Yes, it's the first ever Wednesday Wrestling Wrap Up -- the QuaDubya, if you weee-yill -- all courtesy of the SmackDown's big shift to Tuesday and the hot and fresh straight outta the oven WWE Draft. So, until further notice, the Wrap is officially a mid-week thing, to be written post-SmackDown, but before NXT and Lucha Underground (which wraps up its season this week anyhow).
Even without the WWE Draft it was a busy, bustling week. Battleground is this Sunday, so there was a ton of prep and hype for that. Sin Cara and Simon Gotch reportedly got into some backstage scuffle in catering, Matt Hardy named his precious dilapidated boat Skarsgard as Moose debuted in TNA, and WWE aired the first episode of its Cruiserweight Classic. Oh, and Sexy Star became Lucha Underground's first ever female singles champion after she won the Gift of the Gods belt at Ultima Lucha Dos night... dos.
Oh, and Brock Lesnar failed the two drugs tests he took prior to his fight at UFC 200. Now, do I care about this? Not really as the octogonical sport of kickpunching doesn't interest me very much, but I got a ton of funfans asking me on twitter if this meant that Brock would be suspended in WWE. Granted that a 30-day suspension in WWE wouldn't knock him out of his SummerSlam match with Orton, nor would it even keep him off TV since his not currently on TV. Anyhow, even with my limited knowledge about actual competitive sports and/or the specifics of drug testing policies, I couldn't figure why WWE would punish Brock for a drug test they themselves didn't administer.
WWE is basically self-regulating when it comes to their Wellness Policy. There's no real statute that says they have to so then they're not beholden to any test that Brock takes during activities done outside WWE, right? Plus, how responsible are they for him when he's not being booked by them? As in, when he's off for months at a time, he's his own free man it would figure. Then it all essentially boils down to wrestling not being competitive athletics and WWE has their huge out. They don't have to worry about Brock until they need to worry about Brock, and not a second more. Also, there are like appeals and lengthy legal processes involved now and those are guaranteed to devour everyone's terrifyingly short attention spans like a pack of all-cherry Starbust. I'm already bored. Look how long this paragraph is. This cannot stand.
Of course, I could be monstrously wrong about all of this since it isn't my field of expertise so feel free to correct me in the comments I never read. I did get a laugh out of WWE's official statement about the whole thing though, which was more of a statement of fact than anything offering up an opinion or resolution.
"Brock Lesnar has not performed for WWE since WrestleMania and is not scheduled to return until Sunday, August 21."
There, see. They could have just sent a picture of someone shrugging their shoulders at someone rolling their eyes. With an owl in the middle smoking a cigarette and giving the finger.
Speaking of Brock, here's our nice segue into the Draft.
Orton and Lesnar are now on different shows. Sure, SummerSlam itself is a both-brand PPV, but the separating of them sort of indicates that Brock probably won't be on TV until that fateful Sunday. Not if they want to keep the brand split strong. Because Heyman can just come in and yell at Randy for weeks and weeks on end and sell the match on his own. And, of course, take an RKO as is customary in such occasions.
So. That Draft. What'd ya think? It still seemed to strongly favor RAW, didn't it?
I thought this was supposed to be SmackDown's big breakaway moment, but it still feels like the turkey rueben of the two. Big picture: The Seth/Roman feud will continue on RAW while Cena and Styles got moved to SD, which is exactly what the rumors stated weeks ago. The bigger surprise was the Club staying on RAW, but now that Finn's been called up to RAW, everyone's naturally buzzing about him resuming his role as leader, which is something that he himself has been teasing for about six months.
Of course, because Finn's such a sweet boy (with a lurching demon inside of him), he called his parents after getting the news...
Here's the full Draft list or ya...
RAW
Seth Rollins
WWE Women's Champion Charlotte
Finn Balor
Roman Reigns
Brock Lesnar
WWE Tag Team Champions The New Day
Sami Zayn
Sasha Banks
Chris Jericho
United States Champion Rusev (with Lana)
Kevin Owens
Enzo and Cass
Gallows and Anderson
Big Show
Neville
Cesaro
Sheamus
Golden Truth
Titus O'Neil
Paige
Darren Young (with Bob Backlund)
Sin Cara
Nia Jax
Jack Swagger
The Dudley Boyz
Summer Rae
Mark Henry
Braun Strowman
Bo Dallas
Shining Stars
Alicia Fox
Dana Brooke
Curtis Axel
SMACKDOWN
WWE Champion Dean Ambrose
AJ Styles
John Cena
Randy Orton
Bray Wyatt
Becky Lynch
Intercontinental Champion The Miz (with Maryse)
Baron Corbin
American Alpha
Dolph Ziggler
Natalya
Alberto Del Rio
The Usos
Demon Kane
Kalisto
Naomi
The Ascension
Zack Ryder
Apollo Crews
Alexa Bliss
Breezango
Eva Marie
The Vaudevillains
Erick Rowan
Mojo Rawley
Carmella
Maybe the biggest story though is this...
♫"He’s a none-brand baaaaannnnd..."
Let's pick at this a bit, like when someone says "Want some of my fries?" U.S. title stays on RAW where Rusev can feud with... Cesaro? Young? Swagger? Neville? IC belt goes to SmackDown where Miz can fend off... Ryder? Crews? Kalisto? Of course, if both Ryder and Young win on Sunday the belts will switch shows.
Now, RAW has the Women's title AND the tag belts, with Sasha being the only babyface right now for all the ladies there (unless Nia Jax comes up as a face) and New Day probably set to face the Club along with Enzo & Cass. Because aside from those two teams, there's no one to take them on, tag-wise. It's the Dudleys, Golden Truth and Shining Stars. The rest of the tag teams, plus NXT's American Alpha, are on SmackDown.
So then what's it like to be a woman wrestler or a tag team on SmackDown - the show with no titles for them? I guess they can get a title shot at a dual-brand PPV, but how would they even earn it? I guess, because they've done this before, they can eventually create SmackDown tag titles, but I doubt they'll make another women's title. So poor Becky's getting bridesmaid-ed to the extreme.
Oh, and remember that New Day is currently beating the title reign streak for the "WWE Tag Team Champion" lineage that began in '02 with Angle and Benoit. They have a ways to go before they break Demolition's 478-day reign as part of the old school "World Tag Team Champion" list.
Continue on for more WWE Draftiness...
Continues
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