WWE Royal Rumble 2017: 3 Inter-Promotional Battles We Would Love to See
By Adam O'Brien
Courtesy of WWE.com
2. Brock Lesnar vs. Bray Wyatt
There is unfinished business from early 2016 that might finally be put to bed in this Sunday’s Royal Rumble match. Heading into last year’s event, and even following through all the way to Roadblock in March, the story of Bray Wyatt vs. Brock Lesnar looked like a firm candidate to lead all the way up to a match at WrestleMania 32.
“The Beast Incarnate” had focused a lot of his pre-Rumble aggression on The Wyatt Family, and with all four members in Bray, Erick Rowan, Luke Harper and Braun Strowman entering for the first time, it appeared that Brock Lesnar might be the only man equipped to stop Bray Wyatt from winning the match. That would prove true, when Lesnar emerged at #21 to eliminate each member of the faction, sans Bray.
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Lesnar’s chances of winning his second Rumble were faltered, however, when “The Eater of Worlds” called back upon his brethren to rid the match of Lesnar’s wrath.
Lesnar’s controversial elimination led to the announcement that he would get his revenge at the WWE’s pre-WrestleMania network special, Roadblock, but the last-minute replacement of Wyatt with Harper meant that the match never happened.
That feud hasn’t been given the time of day since, but as we’ve seen a number of times before, the Royal Rumble match can be a good platform to settle old disputes.
And this Sunday, Bray Wyatt is heading in with a Wyatt Family in turmoil.
After seemingly excommunicating Harper, and with Strowman living it up as an independent Raw star, Rowan on the shelf and an Orton double-cross looming, Bray Wyatt will have nobody to hide behind once he finds himself in Lesnar’s crosshairs.
If he thought a handful of suplexes were bad a whole year ago, just wait until “The Beast” catches him one-on-one. Should that happen with Orton – a man who got to know Brock Lesnar very well at SummerSlam – in the ring at the same time, that might be the biggest test of Orton’s loyalty to The Wyatt Family to date.