WWE Payback, one of three “pay-per-view” events happening over the next four weeks, airs live Sunday on WWE Network. The show is headlined by a fatal four-way match for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship that is mostly about whether Kane will be fired from The Authority. Yeah, we don’t know either.
Here’s your complete WWE Payback card, as we know it:
1. Fatal Fourway for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship: Seth Rollins (c) vs. Randy Orton vs. Roman Reigns vs. Dean Ambrose
2. I Quit Match for the United States Championship: John Cena (c) vs. Rusev
3. 2-out-of-3 Falls Match for the Tag Team Championship: The New Day (c) vs. Cesaro and Tyson Kidd
4. King Barrett vs. Neville
5. Dolph Ziggler vs. Sheamus
6. Ryback vs. Bray Wyatt
7. The Bella Twins vs. Tamina and Naomi
8. Kickoff Match: Curtis Axel and Damien Sandow vs. The Ascension
And now, our staff predictions. Be sure to share your picks in our comments section below.
Kickoff Match: Curtis Axel and Damien Sandow vs. The Ascension
What Should Happen: All four guys should stop in the middle of the match, look at themselves and reevaluate their lives. Suddenly we’ve got a new faction with serious versions of Curtis Axel, Damien Sandow, Konnor and Viktor. They stop being jokes to the WWE Universe, and start getting serious about how difficult it is to be stuck in developmental forever and not be an “independent star” who gets treated to magical John Cena championship matches in their debuts. Maybe position them as the first line of defense against NXT callups. Run Neville and Zayn against them for a while. Make your undercard matter, instead of being a throwaway joke.
What Will Happen: Throwaway jokes! You know, if Sandow was going to become the Macho Man, Summer Rae really should’ve stayed on as his Miss Elizabeth. Then Sandow and Axel could be beefing over something. Anyway, I’ll pick Sandow and Axel to win, because “sad guys who dress up like wrestlers from 30 years ago” is still better than whatever The Ascension is.
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — I like the idea of the Ascension, but at this point, they couldn’t beat the Brooklyn Brawler and his imaginary friend. Maybe they should get together with Emma. Axel and Sandow win here.
Jessica Hudnall — This feels like a Loser Needs to Update their Resume match. I’m going with AxDow to win because Curt seems like a swell gent.
Nate Birch — Holy sh*t, Payback is going to start with an empty house because most of the audience is going to die of second-hand embarrassment during the pre-show. Which team does WWE hate more? It’s a tough call. Maybe Triple H will schedule a topless Roman Reigns photoshoot during the show and stealthily book The Ascension to win while Vince is distracted.
David D. — Ascension is still a thing apparently. They beat the Mega Powers and Hogan calls Vince to make sure Macho Mandow gets pinned.
The Bella Twins vs. Tamina and Naomi
What Should Happen: Honestly? The Bellas should morph into SPEED Muscle from Dragon Gate and annihilate these randos. If we’re gonna pretend the Bellas are the guardians of the Divas Division, they should be Brock Lesnar and her twin sister, Brock Lesnar.
What Will Happen: I want to actually predict a Bellas win for some reason, but it doesn’t make any sense. Naomi getting pushed into nothing and put into a tag team match, WWE’s Match of Least Consequence, equates to her pinning the Divas Champion so Cole can yell “NAOMI HAS JUST PINNED THE DIVAS CHAMPION.” You know, even though she’s already done that twice in the last cycle? No idea. I’m just going to say “The Bella Twins win” and not believe it.
Staff Predictions
Note: This match wasn’t announced when I sent out the “hey, send me your predictions” email, so let’s just pretend everybody picked the Bellas.
Ryback vs. Bray Wyatt
What Should Happen: The first move of the match should be Ryback clotheslining Wyatt so hard it permanently damages Wyatt’s voice box and breaks Ryback’s arm. That way we never have to hear another Bray Wyatt promo, and Ryback goes back on the shelf and reads whatever the 2015 equivalent of The Secret is.
What Will Happen: I assume Wyatt wins, because there aren’t many wrestlers less important than The Ryback right now. The trend seems to be building up Wyatt in these matches against directionless midcarders (see also: Dean Ambrose) en route to feeding him to Actually Important Wrestlers at big shows. Wyatt will win a bunch of forgettable pay-per-view matches until SummerSlam, where someone who actually gets a crowd reaction beyond reminding people to turn on their phone lights eats him alive. If Rowan and Harper don’t get involved here, I’ll be shocked.
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — Remember the Wrestlemania XXX feud where Wyatt was in Cena’s head and he actually felt important? Yeah, this is the exact opposite. Wyatt wins, but I don’t see why we should care.
Jessica Hudnall — Ryback wins by DQ after Harper and Rowan, aka Bray’s Beef Boyz, make an appearance and beat the dog mess out of the Big Guy.
Nate Birch — Ryback should totally be the heel in this feud, right? It’s the guy who’s obsessed with eating people against the poor, mentally ill, chubby kid. Anyways, this is just a filler feud for Bray, who wins on his way to his next big feud with, uh, Fandango? Jack Swagger? He sees through your empty slogans and the illusion of the American dream! Yup, definitely Jack Swagger.
