Your SO OF COURSE preview of WWE WRESTLEMANIA 35!By Matthew Martin| April 5, 2019 WWE Blogs Previous Page ~ Hour Four ~ THE MIDCARD MATCHES THAT ACTUALLY FEEL WORTHY OF WRESTLEMANIA ROMAN REIGNS vs DREW McINTRYE Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 4 – Two months ago people were still talking about a WWE without Roman Reigns all over the place for the next ten years. Today he’s back and while his match is the lowest on the card since main-eventing the past four WrestleManias, he’s still one of the most important men in the company. This is going to be the first Mania since WM30 where he’ll enter to a chorus of unanimous cheers. He deserves it for fighting back the way he has. Let’s be real, those cheers aren’t going to last once 2015-2018 booking takes over, but in the meantime, it’ll be nice to hear. Will this match be good? Technically? No. Sports-Entertainingly? Probably. Hopefully they keep it short and sweet and with as few rest-holds as possible. Give the fans positive memories of Roman’s Mania match for a change. Who should win? As easy as it to say “LolRomanWins!” I want to believe the company will book him a little less aggressively. At the same time, Drew needs this win if they’re going to put him in the main-event. Roman can slide in whenever he wants; Drew needs credibility. This is the time to give it to him. SO OF COURSE! KURT ANGLE vs BARON CORBIN Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 9 – It will matter to me as I’ll be watching my favorite of all time hang it up. I’m going to say what I want to say about Kurt Angle on another occasion. For now, it will matter to me and to most-everyone watching in the stadium and at home, certainly among older fans. Will this match be good? Oh gosh no. Angle can’t work at all anymore, but everyone knows that. Hopefully this is just a glorified angle that glorifies Angle. Who should win? Kurt should get a surprise roll-up and then shake hands with John Cena that leads to a big send-off on Raw. SO OF COURSE! ~ Hour Five ~ THE UPPERCARD MATCHES THAT FEEL LIKE BIG WRESTLEMANIA FIGHTS AJ STYLES vs RANDY ORTON Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 7 – This is low-key the best-built feud of the whole WrestleMania season (or at least it’s second to Kofi/Bryan). It’s a match we’ve seen before, many times, but WWE has this special way of making a rematch at Mania feel like a big, epic, deal. You know what the secret is? They actually write stories during these couple months a year. Will this match be good? It’ll be…good, but AJ hasn’t really had many “great” matches in WWE and Randy Orton is what he is and no more. The crowd will be lit assuming they’re not too tired; that’ll make it feel better than it probably, actually, will be. That being said, if a hot crowd makes a match hot, the match is hot. Who should win? You have to think AJ since he’s really of the anchor of SmackDown, but in these sort of matches Vince likes to give the veteran the win. It’s a tough call and as long as the finish is clean, I’ll be happy either way. SO OF COURSE! SHANE McMAHON vs THE MIZ Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 6 – A McMahon Match at Mania always Matters. On the other side of the coin, you have Miz blossoming into a genuinely over babyface. Good for him. Will this match be good? Miz is competent but not flashy. Shane is flashy but not competent. Honestly, the match will probably stink, but they’ll do enough smoke and mirrors stuff to distract from it. Shane will jump off something very tall, I’m sure. Who should win? Shane will jump off of something very tall and Miz will get the win. Shane never wins these solo matches, especially not as a heel. SO OF COURSE! ~ Hour Six ~ THE EPIC NOT “MAIN-EVENT MATCHES” THAT WWE WILL CALL “A MAIN-EVENT MATCH” IN YEARS TO COME TRIPLE H vs BATISTA Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 3 – It’s a Triple H match. It’s a Triple H vs Batista match. It’s a Triple H vs Batista career vs career match. It’s going to be all over the vignettes looking back on the night. Will this match be good? It’ll be ten minutes too long, and both men will be winded after ten minutes of wrestling in a thirty-minute match. Who should win? Triple H is going to wrestle these 30-minute epics until his beard is snow white. Batista is back to say good bye. SO OF COURSE! BROCK LESNAR vs SETH ROLLINS Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 5 – The air got deflated out of this balloon the moment