#3 The need to appease a home audience and its effect on the Goldberg/Lesnar match:
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Hell in a Cell took place in Boston. It also had Sasha Banks drop her belt to Charlotte, in Boston. While the WWE had justifications galore for such a booking, it was foolish not to pander to the thousands rooting for their resident Superstar.
Not even an oddly sold stretcher spot could redeem the loss of a Championship that had been built so minutely around her face character. A week before, Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman entered the Target Center in Minneapolis, anticipating a heated heel response.
The sequence that followed was, instead, a discomfiting display of jarring back and forth exchanges between Heyman and Lesnar’s home crowd.
The importance of the role that Toronto had to play in previous blockbuster fights cannot be understated. A match such as Hulk Hogan versus The Ultimate Warrior back in 1990 was nothing more than a dreary show of heavyweights punching and slamming one another.
However, with both performers’ connection with the Toronto crowd and its electric participation, the match was resuscitated into one of the greatest ever.
When talking about favourable crowd reception, one cannot help but notice the number of Canadians in the match card. However, another Superstar speculated to receive a flattering reception, with whom the WWE might put its wrong foot forward is, Brock Lesnar.
Going into his Survivor Series match against Goldberg, Lesnar is the obvious heel. Meanwhile, Goldberg is the returning face with a family sentiment attached to his first grand fight in 12 years.
Lesnar, having settled in Saskatchewan in Canada, had represented the country at UFC 200 during his fight against Mark Hunt. Goldberg, on the other hand, has been blamed for ending Bret Hart’s in-ring career with a botched mule kick.
While logic calls for a clean finish over Lesnar, given that it is Goldberg’s purported “last” fight, such a booking would prove detrimental to the repute of the show, and not particularly because of the live audience. Goldberg’s long absence would factor into his performance, as would the booking potential of a Brock Lesnar victory.
For someone who has splintered through The Streak, Lesnar would make for an incredibly imposing opponent to put new talent over somewhere down the line. Losing to Goldberg, despite his legendary WCW status (also a cause for Vince’s disdain, ala Sting) would taint his credibility, something clearly bad for business.
