With the 2016 WWE Draft having taken place this past week, the rosters for Raw and SmackDown are going to need to depend on every wrestler to step up their game—particularly if any injuries plague WWE like in 2015, thinning out what is already a small number of people to split in half.
What’s interesting, though, is that the first event post-draft is currently missing a good number of key players who will be entrusted to take the reigns on their respective brands either in the midcard, upper midcard or, in some cases, the main event level.
Battleground is not normally the most important event of the year, but this time, it’s significant to be left off the card, as it leaves a bad first impression that you’re not important enough to be focused on, and therefore aren’t that hot of a commodity for your brand.
Let’s take a look at some of the wrestlers who aren’t currently advertised to appear in some fashion and who will be taking that hit to their credibility ranks.
Alberto Del Rio and Sheamus
Anyone who has followed my exploits with Smark Out Moment, the Smack Talk podcast and so on knows how hard it can be at times for me to cast praise upon Del Rio and Sheamus, as I find the two of them to be dramatically overrated by a good portion of the brass responsible for telling us how supposedly fantastic they are. That year that those two feuded incessantly, month after month, felt like an eternity.
With that being said, these are still two of the biggest guys on the roster! Hell, when the brand extension takes full effect and everything gets watered down again, they’ll go back up to the main event status they were at before and will be undoubtedly pushed to the moon as somewhat top heels on their shows. So why are they not competing at Battleground in any way, shape, or form?
Sheamus had something going with Apollo Crews, which was mishandled to an extent. Del Rio can rub anybody the wrong way and get into a feud with them just with one backstage segment. Something could have even come about from the Team America match, maybe with Del Rio picking a fight with Big Show and Sheamus more forcibly inserting himself as a third wheel into the Rusev and Zack Ryder feud.
It just seems odd that these two have had almost nothing to do for a good amount of this year with just a handful of bullet points along the way, and if I’m going to believe that they will be the #3 or #4 main guys on Raw and SmackDown at some point possibly, I’m going to need a reason to feel that way.
Titus O’Neil
Hey guys, remember when Titus O’Neil was a thing? Rather, remember when WWE wanted you to think he was a thing? Yeah, that time has passed.
If O’Neil is going to be pushed in any capacity going forward, losing to Rusev multiple times and then being tossed aside unceremoniously like this is not giving off the impression that he’s valuable at all, and the uphill battle to getting him to the point where he can be taken seriously will just become an even steeper climb.
Cesaro
It would be a rather big disappointment if WWE devotes a chunk of time for a Highlight Reel segment with Randy Orton to hype a match with Brock Lesnar that may not even happen, all the while a guy like Cesaro sits on the sidelines with nothing to do. The Swiss Superman is in a better situation than 90% of the company to make a lot of improvements to his record when the brand split happens, as he could easily be a main event talent with less competition getting in the way. As mentioned already in this post as well as later on, you can’t give off that impression of being important if you aren’t even viewed by WWE as someone that is worth figuring out how to get on the card.
When you factor in how pissed Cesaro seemed during the draft, perhaps he’s upset someone or he’s been told something similar to what Cody Rhodes went through, in that the company just does not plan on giving him that chance. This would be extremely disheartening and Cesaro’s lack of involvement at Battleground may be more than just an oversight.
Apollo Crews and Baron Corbin
What is going on with these two!?!! I’m grouping them together here because they’re in the exact same position, where they’ve been on the main rosters for months now and accomplished damn near nothing. It isn’t even a consistency to see them appear within a week, let alone consecutive shows. God forbid two young, talented guys who get called up from NXT arguably a little sooner than they should have been are able to work a program for more than a few random sporadic smatterings now and again. They haven’t been given much to sink their teeth into, and that’s why the audience isn’t connecting with them as much as they should by now. Battleground could have been a good opportunity for them to make some statements about how they’re part of this New Era and will be taking over. Instead, they’re going to be hanging out backstage, if anything.
Dolph Ziggler
I would imagine that Dolph Ziggler will be at least an upper midcarder on SmackDown, if not a surrogate main event player. He’s a former world champion and someone who has consistently put on great matches with a wide variety of superstars, all the while maintaining a baseline level of popularity that has its occasional spikes. Why wouldn’t WWE want to put some focus on him at this time to show off The Showoff? It seems as though he goes through these periods of the company liking him and then forgetting he exists, which is a shame, as it halts any momentum he gains over the course of weeks and months before forcing him to start all over again.
Do you think these stars should be included in the Battleground event in some capacity? How would you book them on the card? Tell us your thoughts in the comments below!
