WWE: Lashley For Double Champ Could Be Best For Business

The Hurt Business never close and it’s time for Bobby Lashley’s main event rush to include all the top singles titles available on Monday Night Raw.

Let’s not beat around the bush, Monday Night Raw has been bad this year. Sure, fleeting moments have been great and there are definitely some highlights for this year, but all in all, Raw has paled in comparison to it’s blue and black and yellow brothers on WWE television.

One significant highlight has been the rise of The Hurt Business, a faction of superstars led by returning icon MVP. The premise of the group is simple, legitimizing talent who have been misused and underutilized for the better part of their tenure with WWE. With MVP, names like Shelton Benjamin and Cedric Alexander finally have a bit of weight to them. The most prominent of these members is Bobby Lashley.

At the start of this year, Lashley was in a feud with Rusev, now known as Miro in AEW. At face value, the feud could have been legendary, but the storyline made the feud feel like a dramatic misstep and served only to embarrass all involved. Fans never saw a conclusion to the feud as Rusev was released before any finality occurred. Lashley was strapped with Lana as his valet and looked to have no plan heading into Wrestlemania.

Following a loss to Aleister Black at Wrestlemania, Lashley started gaining wins against enhancement talent in order to build back up as a legitimate contender. Eventually, he aligned with MVP, with Lana falling out of favor as his manager. He earned a match with Drew McIntyre at Backlash, which he lost thanks to botched interference from Lana. He ended his relationship with Lana thereafter and looked to build legitimacy with MVP as his manager.

Lashley then got involved with MVP’s feud with then US champion Apollo Crews, earning his reward in the form of his second US championship reign. He has since held the belt and represented The Hurt Business as the spearhead superstar of their faction.

His year has been a year of two halves, going from being stuck in a dead-end romantic storyline with Rusev to being a dominant US champion sat at the upper end of the card.

Having reinvigorated his character, there represent no credible challengers to his belt as it stands and as such, you can’t help but feel Lashley will be looking upwards, at the WWE champion.

He has faced McIntyre before, and in the storyline, you can make the argument that he would have won if there had been no interference from Lana. This paired with the fact the man is a legitimate beast, boasting an impressive 15-2 MMA record, and his superstar look, says that Lashley is a man ready for world gold.

He currently remains out of the reckoning for a WWE title shot at TLC, having been defeated by Keith Lee, albeit by DQ. But, the case can be made for him to after the belt beyond the upcoming event.

Legitimate monsters like Lashley only come around once in a while. There are those who can cross over from UFC and Bellator, but rarely have the wrestling ability of Lashley. Although unlikely to produce a Meltzer five-star match, will still put on a truly serviceable and entertaining clash with the right opponents. Fans have wanted Lashley to clash with Brock Lesnar for a reason. As mentioned before, he has the US belt on lock with few credible challengers, and is one of the top competitors on Raw that could credibly beat the WWE champion, so why shouldn’t he take the belt off of McIntyre at the Rumble?

With Wrestlemania season just around the corner, and notably a Wrestlemania likely to be without a certain beast, shouldn’t WWE look to build the next monster heel to take his place? Bobby Lashley winning the WWE title whilst holding the US belt will cement him as the man to beat, and surrounded by MVP, Cedric, and Benjamin also holding Raw Tag titles potentially, he would spearhead the new unbeatable and destructive faction on Raw.

Defending both the US and WWE belts on the same night in different matches prior to Wrestlemania will add to the unbeatable feel of Lashley and therefore if and when he puts someone over at Mania, then his conqueror will be cemented further. With such a bad year for Raw and a significant reliance on stars of the past to pick up ratings, Lashley is in the unique position of still being very nimble for a 44-year-old, therefore the perfect candidate to be built as a monster heel to put babyface stars such as Keith Lee over as credible main eventers.

Another school of thought is if Lesnar does return to WWE, we can see the dream match between Lashley and Lesnar for the WWE championship, with Lashley going over. It’s up to WWE to pull the trigger on Lashley while he is hot and prominent, in a move that will build towards the future of the WWE.