This was the worst WrestleMania build up ever...

[The Legend]

So I was thinking about this and what kind of topic I could create for WrestleMania week to try and generate some discussion. I thought about ranking my excitement level for each match, but then came to a simple realization, there's nothing about this WrestleMania season that stands out at all. There have been plenty of times where WWE's tried to do something and it just didn't connect or missed the mark or was in poor taste, but this is totally different. WWE literally didn't put any effort into creating interesting stories at all for this year's Mania and it's ridiculous.

Let's start with not one match, but a story that permeated throughout multiple matches for Sunday. Brock Lesnar didn't show up week after week and it is the main crux of the main event against Roman Reigns, Undertaker didn't show up week after week and it is the main crux of his match with John Cena and Ronda Rousey didn't show up week after week. That's three of the top matches at Mania where the only thing told was one of the people in the match couldn't be bothered to show up to RAW and promote the story hardly at all.

Then there's two battle royales that are happening. We are supposed to think they are important just because they are happening. It's not that hard, give the winner a title match at Payback, let them be GM for a week on their show and set up the next rivalry, make it some cash prize. All things that have been done before to great success and make you invest in who is fighting and give the wrestlers a reason to want to win. This is literally just, it's the first women's battle royale at Mania so it's important or it's Andre the Giant so it's important. It's laziness to the highest degree.

There's the Cruiserweight Tournament final, which in and of itself is fine. I like Cedric Alexander and think Mustafa Ali could be good if given enough time. But, the problem with this match is simple, the WWE didn't think that five hours of weekly programming were enough to give this match any main show time. It happened strictly on 205 Live. Listen, I get it, you have the Network, it's a lot of time to fill, frankly it's more time than I can commit. I watch RAW and SD every week, I've watched every NXT since the last Takeover until Takeover New Orleans. That's six hours per week, sorry WWE I draw the line at trying to find time to watch 205 Live or Main Event, regardless of what you put on those programs.

I've already touched on Brock vs Roman and my main problem with it. My other problem is simply I'm over Brock Lesnar, he's not entertaining, he's staler than 2008 John Cena, his matches are all worse than 2007 John Cena. They give this money to guys like Brock to be on these part time contracts and there's never the return on investment from the fans perspective.

Styles vs Nakamura. Listen the match will be fantastic, probably the runaway MOTN hands down. But I'm sorry, the WWE has failed and yes Nakamura has failed to get over the fact that this guy is a badass and a threat and should be a guy that fans look forward to. I have zero hope that Nakamura will never not be repetitive and boring given his limitations in storytelling and you know what he seems charismatic, but all his gyrations and craziness don't excite me, the guy doesn't connect with me.

The Triple Threat for the IC belt is a bright spot. Miz, Rollins, Balor, all are at the top of their games and have told a good story. The extra layer of if Miz is turning over a new leaf as a father is interesting. These guys should tell a good story and have a really good match.

The US Championship. This is just a cluster. Rusev has no business being there, except that he's really over and deserves a spot of the card and the WWE overlooked him until two weeks ago for the show. Jinder is playing a weird mind game, Roode and Orton have this weird dynamic when Orton never should have taken the belt off him this early. I don't really understand why this match is happening (other than it has something to do with SD starting a weekly top 10 superstars list, the first list created heat between Orton and Roode and the list stopped being weekly after it's second installment). Every Mania card has its cluster match and this one is it.

Bliss vs Nia Jax. Look, the women's revolution (or is it evolution now, since revolution is a dirty word for conservatives like Vinny Mac?) is wonderful. These women are finally getting to show what they can do, no longer are they relegated to lingerie matches and King shouting puppies. They've come a long way and the quality of this match should show that. But then, you remember the McMahons are in charge of creative, which means they are in capable of telling a story about the women competitors that ever evolves past the sophistication of a sad high school cat fight.

Charlotte vs Asuka. They've fallen into the bare minimum here. You have Charlotte who has been booked extremely well to maintain status of queen of the division. Asuka is the hot newcomer that seems unbeatable. All well in good, I want something more from the story though and this doesn't have it.

The Bar vs Strowman. This one has been fairly well done and the payoff could be great too. I'd love it if they do something where Strowman has some jobber for a partner, that guy starts getting his ass kicked, Strowman tags himself in, demolishes his partner and then goes on to single handedly beat the Bar anyhow. Strowman is probably the best booked guy in the entire company right now.

