With Elimination Chamber just three days away, there’s a lot of speculation as to who will be holding what title going into the grandest stage of them all. These last two PPVs set the tone for the biggest time of the year in WWE, and therefore Smackdown Live really needs to bring their A-game here.
Now, to be fair, that shouldn’t be too hard for them. Up to this point, SD Live has been outshining Monday Night Raw both on TV and on Sundays, so I can’t say I’m walking into Elimination Chamber expecting a dud.
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If anything, it has a chance to be one of the best shows of the first quarter of 2017.
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For starters, the face that runs the place, John Cena, is back on top and tied with Ric Flair in his current championship run. While not every fan is thrilled with that, they have to be excited about all the possible victors for the chamber match.
AJ Styles, Dean Ambrose, Miz, Baron Corbin and Bray Wyatt all look like strong picks. Ever since the brand split, they’ve all brought their best to the blue brand on Tuesday nights, so I wouldn’t be too upset with whatever outcome we see here.
Besides that, we have a six team tag turmoil match for the tag titles that, while not exactly stacked with stars, has the chance to wow us and give us a reason to care for teams like Breezango and the Ascension.
We also have three pretty interesting women’s matches in Smackdown Women’s champ Alexa Bliss taking on Naomi, Cena’s girlfriend Nikki Bella against the last leg of the Hart Dynasty Natalya, and the crazy vet Mickie James going after the Lasskicker Becky Lynch.
I’m looking forward to these three, personally, especially the latter. We’ve also got the “Look at me, Bray” match in Luke Harper vs Randy Orton. While I’m not too high on the story here, these two should put on a good old-fashioned slobber knocker.
Finally, we have Dolph Ziggler in a weird spot as he’s left in a handicap match against Apollo Crews and Kalisto. Now, if this was a triple threat, it’s possible that this would be a show stealer. But I’m interested to see how this plays out for the showoff.
With two of our titles possibly leaving in six different directions, 2017 is shaping up to be one of the better Elimination Chambers of the past few years. The problem is, there are also several wrong choices when it comes to this show.
Certain people will need the momentum, and gold, heading into Wrestlemania, to establish them as top talent. To set up the rivalries we’re hoping for, there are a handful of outcomes that should not happen this Sunday, and I’m here to give you the top five.
#5 Dolph Ziggler Cannot Lose to Crews and Kalisto
To be honest, this match is a bit of an odd one. First off, heels normally aren’t on the wrong end of a handicap match, so this already feels bass-ackwards. Second, none of these guys have any kind of momentum or steam going into their match this Sunday.
Neither Apollo nor Kalisto have done anything worth watching as of late, even though this time last year they were two of WWE’s shining rookies. Ever since the brand split, the two have been left floundering on Smackdown Live. So what they might need is a convincing and meaningful win.
Also read: 5 WWE superstars with the worst Elimination Chamber records
On the other hand, it’s too bad that Ziggler has been on the wrong end of every feud he’s had lately. Even in his feud with the Miz last year, one of the feuds of the year in my opinion, he ended up on the losing side. Besides that, he’s been caught in the fury of Baron Corbin and AJ Styles.
After finally snapping last month and turning heel, you’d think Ziggler would be going on a bit of a run here. You’d be wrong. Dead wrong.
In fact. Ziggler has nothing to stand on at this point, having lost to both Kalisto and Crews, and they don’t get anything back by beating him either. This really is a lose-lose match, the only one on the card.
All that being said, Ziggler needs this win more. He’s a freshly turned heel in a handicap match. The recipe calls for a win here for the Showoff. If not, I’m not sure what the point of turning him heel even was in the first place.
#4 Nikki Bella cannot lose to Natalya
It’s no secret that Nikki Bella is rumoured to be retiring soon. The last standing Bella Twin came back from an almost career-ending injury, and it seems like Wrestlemania might be the last time we look at what we cannot touch (I’m sorry.)
If the rumour is true, it would make sense to build her up a little bit before she says goodbye to the WWE Universe. And that starts with Elimination Chamber. Looking to take on Natalya, Nikki doesn’t have too much left to prove. Being the longest reigning Divas champion in history, she has definitely left her mark on the business.
Natalya believes that the mark is more of a stain, however, believing that all of Nikki’s success has come by way of her boyfriend, the current 16-time world champion John Cena. Natalya has begun to take her aggression out on Nikki and since Survivor Series, Nikki and Natalya have been butting heads.
Originally an unknown assailant, Nattie has been taking out her opponent every chance she’s had, verbally assaulting her in the process as well, claiming that she would be nothing without her man and that if she herself wasn’t married to Tyson Kidd, Cena might have ended up with her.
This feud has a real feel to it that is hard to come by nowadays.
Nikki hasn’t been shaken too much, however, as she had a comment for Natalya earlier on that seems to have stuck with the Queen of the Harts. stating that she was the “nothing of the Hart family” has really dug into Natalya’s skin.
This feud has been built about as well as it could have been. There haven’t been many matches between the two over the past few months, which is great. It helps to build that big confrontation when we haven’t seen two wrestlers fight multiple weeks in a row.
