Team RAW vs. Team Smackdown Live
Isenberg: The battle of brand supremacy will come to a head when Kevin Owens, Chris Jericho, Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns and Braun Strowman take on Dean Ambrose, Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt, AJ Styles and Shane McMahon. We can already guess that tables will be broken, bodies will be hitting the floor (circa Drowning Pool and SummerSlam 2001) and chaos will ensue. I am really interested in seeing how WWE goes here. Braun looks so dominant, but he cannot be pinned. I see him getting eliminated, with Reigns letting his emotions get the best of him. I want to see history. Hell, throw The Shield together in the ring while Braun and Bray square off. Let Owens and Jericho be captains, but take a backseat to the action until the perfect time. If anything, Smackdown Live needs this. We will always know that RAW is “viewed” as the A show. Many will disagree, but it will always be the flagship show for WWE.
If I am booking it, I let Shane hit a few big moves and be “carted” off in dramatic fashion. I would also let AJ Styles pick up the win for his team over Kevin Owens. Let it go down to Universal Champion vs. World Champion. Sign me up for that ending and give those guys at least 7 minutes together in the ring.
Killam: I’m gonna be honest, and this is a wee bit painful to admit… but Josh is absolutely right on the money here. Strowman should look like an absolute monster. Shane O’Mac should do something stupid and be taken out by medics. If you’ve got them all in the same place, there’s no reason not to do SOMETHING with the Wyatt Family and the SHIELD. And both Jericho and Kevin Owens, as well as even AJ Styles, should take a back seat until the fog clears and the champions are left standing.
To address the elephant in the room (and that’s barely hyperbole), I’d personally like to see Strowman go full Hulk on everyone. And I do mean everyone. Have him be the one to put down Shane in some kind of dramatic fashion (throw him off the stage or something, I don’t care), and let him just go bananas on whoever gets in his way. I want to see a breakdown between him and Roman, maybe even him and Rollins as the guy trying to keep everything together. You have a rare opportunity with all three former SHIELD guys currently running babyface – create a scenario in which Rollins and Reigns have to put Strowman down for the sake of their own team, recruiting the help of Smackdown’s Dean Ambrose for a throwback powerbomb through the announce table. The ref counts to ten, he’s counted out, and you’ve removed the hurdle of keeping Strowman safe by not taking a pinfall, while giving the fans the feel good (albeit temporary) moment of the SHIELD reunion.
As for who wins… That’s a tough question. Kevin Owens and AJ Styles are probably my two favorite wrestlers currently working anywhere in the world today (the Top Five also includes Kenny Omega, Katsuyori Shibata and Zack Sabre, Jr. in case you were wondering). I’d give it to Owens, personally. Styles does better at being the whiny, complaining heel that can get his heat back on Smackdown with a well-placed promo about how his team screwed him over (enter: Dean Ambrose), while Owens thrives on being the cocky heel that, even though he’s kind of a dick, more often than not he backs it up in the ring. There’s so much money in a future Owens/Styles program though, that I barely care who takes the win. I’m going KO.