Usos vs Bludgeon Bros vs New Day. The WWE dropped the ball fantastically with this one. After the last SD PPV this was one of the more buzzworthy matchups. The previous match ends with a brutal attack, but then nothing. There's been almost no interaction or furthering of storyline except for a couple of bland matches.

Angle & Rousey vs HHH & Steph. Let's see this match is built on the WWE (HHH & Steph) making a huge investment and big deal out of WWE's ability to sign Rousey, a legit badass. Only for us to find out a day after she was announced, that HHH & Steph secretly think she sucks and has no business in the company. I mean come on now, how stupid are we supposed to be.

Bryan & McMahon vs Zayn & Owens. The WWE have actually tried with this match. They are consistently having these four interact and drive towards a match. However, they haven't really answered why they are fighting, other than Owens attacked Vince six months ago, Shane has attacked like an ass since then, but not actually done anything about it. Bryan gets cleared and goes from being an ally to the other two to being a rival worthy of a beatdown. The whole thing just sucks.

Taker vs Cena. Nothing good exists in this match. There's no build. No reason to want to see and Taker can no longer go, so what's the point.

[Messiah]

I agree with what you are saying, but I'm not sure if I would call it the worst. But that has more to do with me separating 'worst' from 'boring'. Not taking into what we know about the show itself, which obviously turned out great, I would consider the build to WrestleMania 30 to be far worse. Nobody expected that show to be good. There were only 7 matches, 2 of them included Bryan, 1 was Kane teaming with the New Age Outlaws, 1 was a battle royal, and the other was some stupid invitational match. Lesnar/Undertaker had a crummy build. Bryan's story got a bit better once we knew he was going to be in the main event, but it was still a lot of bad booking. Cena/Wyatt is the only match on the show that had a strong build up to it.

But one thing that build did have is it made you react. Whether it was react angrily to Bryan not being given a chance or looking forward to seeing if the WWE would actually have him lose to Triple H. The build to this show has been a lot like the WWE in the past year: boring. I would agree it is the most boring build to 'Mania ever because WWE is as boring as it ever has been. The booking isn't terrible, but they don't do anything to rock the boat.

The only two matches I'm really looking forward to are Balor/Rollins/Miz (which from what I have read and watched on Youtube has actually been built up very well) and Asuka/Charlotte (which is unrelated to the build, which has sucked, but it is still a huge match). Both tag team title matches, Jax/Bliss, Bryan's return, and Styles/Nakamura are interesting too, but mostly all for the performers themselves. Styles/Nakamura represents what I mean though. It could be worse because it could be two guys who aren't Styles or Nakamura. But nothing could be more boring. They haven't even tried to build up a story between them.

I think it will be a good show though. I'm more optimistic on that front than I was a month ago. But it will be because of the performers. If the WWE's creative could match up with their talent level, the WWE would be on Godly levels.

[The Legend]

I get what you are saying and agree to an extent. Although, depending on what you believe is kayfabe and what you believe is real in when WWE actually decided to put Bryan in the main event picture. Everyone knows he wasn't originally in their plans, but he did become in their plans at some point and what resulted from that point was honestly the best main event story they've depicted in ages. It had drama, it had doubt, it had a babyface that the fans would do to see him win and it was most of all exciting.

Lesnar against Taker I think was better than you are saying because it was Brock and Heyman at their best.

BTW, the Vickie Guerrero Invitational kinda pisses all over the whole this is the first women's battle royal in WrestleMania history.

But, you are also right in the sense that it is boring above all else, but that lack of effort by the story telling that leads to the boredom is exactly what I'm talking about. At least with WM 30 they hit you over the head with it being the 30th Mania, made a big deal about the event, everyone in the ring was putting in extra effort because it was Mania season.

Honestly, I still do consider it the worst on top of boring, because it's so boring that you almost forget that it's WrestleMania. I mean I honestly expect to be more excited for and see a better build that gets me excited for HIAC or TLC in the Fall, because this build has so amazingly been uninspiring in moving the needle.

[Str8Shooter]

Exactly what about the Nakamura build has been that bad? It's been pretty simple and effective. Obviously the "dream match" aspect of it has been the primary focus, but with two babyface competitors what should they be doing? I think the story of Nakamura trying to subtly get into AJ's head by claiming he's too emotional to try and throw him off his game is just fine. Nak pulling up on hitting the Kinshasa on AJ and then patting him on the head only for AJ to do the same thing this week was great. It got a reaction, both guys are still over as hell, everyone knows the match should be great. What's the issue.

