t surprise me if in a few years we saw something akin to Kofi’s ascent earlier this year. Like I say though, in a few years, with Becky Lynch sitting pretty holding both women’s championships there’s just no room for her to be skulking around that scene right now.

Mandy Rose – If Asuka was still Smackdown Women’s Champion, I’d say she had a pretty good chance, but that’s not the case, so there’s not a lot for me to say. I can’t help but feel like WWE have backed the wrong horse out of Fire and Desire, don’t get me wrong I like Mandy Rose, even if she is still a little bit green, but I think Sonya Deville really has the makings of an all-time great female wrestler if they’d just give her a shot. Regardless, Mandy isn’t winning this match, because I don’t really see her being a champion anytime soon.

Nikki Cross – As announced on Thursday via WWE’s social media pages, Alexa Bliss wasn’t medically cleared to compete, and Nikki Cross is here replacement because…she sorta helped Alexa out on Monday? As far as reintroductions go, a Money in the Bank ladder match could be really good for Nikki if she’s given some time to stand out in it. Perhaps having her as the last person to be thrown off of the ladder before the actual winner climbs would be a good spot for her, and hopefully some form of story with Alexa Bliss will keep her on TV for the next few months. There’s no way she’s going to be winning this match though.

Ember Moon – Out of everyone in this match, I think this is who I want to win the most. Since coming over to Smackdown she’s been positioned perfectly for a meteoric rise in the coming months, but I’m really sceptical about WWE actually pulling the trigger on it. However, for that rise to happen, I really don’t think she needs to win Money in the Bank, it would help of course, but I think a more organic rise, similar to the one Becky Lynch saw last year would leave her better off in the long run. Ultimately, I wouldn’t be surprised if Ember won it, but it’s not what I think is going to happen.

Bayley – Time for a totally mad theory.

As much as I’ve loved (almost) every Charlotte vs Becky match, I’m at the point where I’d rather see someone else challenge Becky for once, which WWE illuded to a number of weeks ago when Becky proclaimed she also wants to face new people. In addition to this, Bayley has been made to look a million bucks since coming over to Smackdown last month, taking it to everyone she’s come accross.

So let’s put two and two together here, WWE seem to have loved pulling the “same night cash in” trick on a number of occasions, so why not do it again? Except this time, instead of making it a cheap sneak attack, have this match go on early, and once Bayley has unhooked the briefcase, she grabs a mics and inserts herself into Becky vs Charlotte, making it a triple threat. I’ll get into what happens in that match in a moment, but I personally think that would be a great way for things to play out.

Even if that doesn’t come to pass, I still think Bayley’s the one to go with here. She’ll likely announce her cash-in in advance because that’s what faces with the briefcase do, but I think it will be a good way to keep her in everyone’s minds while Becky goes off to face anyone and everyone on the Smackdown roster.

Men’s Money in the Bank Ladder Match

Orton aside, I’d be perfectly happy with any of these men winning the coveted briefcase. There’s a great mix of big guys and high flyers in this match, and as previous years have shown us, that usually makes for the most entertaining of ladder matches. Ricochet and Ali are gonna try and out crazy each other which Balor & Andrade go at it, Drew & Braun try to murder each other, Orton doles out RKOs left right and centre and Corbin is also there.

Ricochet – I love Ricochet as much as the next guy, but let’s face it, he’s only in here to do some cool ladder spots. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure we’ll be raving about whatever it is he did come Monday, but he doesn’t have any real chance of actually winning the thing. It’s hard to tell where Ricochet’s going right now, which makes me worry that it’s nowhere, hopefully, a good showing here will stop that from happening.

Randy Orton – Much like Bliss in the women’s match, he almost certainly won’t win, but there’s a tiny chance he might because it’s Randy Orton. Orton is another guy who feels pretty directionless right now, he hasn’t done a great deal of anything since Wrestlemania, thanks to AJ jumping ship, so he’s just been doing what he always does between storylines which is RKOing people with no rhyme or reason until one of them gets pissy about it. He doesn’t need the briefcase to do that though, so let’s move on.

Baron Corbin – This seems very much like another opportunity for everyone and their grandmothers to mug off Baron Corbin with ladders right at the start of the match. I can’t say I’d be pissed off if Corbin won, but I certainly wouldn’t be that pleased about it. I’m sure Corbin will win a world title at some point over the next couple years – no matter how much we don’t want him to – but the Universal Title scene really doesn’t feel fit for him to drop in right now. It could look very different come November-January time, but somehow I doubt it.

Ali – I really hope Ali has a good showing here, he kicked ass in the WWE title match at Fastlane and he’s disappointingly faded back down the card a bit since then. With Buddy Murphey on the way to Smackdown as well, it’s getting a little worrying for Ali, as it’ll be really easy for him to get lost in the shuffle and have a really mediocre year, like that of Andrade in 2018. He’s not picking up the win here, but I imagine him and Ricochet will try and outdo each other and Ali will really show off his stuff.

Sami Zayn – I don’t really know what to make of Sami being put in this match in place of Braun. The way they did it was fine, Corbin and Mcintyre getting in there to take Strowman out of the picture made sense for both of those characters, and heel Sami Zayn is exactly the type of character to take advantage of it. That said, I don’t think Sami has any chance of actually winning the thing, I’m glad he’s getting a spot in a major match like this of course, but I can’t see him doing a great deal of note other than getting killed by Braun Strowman, that is if Strowman doesn’t take Zayn out before the match and reclaim his spot anyway.

