Opinion: Why Roman Reigns Vs. Brock Lesnar will Main Event WrestleMania 35
With WWE signing two new very lucrative television deals which will see them making $2.35 billion from 2019 to 2024, which adds up to $470 million annually, they're pretty immune to the consequences of bad booking. In short, it doesn't matter what they do anymore as long as they're not WCW-level incompetent, and even if they are, they'll still be making over $2 billion over the next five years.
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Of course, WWE has been immune to bad booking in recent years, and they've been immune to the fact that they don't listen to what their audience is telling them, which would sink any other professional wrestling promotion.
But, WWE is making so much money, and they're so ahead of everyone else in the genre, so it doesn't really matter if they continue to push someone like Roman Reigns, despite their own fans telling them that they're sick of it.
WWE's latest storyline with Roman is that he's butting heads with the higher-ups in the company, as they're hoping that the fans will then view the ex-WWE World Heavyweight Champion as an underdog that the company is trying to bury. As of this writing, their plan hasn't worked, and nobody, perhaps aside from Vince McMahon, is expecting it to work.
But, whether it works or it doesn't, I still believe that Roman Reigns will be in his fifth straight WrestleMania main event next year, and he'll once again go one-on-one with "The Beast" Brock Lesnar. Whether or not it's for the Universal Championship is to be determined, but if it is, that'd mean that Lesnar would have to hold the title for another year, which isn't the best idea, but as previously mentioned, it's not going to prevent WWE from making a ton of money.
WrestleMania typically sells out prior to any matches being announced for the card, so WWE books Reigns vs. Lesnar for next year, it won't matter simply because the fans have already paid their money. And, as you saw from this year's WrestleMania, the fans will stay in their seats and watch the entire match, even though they were supposedly not interested in the outcome.
WWE has been trying to have Reigns beat Lesnar since 2015, but they obviously don't want to do it until the ex-Shield member is fully embraced by the fans. But, as everybody knows by now, that's not going to happen until they turn him heel, which they're clearly not going to do.
In terms of match quality, Reigns and Lesnar have had two fantastic, bloody, hard-hitting matches that were pretty fun to watch. However, the bulk of the WWE universe just didn't want to see it this year, and they probably won't want to see it next year, no matter what WWE does between now and then.
But, again, it doesn't matter what the fans want to see. All that matters is what Vince McMahon wants to see. Needless to say, it's pretty clear that he wants to have Roman be the guy to beat Brock Lesnar, even though it's pretty obvious that Braun Strowman should be that guy.
To me, the current Roman Reigns storyline where he can't beat Lesnar, and he can't get any more opportunities because of WWE management can only lead to one thing: him winning the 2019 Royal Rumble, thus putting him in the main event of WrestleMania for the fifth straight year where he'll finally defeat "The Beast" and capture the Universal Championship.
WWE is probably banking on the fact that the fans will be furious with Lesnar if he's champion for two straight years, as he'll probably defend the title no more than four times between now and next year's WrestleMania. Hence, they're probably going with the idea that the fans will love Roman for finally taking the title off of the "part-timer."
But, as we've already seen, when WWE books Roman against a guy that the fans hate, they end up booing both guys instead of cheering Roman. So, expect to see more of the same over the next calendar year as WWE once again tries to build Reigns up for Brock Lesnar.
Do you think we will see Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar main-eventing Wrestlemania next year? Let us know in the comments section below.