WOR: Lesnar vs. Balor at Rumble scrapped

[A Platypus Rave is Correct]

Nov 22, 2017 15:37:10 GMT -5 Feargus McReddit said:

Nov 22, 2017 15:36:08 GMT -5 A Platypus Rave is Correct said:

just from history though Finn does read the dirtsheets and makes references to them on his Social Media Account alot.

This is the man who stood outside TNA headquarters in Nashville pointing to the sign and smiling like a gigantic troll.

and before Anderson and Gallows signed he had pictures of him holding a door at the Performance center while looking at his watch.

[Ringmaster]

Good for Finn calling out the bullshit, Times like these make me wish a real alternative popped up to take the guys E shit the bed with and then proceed to make tons of money.

The booking committee needs a clean sweep and Vince needs to be put in a corner with old LJN figures to keep him busy

[MGH]

lol THIS DUDE

[Citizen Snips]

Bob Holly once got a title shot at Brock Lesnar at the Royal Rumble.

[Allie Kitsune]

Nov 23, 2017 16:44:44 GMT -5 MGH said:

lol THIS DUDE

Put the Universal Title back on this man immediately.

[Feargus McReddit]

Nov 23, 2017 16:56:26 GMT -5 Citizen Snips said:

Bob Holly once got a title shot at Brock Lesnar at the Royal Rumble.

So a rematch for next year’s Rumble, then. Problem solved!

[The Rick Jericho]

Nov 22, 2017 15:32:26 GMT -5 Widow's Peak said:

Of all the pictures he uses with another wrestler in it, it had to be Roman...

[EoE: Workin On My Night Cheese]

This is like all those times they dialled back on Cesaro singles runs... Loses clean to Big Show or Kane, then a news report comes out saying that Vince finds them boring or something, and everyone circles the wagons while the talent themselves just poke fun at it.

[The Rick Jericho]

According to Justin Barrasso:

Also, contrary to reports that Finn Balor was pulled from a potential Royal Rumble Universal title match against Lesnar, Sports Illustrated has learned that Balor was never even in the mix for the match. Balor is slowly transitioning into a newer version of Dolph Ziggler as a performer with a great series of matches but no reward atop the card or faith from the office.



A source close to WWE creative relayed that McMahon sees Balor as bland when he is not portraying “The Demon” character. WWE desperately needs to give some life to Balor’s character. He carried NXT as its champion, but WWE is a far different beast. Balor is not an exceptional promo, considered small by even the newer WWE size standards, has visibly lost some of his confidence, and is not connecting at the moment with the audience.

[nisidhe]

Nov 23, 2017 17:05:04 GMT -5 Allie Kitsune said:

Nov 23, 2017 16:44:44 GMT -5 MGH said:

lol THIS DUDE

Put the Universal Title back on this man immediately.

f*** that. I want him in my kitchen cookin' my Christmas dinner. I might let him out for the Rumble - I'm harsh, but fair.

[Rican]

Nov 23, 2017 16:44:44 GMT -5 MGH said:

lol THIS DUDE

This is the most I have ever liked Finn.

[nisidhe]

Nov 23, 2017 17:25:58 GMT -5 The Rick Jericho said:

According to Justin Barrasso:

Also, contrary to reports that Finn Balor was pulled from a potential Royal Rumble Universal title match against Lesnar, Sports Illustrated has learned that Balor was never even in the mix for the match. Balor is slowly transitioning into a newer version of Dolph Ziggler as a performer with a great series of matches but no reward atop the card or faith from the office.

A source close to WWE creative relayed that McMahon sees Balor as bland when he is not portraying “The Demon” character. WWE desperately needs to give some life to Balor’s character. He carried NXT as its champion, but WWE is a far different beast. Balor is not an exceptional promo, considered small by even the newer WWE size standards, has visibly lost some of his confidence, and is not connecting at the moment with the audience.

McMahon _clearly_ has no clue what he's f***ing with. It's not just about one individual talent - a talent with the potential to be the face of his company and an all-time legend, to be sure - but about WWE's ability in future to draw interested and well-trained talent to keep his business going on the scale it currently enjoys. Who will want to join WWE if they can f*** up Prince Devitt so blatantly? Even if this is all a big joke among the brass and the talent at the expense of dirtsheets and fans, do they not realize that the up-and-coming wrestlers might be looking at all of this and thinking, "Nah. I'll take my chances in Japan," or "I can get more respect and pay on the indie circuit," or even, "I'll see what they'd offer me in Toronto." Does Vince really want to lose prospective talent to those options? 'Cause this is how Vince will start getting "No, thank you" responses from some very good talents that he'll need in the next couple years, as well as from some of his favourite types who have found better opportunities in other sectors, like MMA.