Finn Balor – Balor seems like the prime candidate in this match for a whole host of “almost” moments. I imagine he’ll be much like face Dolph Ziggler was, where several times in the match, he’ll be fingertips away from unhooking the briefcase only for someone to snatch it away from him. I also think he can afford to not do a great deal of consequence in this match and still come out of it looking great. There are plenty of people lined up for Balor to face for the IC in the coming months and here would be a really good place to sow the seeds by having someone like Ali or Andrade stop him from doing it. At the end of the day though, he’s the Intercontinental Champion, so he really doesn’t need the Money in the Bank briefcase

Drew Mcintyre – If I were a betting man, this is probably who I would put my money on. As I mentioned in the intro, apparently the plan is to properly try and make a star out of this year’s Money in the Bank winner, and we’ve all known it was only a matter of time until Drew was a world champion when he resigned with NXT a few years ago. Drew really does seem like the easy pick to win this briefcase, but I’m not sure he actually needs the briefcase in order to get to the Universal Championship. All it takes is multiple months of Drew absolutely murdering dudes left, right and centre. Ultimately, I will not be surprised in the least if Drew walks out with the briefcase, but he’s not the horse I’m backing in this race, because…

Andrade – 2019 might be a “now or never” year for Andrade, not just because there are multiple reports of him being disgruntled, but also because of how he was treated throughout most of last year. He had great matches with top stars yes, but with the exception of Rey Mysterio, he lost all of them. Those matches did a great job to raise his stock and Vince is reportedly really high on the guy, but if he spends another year doing the exact same thing there might not be any way for him to recover.

If Andrade was still on Raw I’d say he didn’t have a chance, but now he’s back on Smackdown all bets are off, and Andrade could be the perfect person to hold the briefcase and eventually become champion. Andrade is a Wrestlemania main event level guy, and all it will take is management to get behind him and he’ll soar. He’s like Alberto Del Rio but not a massive douche, and about 60 times better at wrestling.

Kofi Kingston(c) vs Kevin Owens
(WWE Championship)

This is going to be the next few months, isn’t it? Us all being terrified that Kofi is going to lose the title way too soon every time he defends it.

As much as I’d wish they’d saved this feud for the summer, I can understand why they put the rush on it given Daniel Bryan’s uncertain health at the time. As it turns out, what we’ve got so far has been pretty good, I personally would’ve kept the whole “Kevin Owens as part of the New Day” thing going a bit longer, but the turn was still shocking enough to create a memorable moment and the promos in subsequent weeks have put some real fire behind this feud.

As for the match itself, these two seem like their styles will mesh really well in a high profile match like this. Kofi has proved to be the ultimate underdog wrestler this year and Owens is always at his best when he gets to dominate someone and really enjoy rubbing it in their faces. It does have a slight problem in that this feud definitely isn’t going to be a one-and-done so we could get some kind of wonky finish that really takes the wind out of the sails of the great match that preceded it, Styles vs Owens is a pretty good example of this.

While it’s entirely possible they hot shot the title a couple of times in this feud, I’m going to stick with my guns and say Kofi Kingston is going to retain for now. The moment at Wrestlemania will live on forever in the history books, but I feel like losing the title in his first PPV defence like this would undercut it a bit too much.

Becky Lynch(c) vs Charlotte Flair
(Smackdown Women’s Championship)

Please be the last one.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve liked almost all of the matches these two have had together, and I’m sure this will be no exception, but I’m pretty tired of seeing it for a good while. The story’s been pretty solid, and while these two are both great on the mic they’re kind of out of insult to throw at each other by this point. We know that Becky thinks Charlotte was handed everything, and we know that Charlotte thinks Becky is just a flash in the pan still, we’ve heard all these points over and over again for almost a year now, which is why I think this match needs something to spice it up.

So that’s why I’m proposing the scenario where Bayley wins the Money in the Bank and uses it to insert herself into this match. It makes sense from a character perspective because not only would face Bayley not want to sneak attack with the briefcase but since Bayley’s come over to Smackdown, she’s had a massive chip on her shoulder and desperate to prove she can still do it on her own, so what better way to prove that to everyone than taking out both Becky and Charlotte on the same night?

If that scenario comes to pass, I think Bayley will walk away the winner because they just can’t have another Money in the Bank winner lose their title match, plus it opens up new and fresh opportunities for both a Becky vs Bayley and Charlotte vs Bayley feud for over the summer. If my scenario doesn’t happen though, Becky Lynch is pretty much a lock to retain, they can’t undermine Becky’s Wrestlemania win by having her drop one of the titles back to Charlotte at the first opportunity.

Seth Rollins(c) vs AJ Styles
(Universal Championship)

I think I may be dreaming.

Before you say it, I know. Getting this excited for this match is only setting me up for a disappointing non-finish, but just let me have this one. I don’t care if almost every match AJ had as champion last year ended up performing below expectations when Seth was IC champion last year almost every one of his matches far surpassed expectations. Rollins vs Styles has been the one dream match I’ve been begging for ever since Styles came to WWE, so until it’s proved otherwise, I’m going to be optimistic about it.

The feud itself has been alright I guess, although nothing special. Touching on the two’s past was a nice little touch, but nothing they’ve said on the mic has caught my imagination a great deal. Not to mention there wasn’t really any build for the match on Monday outside of a video package, it would’ve been much more beneficial for the contract signing to have taken place this past Monday instead of 3 weeks ago, but oh well.