I'll take issue with the Ronda tag match as well. The story is Trips and Steph signed her because she's a big deal and she'll be "best for business", only they secretly don't really like her and are just using her like she's an animal for show or something. Angle lets this come out because he's not fond of Hunter himself, so obviously there's the reason Kurt is dragged into this. Ronda kicks Steph and Hunters ass and embarrasses them so they want to teach her a lesson now by beating her and proving this is a new world where she isn't the top dog and they run the show. If you wanna complain about Kurt being a bumbling fool a lot of the time on the mic and Ronda being green as grass, fine, but the story isn't that hard to follow.

[Hanley!]

You're correct in saying that the stories building up this show have been very lazy, bordering on non-existent. That's not anything particularly new though. They've made very little effort to build Wrestlemania for the last few years. The important thing these days is to just announce matches and point at signs. Everything else is surplus to requirements. They don't need connection or intrigue or emotion to sell Wrestlemania, provided they overwhelm the audience with branding.

What I find funny this year though is this: considering how few stories there actually are this year, a surprising amount of them require a massive suspension of disbelief from the audience. They have about half as many stories as they have matches on this card, and most of them are still idiotic.

The Cena vs Undertaker feud is based on the idea that Cena is at risk of not finding a place on the Wrestlemania card. That's bullshit. The card has over a dozen matches, the show is going to be seven hours long, and he's one of the company's biggest stars. They'd find space for him. Hell, there's a Battle Royal that literally anyone in the company can enter. The premise that he might not make Wrestlemania was absurd from the start. This week they tried to make a little more sense out of it by saying that he would be stealing a spot from a more deserving wrestler if he was to join that Battle Royal. Are there an assigned number of spaces? Are we not going to see Curt Hawkins - the biggest loser in the company - in that Battle Royal?

The Ronda and Kurt vs Steph and Triple H feud kinda makes sense if you squint a little. But if the McMahons hate Angle so much, why is he still the General Manager? And more importantly, they're trying to sell people on the idea that Stephanie McMahon can be competitive in the ring with an Olympic medalist and MMA badass. If they tried to tell me that Stephanie McMahon could hang in there with Sasha Banks I'd be annoyed. But Ronda Rousey? Fuck off.

The Bryan/Shane feud has been kind of a clusterfuck of shifting allegiances, and it's been hard to tell who the faces and the heels were supposed to be until now. The build has still been better than most other matches, but did they really have to fire Owens and Zayn and then bring them back for an "if you lose you're fired" match? That story doesn't make sense.

Maybe I'm being nitpicky, but that's what I do.

[Messiah]

@Str8Shooter The issue is its WrestleMania. The build for Styles/Nakamura might be fine for some other PPV. Maybe even SummerSlam. But not WrestleMania. The only thing that feel WrestleMania worthy about it is the dream part of it. They have hardly done anything noteworthy. Just a bunch of barebones stuff.

It also has to do with the fact that I think Nakamura is largely living off reputation at this point. Outside of his first match with Zayn in NXT, he's been dull to me in the ring.

[KaiserGlider]

Wrestlemania 31 was worse. The build for Brock/Roman 1 was abysmal and their only segment together in the ring ended with a literal tug of war over the championship belt. Daniel Bryan was stuck in a multi-person ladder match a year after his incredible run. The story for Sting vs Triple H was decent but it suffered from them constantly trying to figure out what Sting's character was. Orton/Rollins didn't feel as big as it should have. I remember nothing about Rusev vs Cena. And Bray Wyatt vs Undertaker consisted of Wyatt cutting the same promo every week while Taker sat at home. That sounds familiar... but at least their match was fucking announced!

And this may go too far back for me to remember properly, but the build for Wrestlemania 23 wasn't very good either. Both world title matches (Cena/HBK, Batista/Taker) consisted of the opponents being tag team partners with each other and not getting physical at all. A bunch of main eventers were in the Money in the Bank ladder match. The only match that had a strong build was Battle of the Billionaires.

As far as this year goes, my issue is that there's a lack of intensity/excitement and real buzz surrounding the card as a whole. A lot of matches feel predictable, a lot more than most years I'd say.

Lesnar vs Reigns is taking place at the worst possible time ever. It would have been fine as the Summerslam main event last year, but over the past six months Reigns has lost all heat from "retiring" the Undertaker and Lesnar's reign has only gotten staler. It's a foregone conclusion that Roman will dethrone Lesnar and has been for a long time. They've tried to have a good story here, but we've discussed the various problems with that in another thread.

