RADICAN’S TAKE: WWE’s main event players ready to take center stage after a post WrestleMania lull

The lull in the WWE main event scene since WrestleMania has put WWE in a position to tell good stories, but something has been missing at the top of the card. After the fire and rockets blow off to Cody Rhodes finishing his story at WrestleMania this year, a lull at the top of the card in the WWE Undisputed Championship scene was to be expected.

Rhodes hasn’t had a compelling opponent that anyone felt was truly a danger to his title since WrestleMania. Cody finding his next rival for his WWE Undisputed WWE Championship is going to be key to WWE picking up steam to the point where they’re firing on all cylinders again. A.J. Styles, Kevin Owens, and Solo Sikoa never felt like true threats to Rhodes for his title as they lined up to challenge him in the months following WrestleMania.

WWE has been able to get by with some less than stellar PPV lineups by bringing their PLE’s to markets overseas and outside of the U.S. Matches and programs that weren’t all that interesting were buoyed by red hot crowds across the world.

WWE programs haven’t been perfect since WrestleMania, but they’ve done a good job outside of building up wrestlers outside of the main event title scene for the most part. The Judgement Day breakup felt like it took too long to execute, but it’s rolling along nicely now and the rivalry between The Terror Twins (Damien Priest & Rhea Ripley) and Judgement Day is filling up a big chunk of the card at the Bad Blood PLE tomorrow.

The Drew McIntyre vs. C.M. Punk feud has had its share of ups and downs, but after some missteps, it feels like they have gotten to where they wanted to be. It felt like the feud was in rough shape following their match at SummerSlam, which had some questionable storytelling involving Punk becoming unglued over McIntyre having his friendship bracelet during the match to the point where he went after special referee Seth Rollins when he gained possession of it. Punk ended up losing the match after going after Rollins.

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Since then, the feud has picked up and both men have done a great job of building up to their Hell in a Cell match at Bad Blood. Both men have shown they have nothing but hatred for each other and it has been a long time since a feud felt like it needed Hell in a Cell to end it. Thankfully, Triple H has gotten away from building up to theme shows where matches would have stipulations based on which PLE was up next with shows like Hell in a Cell and Extreme Rules PLE having wrestlers forced into stipulations that didn’t make a lot of sense.

Elsewhere WWE has done a nice job of building up Gunther as the World Hvt. Champion on Raw after he finished up a fantastic reign with the WWE IC Championship by dropping it to Sami Zay at WrestleMania. Jey Uso has taken advantage of his opportunities as a singles wrestler and finally captured his first singles title in WWE by beating Bron Breakker on Raw as well in recent weeks.

So how does WWE really get cranking again on all cylinders? That should start tomorrow night with Roman Reigns taking the first step to getting revenge on Solo Sikoa for remaking The Bloodline in his own image after Reigns disappeared after WrestleMania weekend.

Before Cody’s next big feud or challenger is revealed, it is likely there’s going to be a War Games match at Survivor Series with Reigns reforming his version of The Bloodline and getting revenge on Solo Sikoa. That War Games match will easily be WWE’s most anticipated match since the pair of matches that pitted Rhodes and Reigns against each other during WrestleMania weekend.

Once things with The Bloodline get sorted out, Rhodes should come back front and center for a big title program against Rhodes. My guess is once Reigns sorts himself out and gets over his petulant child stage (“You’re in my way…of life”), there’s big business in a Rhodes and Reigns rematch, especially if one or both of them flip roles as babyface or heel.

While WWE certainly hasn’t lived up to the highs of The Bloodline storyline and Cody Rhodes finishing his story since WrestleMania, they’ve done some really good things to strengthen many of the wrestlers on the roster. Bad Blood tomorrow should be the official launch of WWE presenting a more well-rounded card with Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns now involved in more compelling storylines at the top of the card.

Contact Sean at pwtorchsean@gmail.com. Follow him on X @SR_Torch

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