At first glance, the WWE Payback card could look a little light.
There are just six announced matches and Cody Rhodes will be on the “Grayson Waller Effect” talk show.
It does feel odd to have a WWE pay-per-view without a Bloodline-influenced match.
But here we are
What that means is a greater spotlight for WWE’s other storylines such as The Judgement Day and the Trish Stratus versus Becky Lynch cage match and the World Heavyweight championship main eventing a pay-per-view for the first time since its return.
It also means WWE could have some surprises up its sleeve having not announced Jimmy Uso vs. Jey Uso, John Cena hosting and this feels like a prime spot for Damian Priest cashing in his Money In The Bank contract.
The Post’s Joseph Staszewski does his best to predict what will go down at Payback (8 p.m., Peacock) on Saturday night in Pittsburgh.
Though this one seems like a foregone conclusion considering how much losing Miz has done recently and Knight’s rising status in the company, but having the A-Lister cheating to win isn’t the worst idea.
Even so, WWE has pulled the string back on Knight’s momentum too much to do it again here.
I do think they give Miz something to point to so he gets a television rematch, but it’s up, up, up for Knight.
The delayed blowoff to this feud feels worth it now as Stratus will get to have the first cage match of her career instead of it being jammed into the SummerSlam card.
That being said, it’s long past time for Lynch to get a definitive victory over the WWE Hall of Famer and Stratus has said she has “more work to do” in the division once this ends.
I expect Lita, whom Stratus took out all the way back in April to start her heel run, to return and thwart Zoey Stark’s attempt to interfere in this match, which will need to top Stark and Lynch’s excellent contest on Raw.
Maybe we get one more tag match on TV before we truly say goodbye to this.
Raquel Rodriguez truly is a perfect opponent for Ripley because of their history in NXT and she can believably match or exceed her in size, strength and wrestling ability.
It should make for a compelling match, but Ripley has too many big feuds to get to before her title reign ends.
This could all lead to Rodriguez and Liv Morgan vs. Ripley and Lyra Valkyria down the road, if Valkyria doesn’t align with Finn Balor in a Judgement Day split.
This might be the hardest to call because Theory’s run was getting stale, Mysterio doesn’t need the title and WWE doesn’t feel quite ready to turn Santos Escobar on the Hall of Famer.
I’m gonna lean toward Theory here because the title loss could become a point of contention between Mysterio and Escobar if the latter does something that leads to the loss or fully turns on him.
Also, this is the championship L.A. Knight said he’s going after.
You need a true heel on the other side from him.
The Judgment Day will never be the same after this as Rhea Ripley has warned of changes needing to be made if Balor and Priest can’t get the job done.
That will be the case as Zayn and Owens’ run is too much fun across brands and The Judgement Day squabbling storyline can’t go on for another month.
It feels like Balor will be kicked out and will team with J.D. McDonagh and Lyra Valkyria, both have whom have been weaved into this story. Priest being on his own really leads to nothing interesting.
How well Nakamura has been presented makes this feel like the start of a long feud.
Nakamura using Rollins’ back injuries as a way to win the title should not be out of the question as the visionary can rise up and win it back later.
Nakamura has made this personal and loss would add to the sting.
My gut, however, thinks Rollins gets beaten up badly before using a roll-up or reversal to escape – maybe digging deep after the challenger threatens his family again, so WWE can see if Nakamura gets hot enough for a title change down the road potentially.
The fact that Damian Priest’s standing in the Judgement Day could hand in the balance and that this match is main eventing the show could make this the first spot for cash-in if Nakamura beats down Rollins enough.
I think we leave with a new champ, so that WWE has some buzz coming out of this show.