Welcome back to another Monday Morning Q&A where I toss out some questions to get a feel of how you guys and gals are feeling about certain topics.
So here are 5 questions I’d like to toss out for this week. I’ll give my answers, too, but the key here is that I want to know what YOU think! So make sure you chime in!
1) Karrion Kross and Scarlett have returned to WWE SmackDown, following Dakota Kai from SummerSlam. Who do you think will be the next Superstar to come back to WWE?
Obviously, I’m sure Triple H wishes he could get a lot of people back like The Undisputed ERA and Keith Lee, who are signed to All Elite Wrestling. When looking at the people not contracted elsewhere, that takes a lot of names off the table.
However, even with that limitation in mind, I was crossing my fingers already for Johnny Gargano. I’ve wanted him to fill the “New Daniel Bryan” role for a few years now. Since he hasn’t gone elsewhere, I’m hoping that means he’ll be interested in coming back under the Hunter regime.
Give me Gargano against essentially anyone on the roster and I’m down for it. Gargano and AJ Styles? Seth Rollins? Cody Rhodes? Kevin Owens? All of it. Hopefully, if she’s willing, Candice LeRae could come back into the fold, too.
2) No titles changed hands at Battle of the Belts III this time. Does that negatively influence your hype for BOTB IV, or have little to no effect?
Out of three shows, the TNT interim title went to Sammy Guevara and the TNT Championship itself also went to Sammy Guevara. Then, nothing for this time around. But when I looked at the matches they had announced in advance, I assumed it would all retain, so I’m not exactly disappointed. I feel like any of those would have been the wrong decision to put the belt on the opposite person just for the sake of a title change.
That’s okay to have everyone retain sometimes. However, it shouldn’t become a habit to get into that all to often for these shows.
Battle of the Belts treats itself like a bonus episode, but also a pseudo-pay-per-view. Its a Saturday night program that takes place outside of Dynamite, Rampage, Dark and Dark: Elevation, where championships are up for grabs. That should feel special, and it will quickly turn into “just another pre-taped episode of Rampage” in due time if nothing decently big happens on the fourth one.
Considering all the options for 14 different belts from AEW and ROH, I can’t imagine you can’t sort out a title change to happen there at BOTB IV. By no means should the world title change hands at that type of show. That’s asking too much. But what about the ROH Six-Man Tag Team Championship or something? Hopefully, that will be the case.
3) Speaking of title changes, Bobby Lashley’s United States Championship is on the line against Ciampa and Gunther will defend the Intercontinental Championship against Shinsuke Nakamura. Do you think either titles will go to the challenger this week?
Nope. Sorry guys. Not a chance for either of them.
In a different time frame, I think Ciampa would have a strong chance at winning. He’s not only awesome, but he’s got Triple H behind him. However, I don’t think it will send the best message for him to win a belt so fast after HHH gets in control. It’ll just feel like swift favoritism. Plus, The Miz can screw Ciampa and start a feud that can put Ciampa back on the right track.
I think we’re getting Lashley against Gunther at Survivor Series, too. That not only means I’m banking on Lashley retaining in the coming months, but I don’t see Gunther dropping that belt until at least WrestleMania.
Nakamura is a perfect opponent to stand next to Gunther, give him a fight, but lose. Gunther needs to beat people like that to build himself up to main event status.
4) We’ve gotten another look at AEW Fight Forever. Are you likely to pick up the video game or pass on it?
100% pass. Not only am I not a big gamer as it is (Nintendo Switch is the first console I’ve owned since the PlayStation 2), I’ve also not been fond of wrestling games since I was a kid. Pretty much the last time I remember genuinely enjoying a wrestling game was the WWF WrestleMania: The Arcade Game era. I can see the improvements made over the years, but the gameplay just tends to not be fun for me.
On top of all that, though, this game just doesn’t look like it is anything noteworthy. The graphics seem worse than WWE’s games, the maneuverability seemed clunky and the Britt Baker and Tony Schiavone commercial was so bad that I can’t even give a thumbs up to the marketing department.
For spending so much time on this, I really expected much more.
5) The feud between Tony D’Angelo and Legado del Fantasma is coming to a head this coming Tuesday night. How do you want this to go down?
Ideally, D’Angelo would be in a better position where he could lose and it wouldn’t hurt him. I’m not sure that’s necessarily the case. He might have to win this to keep up his credibility, and if that’s the case, he needs to win by cheating, since he’s the heel.
But win or lose, what I want to see is for Legado del Fantasma’s Santos Escobar, Cruz del Toro and Joaquin Wilde to move on from NXT. Elektra Lopez still needs lots more time at the Performance Center and doing things like Level Up to learn the ropes. She can stay down there. But we can get the three guys saying they want to put NXT behind them and go on to greater things before moving up to Raw or SmackDown.
I’d love to see a new person join D’Angelo to compensate for losing Two Dimes, but I don’t know if there are any guys who make sense to fit that mold. Myles Borne?
Let us know your thoughts about these questions by answering them in the comments!
