In this WrestleTalk News, WWE morale low after Royal Rumble, major heat on Shane McMahon
after Rumble return and WWE has no idea what the plans are for the WWE Championship at
WrestleMania… sounds about right.
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This weekend was the most Rumble-full time of the year, but like xmas sometimes is, it
was pretty boring and the only thing you can really do is drink an entire bottle of wine
about it.
Or a W.H.ine about it on Twitter, which plenty of people did in order to voice their frustrations
with this year’s event - usually WWE’s best - being, well, just a bit boring.
Perhaps the most exciting thing all show was the WrestleMania sign setting itself on fire,
not once, but twice.
PWInsider claim to have heard from a number of sources within the company that the Rumble
was plagued by constant changes to the line-up, order of eliminations, interactions between
the talent and spots.
One source noted the Men’s match changed “20 times” over the course of the days
leading up to the event, with many blaming this back and forth on the match itself being
slow and lacking real excitement, and also being produced really badly, they missed so
many eliminations.
The same was said of the Women’s Rumble match as well.
One anonymous talent said that this had left morale incredibly low backstage after the
event, stating: "We were all in a whirlwind.
Just as you had your role and spots down, everything started over and over and now most
of us were back to square one.
It changed again and again and again.
It wasn't an easy night even before we hit the ring."
If a 3 hour episode of Raw turns out badly whenever Vince rips up the script on the day
of the show, of course the Rumble which is a careful marriage of spots, story and key
interactions is going to suffer if its being bunged together at the last minute.
After all of the reports of WWE making moves for some Forbidden Door style entrants, legends
and returns, one of the very few surprise entrants in the Men’s Rumble was just Shane
McMahon, the boss’s son.
Feel like a few people turned WWE down hard this year.
In news that requires a pinch of salt, though they had a good track record heading into
the Rumble with rumors, Ringside News are reporting that there is a “substantial amount”
of heat on Shane O’Mac after the men’s rumble.
They’re reporting that Shane was given the role of lead writer and producer for the match
and repeatedly tried to book the entire affair around himself and was adamant about putting
himself over.
At least that would have been one person to be featured properly and get over, so a slight
improvement on what we got.
On the day of the show, Shane was reportedly confrontational, “openly buried Jamie Noble”
and was “fighting everyone” to book himself into the final group of wrestlers.
The final four of the Rumble was Brock Lesnar, Drew McIntyre, Bad Bunny and Shane McMahon.
A source reportedly told Ringside News that “when Shane is more impactful in the Rumble
than Big E or Owens, even people who don’t normally complain are complaining loudly today.”
More on what WWE has planned next for hot up and coming star Shane McMahon in just a
sec after this word from today’s sponsor.
Before we get on with the rest of the episode, I’d just like to say a huge thank you to
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If the
Rumble left you desperate for a second helping of O’Mac and cheese then you’re in luck
because according to Dave Meltzer Shane is reportedly booked for both the Elimination
Chamber and WrestleMania 38.
Meltzer noted in his Sunday update that Shane is on the Mania card but as of a few days
it hasn’t been finalized.
Shane did eliminate Kevin Owens though so, you know, that’s what’s happening isn’t
it.
So look out for more Shane on February 19th in Jeddah - notably the last time Shane was
there he beat Roman Reigns at Super ShowDown in 2019.
Speaking of Roman his match with Seth Rollins at the Rumble ended in a bit of a bum note
as Roman held the guillotine choke despite Seth making it to the ropes, getting himself
disqualified and ending his undefeated PPV streak.
On Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer said WWE had Roman Reigns do the post-match
chair beatdown on Seth Rollins so they would boo him instead of booing the match finish.
This might be crazy folks, but why not just not do the finish instead of having to do
something else that will get booed to stop a boo you never had to start.
It’s like putting out a fire with more fire.
The DQ did mean that Roman managed to retain his Universal Championship likely setting
up another confrontation with Brock Lesnar who absolutely walked to victory in the slow
motion men’s Rumble match.
This leaves a big question mark though over what will happen with the WWE Championship
that Bobby Lashley won earlier in the night.
Well, we’re not the only ones with the question mark, as according to WrestleVotes on Twitter:
“Lesnar had to be the winner here.
I’m told they legitimately have no idea what the WWE Title match at Mania is going
to be at this point.
Avoid the ol pigeon hole.”
Now obviously we find out tonight who Brock will pick as his WrestleMania opponent, but
currently the reports all seem to point in the direction of Roman.
That leaves the WWE Championship in a weird spot as it likely won’t headline a night
of Mania with Ronda Rousey likely getting to main event the other night of the show.
Speaking of Rousey, her Rumble win gives her the choice of Champion to chase heading into
WrestleMania.
Before the show kicked off Dave Meltzer noted that WWE are planning to have Ronda and Charlotte
Flair go toe-to-toe at the show-of-shows this year - their final two spots in the Rumble
could very well be a nod to this too.
Fightful Select are now reporting that the word backstage is that Rousey and flair are
pencilled in for Mania with Becky Lynch and Bianca Belair currently being planned for
the Raw Women’s Ttitle bout.
Charlotte has reportedly been pushing to work with Rousey for months now.
And WWE were immensely keen to get the baddest woman on the planet back in action asap after
the birth of her daughter.
With Flair vs Rousey reportedly the plan of Mania, most people are probably like yeah,
but what about the match we actually want to see?!
The one on one with Becky Lynch that we were all denied when WWE omni-Flaired Charlotte
into the Mania triple threat.
Well, Dave Meltzer on Wrestling Observer Radio, gosh he’s been a busy boy this week, said
it’s in the works: “As soon as I did the reporting of the thing,
people were just like, ‘It should have been Becky, it should have been Becky’.
Which at one point, it was.”
“But the whole thing is, is that, as best I can tell, the plan is for Ronda and Becky
for the 2023 WrestleMania.
So it’s not like that match isn’t happening.
Of course, people can get hurt, people can… a million things can happen between now and
2023, but that’s basically the deal is that she was gonna come in for two WrestleManias.”
With a new baby at home people also speculated what Rousey’s workrate was going to be like
and whether her deal was part time - do the Rumble, bosh Flair, have a break, come back
for Mania.
Meltz noted: “She’s in as a ‘regular’.
I don’t know what that means as far as, I don’t know that it’s gonna be every
week, but she’s gonna be a regular member (of the roster) in the sense that she’s
gonna do big shows and everything like that.
It’s not just she’s gonna come in, put over Charlotte Flair at WrestleMania and go
on her merry way.”
One person, not bothered actually about Rousey returning, is Raw Women’s Champion Becky
Lynch, who when interviewed by Ariel Helwani of BT Sport said:
“I already beat her.
I already beat her, so I’ve got nothing left to prove.
I mean I’m still holding this championship that she gave me three years ago, almost three
years ago.”
Becky glazed over her own time off to have a baby of her own there, but the point is
their last encounter did end up with Becks going over big time and Rousey disappearing
for the company - so what the Mania 2023 encounter will hold could be mega exciting.
But it’s Mania 2022 first and we already know that Shane McMahon will be sticking around
after his Rumble appearance, Bad Bunny can’t because his tour clashes, but the Bella Twins
may well be doing something at Mania 38.
According to PW Insider there is a belief that “we’d probably see more with Nikki
and Brie Bella for WrestleMania 38.”