Backstage News On Plans For The WWE Universal Championship At WrestleMania

[Big Red Machine]

Source: WrestlingInc


By Raj Giri | January 30, 2017


As seen at The Royal Rumble last night, Kevin Owens defeated Roman Reigns to retain the WWE Universal Championship after outside interference from Braun Strowman.

We first reported last week that a Reigns vs. Braun Strowman program was in the works after The Royal Rumble, as the two are scheduled to face each other on RAW house shows heading into WrestleMania. Marc also noted later that week that Owens will be facing Sami Zayn at those shows.

The Owens vs. Zayn matches will be for the WWE Universal Championship, although Dave Meltzer noted on the latest episode of Wrestling Observer Radio that the Reigns vs. Strowman matches will be headlining those shows. While Reigns and Strowman will be wrestling each other at live events, the plan is for Reigns to face The Undertaker at WrestleMania, which was teased during the Royal Rumble match last night.

We noted on last night's episode of the Wrestling Inc. podcast that it appears as if Kevin Owens vs. Goldberg for the WWE Universal Champion will take place at the WWE Fastlane pay-per-view on March 5th, with Goldberg winning the title and then defending against Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 33. Meltzer said that it is indeed the plan. Meltzer had first reported in last week's issue of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter that neither AJ Styles or Owens were scheduled to go into WrestleMania as champion.

Goldberg does not work WWE live events, so if he were to defeat Owens at Fastlane as scheduled, that would mean that the WWE Universal Championship would not be defended at live events between Fastlane and WrestleMania. That has been the case for the past two WrestleManias as well, as Triple H went into WrestleMania 32 as WWE World Heavyweight Champion and Lesnar did the same at WrestleMania 31, despite either man working a full time house show schedule.

[Big Red Machine]

Source: WrestlingInc




We noted on last night's episode of the Wrestling Inc. podcast that it appears as if Kevin Owens vs. Goldberg for the WWE Universal Champion will take place at the WWE Fastlane pay-per-view on March 5th, with Goldberg winning the title and then defending against Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 33. Meltzer said that it is indeed the plan. Meltzer had first reported in last week's issue of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter that neither AJ Styles or Owens were scheduled to go into WrestleMania as champion.

This would be an absolutely terrible idea for so many reasons.

[cero2k]

Source: WrestlingInc




We noted on last night's episode of the Wrestling Inc. podcast that it appears as if Kevin Owens vs. Goldberg for the WWE Universal Champion will take place at the WWE Fastlane pay-per-view on March 5th, with Goldberg winning the title and then defending against Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 33. Meltzer said that it is indeed the plan. Meltzer had first reported in last week's issue of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter that neither AJ Styles or Owens were scheduled to go into WrestleMania as champion.

This would be an absolutely terrible idea for so many reasons.

seems like they really want to put titles into feuds that don't need titles. Orton/Wyatt will even make it seem like Orton was Wyatt's friend after all and now the title got inbetween them.

Bryan was suggesting that if Goldberg wins the title at Fastlane, then Brock likely wins it at WM, and then have Reigns coronate himself once again at Summerslam.

[Big Red Machine]

Source: WrestlingInc




We noted on last night's episode of the Wrestling Inc. podcast that it appears as if Kevin Owens vs. Goldberg for the WWE Universal Champion will take place at the WWE Fastlane pay-per-view on March 5th, with Goldberg winning the title and then defending against Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 33. Meltzer said that it is indeed the plan. Meltzer had first reported in last week's issue of The Wrestling Observer Newsletter that neither AJ Styles or Owens were scheduled to go into WrestleMania as champion.

This would be an absolutely terrible idea for so many reasons.

seems like they really want to put titles into feuds that don't need titles. Orton/Wyatt will even make it seem like Orton was Wyatt's friend after all and now the title got inbetween them.

Which is a lesson they still haven't learned from the unfortunate downfall of Ryback back in 2013 when they decided that Rock vs. Cena had to be a title match instead of keeping the belt on Punk and giving Ryback the big victory that he sorely needed but never got.

Bryan was suggesting that if Goldberg wins the title at Fastlane, then Brock likely wins it at WM, and then have Reigns coronate himself once again at Summerslam.

Which is about the only way that this idea makes any sense, but it's still terrible because you've not got an obvious finish in not only a big featured match, but in the Universal Title match as well. Plus Owens getting squashed by Goldberg will kill him after the terrible way he's been booked as champion. And that SummerSlam thing... at this point I think that- for the good of the company's long-term future, Roman Reigns should just retire because Vince will obviously never stop pushing him as the top babyface and doing things like beating Taker and Mania and then beating Brock will only annoy the sh*t out of people and make them turn on the product and eventually give up on it.

[cero2k]

Bryan was suggesting that if Goldberg wins the title at Fastlane, then Brock likely wins it at WM, and then have Reigns coronate himself once again at Summerslam.

Which is about the only way that this idea makes any sense, but it's still terrible because you've not got an obvious finish in not only a big featured match, but in the Universal Title match as well. Plus Owens getting squashed by Goldberg will kill him after the terrible way he's been booked as champion. And that SummerSlam thing... at this point I think that- for the good of the company's long-term future, Roman Reigns should just retire because Vince will obviously never stop pushing him as the top babyface and doing things like beating Taker and Mania and then beating Brock will only annoy the sh*t out of people and make them turn on the product and eventually give up on it.

well, at this point if Reigns vs Taker happens, especially with Reigns going over, there is no way that Reigns can survive this without going heel or being booed out of the state of Florida. So maybe just maybe, Reigns may finally turn heel and be crowned as a heel. By Summerslam we should technically have Balor back, Rollins/Triple H to be over, Nakamura and Joe may have debuted, AND maybe another draft, there's a chance that a babyface Reigns may not be necessary anyway and RAW will be overcrowded.