Crown Jewel: Booked Into Another Corner
How will WWE get Seth Rollins and The Fiend out of this one?
WWE is gearing up for another event in Saudi Arabia at the King Fahd International Stadium, and while the show has a bunch of star power, fans aren’t all that thrilled about the card itself. Obviously, we can see that this is all booked to appease the Saudi leaders: months of storylines can go right out the window when it comes to these shows, women aren’t allowed to compete, and some wrestlers aren’t even allowed to go due to religious reasons. With all that being said, I will look at the card and see how I can turn a glorified house show into a blockbuster PPV.
Nobody is thinking that Brock Lesnar loses the WWE Championship here; he squashed Kofi Kingston just to get the title for this match and to introduce Cain Velasquez on SmackDown’s debut on FOX. WWE has been known to pull off shocking WWE title changes (see Jinder Mahal), but here is neither the place nor time for it. WWE needs to focus on these athletes’ MMA backgrounds, building off of Lesnar’s loss to Cain in UFC. Cain shouldn’t view him as a Beast when he has literally beaten him in a real fight before. Cain is still very green and neither man needs a loss right now, but I’m no fan of a non-finish either. Therefore, Lesnar must pick up the win after Cain is distracted by something that has happened to his friend Rey Mysterio.
Speaking of screwy finishes, next up is Braun Strowman vs. Tyson Fury. I know the “Gypsy King” will get a big entrance, but WWE needs to do its own talent some favors here. Take a page out of AEW’s book Moxley vs. PAC: start the match off with Strowman attacking Fury during his glamorous entrance. This will eliminate the wrestling aspect of the match, which WWE so desperately tries to do in these matches. Let these two big men throw down until we finally get them in the ring, with Strowman likely to take the loss. Enter Drew Gulak, who has been getting destroyed by Strowman during his PowerPoint presentations. Gulak will actually be on the upcoming shows, unlike Fury, so have him put a PowerPoint up on the screen right before Braun is going to win to distract the Monster Among Men. It will give Gulak something to work with on SmackDown, he’ll get a laugh in Saudi Arabia and then become Strowman’s ragdoll for the next few weeks.
Team Hogan vs. Team Flair: this match screams that one of these captains is going to get involved. The teams are pretty straight forward – five babyfaces (Roman Reigns, Ali, Rusev, Ricochet and Shorty G) against give heels (King Corbin, Lashley, Drew McIntyre, Randy Orton and Shinsuke Nakamura). Team Flair is a bit stronger and will get the win here. They will have a bunch of spots they are going to try and cram in with all the babyfaces, especially Ali and Ricochet. The only thing I would push in this match is McIntyre being back and running through Team Hogan.
Do you remember Mansoor? After winning the 51-man battle royal at Super ShowDown, he disappeared. Well, he’s coming back! And he’s facing Cesaro, in what should actually be a good match. But to add some stakes and have people actually care, WWE should decree that the winner gets added to the battle royal for a shot at AJ Styles’ U.S. Title. Mansoor could pick up the win in both matches to challenge Styles. If we can put the WWE Championship on Jinder, we can do the same here with Mansoor. The majority of the U.S. audience doesn’t know who he is, so going over Styles would get him major heat and would set up a natural U.S. vs Saudi Arabia feud. It would be a new version of Bret Hart’s 1997 run, in which Mansoor would be praised as a hero in front of his home crowd before coming to Raw in the U.S. and being booed out of the building.
The tag team turmoil will simply showcase as much talent as possible on the show with the winners not really receiving anything that truly matters. This is where I would have added the Raw (Viking Raiders) and SmackDown Tag Team Champions (The Revival) to the Hogan/Flair match, while the winner of the turmoil match was granted a title shot. With that out of the question, Viking Raiders will run through everyone.
As for the The Fiend vs. Seth Rollins, we should have left Hell in the Cell buried and just let Bray move to SmackDown. If anyone deserves a mulligan, it’s him. Now his character is at risk again because I don’t see Rollins dropping the title here. The Fiend doesn’t need the title, anyway, but what he absolutely doesn’t need is a loss. WWE has added the stipulation that the match can’t be stopped, booking themselves into an even tighter corner than last time.
No matter what Seth does, The Fiend should continue to just keep getting back up because it’s actually not a bad idea. Having The Fiend look like a “Friday the 13th” villain is terrifying, but this time, instead of Rollins being the one dealing the final blow, we need The Fiend to finally HURT. Bray needs to allow Rollins to hang around and then like a pesky gnat finally get swatted. The Fiend needs to absolutely tear into Rollins, delivering a Mandible Claw and instead of going for the pin, then that bone chilling music plays, the lights fade and The Fiend disappears with our Universal Champion’s limp body in his arms.
I know it’s still technically a non-finish, but at least this way fans don’t see Wyatt lose or get screwed over by a ref, and you avoid putting nuclear heat on Rollins for just simply doing what Vince McMahon told him to do. WWE must avoid the start-stop push with Wyatt or the fans will stop caring about him like they did his cult leader persona. For Rollins, unless he is going back to full-time heel duties, he must avoid being set up to fail because no one is going to be cheering for him over The Fiend.
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