What if Steamboat beat Hogan? A Professional Wrestling Fable: Road to Royal Rumble 2017

Road to Royal Rumble 2017 - Part 2

Friday, December 15, 2017

Four matches set up in Part 1

WWF Title: Cage: AJ Styles v. Luke Harper

Bullet Club (Anderson/Gallows) v. Bray Wyatt/John Cena

IC: Rusev (w/GHB and Lana) vs. Brock Lesnar (w/Heyman)

IC Number One Contender: Nick Nemeth v. Chris Jericho v. Roman Reigns-Uso

Five left, here are the two remaining title matches.

Tag Titles: Trash (Claudio/Neville) v. Kevin Steen/El Generico

Women’s Title: 2 of 3 Falls: Charlotte Flair v. Sasha Banks

WWF is a workrate centric promotion and this tag title match is why you buy PPVs. Former stablemates meeting for the WWF tag titles. It’s largely a continuation of the Survivor Series program, Neville swerved the babyfaces, claiming an injury that took him out of that match but then appearing to determine the finish. Gargano and Ciampa continue to be involved as the GDI squad from Dark Ride, but now they pick sides – Gargano aligns with Trash, feeling as if he has been treated badly by the sport, hasn’t gotten his due, his bitterness seeps through – whereas Ciampa sticks with Steenerico; we see those 6 guys in multiple combinations in the build for the match. The other element that gets a lot of time in the programming is Trash is the 99^th WWF Tag Team Champions, meaning, if Steen and Generico take the belts – they will be 100.

Lots of historical looks at each of the 99 championship reigns, each title change airs on the WWF Network, the talking head shows debate who the greatest team from each decade is with the focus being on an all time top 10 which then gets rolled out in advance of the Rumble. There is pretty heated debate among everyone about the composition of the list – and there’s anger from Trash that there’s even any talk about the 100^th tag team champions when they are the 99^th and not planning on losing them any time soon.

10-Tie Division One (Nick Nemeth/Jack Swagger) – the most recent tag team champions in the great amateur lineage of Steiners and Haas/Benjamin, D1 was the 87^th WWF Tag Team Champ, taking from Dead Men Walking at Summer Slam ’09 and losing to Young Money at Wrestlemania 26 the following year.

10. Tie Charlie Haas/Shelton Benjamin – two time champs (69^th and 71^st) who won their initial belts from two legends, Chris Benoit and Eddy Guerrero.

9. Wild Samoans (Afa/Sika) – the best WWF Tag Champions from the pre-Mania era, Afa/Sika held the belt 3 times (21^st, 23^rd, 31^st) for a total of nearly a year and a half. They first took the belts from Tito Santana and Ivan Putski in April of 1980 and their final reign ended in November of ’83 when they dropped the belts to Tony Atlas and Rocky Johnson.

8. Road Warriors (Hawk/Animal) – the Roadies squashed the Orient Express at Survivor Series ’90 to become the 44^th WWF Tag Team Champs and kept those belts for over a year, at the time, the second longest reign in WWF tag history (they lost to Money Inc at Rumble ’92). They added a second reign later in the decade (56^th) taking the belts from Davey Boy and Owen at Summer Slam ’97 and losing to Rock and DLo at Survivor Series. Rock and DLo, like Hunter and Shawn, and Young Money, are two time champs who controversially did not make the list. Mr. Fuji and Professor Tanaka are 3 time champions who were left out.

7. Dudley Boys (Bubba Ray/D-Von) – competed in some of the best remembered tag team matches in WWF history, held the tag belts twice, first taking from the Hardys at Survivor Series ’99 (62^nd) and then from Raven/Taz (66^th) at Wrestlemania 17 in 2001, combined, they held the belts for a year.

6. Edge/Christian – another two time tag champion who competed in many of those same matches with the Dudleys, they were the 64^th tag champs, like the Dudleys, they also took the titles from the Hardys. That was in 2000 – their second reign was 9 years later with a masked Christian joining Edge at Rumble 2009 (85^th)

5. Brainbusters (Arn Anderson/Tully Blanchard) – this half of the Heenan Family only held the WWF tag titles once (39^th) but it was for 9 memorable months in 1989 that provided some of the greatest tag team title matches ever against their greatest WWF Rival, the Rockers.