Roman returned. What seemed like a sure-fire Seth Rollins win fell to a toss-up, to now most are comfortable predicting another predictable Lesnar win. Will this match be good? Yeah, it’ll be great since it’s Lesnar vs a guy small and fast and super athletic, who can run circles around him in between getting german-suplexed fifteen times. Who should win? Should win? Seth. Give it to Seth and put the belt on Drew later in the Spring, like an old school “heel transitional champ.” Give us a trifecta of babyface title wins. SO OF COURSE! ~ Hour Seven ~ THE ACTUAL ACTUAL MAIN-EVENT MATCHES DANIEL BRYAN vs KOFI KINGSTON Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 2 – This is the best overall match on the card, in terms of fan enthusiasm, storyline, stakes, intangible significance, etc. It has everything the women’s title has in that respect, except Kofi’s rise to the top is more recent than Becky’s, Kofi’s storyline has been more coherent than Becky/Ronda/Charlotte’s, and Kofi’s potentially race-breakthrough victory* is arguably more important than getting the final spot on the card. *I’ll let the Rock’s comments on the race angle stand on their own; his words mean more than mine, anyway: He considers himself the first black WWE Champ so I will too. That being said, many will look at Kofi and consider him the first. They will have their own reasons and I’ll leave them to have their reasons and to defend them if they want. Honestly, I think Kofi’s race should not be the sole focus of this moment. This is a superstar with over a decade in the company, who has grown more popular every year, who took a crap sandwich idea for a stable and (with Big E and Xavier Woods) turned it into one of the most beloved acts of the past twenty years. This is Kofi’s WrestleMania 30 moment, and it’s beyond wonderful for me as a twenty-year fan of this stupid pseudo-sport that Daniel Bryan himself is the man on the other side of the ring, especially considering all that he has gone through to get here, as well. Hats off to both men. Will this match be good? Yes. Who should win? Not only should Kofi win, but any finish other than Kofi winning is so unthinkable to me, I don’t even know how to finish this sentence. New Jersey might literally riot. SO OF COURSE! RONDA ROUSEY vs BECKY LYNCH vs CHARLOTTE FLAIR Scale of 1/15, does this match matter? 1 – It’s the main-event. It’s an all-women main-event featuring a huge crossover star, the hottest thing going right now, and a Flair. It matters. Beyond that, there’s really nothing more to be said. So much has already been written about these three, the convoluted storyline that got them here, and the drama surrounding the match, it’s not worth rehashing it all. Instead, let’s just step back and consider both this and the WWE Title match. Imagine the Spring of 2015. It wasn’t too long ago; just four years ago. Imagine going back in time to the Spring of 2015, when Daniel Bryan was forced to retire again and it looked like he’d never wrestle another match, and when New Day were a floundering team just starting to shed the sliiiightly racist “happy, dancing black doods” gimmick.” At the same time, Ronda Rousey was one of the hottest fighters in UFC, Charlotte Flair and Becky Lynch were big stars in the very small NXT pool, and women were still afterthoughts in WWE. Imagine going back to that time and telling your past self: “Hey past self, news from the future: Daniel Bryan is going to be the best heel in wrestling, he’s going to be the WWE champ going into WrestleMania 35, and he’s going to be wrestling Kofi Kingston with New Day in his corner. Oh and also Becky Lynch, Charlotte Flair and Ronda Rousey will be the main-event.” That’s pretty incredible. Will this match be good? Yes. Becky is the veteran. Charlotte is no stranger to big match moments and can rise to the occasion. Ronda has improved leaps and bounds since last year when she already was good enough to steal the show. This match will be great. The only thing working against it would be how tired the crowd could be after seven hours of watching the same thing, nonstop. I’m exhausted just writing the preview. Who should win? Please don’t be stupid, WWE. Please don’t overthink this. Don’t try to outsmart us or swerve us or anything else you may be planning that’s not the simple and obvious finish that should have been in the books for months now. Just give Becky this moment. SO OF COURSE! Oh well, there’s always NXT. Here’s to Sunday!
