For all intents and purposes, SummerSlam is WWE’s second-biggest show of the year, which means there’s no time to wait before we start speculating on what matches may appear on the card.
Unlike a standard event’s lineup, SummerSlam is one of the Big Four co-branded shows where both Raw’s and SmackDown’s rosters will share screen time. Unfortunately, every time a crossover event is looming, there is always a gap of several weeks between both brands’ precursor events and whichever one goes first gets the jump on building matches as soon as possible.
Since Great Balls of Fire is in the past, Raw is going to be focused on slowly rolling out the list of matches the red brand will be represented with at SummerSlam while SmackDown is still focused on Battleground. By the time Battleground is done, Raw will have already set in stone half the SummerSlam card, killing much of the ability for us to test our predictive skills.
However, we can still look at the current feuds happening on Monday Night Raw, analyze the fallout from Great Balls of Fire and try to determine which potential directions the Raw roster will go for SummerSlam, even without factoring SmackDown in the mix.
With that in mind, let’s try to give our extended projections for which matches we think will be on the card as far as the Raw roster is concerned. Make sure you leave your comments below with your predictions!
Universal Championship: Brock Lesnar (c) vs. Roman Reigns vs. Braun Strowman vs. Samoa Joe
This started off as Roman Reigns definitively getting the winner of Lesnar/Joe from Great Balls of Fire, but all that has changed. Now, the story we’re being told is that either he or Samoa Joe will face Brock Lesnar for the title, depending on who wins their No. 1 contender’s match.
I’m not buying it.
I thought Braun Strowman was going to be written off television for SummerSlam following the Ambulance Match, which would have left Reigns open for his match against Lesnar and Joe looking for a new opponent. Since nobody was set up to feud with Joe afterward, this is looking to me like we’re getting a Fatal 4-Way where Strowman will interrupt the match next week between Joe and Reigns, causing the result to be thrown out the window.
Why WWE is doing this, I’m not sure, but I just hope against hope that one of the three challengers walks away with the Universal Championship instead of Brock Lesnar. Whoever wins can have a rematch down the line at No Mercy or even Survivor Series, but I do not under any circumstances want this to be a stalling tactic where Lesnar retains and Reigns should’ve won, leading to the two of them fighting at WrestleMania 34…which is probably going to happen, so come the Road to WrestleMania 2018, look forward to hearing me have zero interest in the main event.
Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins vs. The Miz and Bray Wyatt
This isn’t meant to be taken as that being a tag team match between the two sides. Rather, it’s just to signify what the feud has in store. We will probably see a tag team match on Raw leading up to SummerSlam with those two sides being drawn as Ambrose and Rollins have to put aside their differences to fight their adversaries.
Since we’ve seen Ambrose and The Miz go at it so many times, I’m hoping they switch dance partners, essentially. While I don’t have any need to see Ambrose vs. Wyatt ever again, I’m actually intrigued about what The Miz and Seth Rollins can do together in an Intercontinental Championship match.
To be perfectly honest, a feud between Ambrose and Wyatt doesn’t seem like it should even make the card for SummerSlam once we factor in some of the other, more important things going on with Raw and including the SmackDown side of things, but it’s all relative. There’s a chance WWE finds themselves in a position where that match can exist on the pre-show and something else will
Cruiserweight Championship Options
This week, we saw a definitive end to the feud between Noam Dar and Cedric Alexander, which should allow the two to move on to something else. Next week seems to be the end to the feud between Mustafa Ali and Drew Gulak as well, while TJP and Rich Swann remain interlocked, as do Gentleman Jack Gallagher and Brian Kendrick.
WWE seems to put absolutely no effort into maintaining Lince Dorado and Gran Metalik, so while they’re on the brand, they might as well not be, and we all know Austin Aries is gone at this point, so what is going on with the Cruiserweight Championship?
We have so many weeks until SummerSlam that I think we’ll see Akira Tozawa act as a transitioning point for the next few, losing a rematch to Neville somewhere down the line before either rekindling a program with Ariya Daivari, or moving on to Noam Dar or Drew Gulak. Mustafa Ali, meanwhile, will pick up the slack with the other one (Dar or Daivari) and the new No. 1 contender will end up being Cedric Alexander.
Alexander has been receiving too much attention as of late to be ignored and the momentum he has outweighs every other person on the roster. Plus, he’s the only babyface who hasn’t had his multiple interactions with Neville yet, and after all this time, it’s perhaps the right part of the year for a title change.
That may not necessarily happen at SummerSlam, as Neville could do something to cheat to retain and drag this out a little while longer, but I do think Alexander is the one who gets the title opportunity and dethrones the king.
Raw Women’s Championship: Alexa Bliss (c) vs. Nia Jax [and Sasha Banks?]
Sasha Banks technically defeated Alexa Bliss at Great Balls of Fire, but was unsuccessful in regaining the title as it was by count out. By normal WWE rules and standards, this opens her up to a rematch of some sorts, but that can’t just be the only thing happening for SummerSlam, can it?
In my mind, that’s too bland. Plus, it seems like they’ve been building up the idea of Alexa Bliss and Nia Jax crossing paths, so that has to happen at some point unless they decide to drop it.
The only question I have is whether or not this is going to be a Triple Threat or if Jax is going to usurp Banks and push her out of title contention by the time we get to SummerSlam.
I can’t see this being a Fatal 4-Way with Bayley involved, as that would be two of the same exact match on the card for Raw’s top titles, nor can I see it being a singles match between Bliss and Banks, leaving Jax completely out of the loop.