Cena vs Taker has been a colossal disappointment, and it may not even be happening. What I'm most looking forward to here is being right in my prediction and collecting that rep from Tim.

Styles vs Nakamura and Asuka vs Charlotte are both matches that will be awesome and I am looking forward to seeing, but it's due to the fact that they're actually taking place rather than anything that has happened since they were announced.

Bryan and Shane vs Owens and Zayn was weird until Bryan got cleared to compete. Since then it's been good. My issue is that Owens and Zayn have looked like chumps for a long time. I mean, they couldn't beat AJ Styles in a handicap match at the Rumble, what chance do they have here?

I haven't watched the shows enough to comment on the midcard matches, but other than me feeling like there's too many of them for this 6-hour show, they look okay. There was a rumor that the Smackdown tag titles match could be a TLC match.

It seems I'm the only one who has truly liked the build for Ronda and Kurt vs Haitch and Steph. That's in my top three matches I'm looking forward to most. It feels like a special match that has been a long time in the making. And I don't get two of the complaints I've seen here against it: First, Ronda has showed up to almost every Raw since her signing segment. Second, they have never implied that Stephanie can be competitive with Ronda. I'll eat my words if that happens on Sunday, but so far I haven't gotten that impression.

The one thing I don't like is how marginalized Kurt Angle has been in this feud, considering this is his return to the Wrestlemania stage. Can you find Kurt Angle on the Wrestlemania 34 poster? I'm concerned that he can't work a match anymore, and they know it.

All if all, not a great build, but I wouldn't say it's bad either just based on the card. It should be a good show from a wrestling standpoint, and maybe that will make people look upon its build more favorably in the future. I say enjoy it along with the Hall of Fame and then we'll come here next week and dissect it.

[Messiah]

Semi-related but it is insane to me that since Lesnar's return, he has only lost to 5 guys.

The Undertaker
John Cena
Goldberg
(this Sunday) Roman Reigns
Triple H

They had an opportunity to make a star out of someone by having them defeat Brock. Instead it's been a bunch of guys who didn't need the rub. The youngest guy on that list is Reigns, who already is who he is at this point and a win over Lesnar won't do anything.

Just a shame. I consider it as disappointing as the follow-up to MITB '11 Punk/Cena.

[The Legend]

For what it's worth Rollins technically beat Lesnar at WM 31, that loss got returned though.

What's more Lesnar has faced 16 guys on PPV since returning. The youngest is Wyatt at 30, although he faced him in a handicap that also featured the 38yo Luke Harper. After Wyatt it's Rollins at 31. 11 of the 16 are over the age of 35 and 7 of the 16 are over 40. The average age of Lesnar's opponents is 40 years old.

[Messiah]

For what it's worth Rollins technically beat Lesnar at WM 31, that loss got returned though.

Rollins didn't even get to pin Lesnar at least. He pinned Reigns.

In hindsight, it would have been cool if Rollins pinned Lesnar. He could always brag about being the one who pinned Lesnar in the main event of 'Mania. It would have been accurate and got him even more over as a chickenshit heel.

[KaiserGlider]

I'm glad that they had Rollins pin Reigns. Lesnar shouldn't be pinned unless it was a clean loss in a singles match. Having Reigns take the pin allowed Lesnar to keep his indestructible aura and carry it into his babyface run and his feud with Rollins later on.

What's more Lesnar has faced 16 guys on PPV since returning. The youngest is Wyatt at 30, although he faced him in a handicap that also featured the 38yo Luke Harper. After Wyatt it's Rollins at 31. 11 of the 16 are over the age of 35 and 7 of the 16 are over 40. The average age of Lesnar's opponents is 40 years old.

I don't really care that he mostly faced veterans, but more that the veterans were the only ones who were able to take the fight to Brock and have a competitive match with him. (The notable exception, of course, is Roman). They didn't have to have someone beat Lesnar to get a rub, a strong performance in a great match against him would have done wonders for the rising stars like Rollins, Ambrose, Wyatt, Braun, etc that were never made to look that good against Brock. I remember thinking how wrong it was that old man Taker was able to go toe-to-toe with him for 20 minutes at Summerslam 2015 when Seth Rollins, the WWE Champion, barely did any damage during his PPV match with Brock the prior month.