ALL I'm saying is that there's time to change the name of the WWE Universal Championship. No one's been named champion yet, we're still weeks away from SummerSlam, and no one will mind the awkward backtracking. Because it's a ridiculous name. It just is. Reasons being...
- It's blatantly sounds like a child trying to one-up his friend. Yours is the world belt? Well, mine is the whole UNIVERSE!
- It sounds like someone's grossly smooching up to NBCUniversal, who own the USA Network.
- It's supposedly named after the WWE Universe - which is a term plenty of us still reject openly. Plus, if it represents them, then it feels more like a fan-favorite Kids' Choice-type award than an actual title.
- Steph creating it makes it, more or less, a heel move. So that plus "bad name" makes it all go down worse.
Why not "Global?" It's on par with worldly matters. That's a okay name, right? Or even something like "Ultimate" or "Supreme." Yeah, I know that makes it sound like a toppings-heavy pizza, but at least it's not shooting us out of the stratosphere and into the cosmos.
Anyhow, bad name for the new world belt. Just bad. BUT, RAW was freaking amazing. What a showing for both Finn Balor and Sasha Banks! I have to say, I was worried for Finn when his debut came right at the top of the show and he just stepped out in front of all the wrestlers to be named as part of the contendership process. There was so little fanfare. But then after his initial win - that stomp on Rusev - he was made whole.
Finn then headed into the main event to face Roman, leading everyone to assume Roman would win. I, strangely enough, was not so pessimistic. I thought Finn had a good chance of toppling Roman. No, I didn't fully predict such a clean and perfect win, but I thought Roman would stumble here. Plus, I didn't think they'd debut Finn just to have him lose.
Roman's new spot, as far as I can see, is to be a top guy who's no longer "The Guy." No, that's been taken from him. The mega-push, for all intents and purposes, is gone. Whether it's gone for good, I can't say, but he shot himself in the foot and now he's gotta limp for a while. He took the fall at Battleground - which was awesome in its own right since Dean got a bit of payback for having to lose to Roman a few times - and then he lost flat on his back to Finn. Yeah, we're definitely seeing a humbled "Guy."
Side note: It's still weird to be writing the Wrap Up on Wednesdays. Especially after a Sunday PPV, which now sees very far away. I guess I'll briefly mention Battleground here. I LOVED a lot of it. Owens vs. Zayn was tremendous. I also though the two main events were really strong. It was a solid show filled with some fun, unexpected moments. Though I'm still haunted by this particular JBL call...
Cole: "What is up with these two?"
JBL: "ARE YOU KIDDING ME, MAGGLE? IT’S EYES WIDE SHUT! IT'S WHAT THEY ALL DO IN HOLLYWOOD! IT’S STANLEY KUBRICK’S CLASSIC!"
Yes, JBL decided it was time to share with the audience that all of Hollywood attends giant secret society orgies. Orgies so graphic that CGI onlookers need to be created in order to block penetration shots. And while I'll defend certain parts of Eyes Wide Shut, and know that there are moderate fans of the film out there, it's in no way considered one of Kubrick's classics.
Of course, Cole's perfect Cole response was to point out that the film was - jeez! - ten years old at this point. It's actually more than that, but don't tell Cole or his brain will ooze through his ears.
Also from Battleground... IT'S BAYLEY!
This is one of those cases where we all knew it'd be Bayley so there wasn't really a huge surprise but we didn't care "Because Bayley." We all wanted it to be Bayley and then Bayley happened. So all was right in the Bayley-verse.
Of course, this didn't really signal her official call-up. This was more like a one-off. She's still NXT by all accounts, including her TakeOver match coming up, and she hasn't been drafted or anything, so this was like a special little three-of-the-four Horsewomen reunion match.
Now, what would this mean for Sasha? She got Charlotte to tap at the PPV, but then she also has to face her at SummerSlam. Which means Sasha has to lose at some point, or get the crap kicked out of her. Something to "opposite momentum" everything. Fine. It was to be a singles match on RAW for the title. Sasha vs. Charlotte. Sasha will come close but fail, right? Dana will interfere and get Charlotte DQ'd or make Sasha lose or whatever. But wait... Dana ejected from ringside? Due to a nifty "Eddie Guerrero" trick? Does this mean Sasha would lose clean?
NOPE. SHE'D WIN IT ALL.
So RAW was pretty powerful. And yes, I get that Smackdown is only two hours, but - man - it has a ton of obstacles to overcome. It's still the B (minus) show. RAW's roster is bigger, sure, but RAW also has more stakes. They now have a world belt AND they have Women's, Tag, and the U.S. title. Soon they'll have a Cruiser belt. They could actually afford to give us a giant title change on the show. Smackdown can't do any of that, despite having the WWE title.
By the way, is it the WWE Championship or are we back to calling it the WWE World Heavyweight Championship? I figure it was the word "world" in there that made RAW go all "universal."
Continue on to read about Smackdown...
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