There is a chance that this will end in some kind of DQ, dirty finish if WWE wants to keep the feud going for another few months, but regardless of what actually goes down, Seth Rollins is walking away with the title, and he’s holding onto it for quite a long time.

So, those are my predictions for Money in the Bank 2019! What do you think is going to happen on Sunday? Let me know in the comments below or on Twitter @10ryawoo, and make sure you come back early next week for my review of the show!

WWE Wrestlemania 35 Predictions & Analysis

It’s finally time, the road this year seems to have felt longer than ever, but we’re just 48 short hours away from Wrestlemania 35. Much like last year, this card, on paper, has the potential to be one of the best Wrestlemanias of all time, although we all know how that turned out last year…

Almost every single match has the potential to be fun and memorable, and there will almost certainly be moments on this show that get played in the highlight packages for years to come.

However, tradition must still hold, and it is that time once again, to break down all 16 (SIXTEEN!) matches that are scheduled to take place on Sunday, and predict a winner for each one. So here goes, starting with…

Women’s Wrestlemania Battle Royal

I’m sure this one will be well thought out and planned considering it was announced a whopping 9 days before the show and on Twitter, not TV.

WWE seemed to skip the idea that this battle royal would actually mean something last year, handing the win to Naomi and proceeding to do precisely nothing with her for the whole year, so I’m sure we can expect just as important things from this winner’s.

If you’re trying to pick a winner, I think just picking a woman based off of a random number generator might be more effective than trying to break down and analyse it. The most obvious pick seems to be Asuka since, until Tuesday morning, she was meant to be defending her Smackdown Women’s championship on the show. That being said, I could quite easily see them bringing someone up from NXT and use this as a platform for them, Shayna Baszler, Kairi Sane or even Bianca Belair could be good candidates for that.

It’s hard to pick any of the NXT women though since we won’t know if they’re even participating in the match until it starts, so I’m going to go with the safe pick here and say Asuka will win.

Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal

Oh, who cares?

I know the ARMBAR hasn’t exactly been the most prestigious match over the past few years, but this year it seems especially pointless. Partly because until the go-home Raw, Braun and the SNL hosts are the only men who have declared their entry, but also because it means that literally only one of those two can possibly win.

If anything someone completely out of left field winning here would be the worst thing that could possibly happen, because it means you’ve sacrificed your only story of consequence in the match for, I dunno, Shelton Benjamin or someone.

I don’t think I’m going to surprise anyone by picking Braun Strowman here, hopefully, he’ll just toss all 30 men out at once and we can not waste too much time with this crap.

Buddy Murphy(c) vs Tony Nese
(Cruiserweight Championship)
(Kickoff Match)

Please put this on the main show.

Bump the IC title to the pre-show for all I care, I don’t really give a crap about that match, just find a way to get this match onto your 6+ hour main show, please. Buddy Murphy is one of the best damn wrestlers in the company, and whenever he’s been given the chance to shine on a big stage (such as Super Show Down or Survivor Series) he’s blown it away.

While admittedly Nese isn’t on the level of Ali for Murphy’s opponent, the story is definitely there, and he’s certainly a top-level performer on 205 Live. That said, I don’t think he’s going to win the championship. Murphy’s one of those champions where he’s at the point now where I always feel like he’s going to retain, whether the story needs it or not, I can see him holding that Cruiserweight title for a long time, and a big win in a great match here will arguably solidify him as the best cruiserweight champion to date.

This is another one where I’m not particularly confident because I can kinda feel the face win here, but I’m sticking to my guns and picking Buddy Murphy to walk out victorious in this one.

The Revival(c) vs Zack Ryder & Curt Hawkins
(Raw Tag Team Championships)

No. Please WWE. Don’t do it.

The Revival have been putting on some of their best matches since coming to main roster since winning those tag titles (even if they are a mere shadow of their NXT performances) and I swear to the lord on high, if you have them lose Curt Hawkins, whose whole gimmick is that he’s literally never won a match, I will…write a very angry paragraph in my review…ok maybe that’s not the best threat in the world, but the point still stands.

This match is either going to be used as fodder for the pre-show or something for the piss-break in between the two main events, either way, it’s probably going to be short and underwhelming. WWE seems pretty keen on making sure The Revival stick around long enough to sign a new contract, so I imagine they’re going to be keeping the belts until a little bit after that, so I’m expecting them to retain in this one in pretty short order.

The Usos(c) vs Aleister Black & Ricochet vs The Bar vs Rusev & Shinsuke Nakamura
(Smackdown Tag Team Championships)

It’s annoying how the last-minute matches are always the hardest to predict.

After spending a couple of weeks teasing an Usos vs Hardys match, the Smackdown Tag Title scene went quiet for a few weeks and I’d honestly assumed it had just been cut for time, but all of a sudden on Smackdown we just get this clusterfuck of a match announced.

It wouldn’t surprise me if this got bumped to the pre-show at some point before the show starts since we’ve already got a bigger 4 Way Tag match on the card later on, which puts predicting this match in quite an odd position. The story for weeks now has been that Vince has brought Black & Ricochet up in an attempt to make new stars, so surely having them lose here after losing to War Raiders on Friday (presumably) would be awful for them. Then, at the same time, The Usos retaining here just feels like a really easy pick to make.

