Analyzing WWE’s List of Potential WrestleMania 33 Matches

Adam O'Brien

WrestleMania 33, WWE.com

We take a look at WWE’s potential WrestleMania 33 match card.

With the 2017 Royal Rumble in the rear view mirror, we are officially on the Road to WrestleMania 33. There’s still a lot of ground to cover before the WWE lights up Orlando in April, including two brand-exclusive pay-per-views in Elimination Chamber and Fastlane for SmackDown Live and Monday Night Raw respectively.

But at this point, the company should have a pretty clear idea of which matches are going to dominate the card at the Showcase of the Immortals.

Randy Orton’s Rumble victory puts him in lime for a WWE Championship match, and with the challenge put down by Brock Lesnar for one final match against Goldberg, the WrestleMania line-up is slowly but surely starting to reveal itself.

At the same time, however, do we already know what matches to expect at the show this year? Last week, a list of matches that WWE might be considering for this year’s WrestleMania went live, and a whole lot of them look fairly plausible.

Of course, the majority of these are singles matches, so even with the potential to go five hours again this year, who’s to say if most of these will make the cut?

After all, a lot of the names that make up the heart of the WWE’s mid-card, tag and women’s divisions are nowhere to be seen, so this is just a taste of what to expect. But considering for a moment that this is the final line-up, let’s take a look at each match and put them into perspective with regards to this year’s big event.

WWE.com

Goldberg vs. Brock Lesnar

This one has been a no-brainer ever since Survivor Series, and as of this week on Monday Night Raw, it’s all but been confirmed with the challenge from Brock Lesnar.

As of Sunday’s Royal Rumble match, Goldberg continues to act as the kryptonite to Brock Lesnar’s path of destruction. The one-sided beat-down that closed off Survivor Series would be re-enacted in San Antonio, leading many to wonder for a moment why a rematch between these two icons at WrestleMania is even necessary.

Of course, the action between Lesnar and Goldberg since the latter’s return to WWE has been so limited that it’s left a lot of people yearning for more – which certainly helps their encounter in Orlando remain somewhat fresh – but from a storyline perspective, Goldberg should be ready to move on from this particular rival.

We know that “The Beast Incarnate” is incensed at another straight annihilation at the hands of Goldberg, and his motivation heading into the inevitable rematch is going to be through the roof. Since he’s slated to appear at most, if not all episodes of Monday Night Raw from here until the big event, there’s a lot of potential there to weave a tale infused with Lesnar’s desperation for redemption.

Much like The Undertaker with Triple H in 2012, if we see Lesnar in a state as a result of his inability to get the job done against Goldberg, leading to numerous attempts to force the man’s hand and schedule the rematch for WrestleMania, it could be really special. After all, the ball is in Goldberg’s court as a result of his recent dominance.

The important thing in this one, however, is to understand that we are long past the point of Brock Lesnar standing in the ring for fifteen minutes while Paul Heyman delivers a promo. The man needs to get his hands dirty if he’s going to make any impact on the Road to WrestleMania, which means locking up with some of today’s up-and-coming stars ahead of his final confrontation with Goldberg.

That doesn’t mean tossing them around like rag dolls – which he did in the Royal Rumble match – but there’s a way to make the most out of the build to this match that benefits everyone involved. That means getting involved with Roman Reigns, Braun Strowman, Kevin Owens – the list goes on – before what will hopefully be a much more competitive bout at the Showcase of the Immortals.

WWE.com

Charlotte Flair vs. Sasha Banks vs. Bayley vs. Nia Jax

The self-proclaimed “Queen of Pay-Per-View” Charlotte Flair marches into WrestleMania season with a full head of steam after her successful defense against Bayley at the Royal Rumble, taking her unprecedented PPV winning streak to 16-0.

With Fastlane acting as the one and only roadblock on the road to the big one, you have to believe that Charlotte will be waltzing into Orlando in April with her winning streak intact to heighten the stakes at WrestleMania. So who does she have left to face? Well, quite frankly, nobody. At least not in one-on-one competition.

John Cena vs. Samoa Joe

Having won the WWE Championship from AJ Styles to tie the record for sixteen world championship reigns, John Cena is once again perched on top of the WWE mountain as “The Champ”, and with Randy Orton as the 2017 Royal Rumble winner, there’s a lot of work that needs to be done between now and April for this bout to be set up.

Priority number one obviously would be for Samoa Joe to make the move to SmackDown Live. A lot of people were hoping to see the “Samoan Submission Specialist” make his presence felt on Sunday night, but those hopes didn’t come to fruition until he instead made his debut on Raw, so as of this very moment, this match may be the least likely to happen out of everything on this list.

