Tonight's the biggest show of the year with title and grudge matches galore. Read on for how I'd book it.
The emphasis here, as always for me, is where the stories go from here and who gets elevated. This doesn't mean that the matches shouldn't be good or anything, but the purpose is to build things BEYOND the biggest night of the year (and try to grab in some of those casual fans for the other shows).
In the pre-show (since the match has already been announced), Primo and Epico retain over the Usos due to a distraction by Rosa. The Usos use this loss as fuel to launch a quest for the titles. Coming off the induction of one of their legendary family members last night, they try to find new purpose and live up to their family name.
I don't know how Maria's feeling off her injured ribs, so her involvement might have to be minimal. WWE obviously wants press from her appearance. You know the drill with celebrity appearances by now. Maria helps Kelly beat Beth for the big "smiling babyface celebration" moment they can put all over Extra, etc.. Beth uses the loss to try to find the fire she had months ago. Kelly feuds with Eve over her treatment of Zack Ryder, and Beth takes her frustrations out on Natalya (who turns face and wants the title).
Cody Rhodes uses his superior speed and youth to play "keep-away" with Big Show, goading him on and frustrating him while getting in shots here and there. Show eventually gets ticked off enough to try to hit him with a chair. As the referee tries to take it from him, Rhodes takes him out via Disaster Kick. With so many eyes on the product, they should be sending the message that there are stars in the company other than the people who've been there since when Rock was on top of the world.
Team Laurinaitis wins after the match becomes chaos. It's 12 people after all. Miz pins Booker via Skull Crushing Finale. Booker's an inactive commentator in his 40s. This forces Booker to recognize that Miz isn't just a fluke, etc. and WWE stops the Miz burial. Laurinaitis rewards Miz by putting him in a match with Cena at Extreme Rules (Miz will be confident after his victory and want to prove that he can still do what he did at WM27- beat Cena). Might as well make that a #1 Contenders' match for the WWE Title (depending on how long Jericho can stick around).
Orton beats Kane in an a brawl. The story is that Kane's good, but Orton's the better "monster". This is largely an age thing as well, since hypothetically Orton's the guy who's going to be there in a couple of years and Kane isn't. They need to keep building Orton for when that time comes. Depending on how over this gets, some kind of hardcore rematch next month. If there's enough gas for a 3rd encounter at Over The Limit, that can be an Inferno match.
Bryan and Sheamus show why they shouldn't have been kicked to the pre-show last year. They do something similar to the match with Big Show where AJ went out on a stretcher, except with a Brogue Kick or something. Obviously they need to be careful with that! Bryan capitalizes on Sheamus' miscue to hit him with the World Title while he's distraught over his actions (the referees will be checking on AJ). He gets the pin over an unconscious Sheamus, and on Smackdown gets a huge victory celebration where he brags about "winning fair and square" "on his own" etc. with no mention of AJ's role. AJ continues to be blindly behind her abusive boyfriend (for now). When the time comes, she'll align with someone else to dethrone him. That time isn't now. Rematch at Extreme Rules where AJ's banned from ringside. Maybe an Extreme lumberjack match where the lumberjacks have weapons to prevent them from escaping? After Sheamus comes to, he storms around the ring and has to be restrained. He lost his Mania moment after winning the Rumble, so he needs to be ticked here.
Punk shows that while Jericho's a great wrestler, he's even better with a win (remember who's the franchise guy and who's just hypothetically here for a fairly quick run). Jericho tries to steal Punk's WrestleMania moment, knocking him out with a beer can or something and forcing beer down his throat. They can use non-alcoholic beer but take off the label or something and pretend it's the real thing. The feud goes heavier on that theme as we go into Extreme Rules in Punk's hometown.
Taker wins. Since we probably won't see any of these guys full-time anymore, they do whatever they feel the need to do to get the story over. Big bumps, whatever. Where they go from there (Taker retiring?) depends on the schedule everyone can do.
The main event's a tricky one. I'll get crucified in some places for this, but I'll give it a shot: Rock gets cocky and tries to win with the Attitude Adjustment. As he does the "You Can't See Me" gesture, Cena turns it around into a Rock Bottom and wins. Miami's not going to be pleased with that, so after the match Rock shakes Cena's hand... then pulls him in for a Rock Bottom of his own. Rematch atWM29(?).
That's it for what I'd do. I'll be back to cover the real thing later. Thanks for reading!
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