Either we get a Triple Threat or just Bliss vs. Jax, but I think WWE is hesitant to do a heel versus heel setup and will put Banks in the mix just to give the crowd a definitive babyface to cheer for.
Enzo Amore vs. Big Cass (featuring Big Show)
I have my suspicions that this feud is going to be forgotten about from time to time, with no segment appearing on a week or two. Likewise, I expect a match between Big Show and Big Cass to be either on the pre-show or not taking place at SummerSlam whatsoever.
There’s a good chance this feud will be relegated to episodes of Monday Night Raw over the next few weeks and it will fizzle out by the end of August, before Cass is set up to feud with somebody else come No Mercy (if he’s lucky, as he might even be a lower priority at that point and have to skip that event, too).
Easily, though, this has to be Big Cass vs. Big Show, not Enzo Amore. They said all they needed to say with Enzo getting squashed at Great Balls of Fire and a rematch can just happen on Raw, not on a pay-per-view.
Goldust vs. R-Truth
WWE has made it abundantly clear that this is a TV-only feud. If they had any interest in making it noteworthy, they would have at least put it on the pre-show of Great Balls of Fire, as it had been weeks leading up to that point, but it still was missing from that card. There’s absolutely no way it will take up one of the coveted spots at SummerSlam.
Either this feud is finished with by the time August 20th comes along, or they’ll still just be fighting each other on Monday Night Raw. They won’t be promoted to a pay-per-view fight.
Raw Tag Team Championship Options
Frankly, I have no idea what’s going on here. Sheamus is supposed to be filming a movie during the time SummerSlam is going on and both he and Cesaro are currently holding the titles.
That means we have the following scenarios to consider:
A) Sheamus is free to continue appearing on WWE television. He and Cesaro defend the titles. [Against who?]
B) Sheamus is going to be M.I.A. He and Cesaro drop the titles on Raw sometime in the next few weeks, allowing another tag team to defend the belts at SummerSlam. [Who are the new champions and who do they defend against?]
C) WWE doesn’t care about the tag team situation enough to put it on the card at all. There is no tag team title match, so the belts can stay on Sheamus and Cesaro, or they can drop them and the titles still aren’t defended.
I wouldn’t be shocked at all if C was where WWE’s mindset was, but I do think it would be a mistake if we couldn’t get The Hardy Boyz as champions going up against The Revival. That, in my mind, is the money feud Raw has to offer right now.
It’s suspicious that Finn Balor has continued to have an association with The Hardy Boyz, but nothing has come about from that. Also, why would both The Revival and The Good Brothers (Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson) be feuding with The Hardy Boyz at the same time, particularly with the titles not involved at all?
I have no idea what WWE is doing with the tag team situation on Raw, which could make for some entertaining few weeks as we see the stories unfold, or it could turn out to be a chaotic mess that WWE is currently trying to figure out on their own, and have no plans to fall back on. We may look back in September and realize they clearly had no idea what they were doing and the division was such a low priority for them at the time that they didn’t care.
Finn Balor and Elias Samson
Did anybody else get a sense of finality for this thing already even though nothing else has been set in either man’s path, nor has the feud really been about anything at all?
This is some of the laziest writing WWE has done, where it’s obvious no effort is being put into it. Samson and Balor are feuding merely because they keep having matches together, not because there’s any actual story being told or there’s a personal matter that has to be resolved. They’re not fighting for championships or in a bitter blood-war…they’ve just been paired up similar to filler matches that happen during live event tours. Hey kids, Luke Harper and Aiden English are fighting at the next 20 house shows. Why? Because, that’s why!
If Big Cass vs. Big Show isn’t on the card, I can’t see any justification to putting Elias Samson vs. Finn Balor on it. I would have much rather seen Samson and Balor split off and get involved in the Ambrose/Rollins/Miz/Wyatt situation, as the idea of Balor vs. Wyatt seems much more interesting than another Ambrose feud and we didn’t get to see too much of Ambrose vs. Samson as that was just a byproduct of his feud with The Miz.
The Kurt Angle Situation
While this may not turn into a match of any kind, it’s a possibility, and it is definitely a storyline that will factor into the booking for SummerSlam in some fashion.
Rumor has it we may see Triple H vs. Kurt Angle either here, Survivor Series or at WrestleMania. For my money, I’d rather see it at SummerSlam than to have to wait 9 months from now where the storyline will feel too stretched out at that point. Then, Angle can get a match at WrestleMania against someone else—and by the WWE 2K18 promos and Angle’s interviews in the past, it would probably be Seth Rollins.
There’s a chance this becomes a situation where Angle chooses a representative and Triple H (and/or Stephanie McMahon) chooses a representative and those two men fight with them in their corners, but that doesn’t have the same impact as Angle stepping in the ring himself.
Projected Raw Matches
Universal Championship Fatal 4-Way Match: Brock Lesnar (c) vs. Roman Reigns vs. Braun Strowman vs. Samoa Joe
Raw Women’s Championship Triple Threat Match: Alexa Bliss (c) vs. Nia Jax vs. Sasha Banks
Intercontinental Championship Match: The Miz (c) vs. Seth Rollins
Cruiserweight Championship Match: Neville (c) vs. Cedric Alexander
Raw Tag Team Championship Match: ?????
What do you think the Raw side of SummerSlam’s card is going to look like? Tell us your predictions in the comments below!