That being said, and this is a big maybe, but once Samoa Joe finishes up his feud with Seth Rollins heading into Fastlane, Joe might make the switch to team blue. After all, there is going to be a lot of ground to cover between both Raw and SmackDown’s final pre-WrestleMania pay-per-views and the event itself.

So much ground, in fact, that the brands will have a whole lot of time on their hands to properly execute the build for each of its divisions’ matches in Orlando.

Now, we probably shouldn’t expect Samoa Joe to earn a WWE Championship match in his debut WrestleMania, but if John Cena happens to drop the title at Elimination Chamber, it could be a strong indicator that this match will happen.

There is a lot of history between John Cena and Samoa Joe, who trained and competed together in Ultimate Pro Wrestling in the early 2000s. The WWE began exploring that affiliation between the two not that long ago, and it could make for quite the poetic WrestleMania match for the two to square off all these years later.

Again, until we actually see Samoa Joe set foot in a SmackDown Live ring, this match will remain a distant possibility. But there’s really no way of telling what to expect from Cena at WrestleMania until we get into the heart of the build, so it’s not impossible to think these two men’s paths will finally cross paths again.

WWE.com

Seth Rollins vs. Triple H

WWE has been ever-so-slowly building towards Triple H vs. Seth Rollins ever since August, when “The Game” screwed his former protégé out of the WWE Universal Championship and gifted it to Kevin Owens on a silver platter.

Over the last couple of months, Rollins has been constantly calling out Triple H, challenging him to a match to settle their disputes, but it’s been to no avail.

But when “The Architect” had his spot in the Royal Rumble match taken away from him as a result of a distraction in the form of Triple H’s music, he decided to take matters into his own hands and infiltrate NXT TakeOver: San Antonio, where we would be gifted to the brief, albeit electric first face-to-face confrontation between Triple H and Seth Rollins since the bitter betrayal last summer.

Having been kept off the Royal Rumble card altogether, there are zero alternatives for a match between these two men at WrestleMania, and Triple H’s promo on Raw this week before Samoa Joe’s debut practically confirms that. It’s a match we’ve wanted to see since Rollins turned his back on The Shield and joined The Authority in 2014, and we’re finally going to get it three years later on the grandest stage of them all.

All we can really hope for at this stage is a stellar build.

Keeping Triple H away from Seth Rollins in a physical capacity will be smart in getting fans drooling to see these men finally square off, but that’s only provided we still see a lot of heated promos between the two leading up to the event.

Seth Rollins was like a son to Triple H, his hand-picked “Future of the WWE”, so there will be no excuses for a lackluster build. Seth Rollins has had it slightly difficult settling in as a clean-cut babyface on the WWE roster, and it may not be easy getting him fully over against a guy like Triple H – who the fans are always ecstatic to see.

But he should fair a lot better than Roman Reigns did last year. This one will be one of the most anticipated clashes heading into Orlando, so keep your fingers crossed that they make the run into WrestleMania special with a worthy story.

Kevin Owens vs. Chris Jericho

Once it takes place, the inevitable rivalry and subsequent match between Kevin Owens and Chris Jericho has the potential to steal any show it gets booked for.

This tandem has been entertaining fans with its wacky relationship and hilarious antics since well before SummerSlam when the two first joined forces, and ever since, Team Kevin and Chris has risen through the ranks to stand firmly on top of the Raw roster as the WWE Universal and WWE United States Champions.

But as we’ve seen throughout WWE’s long and storied history, good friends make better enemies, and there have been more than one occasion where the friendship of Owens and Jericho has been placed under heavy turmoil.

It doesn’t matter what happens with regards to the titles, whether they both get dropped in favor of other names at Fastlane or not, the rivalry between Owens and Jericho doesn’t need an obscene catalyst in order to make it believable.

Tensions are going to be running high on the final stretch towards WrestleMania about a month from now, and all it should take is some medium stress to have Owens and Jericho turn on one another. The general consensus is that Jericho will be the one to make the heel turn, which makes a lot of sense given Jericho’s endless arsenal of infectious catchphrases that he’s debuted in the last year alone.

Y2J is an old school wrestler who believes that as a heel, he shouldn’t have an unnecessary amount of merchandise because it encourages people to get behind him as opposed to his opponent, so from a financial standpoint it would also be a good idea to turn Jericho so they can start making some money off of “the list of Jericho”, “drink it in, man”, “it” and his countless other hilarious idioms.

This feud promises to be equal parts humorous and deeply emotional, given the sanctity of their bond as it stands, which is going to aid it greatly in being one of the best-built stories heading into WrestleMania 33 should they go ahead with it.

WWE.com

Shane McMahon vs. AJ Styles

Don’t take this the wrong way – Shane McMahon has been a magnificent addition to the WWE product over the last year – but isn’t there anything better they could offer AJ Styles for WrestleMania, after such a riveting tenure as champion?