David D. — Maybe the Wyatts reunite and murder Ryback as Bray tears through the midcard to lose to a main-eventer soon. He’s basically WWE Andy Dalton.
Dolph Ziggler vs. Sheamus
What Should Happen: Ziggler gets the clean victory, then goes full The Devils Rejects on the WWE crowd by graphically rubbing his asshole in Sheamus’ face and laughing until everyone feels uncomfortable.
What Will Happen: An inverse of their match at Extreme Rules. Sheamus wins but acts cocky about it, so Ziggler turns the tables and butts him in the face. That’s really the only payoff, isn’t it? “The buttfacer has become the buttfaced!”
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — No butt-kissing this time, right? OK, good. I think Sheamus gets his win back here. I have no prediction on how far Ziggler will regress into the ’80s for his wardrobe, though.
Jessica Hudnall — I fully expect Dolph to have a super ball in his trunks and bounce all over the place. Despite the thrashing he’ll end up taking, I’m going with Ziggler here. My main reasoning is that Sheamus, who is clearly cosplaying as one of the ancient Dwarf Lords, won’t be allowed to use a battle axe in the match, which will put him at a tactical disadvantage.
Nate Birch — This is basically the only match on the card that’s about Payback at all, I realize. Ziggler wins but then is bullied into kissing Sheamus’ butthole for the second show in a row, because Ziggler is duuuuumb.
David D. — Sheamus gets his win back and Ziggler has to tickle his grundle or whatever. I love it when PPVs build up to PPVs that take place two weeks later at house shows.
King Barrett vs. Neville
What Should Happen: If someone beats King Barrett, do THEY become King? If so, I want to see Neville get the win and become King, only for “Adrian Neville” to get called up from NXT and start a Prince and the Pauper story on Raw. I also want a sad Wade showing up and cutting a promo about how the weight of the crown was too much, and he could not Barrett.
What Will Happen: The picks for most of these matches are just guesses, because so little of the card is actually based on stories. What’s the story here, one guy’s an underdog and the other’s dressed like the villain in a Hanna-Barbera cartoon? I could see Neville getting a showcase PPV victory because Barrett never actually wins matches, but I could also see Barrett winning clean and the announcers giving Neville the “he tried hard” bump. I’ll pick Neville, because “Wade Barrett wins” is such a weird thing to type.
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — This has the potential to be the match of the night. I’m taking Barrett here, but only just barely.
Jessica Hudnall — I can’t think of any snarky, cynical, pessimistic jokes because I really want to see this match. I’ll say the King wins with a Bullhammer that knocks Neville for a reverse-630.
Nate Birch — These two wrestled for the first time less than a month ago and I swear I’ve already seen this match five times. One of those times they were literally fighting to become KING OF WWE. What should I possibly care about this match? Barrett wins since gravity seems to remember Neville when there’s another dude laying on him for the pin.
David D. — I bet this gets a DQ treatment. All of this is probably building to Elimination Chamber. Yippee.
2-out-of-3 Falls Match for the Tag Team Championship: The New Day (c) vs. Cesaro and Tyson Kidd
What Should Happen: The match of the night. No matter what happens, I want these guys to tear it up for 20 minutes and make a statement. New Day should retain, because they’ve finally found something that works.
What Will Happen: I think The New Day will retain based on one passing thought: the Freebird Rule. The idea is that a team of three can defend with any combination of two, right? That’s on a per-fall basis, usually. I want to see them get an unfair advantage by subbing in and out between falls and running all three combinations in the same match.
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — NEW. DAY RETAINS. NEW. DAY RETAINS. Kidd and Cesaro will win one fall, but the champions will successfully defend.
Jessica Hudnall — The main thing I want out of this match, which I think should be pretty solid, is the New Day switching out guys in between falls. It’s tough and heart-wrenching to pick against My Main Man Cesaro, but I’ll go with New Day since Xavier Woods is basically a Doctor of Wrestling and he’s got a giant brain for psychologically dismantling opponents.
Nate Birch — I’m hoping this takes up, like, an entire hour of the pay-per-view. These dudes are the only thing getting me through Smackdown reports these days, and they deserve as much time as they want to shine. There’s still a lot of juice in The Bad New Day, but there aren’t really any other contenders to the titles (it’s too early for Lucha Dragons) so they may as well put the belts back on The Swinging Cats to keep the feud going.
David D. — THE NEW GODDAMN DAY IS HERE MOTHERF*CKERS. After months of begging for it,we’re finally at the Incursion point and New Day is here to destroy the world. They’re winning and stealing the show.
I Quit Match for the United States Championship: John Cena (c) vs. Rusev
What Should Happen: Lana tries to turn on Rusev so he gives her a big jumping kick and knocks her out. Live via satellite, Vladimir Putin jumps out of his chair and cheers, because he’s an awful person. An enraged-but-still-very-asexual John Cena goes nuts and tries to kill him (Rusev, not Putin … OK, both of them) but Rusev is ignited by the power of FREEDOM and puts Cena away. He makes Cena actually say the words “I quit,” causing Cena to fall all the way into that mid-life crisis they keep teasing. Mid-carders are kicking out of the Attitude Adjustment and everybody’s calling him old and washed up. He’s valiantly defending a secondary title and making excuses about it instead of going for the WWE Championship. Lesnar put the fear of God in him and aged him. Now Rusev’s making him re-evaluate his entire life.