[Deleted]

Great, now he's going to have a cooking gimmick.

[Aboutreika18]

Nov 23, 2017 18:19:57 GMT -5 @mrsirdrdaddy said:

Great, now he's going to have a cooking gimmick.

Chef Demon Balor vs Chef Demon Kane. Book it, Vince!

[MrElijah]

Nov 23, 2017 16:44:44 GMT -5 MGH said:

lol THIS DUDE

I now want a straight up Finn/AJ/Good Bothers Cooking Show. Club Cooking, if you will.

Finn: Look, AJ! A f***ing Turkey Dinner!!

[facethatrunstheplace]

-- According to a report at Sports Illustrated, the rumors of a potential Finn Balor vs. Brock Lesnar match being pulled from Royal Rumble are untrue because Balor was never even considered as an opponent for Lesnar.

-- The story goes on to state that Vince McMahon sees Balor as "bland" when he is not portraying "The Demon" and is slowly transitioning him into a role similar to what Dolph Ziggler portrays - a wrestler who ends up having a great series of matches but never reaches main event status due to the front office having no faith in him.

-- Reportedly, WWE is also against the idea of reuniting him with Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson as The Club.

-- While we can't completely refute this report from Sports Illustrated, we do know that WWE did definitely consider Balor as an opponent for Lesnar, but the time frame for that was before the summer. In fact, WWE began teasing a potential match by having Paul Heyman put over Balor on a promo on Raw while also getting Balor to speak on trying to regain his title (after never having been beaten for it). When those plans changed remains unclear, but one rumor we heard is that Balor's size is a big reason Vince doesn't see him as a logical challenger for Brock.

www.ewrestling.com/article/report-vince-mcmahon-sees-finn-balor-bland

If true the bolded part is rather interesting because people on this forum have said exactly the same thing about him.

[cjb01: Limited Edition Item!]

Nov 23, 2017 17:25:58 GMT -5 The Rick Jericho said:

According to Justin Barrasso:

Balor is slowly transitioning into a newer version of Dolph Ziggler as a performer with a great series of matches but no reward atop the card or faith from the office.

For real, if someone called me "A New Version of Dolph Ziggler" I'd slug them right in the mouth, how dare they insult me like that??

 

[Eunös ✈]

Yeah, I have defended Vince in the past but now...Go away you old Dinosaur.

Even if what you said was true, the Royal Rumbles title match is usually just a throw away one anyway, I mean we had Brock vs Hardcore Holly one year.

Only slight positive I can get from this is it means Balor possibly in the Rumble match itself, but even then we have had title match losers that night do double duty.

Situation is stupid.

[imthewalrus97]

Vince really needs to retire at this point. Not only is his booking proving bad, but his reported excuse about Finn not being over enough is hypocritical. I mean was the fanbase really clamoring for Jinder Mahal as WWE Champion? Of course not. But they booked it anyway. And, for me personally, while Jinder may not have gotten over as much as Vince wanted, at least it was a breath of fresh air to have someone different.

I'd also like to note that there's currently a poll on WWE.com asking fans to vote for who they'd like to see Brock face for the Universal Title. Guess who's leading by 5% over 2nd place!

[Deleted]

While I believe the initial report about WWE thinking Balor isn't over enough to face Lesnar, I'm pretty positive the follow-up Sports Illustrated report is bullshit.

First off, the last major thing I remember SI reporting on was the Nia Jax walk out being due to a booking disagreement, which turned out to be completely false.

Second, why would Vince suddenly now be down on Finn for his height and whatnot when he gave him a huge push last year in the run up to SummerSlam? It's not like Finn was 6 inches taller, 50 lbs heavier. and a Rock-caliber promo last year. While some of that push may have been due to Reigns being in the doghouse, going from "let's rocket this guy to the main event and give him a world title within a month of his main roster debut" to "he's too small and bland to main event" in the span of a year is insane even by Vince standards. I can believe that Vince believes Finn isn't over enough now for a main event run (even if that drop in overness is due to their inept booking), but I don't believe that Finn's height and charisma would now be an issue when they weren't a year ago.

So yeah, taking that SI report with a big grain of salt.