No idea why The Bar and Rusev & Nakamura have been let into this match either seeing as both teams have done nothing but lose since January, but hey-ho. I think I’m gonna go with the more risky pick here and say Aleister Black & Ricochet will pick up the titles, because quite frankly if they can’t win any titles after five attempts, then why should anyone care about them ever again?

Bobby Lashley(c) vs Finn Balor
(Intercontinental Championship)

This has been such a weird way of executing this story.

I get that you wanted to tell a story where Lashley loses the title due to circumstances of his own making, but having him almost instantly win the title back, and then have him lose again in a 2 on 1 handicap match to get Balor in here seems like such a weird choice to me. It doesn’t really do Balor many favours, since Balor’s lost to Lashley one on one several times now over the past 6 months or so, and even if he wins here I’m not sure it’s going to do Finn many favours.

That said, what would do Finn a big favour is having a run with the IC title similar to Rollins’ run with the belt last year. Granted, they might not want things to seem repetitive and I doubt the reign will last as long as Seth’s did, but it would certainly help him out a lot more than anything in this feud has done so far.

I wasn’t entirely sure about this one for most of the build, I had a hunch Balor was going to win, but once it got confirmed that Finn would be appearing as The Demon at Wrestlemania (finally), that’s pretty much confirmed that Finn Balor is getting the IC title back on Sunday.

Samoa Joe(c) vs Rey Mysterio
(United States Championship)

And now we’re at the point where I’m more excited for the US title match than I am for the IC title, what a big difference a month can make.

I don’t know how much time this is realistically going to get, but I think it’s going to be pretty great either way. Mysterio’s spent his whole career wrestling giants, and Joe can do so many things that guys like Khali and Big Show could never even dream of. I really think this is going to be a fast-paced and brutal fight, which will be a tonne of fun to watch.

This could also be the opportunity the US title has been waiting for to regain some of the prestige that has been absolutely shattered since Jeff Hardy lost the title last summer and it just stopped appearing on shows. In order for that prestige to be rebuilt though, two things need to happen.

First, it needs to be on the main card. This shouldn’t be too much of a worry as I doubt WWE would dare to put Rey Mysterio on the pre-show, so I think we’re good. Secondly, Joe needs to retain, clean. One of the main reasons the US title has gone so far south in recent months (aside from never being on TV) is that it’s being tossed about like a hot potato so much. If you want the US title to start meaning something then you need a champion worth a damn who can hold onto it for more than a week, and Samoa Joe is the perfect candidate to hold it for at least a couple more months.

Sasha Banks & Bayley(c) vs Beth Phoenix & Natalya vs The IIconics vs Nia Jax & Tamina
(Women’s Tag Team Championships)

I would forgive every other mistake this show makes if The IIconics won this match.

As much as it’s awful that the Smackdown Live women’s division has been completely shafted since Charlotte won the women’s title, I’m very happy that The IIconics are getting their Wrestlemania moment, even if they don’t get to win. I’m also very happy for Beth Pheonix, she was one of those women just was just 4-5 years too early to really get the chance to shine, and even if she can’t go like she used to, I’m glad she gets to participate in a match that she would’ve dreamed to have when she was an active competitor.

Picking a winner is a pretty straightforward affair though, Nia & Tamina aren’t getting anywhere near those belts, and I doubt Beth is going to wrestle full-time past Wrestlemania, so they’re out, and while I would be over the moon if The IIconics picked up the title, this really has to be Sasha Banks & Bayley‘s moment. Whether you think that Mania will end with the horsewomen standing tall or not (I’ll get into my thoughts later), it makes the most sense for them to retain here, and hold those titles for at least one more month.

AJ Styles vs Randy Orton

Now we enter the “for shits and giggles” portion of the show.

I understand that this is a big match that we haven’t seen outside of a short Smackdown match a couple of years ago, and if Orton’s motivated it should be pretty good, but I still can’t help but ask why? Orton felt like he’d long since given up on his mission to tear down our heroes, and the general impression I’ve gotten for why these two hate each other so much is “cos indies”, which doesn’t exactly seem like a Wrestlemania feud to me.

It also seems pretty predictable, as much as AJ has lost matches like this before (remember Chris Jericho?), AJ’s been taken down quite a lot since losing his WWE title to Daniel Bryan, and a big win over Orton would be a pretty good way to build him up, and hopefully send him over to Raw where he can do something new.

I remain optimistic about this match, but I know that it could end up getting way too much time and stinking out the joint, but as I said I will hold onto my hope, and say that AJ Styles will beat Orton.

Roman Reigns vs Drew Mcintyre

Now, this is an interesting one.

Both men have been really good on the mic in the build-up to this match and they seem to have gone to great lengths this past month to build him up as an absolute destroyer (not having lose to both Ziggler & Balor a couple months back might’ve helped, but oh well.) and I’m hopeful that this match will rock.

I’m having quite the pickle choosing the winner though because on the one hand, it’s Roman pissing Reigns, who’s just returned from kicking cancer’s ass and this is first big singles feud. On the other hand, Drew would be quite heavily damaged by a loss here, and a win would absolutely catapult him into stardom.

Ultimately, I think I find myself leaning on the side of Roman Reigns winning, partly because it feels like the safe bet, but also because I really think this will be a big feel-good moment to kick off the show with and get the show off to a great start, but even if it doesn’t go on first, I just can’t really see Drew winning this one.

Kurt Angle vs Baron Corbin

This is probably the match I’m looking forward to the least.