The followup story is Lana and Cena getting together as the Super America Team, but staying as far away from Rusev as possible, because he’ll just jumping kick them both or chain them in their faces.
What Will Happen: John Cena wins. Come on.
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — Which of these guys has the “Never Give Up” shirt? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
Jessica Hudnall — This isn’t a prediction so much as a plea: please do not let Lana be threatened to force either man to say I Quit.
Ideally, Rusev would only be able to say Ike Wort, which doesn’t count, and Cena would be tricked into saying I Quit out of frustration. In reality, Cena will put Rusev in a terrible STF and Rusev will give up.
Nate Birch — Lana throwing in the towel for Rusev, leading to him permanently kicking her to the curb is the super obvious place for this to go, and so far everything about this Rusev/Cena feud has been super obvious. No reason to believe they’re changing course now. Hopefully they also throw all subtlety to the wind, and have Lana tear off her suit and do Hulk Hogan poses to Real American in a red, white and blue bikini immediately after Rusev fires her. Y’know, for democracy.
David D. — In consecutive years, Cena has been used to “get over” new heels in Wyatt and Rusev and he’s 4-2 in those matches. One of those losses came due to Paralysis By Way Of Singing White Kid. So I’m not feeling great about Rusev here. I HOPE it ends with Rusev handcuffing Cena then threatening to put Lana in the Accolade (with her reluctantly going along with it) and Cena giving up to save her. But it ending up being a swerve for Lana to return to her heel form. A man can dream.
Fatal Fourway for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship: Seth Rollins (c) vs. Randy Orton vs. Roman Reigns vs. Dean Ambrose
What Should Happen: You know what I’m gonna type before I type it.
Last year, Seth Rollins “sold out” The Shield to elevate himself and work the system. He did that, winning the Money in the Bank with Kane’s help and cashing it in (with Roman’s help) at WrestleMania. Now he’s at the top of his game and at the top of the company, entering a match that is Randy Orton vs. The Goddamn Shield. The match needs to start with Orton thinking everything’s normal, then sloooowly realizing he’s slithered into the biggest trap ever. The Shield reunites, triple-powerbombs him and Rollins pins him. Kane’s all WAIT WHAT HAPPENED and tries to celebrate with them, but HE gets triple-powerbombed. The Shield is now back and in possession of the WWE World Heavyweight Championship without a MITB holder or any challengers, and they’ve gone rogue from The Authority because they no longer need them. Seth has learned how to work the system, and Ambrose and Reigns are his insane karate-movie muscle. The crazy guy and the unstoppable one. Wonderful darkness rains.
Triple H responds by sending in the only team that can stop The Shield: the newly reformed Wyatt Family. IT’S ON.
What Will Happen: Not that.
I wish they hadn’t introduced the “Kane will be fired if Rollins doesn’t leave as WWE Champion” thing because it telegraphs the finish. Nobody cares about what happens to Kane, so Rollins HAS to retain. It can be as easy as Kane hitting somebody (Ambrose) with a chair and Rollins pinning him, or as also-easy as Kane attacking Rollins in anger or whatever and … I don’t know, Rollins retains. That’s the story they chose. I’d love to see Ambrose take it and shock the world, but what’re you gonna do?
Staff Predictions
Austin Heiberg — Rollins isn’t through yet. I’m sure he’s got something in his bag of tricks that’ll keep the title in his possession. Hopefully Orton can continue his streak of amazing RKOs at pay-per-views.
Jessica Hudnall — Look, I’m not saying Randy Orton is a Crystal Gem Fusion of Rollins, Ambrose and Reigns, but he does exhibit the major traits of each dude: cold and calculating schemer (Rollins), violent psychopath (Ambrose) and dude what’s got a move that kills people dead (Reigns). I’m not sure how that factors in how this match will play out, but I know I’m intrigued. I want Rollins to retain, and I see there being some Authoritarian shenanigans to make that happen.
Nate Birch — I’m actually somewhat intrigued by this match. Most WWE main-event guys are pretty one-note, but mash enough of them together in one match and you start to get something with enough facets to be interesting. I mean, there’s really no reason, say, Dean Ambrose can’t win. It’s not like we’re heading anywhere particularly definite or important with Seth Rollins. It would certainly spice up what’s been a totally dead post-WrestleMania season, and we do have another pay-per-view in two damn weeks that needs some sort of main event. So yeah, what the hell, I’ll get a little crazy myself and predict Ambrose.
David D. – I was hoping the Shield would stay apart until SummerSlam but slow burns aren’t a thing anymore. Rollins wins, but the highlight is when Orton is tossed out of the ring and the Shield face off to a cavalcade of “This Is Awesome” chants.
