We’ve already taken care of the superstars missing from Great Balls of Fire 2017, but who are the lucky few who will not only perform, but likely steal the show in some capacity?
Whether it’s in a scripted or a non-kayfabe sense by factoring in everything from wins/losses, how much of an emphasis WWE puts on that superstar, their momentum heading into the next television episode, match performance and everything between, here’s the shortlist for who I think will be coveting the most of the spotlight:
Brock Lesnar
Try all they might to portray Samoa Joe as having Brock Lesnar’s number, there’s no way WWE is going to fool me into thinking he has any chance in winning the Universal Championship in this match.
Frankly, I’d feel more comfortable betting that Joe gets humiliated after Lesnar dominates him rather than putting my money down on a new champion being crowned, which is sad, as I don’t want to see that happen.
WWE has a tendency, though, to overcompensate in weird situations. To make Goldberg look amazing, they had him wreck the guy they had built up as unstoppable—the same guy who decimated Randy Orton, was booked as the unparalleled dominator of THE UNDERTAKER of all people, whooped Big Show like he was a pinata and so forth.
I can just imagine that there’s a philosophy backstage that “Lesnar needs to look scary again before SummerSlam” and that for some reason, they decided the sacrificial lamb should be Samoa Joe rather than anybody else, willing to downgrade Joe’s character and monster status considerably in order to lift Lesnar up slightly.
I don’t expect this to be a 45 second squash, but I do think this is going to be a one-sided affair. Yes, there’s a chance Joe puts up a decent fight, and an even lesser chance that Lesnar only retains by the skin of his teeth, but I can’t see a scenario happening where Lesnar loses the title to Joe, particularly with Roman Reigns vs. Samoa Joe not having the same ring to it that Roman Reigns vs. Brock Lesnar does for SummerSlam.
No matter what Joe is able to do in the ring, this will boil down to Lesnar retaining the Universal Championship and whether it’s with ease or after a struggle, The Beast Incarnate will be the one celebrating and looking like the top dog.
Roman Reigns
You can’t have one top dog without someone else claiming to be his successor and that is what Roman Reigns is doing, since he already set forth the challenge for the winner of the Universal Championship match.
Since nothing is on the line, it’s no guarantee that Reigns has to win his Ambulance Match against Braun Strowman, but if WWE wants The Guy to look like The Guy heading into SummerSlam, they’re more likely to have him score the win to end his feud with The Mountain of a Man.
Strowman will get his licks in, but with a little ingenuity from the creative team, they can figure out a way to write a scenario in which Reigns is able to win without cutting Strowman’s balls off and putting him down a peg. The best case scenario is that this elevates both men, not that it downgrades Strowman so Reigns looks better in comparison.
The only way I can see Reigns losing is if the game plan is to paint him as the underdog against Lesnar, where Strowman can go take the momentum of beating Reigns and apply that to a brand new feud against someone else. Then, Reigns will seem like he’s fighting an uphill battle and people will question if he can get the job done at SummerSlam.
Outside of that, there’s a chance the game plan is for Strowman to win and subsequently usurp Reigns’ title shot, but I hope against hope that that doesn’t happen.
That option is on the table, but when push comes to shove, go with the simpler option, as WWE booking Reigns to win a match certainly sounds like old hat, doesn’t it?
Alexa Bliss
After the Superstar Shake-Up, I was imagining a scenario where Alexa Bliss would defeat Bayley for the Raw Women’s Championship and eventually drop it to Sasha Banks, which would then lead to a WrestleMania match between Bayley and Sasha. I figured those plans would stretch for the whole rest of the year, essentially.
Then, Bliss immediately became the No. 1 contender and dethroned Bayley, so I had to reevaluate. Now that Sasha Banks is getting a title shot, it’s far too early to have her beat Bliss and then keep the title for all those months before turning heel.
Plus, it seems like the match WWE is building toward for SummerSlam is Nia Jax vs. Alexa Bliss, which would mean Bliss by default has to retain the title (unless they wanted to stupidly give it to Banks just to have her drop it to Bliss next week on Raw or something like that).
Sasha will get the title again down the line, but it’s not happening here. Bliss is just in too good of a position and too popular of a performer for her to take a backseat right now.
The Hardy Boyz
Strange as it may be, since Cesaro and Sheamus just won those tag titles back, I keep thinking Matt and Jeff are going to regain them.
Between the two teams, the bigger stars are The Hardy Boyz and they should take priority come SummerSlam as far as getting on the card.
It would be strange for Cesaro and Sheamus to go up against the only other babyface tag team on the Raw roster right now, which is Heath Slater and Rhyno. Nobody cares about them in comparison to The Hardy Boyz.
Plus, Sheamus is supposed to be getting written off TV soon to start work on Josh Duhamel’s film, which means if Sheamus and Cesaro have to drop the belts, they might as well do it on this event.
All the stars align for The Hardy Boyz to walk into SummerSlam with the belts to face either Gallows and Anderson, The Miztourage or The Revival with Cesaro sitting things out and Sheamus off television for a month or however long it takes.
Those are my picks, but who do you think will end up being the primary focal points? Drop your predictions in the comments below!