I understand the choice in opponent since, given WWE storylines since Angle’s return, it does make sense, and honestly, I’m OK with it. Would I have preferred someone better? Absolutely, Cena, Bryan, hell even someone like Elias would’ve been a better choice, but am I furious that this is what we got? No, not really.

As much as I hate to say it, Angle’s farewell tour has just proved that he really can’t go like he used to. He can still wrestle circles around a guy like Corbin of course, but I get the same feeling watching Angle wrestle now that I do when The Undertaker wrestles. I love him with all my heart as a performer, but I really just want him to stop and leave the memories alone at this point.

I also don’t think this is a bait and switch, I think Angle vs Corbin will be the match we get, it will probably only be about 10 minutes, but here’s the thing…I want Corbin to win. If we’re going down this road, let’s do it properly. I don’t consider myself to have an old-school mentally by any stretch of the imagination (hell, I’ve only been a fan since 2013), but I really do agree with the ethos that wrestlers, however legendary, should go out on their backs.

Will Corbin ever be the star WWE probably want him to? I doubt it, but lets at least give it one last try, so I’m doing it, I’m predicting that Baron Corbin will win this match, and more so than that, I think he should.

The Miz vs Shane Mcmahon
(Falls Count Anywhere)

Why is there even a conversation here, it’s the Best-Wrestler-In-The-World™ versus The Miz. I mean, come on guys.

Jokes aside, I really don’t know what to make of this match. On the one hand, I’ve been wishing Shane would be a heel for ages and so far face Miz has been on fire, but I’m not sure it’s going to make for all too compelling a match.

Miz is definitely a top-level wrestler now, that much is true, but I’m not sure he’s a guy like AJ Styles that can carry Shane to a 4-star match. Hopefully the Falls Count Anywhere stipulation will do something to remedy this, making the match more about brutality than technicality, but I’m still worried that this could be quite the slog, especially if it’s placed late on the card.

I have been umming and erring a little bit about who I think will win here, but when I picture it in my head, I just can’t reasonably see Shane standing tall, it doesn’t make any sense to me at all and it would kill The Miz’s face turn dead immediately and then you risk him sinking back into the territory he was in throughout late 2013/early 2014 where no-one cared about him in the slightest, so I say The Miz has to win this one.

Triple H vs Batista
(No Holds Barred)

Wow, the Ruthless Aggression Era just doesn’t ever want to end doesn’t it?

This is another match that I think is an interesting one to break down because there are two conflicting ideas going on here. On the one hand, Batista is a big Hollywood star now, and if there’s one thing WWE love it’s pushing their multi-media stars for the whole world to see (just look at who’s in the main event this year).

Then you look at Triple H’s Wrestlemania record since Mania 29 and it shows quite the obvious trend. Triple H loses to all the young guys (Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins & Ronda Rousey), but beats the older ones (Brock Lesnar & Sting) so logic would dictate Triple H beats Batista here right? Not only that but this storyline kicked off with Batista attempting to murder Ric Flair, so Triple H is the big babyface defending one of his friend’s honour, so that should make it a lock.

So I was going back and forth on this one for a while until they went and added the stipulation that if Triple H loses, he must retire. Admittedly, Triple H does only wrestle one or two matches a year, and if he’s going to be running the company in the coming years he may want to stop wrestling, but I highly doubt it would happen with this little build and hype behind it.

Until that stipulation was added I was seriously considering picking Batista, but now I’d be an idiot to not say that Triple H is going to win.

Daniel Bryan(c) vs Kofi Kingston
(WWE Championship)

Interestingly, I think a lot of people’s opinions on the show will hinge on this match.

Much like last year, where AJ vs Nakamura disappointed most, one match seemed to cause everyone to have an overall negative opinion of the show. I know Brock vs Reigns helped too, but I think if the WWE title match had been amazing, then people wouldn’t have been anywhere near as harsh on it as they were, and this match is in the exact same position this year.

This match has all the potential in the world to be amazing, it’s between two of the best pure wrestlers in the company, and the story is arguably the most well written on the entire card (something AJ vs Nakamura didn’t have last year). If this match gets about 20 minutes and the two are allowed to go with minimal shenanigans, this could be the match of the night, even if Daniel Bryan ends up retaining.

Which brings me to who I think is going to win, I’ll get into the debate over whether all three faces can get their big wins towards the end of the article, but this is the match which I currently feel the most confident in the result of. There is still this niggling little doubt in my mind, but I believe that we’re going to get a big moment here and Kofi Kingston will pick up his first ever world championship in WWE. I don’t think the reign will be all that long, but I don’t think that matters because his Wrestlemania victory will secure his legacy for the rest of his life.

Brock Lesnar(c) vs Seth Rollins
(Universal Championship)

Boy, this one is more difficult than it should be.

Every semblance of wrestling logic I’ve ever learnt is screaming that Seth Rollins finally slays the beast and goes on to have a long reign with the Universal Championship. He was the best wrestler in the WWE throughout 2018, he had his big climactic Royal Rumble win in January, and Lesnar only has the belt again because of Roman’s illness.

The flip side of the coin is pretty much the sentence “but Brock Lesnar”, which is a surprisingly hard argument to counter. Last year we were all 100% without a shadow of a doubt certain Roman Reigns would beat Lesnar for the title, and look what happened then. If there’s anyone who will inexplicably win when it makes absolutely no sense for them to, it’s Brock Lesnar.