4. Steiner Brothers (Rick and Scott) – another one time only belt holder, but they held the tag titles for over a year (46^th) keeping them for all of 1993, like the Brainbusters, bringing a high level of match quality.

3. Hardy Boys (Matt and Jeff)- the final third of the trio of late 90s/early 2000s tag teams that revolutionized the division, the Hardys are two time tag champs (61^st and 63^rd) who pushed the boundaries on extreme tag team wrestling.

2. Hart Foundation (Bret/Davey Boy/Anvil) – the 37^th WWF Tag Team Champions held the belts for a more than a year and a half, from Wrestlemania 2 all the way to Survivor Series ’87. Bret and the Anvil would go on to win the titles without the Bulldog 7 years later, at Survivor Series ’94 – and Davey Boy grabbed Bret’s brother Owen and won them at Rumble ’97.

1. The Shield (Tyler Black/Dean Ambrose/Langston) – The longest title reign for any champion in any division in the Wrestlemania era, the Shield took the belts at Mania 29 in 2013 and held them for nearly 2 and a half years, until Summer Slam 2015.

Trash (99^th) takes on Kevin Steen and El Generico (100????) at Rumble 2017.

The women’s title is positioned as the blow off to the Sasha/Charlotte program and maybe the culmination of the 4-Ground breakup – the launch of the women’s title was really on the backs of 4-Ground (Charlotte, Sasha, Becky, Paige) with the aid of her dad, Charlotte swerved the group, took the title from Charlotte – then lost it and regained it from Sasha. Now we’re doing a 2 of 3 falls title match between Banks and Flair – once and for all to see who is the better woman.

Three matches to go:

Dean Ambrose v. Langston

Mike Mizanin v. Braun Strowman

Kalisto/Apollo Crews v. Rich Swann/Jack Gallagher

The breakup of the Shield storyline continues; Langston turned on Ambrose and Black to end the greatest tag team in WWF – further, it cost Black over a year of his career with the injuries suffered in the turn. Ambrose didn’t seek revenge, pursuing his singles career instead, that caused a fissure between he and Black. Black and Ambrose met in the quarterfinals of the Survivor Series – but Langston injured Black again and here we are.

Ambrose and Langston do a face to face on an episode of Heyman’s Hustle. Ambrose, as mentioned in Part I, turned down an opportunity to compete for the IC in order to get this match – Heyman questions about it – Ambrose says he made that choice once and it cost him his brother – now, he’s coming at Langston with all he has. Langston asks when does this end – is Jannetty still out chasing HBK? Langston says Black’s the one who got in his face at Survivor Series – and Langston put him down again and will put him down again and again if Black can’t just let it die. And if Ambrose can’t let it die, he can get a hospital room next to Tyler.

Chickenshit heel Miz became creepy heel The Cuck and is now babyface Mike Mizanin. He’s up against it here – Strowman’s got a hard on for Miz, taunting him about being the Cuck, about letting his wife fuck other men – about how he fucked her and maybe will do it again. Miz is brave and true, stands up to it, and now he’s got to face the wrecking ball.

No real storyline for the opening tag – Kalisto and Crews tagged together in developmental and Regal’s putting them back together again.

That’s the show – here’s your update on Dark Ride, Nakamura spends the entire build there, he just avoids the rest of the Bullet Club entirely. He successfully defends the Dark Ride title multiple times – against Roode, against Strong, against Tozawa, against Dorada ---- Nakamura says he’s fighting champion, defending Dark Ride Title against all comers.

The last comer is Samoa Joe – and Joe beats him to regain the title.

The other thing on Dark Ride is the breakup of BFFs Aries and Ranallo. A candid picture makes the social media rounds with Ranallo and the Bullet Club (including a couple of members not with the promotion) all making the finger guns. Regal and Nigel both needle Ranallo about it, but Aries, whose career was ended by Bullet Club attack, is heated. Ranallo says the picture was taken months and months ago, but Aries won't have it. He ends their popular podcast - they continue to do the Dark Ride broadcasts, but Corey Graves returns to that booth essentially to serve as a buffer between the men as Aries refuses to talk to Ranallo.

Here’s your show.