And with not much time left before Wrestlemania, this seems to be the blowoff match. Whoever wins this probably ends up with a match that night, while the loser will end up watching from the back.
If that’s the case, and the rumours of Nikki’s retirement are true, Nikki cannot lose this match. There’s really not much left to argue here.
Natalya will be around after the dust settles. Nikki is looking to go out on a high note, a stumble here will make it hard for us to care when she waves to the crowd for the last time.
#3 The Tag Match cannot end too early
If I’m being honest, the tag division of the Blue Brand leaves a lot to be desired. At one time, it was on fire. The tournament for the tag titles back in 2016 had helped establish every team as a contender.
The problem is that after the champions were crowned, the other teams, save for the Usos, fell to the wayside. Breezango became fashion police. The Vaudevillains have been booked poorly, probably due to Simon Gotch’s mouth, and the Ascension were kneecapped the second they were called up to the main roster.
Not to mention the fact that American Alpha hadn’t, in fact, still haven’t gotten the crowd behind them, this part of the roster fell apart relatively quick.
The titles have changed hands twice since being formed, and the fans only seemed to care about them when the WWE was using them as a tool to push the Wyatt storyline forward. Alpha is only now coming into their stride, and at this point, they look like a big fish in a small pond.
At least that was the case until this past Tuesday. While the 12-man tag team match didn’t get every team over, it did its part in showing that Alpha might not be walking out of Elimination Chamber holding the titles.
In what was surely one of the most shocking moments of the year so far, the Ascension actually picked up the win for their team, and if you weren’t surprised by that, you’re lying.
There are three or four teams right now that I could see walking away with the belts in a couple of days, and I can only hope that this match lasts longer than ten minutes. Usually, they try to rush these, especially if they involve tag teams.
Teams run in, get their biggest offensive moves in, get a pin, rinse and repeat until it ends before you’re back from your bathroom break. They can’t do that here. This is the time for some of these teams to show what they’re made of, to wow us.
Maybe the Ascension can dominate like they did in NXT. Maybe the fashion police have a thing or two to show us. Give them a chance, WWE.
#2 Alexa Bliss cannot walk out of Elimination Chamber as Champion
While the tag division seems a little weak right now, the women’s division is incredibly strong. And I say that being one of the many fans feeling a little off put by the draft. When it comes to the new talent, Raw ended up with Charlotte, Sasha, Nia and eventually Bayley, while Smackdown took Becky and Alexa.
Raw seemed to be the place to shine if you were an up and comer, while the idea, at least in the fans’ minds, was that Becky, Naomi and Alexa would be fed to Nikki and Natalya. We thought that, and we were wrong.
The Smackdown Live Women’s Division has been fantastic. Great technical work from Becky and Nattie, an insane amount of athleticism from Naomi, and some strong vet support has been coming in from Nikki and, now from Mickie James as well.
This is a division that has delivered again and again. We just left the Alexa-Becky feud, one that ended at TLC with a pretty brutal tables match, crowning Alexa Bliss the Smackdown Women’s Champion.
Smackdown has been the brand to give the younger talent the ball and run with it, and Alexa has done just that.
Alexa, not even being on the main roster for a full year, is already a champion. She has a bright future ahead of her. So having a short reign wouldn’t hurt her that much. Not only that, but Naomi has improved leaps and bounds since she first came in as a Funkadactyl.
Some even believe that she’s the most athletic woman on the roster. Now, this won’t be Naomi’s first title, should she walk out Sunday as champion. She was, in fact, the inaugural FCW Divas champion.
She’s yet to capture gold in her six years on the main roster, however, and she’s almost thirty years old. Nobody knows how long she’ll be around for but it’s fair to say that she needs at least one reign under her belt before she calls it quits.
#1 John Cena cannot retain
No. No, God, please no. No. No.
Seriously can we not have Cena and Randy Orton main event Wrestlemania? I know the WWE likes to push that rivalry as the current Stone Cold/Rock but... it’s not. It really isn’t. Over the past ten years, there’s no telling how many times these two men have fought, but it’s more than enough.
And it’s not that this is my only reason. You have five other guys that can take the title Sunday and the fans would love it.
...okay, four.
Alright, alright. It’s Bray. Bray has to win Sunday. There’s no question. The Bray-Randy feud has been on a slow boil since August, and the perfect way to finish it is to have those two fight for the WWE Championship at Wrestlemania.
I wouldn’t even have Cena stay in this match that long. This should be a match to see what the other top guys can do. This is a time for AJ, Dean, Baron, Bray and the Miz to show what they can do. Well, okay, the Miz can go out first, but then Cena.
Having Cena win Sunday would ruin the biggest storyline Smackdown has going. Plain and simple, that is the wrong way to go.
Sunday is shaping up to be an interesting stepping stone to Wrestlemania. A star-studded chamber match, three highly competitive women’s matches, and a chance to show off your entire tag division.
Along with the run of great shows that Smackdown Live has been having, this is a PPV you don’t want to miss.
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