All that said, I really am getting the feeling now that the “Brock as the champion who doesn’t exist” era is ending, given that WWE tried to end it at Summerslam last year. So I’m going with what I desperately want to happen, and saying Seth Rollins will win this match.

Ronda Rousey(c) vs Charlotte Flair(c) vs Becky Lynch
(Raw Women’s Championship & Smackdown Women’s Championship)

What a wild ride this has been.

This storyline as a whole has certainly had it’s ups and downs as we’ve followed it since Summerslam last year, and if I were to traipse through all of it, it would take all day, so let’s review the highlights.

– Becky’s heel turn turned out to be the best thing she’s ever done in her career.
– Her feud with Rousey on Twitter turned out to be the new best thing she’s ever done in her career.
– Then Becky won the Royal Rumble, which once again turned out to be the best thing she’s ever done in her career.
– Following that, things got a bit convoluted with suspensions, Charlotte, and the Smackdown Women’s Championship getting involved.
– Finally, The go-home Raw had the most over the top, yet brilliant, segment of the whole feud.

I know some people thought it was hokey and crap, but I thought it was a great way to cap things off before Mania, since it took all these complicated plot strands that have been going on since the Royal Rumble and boiled it down to three women who just hate each other so much and desperately want to win the biggest match of any of their lives.

I don’t think there’s any question about the quality of the match, it’s going to be awesome, and will hopefully go down as one of the greatest main events in Wrestlemania history, the real question is who’s going to win.

Up until Charlotte won the Smackdown Women’s title, I was the least confident about this one, I could quite easily see Ronda Rousey walking out of this one with both the belts. However, once Charlotte got herself a title, things changed in my mind, because now it feels like Becky Lynch has to win.

I know, I’ve picked all three faces to get their big win, and the prevailing opinion is that only 2 out of 3 will, but I’m not so sure. This is going to be such a long show that if it’s structured right, then you can avoid the crowd running out of energy and give all three faces their time in the sun. I’m not entirely confident that it will happen, and in all honesty, I’m expecting at least one of them to lose, but I just can’t put my finger on which one. If you pushed me for an answer I think I’d say Seth is most likely to lose, but I still think it’s at least a 50/50 chance.

All I know for certain is, it’s made things very exciting indeed.

So there you have it, those were my official predictions for every match that is announced to be taking place on Sunday (as of time of posting). If you enjoyed then sharing it on social media would be a big help, and make sure you come back early next week for my reviews, of both NXT Takeover and Wrestlemania. I will also be live tweeting both shows @10ryawoo on Twitter if you want thoughts as they happen!

I’ll be seeing you very soon.

NXT Takeover: New York Predictions

Wrestlemania weekend is quite the beast nowadays, with this year’s Wrestlemania looking to be the longest WWE show of all time, it’s in danger of wearing out its audience before the show’s even begun. However, the night before Mania we get to not worry about that for a few hours and watch what is arguably one of the most stacked cards in NXT history.

You don’t need me to tell you how geat Takeovers always are, but this one has a lot of intrigue to it thanks to a lot of storylines moving in directions I don’t think any of us were expecting. In part thanks to Ciampa’s injury and also thanks to sudden call ups.

So, we’ve got five matches which all look like they’re going to be amazing, so let’s get to predicting them.

War Raiders(c) vs Aleister Black & Ricochet
(NXT Tag Team Championships)

This match is arguably the easiest to pick on the whole card, purely because of what else is going on over on the main roster right now.

With Black & Ricochet having pretty much already left for main roster, this is quite clearly designed to be their farewell match. That said, this should be far from a phoned-in performance. We’ve seen all over the place for the past couple of months that these two seem to work really well as a team, granted they don’t quite gel like you’d expect a team to, but their offensive styles seem to complement each other quite well in the ring.

Meanwhile, War Raiders have always been great, and I imagine Black & Ricochet will give them a run for their money, but ultimately War Raiders will win, and Black & Ricochet will ride off into the NXT sunset together.

Velveteen Dream(c) vs Matt Riddle
(North American Championship)

The North American Championship seems like quite a weird one now I’m thinking about it because I don’t think we’re ever really going to get that long a reign with someone holding it.

While NXT veterans like Dream and Gargano have held it recently, for the most part it seems like it’s going to be used for people who are hot new stars on the scene, but aren’t ready to be thrown up into the NXT title scene just yet, which is exactly where Matt Riddle currently stands.

I like both of these guys, and I think Dream is going to have a field day when it comes to taunting, mocking and imitating Matt Riddle, but I’m not entirely sure if these two guys styles will mesh properly. They seem like two very different wrestlers to me, but I have faith that this one will at least be a fun match to watch.

As much as I’d love Velveteen Dream to hold onto this title for ages (mostly so he doesn’t have to go to main roster), it would be a bad idea for Matt Riddle to lose here, so I’ve got to go with him to pick up the title.

Pete Dunne(c) vs WALTER
(United Kingdom Championship)

I don’t often feel very patriotic, but when I look at these two…just wow.

Pete Dunne has been the lone constant in the WWE for the past couple of years, with almost 700 days as UK Champion, putting on amazing title defence after amazing title defence, it’s going to be very difficult to see with without a title over his shoulder anymore. I hope he eventually makes it to main roster and isn’t stuck in NXT UK forever, but for now, I’m going to enjoy it.

