WWE Royal Rumble 2020: Daniel Bryan needs to face The Fiend

On the next episode of Friday Night SmackDown, Daniel Bryan, King Corbin, and The Miz will face off for the opportunity to face Bray Wyatt at WWE Royal Rumble 2020. And Bryan absolutely has to be the one to face The Fiend.

Bray Wyatt has caught fire as The Fiend, which has been one of the most compelling characters in WWE this year. Now the Universal Champion, Wyatt needs to face the best possible babyface at WWE Royal Rumble 2020, since The Fiend is on a path of dominance to WrestleMania 36, where he will presumably drop the title to a top star like Roman Reigns.

Next week, three of SmackDown’s most important wrestlers will face off in a Triple Threat No. 1 Contender’s match for the Universal Championship. The Miz, Daniel Bryan, and King Corbin will all go to battle, with the winner facing The Fiend at the Royal Rumble on Jan. 26 in Houston.

Corbin basically stands no chance of winning, since he’s in the match as the heel nobody wants to see win. He’s busy making Roman Reigns’ life miserable, though he’s honestly made everybody watching’s lives miserable (and that’s kind of a good thing, noting his job as a heel).

But Corbin does spice things up, since we can’t have another straight-up match between Miz and Bryan. That said, the dynamic between Miz and Bryan, who know each other so well and are essentially competing babyfaces right now, is the story here.

The Miz recently lost to Wyatt, who did not wrestle as The Fiend, at TLC in one of the most bizarre matches of the year. Wyatt’s acting as a dual character, possessed by The Fiend, was brilliant. And The Miz, as per usual, sold everything perfectly.

As fun as that match was, The Miz is just a layer of the story meant to add more intrigue and provide a better setup for Bryan’s story.

Bryan vs. Wyatt is the marquee matchup, They had a match at Survivor Series, and the program with The Fiend has led Bryan to show his true colors as the babyface “American Dragon” character we all fell in love with years ago. Whereas Seth Rollins turned heel after feuding with Wyatt, the ageless Bryan has turned babyface, and we need to see The American Dragon vs. The Fiend at WWE Royal Rumble 2020.

Wyatt should also get a boost from working with a throwback babyface Bryan in the ring, since his matches as a champion have been somewhat lackluster. He is capable of putting on great matches, but we haven’t seen that against Rollins at Hell in a Cell, Bryan at Survivor Series, or Miz at TLC.

Their match at the Royal Rumble PPV would be Wyatt’s best yet as champ. The fans are fully behind Bryan as a babyface again, and he’s been built up for this moment. The Miz has momentum, but it isn’t quite the same. Bryan is the one who has the support of WWE fans, and he’s the one who can help take The Fiend to the next level on the road to WrestleMania 36.