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Why the WWE World Heavyweight Championship Tournament Has Multiple Flaws

By Dean Siemon

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While there are some good choices selected to the WWE World Heavyweight Championship tournament, there are a few “questionable” entries where qualifications are debatable.

SPOILER WARNING: This column may contain spoilers involving SmackDown on Thursday night.

When the bracket for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship was shown on Raw this past Monday, there were names that made perfect sense as the matches continue leading up to a new champion crowned at Survivor Series on Nov. 22.

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Obviously, Roman Reigns belongs in the tournament considering he was the previous number one contender before the injury to Seth Rollins. Intercontinental Champion Kevin Owens and United States Champion Alberto Del Rio make a lot of sense, so does Dean Ambrose and Dolph Ziggler. It’s even good to see Cesaro get a first round upset over Sheamus.

But there are a few names that leaves some fans scratching their heads. Titus O’Neil? Kalisto? Tyler Breeze?

While this is a larger tournament bracket where they wanted to have 16 Superstars, but it seems as if the selection committee after the first 8 or 10 entrants involved throwing darts at a very large dartboard that had everyone else. That’s really the best explanation for how it can be justified having Titus O’Neil considered a contender for a world championship.

In fact, you can question some of the qualifications for some of the others. While Kalisto has started to develop a bit of a following, it’s questionable to consider him someone who can contend in this tournament. But with the upset victory over Ryback, it’s almost like a mid-major school upsetting an established team in NCAA Men’s Basketball National Championship tournament – like when 13th-seed Valparaiso upset fourth-seed Ole Miss back in 1998 (there are other examples, but this writer is a Valpo graduate).

Then you have someone like Tyler Breeze, who was just called up from NXT to the main roster and started a feud with Ziggler as Summer Rae’s new man as part of the fallout with Rusev and Ziggler. Sure, Breeze has a lot of potential to be a big star. Yet, he hadn’t done anything in the ring to warrant a berth in a tournament for the championship. The loss to Ambrose also doesn’t really help despite being a quality match.

Granted we are dealing with some injuries of veteran superstars who would have been better choices, like John Cena filming a reality television show and Randy Orton dealing with a dislocated shoulder. That’s not to say either should have won the tournament, but to help enhance the younger talents like Reigns, Owens and Ambrose.

Kalisto could have been replaced with Bray Wyatt to defeat Ryback and then the storyline with the Brothers of Destruction could have cost him a second or third round match. No need for O’Neill when you have Mark Henry who is an established veteran with world champion experience. As for the spot that went to Breeze, someone from New Day would have been a better fit when you consider you already have the other two singles champions involved in the world championship tournament.

But if you had to choose someone for a surprising upset in that first round, someone like Jack Swagger or R-Truth could have played the role of a Valpo in a much better capacity. But maybe this is just nitpicking how the creative staff selected a 16-man tournament field – especially when you consider that half of them get eliminated on the first set of matches.

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Maybe that half that lost this week didn’t matter to fans, as long as they see names like Ambrose, Cesaro and Owens get a fair push into the spotlight.

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