As much as I love Pete Dunne and wish he could remain UK Champion forever, Walter has to win here. NXT UK can’t really move forward in its current state, and I feel a new champion who doesn’t reign seemingly forever would be a good idea to help that along. Granted, I doubt Walter will lose the title very quickly once he has it, but having Pete Dunne at the top for so long hasn’t really done the UK scene many favours, even if he is amazing.

Shayna Baszler(c) vs Kairi Sane vs Io Shirai vs Bianca Belair
(NXT Women’s Championship)

Turns out this one is a really hard pick.

Generally, in a multi-person match for a title like this one, it’s generally a safe bet to say that the champion will retain because them losing the title in a multi-man would be a bit underwhelming.

That said, I can’t help but feel like it’s Baszler’s time to drop the title and move on from NXT before the summer. It’s inevitable that Duke & Shafir will get involved, although I imagine they’ll be easily repelled, but if I say that Baszler is going to drop the title, who to?

Kairi Sane seems like the easy choice, but we’ve already seen Sane & Baszler fight a lot and I don’t really feel like Sane needs the title right now. Bianca Belair could work, but I don’t think Belair could reasonably get away with beating Baszler in a one on one rematch, and she certainly can’t out heel Shayna Baszler to win. So what about Io Shirai? Well, there really is no tangible reason for her not to win the belt here, just for some reason I’m not feeling like it’s going to happen. I know she’s been around for a while now, and her winning the belt opens up opportunities for great matches, but it just feels like it’s too soon for me, and I can’t quite put my finger on why.

I’m going to take a risk and say Shayna Baszler is going to retain, hopefully, to lose the belt to Io Shirai in a one on one match at the next Takeover.

Johnny Gargano vs Adam Cole
(NXT Championship)
(2 out of 3 Falls)

Match of the year, right here.

I don’t think there’s any debate over whether or not this match will be good, Gargano doesn’t even know what a bad match is and Cole has shown time and time again that he can hang with the best. The real debate here is who’s going to win.

I think my head might be messing with me a bit because I desperately want Adam Cole to win, and it seems obvious that Gargano will win since Cole wasn’t even supposed to be in the match, but I like to think NXT storylines are more complex than that. Sure, logic dictates Gargano wins, but the NXT writers could quite easily change the storyline on the fly.

You also have to consider that it seemed Gargano was originally planned to be joining Ricochet & Black on main roster until Ciampa got injured, so maybe that will happen anyway past Wrestlemania? However, The Undisputed Era has done pretty much everything there is to do in NXT, and they feel like they’re about to leave as well, and while I’d love to see it, I’d argue Cole doesn’t really need to win the NXT title to be seen as a big deal on main roster.

While I would be entirely happy if Cole won, I think Johnny Gargano will finally win the big one here, probably losing the first fall thanks to the Undisputed Era before overcoming the odds to win the gold.

As always thank you very much for taking the time to read, if you enjoyed then please share it around on social media and make sure to follow me on Twitter @10ryawoo for plenty of thoughts about what’s going on throughout Mania weekend. Tomorrow will be my predictions for Wrestlemania, and then in the days after I will have my review of both Takeover and Mania, so stay tuned!

Pokemon Sword & Shield: Predictions & Wishlist

So, the cat is officially out of the bag, and the next entries in the main series Pokemon franchise have been revealed. Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield will launch in the latter quarter of 2019 and are officially the first games in the 8th generation of Pokemon.

With it, we had some key reveals, such as the brand new Galar Region, which is essentially mainland Britain (sans Wales) flipped upside down, with various style of cute English towns. We also were introduced to the brand new starter Pokemon: Grookey, Scorbunny and Sobble.

So the information we have right now is very exciting, but also quite basic, which means it’s open to wild speculation, which is always one of the most exciting times for the Pokemon community. As those of you who read my wrestling articles will know, I love to make grand predictions for what to come, only to point and laugh at just how wrong I was when I look back on them.

With that in mind, I’ve come up with a whole bunch of predictions/wishes that I have for the new Pokemon games. They’re all over the spectrum, covering large aspects of the game and some smaller ones that only I will care about, in addition, some of these are things I actually think will happen, and others are just things I want.

So let’s not waste any more time get right into it.

Prediction: Starter Pokemon Evolutions & Types

So let’s look at the obvious first, what will these adorable new starter Pokemon transform into as you take them on your journey?

Let’s start with the one I’m most confident about: Sobble.

In the trailer, it showed Sobble camouflaged as it peaks its head out of the water. Combining that fact with the look of its tail and out it walks, I think it’s roughly based off of a Chameleon, with the head of something like an Axolotl. I think its evolutions will keep going down this route, keeping the lizard vibe, with the final evolution resembling something similar to a Komodo Dragon, with a chameleon’s tail.

As such, a Water/Poison type seems to make the most sense to me, you could perhaps even give it’s later evolutions fangs so it can learn a lot of the biting moves.

Moving onto Scorbunny, I’m not too sure about this one, but I have a lot of cool ideas.

It’s a little harder to tell where Scorbunny’s going to go, the most obvious one seems like it would take the form of a Fire/Fighting route, but I doubt that’s what we’ll actually get. The Pokemon Company are self-aware enough to not go down that route again though since many fans would be at best, disappointed and at worst, angry about it. So looking at some alternatives, the two that I keep going back and forth between are Fire/Electric or Fire/Fairy.