The man had a spectacular debut year in 2016, delivering consistently amazing matches every night and doing an extremely good job of carrying the SmackDown Live brand on his back throughout his WWE Championship reign.

All good things must come to an end, so one can hardly be too fussed over John Cena’s inevitable victory over “The Phenomenal One” at the Royal Rumble – as much as we might hate to admit it – but somehow a rivalry against Shane McMahon heading into April just doesn’t step forward as must-see television.

Roman Reigns vs. The Undertaker

With an unexpected entrance into the Royal Rumble, Roman Reigns attempted to redeem his controversial loss to Kevin Owens on Sunday night by guaranteeing himself a spot in the main event at WrestleMania – much to the chagrin of the fans.

Unfortunately for “The Big Dog”, Roman’s attempts to win the match were to no avail when Randy Orton eliminated him after a spine-tingling RKO in the center of the ring.

He didn’t walk out of San Antonio, Texas without making an impact, however, as it was Roman Reigns who would be the man to eliminate The Undertaker from the match, especially when “The Deadman” was considered a firm favorite to win.

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The elimination itself wasn’t exactly Maven-levels of shocking when you consider the fact that Roman has been booked as a top star for almost two years now, but there was some serious electricity in the post-elimination staredown between the two.

You might even be able to make out the incredibly bold and mocking statement of “this is my yard” from Roman Reigns. In that moment, a WrestleMania rivalry between Roman Reigns and The Undertaker looked more than plausible.

Given that this match was on the list of proposed ‘Mania bouts prior to the Royal Rumble, the encounter at the Rumble most certainly indicated it to be one of the card’s top matches. This encounter makes sense from an athletic point of view.

The Undertaker is getting up there in age, so he’s not going to be putting on any five-star technical classics with the likes of AJ Styles.

In the same vein, a match with someone like Braun Strowman wouldn’t necessarily work considering any of the usual offense from Strowman would be far too rough for “The Phenom”. Roman offers a similar hard-hitting albeit evenly paced ring style that would suit Undertaker’s physical capabilities to no fault.

The only real concern here is the story.

Let’s be real, Roman Reigns is not going into WrestleMania as a babyface. WWE can continue to lie to themselves and us for however long they like, but all of the fans should know by now that when he goes toe-to-toe with a hugely popular WWE legend like The Undertaker, Roman Reigns is the villain every single step of the way.

Should WWE incorporate that into the feud and actually turn Roman heel ahead of WrestleMania, this could turn out to be a decent match.

WWE.com

Randy Orton vs. Bray Wyatt

When this list of potential matches dropped last week, the idea of seeing Randy Orton take on Bray Wyatt at WrestleMania looked like the most fitting outcome for the story of “The Viper” joining The Wyatt Family all the way back in October.

With Luke Harper having been excommunicated from the faction just last week, it appeared as though Randy Orton’s plan all along had been to infiltrate the Wyatts and turn them against one another, since he had been unable to counteract the numbers game put forth in his feud with Bray Wyatt prior to joining forces.

Randy Orton winning the Royal Rumble, however, makes this match even more interesting if you think of what needs to happen for it to satisfy the conditions.

Now, there’s always the possibility that plans have changed and WWE has instead opted to keep Wyatt and Orton as a tandem, with Orton heading into a WWE Championship match against new titleholder John Cena in Orlando.

But we have seen that bout happen far too many times for it to main event the biggest event of the year in 2017, so most fans will be hoping for Cena to drop the title somewhere along the road – which is unfortunate because it lessens the significance of John’s history-making sixteenth title reign.

Eliminate Chamber seems like the best bet for this to take place, and with six of SmackDown Live’s best all duking it out for the WWE Championship, John Cena’s chances of walking out the champion are dramatically low.

If we are going to get a WrestleMania-payoff for this Wyatt Family narrative that’s gone on over the last few weeks, that means Bray Wyatt will have to win his first singles title since joining the WWE roster – the holy grail of the WWE Championship.

Fans have been begging for a big push for Bray Wyatt, as his immeasurable charisma and ability in the ring for a man of his stature has allowed him to step forward as one of the company’s most notable characters of the last decade or longer.

To see him represent SmackDown Live as the WWE Champion would be a welcome breath of fresh air, and would almost guarantee and excellent main event given the heightened stakes involved now that Orton and Wyatt no each other so much better.

Adam O'Brien

Adam is a writer based out of Dublin, Ireland, and ever since he was six years old, he has been a fan of professional wrestling. He’s put that passion to use, having written for a number of reputable networks including WhatCulture, The Sportster and Fan Rag Sports. He can also be found at SLTD Wrestling, where he takes serious pride in his work as an editor and site administrator.