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WWE’s decision to bring support Brock Lesnar as Roman Reigns’ opponent at SummerSlam was as soon as reportedly made three weeks within the past.
In conserving with Fightful Rep (h/t H Jenkins of Ringside Recordsdata), a Lesnar vs. Reigns rematch had been within the works for fairly some time, and americans unhurried the scenes started talking about Lesnar potentially appearing on Friday night’s episode of SmackDown about three hours sooner than the display started.
After Reigns beat Riddle within the considerable match of the display to preserve the undisputed WWE Universal Championship, Lesnar confronted him and hit him with an F-5 to total the episode.
Rapidly after SmackDown went off the air, WWE presented that Lesnar vs. Reigns was as soon as put of residing for SummerSlam on July 30 in a Final Man Standing match.
The Beast Incarnate had now now not appeared on WWE programming since shedding the WWE Championship to Reigns within the considerable match of WrestleMania 38 in April.
Lesnar’s return and the following announcement of the SummerSlam match came as something of a shock attributable to reviews of what WWE previously had deliberate for Reigns at the July 30 match.
Final month, Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter (h/t WrestlingInc’s Sai Mohan) reported that WWE was as soon as planning to beget Reigns defend against Randy Orton at SummerSlam.
That match would beget made a lot of sense attributable to Reigns and The Usos attacked Orton final month following a ticket crew title unification match that noticed The Usos beat RK-Bro.
Fightful Rep (h/t WrestlingInc’s Dominic DeAngelo) reported earlier this week, nonetheless, that there was as soon as “agonize” within WWE that Orton would require surgical treatment for a support rupture, most likely conserving him out for the rest of 2022.
Riddle has mentioned in promos attributable to the loss to The Usos that Orton was as soon as going via a support rupture, nonetheless the ailment will be some distance extra unswerving than followers in the starting up put thought.
There had furthermore been some speculation in relation to WWE bringing Lesnar support for Friday’s SmackDown as a strategy of overshadowing the controversy surrounding WWE chairman Vince McMahon.
McMahon temporarily stepped down as each and each chairman and CEO this week amid an investigation by WWE’s board of directors into allegations that he paid a girl $3 million to now now not discuss publicly about an affair that they had whereas she worked for WWE.
While McMahon’s daughter, Stephanie McMahon, is serving as intervening time chairwoman and CEO, McMahon has retained his characteristic as head of ingenious, and he prick a short promo in the starting up up of SmackDown.
On condition that the allegations against McMahon had been most intelligent made public this week, it looks as though Lesnar’s return was as soon as in space some distance sooner than that given the timeline provided by Fightful.
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