Electric is a bit of a stretch, but I can see it’s fur getting a bit more jagged and the small amount of yellow on its ear becoming more prominent. I could also see it going the exact opposite way, and its fur gets light and fluffier, as some of the red fades into pink and we get an adorable Fire/Fairy type instead.

I also have a couple more slightly out there theories, for example, perhaps it’s wings could grow out to be massive and it uses them as propellers to become Fire/Flying? Or what if it’s white fur is actually meant to be more snowy, as it’s flame starts to burn cold and we get a Fire/Ice type instead?

There’s a huge number of ways I can see this one going and as long as it’s not Fire/Fighting, I think it’ll be really cool.

Finally, we have Grookey, and I can really only see this one going one way.

The trailer here showed us Grookey hitting a rock with a stick in order scare off Sobble, which makes me thinks that when it evolves, it will start to use sticks or logs as weapons, similar to Delphox’s wand or Gurdr’s Gurder. This would naturally end up with it being a Grass/Fighting type.

Dependant on the design, I’d be happy with this, although it would be fairly similar to other fighting monkeys in the past like Infernape and Passimian, and we did get a Grass/Fighting type just two generations ago with Chespin, although that’s never stopped them before. You could also theorise that we would have a Grass/Rock type coming, which I’d be down for, as it grows to be fast and uses small rocks as weapons perhaps.

Wishlist: Doctor Who reference

This is one that’s almost definitely not going to happen, but I’d be so damn happy if it did. Just imagine it, you’re wandering around the back alleys in the big London-esque town when you come across a mysterious blue box, and when you interact with it, it says something like “You can hear noises coming from inside…”

It doesn’t actually have to do anything, (although giving Looker some sort of interaction with it would be amazing) I just think it would be a really cool Easter egg for Whovians such as myself.

Why stop there? You could potentially have references to loads of UK based elements of pop-culture, like a castle reminiscent of Hogwarts, or a house labelled “221B” where Looker lives, just something small like that to make us British Pokemon fans squeal with excitement.

Prediction: The cover legendaries will be based on the UK coat of arms

This one is a little bit of leap admittedly since Game Freak seldom themes the legendaries based on the region that it draws its inspiration from, but I like this idea.

As you can see pictured above the UK coat of arms features a shield in the middle, with a Lion (England’s national animal) on one side, and a Unicorn (Scotland’s national animal) on the other, so what better to base you cover legendaries off of?

The Lion is admittedly a bit problematic since we had Solgaleo in generation 7 which was also based off of a Lion, but we had two sets of Dragons in a row from gens 4 to 5, so it’s not like they haven’t done something similar before. In addition to this, if you were a bit creative with the typing and made it something like Electric/Poison, you’d be able to create something pretty unique looking so it wouldn’t be too much of a worry.

As for the Unicorn, I like the idea of upgrading it isn’t a Pegasus, to give it a secondary type of flying, however, I’m a little stumped for the primary type. Fairy seems like the obvious choice, but I’m looking for something a little bit more creative like that. The next one I jumped to was Water since we haven’t had a Water-type cover legendary in quite a while and you could quite easily explain it in law why it’s a water type (Maybe it’s responsible for it raining in the UK 99% of the time?).

That would create the issue that one of the legendaries is 4x effective against the other, which could be an issue, so maybe Fairy/Flying is the more likely type, I think Water/Flying would be cooler.

Wishlist: Gyms based on various English landmarks

Since we now know that Gyms are coming back (and at least one is going to be based on a football stadium), why not throw in other English landmarks to theme your gyms around.

The London Eye would be a great place to have a gym, with teleport pads going between each of the cabins until you fight the gym leader in the very top pod. It’ll probably have to be a normal type gym for it to make sense, but what a setting for a gym battle.

You want a steel type gym? Easy, just look to the abandoned steel mills in places like Sheffield, you could quite easily create a multilayered building where you’re walking over the metal walkways in a maze in order to reach the gym leader.

The one that I desperately want to see the most though, is one based on the London Underground. I don’t really know what type it would be (perhaps ground?), but I love the idea of a gym puzzle where you have to navigate a train network like the London Underground. Imagine Elesa’s Gym from Black and White but bigger. Making people read a simplified version of the tube map and navigate their way to the gym leader, battling trainers on the platforms, or maybe even on the trains would be a really fun time, and I hope we get something like it.

Prediction: The evil team will be based on cockney Victorian gangsters

Not really sure how likely this one is since there’s a whole bunch of things that the evil team could be based on, but I like this idea the best.

The evil team grunts are often presented to be bumbling idiots the whole time, and imagine how much funnier that will be if everyone involved has cockney accents while looking like they’re supposed to be somewhat high class. I’m imagining a design fairly similar to that of The Rooks in Assassin’s Creed Syndicate or the Peaky Blinders,  with flat caps and thick jackets who just go around roughing people up and causing trouble for the local Bobbys.

The admins and leaders could then be based on notable British criminals (real & fictional) with visual designs reminiscent of Moriarty, The Kray Twins or Jack the Ripper (without the chainsaw) being personal favourites of mine. As for what their goal would be, revolution seems like the easiest one. If we make the Elite Four themed like a monarchy then the evil team’s goal could ultimately be to overthrow them using the powers of the legendary Pokemon and establish their own government.

So there you have it! There are my predictions and wishes for Pokemon Sword and Shield. Let me know what you thought, and give me your own suggestions @10ryawoo on Twitter since like I said, this is always a very exciting time to be a Pokemon fan. I’ll see you next time.