The Shield, Evolution, and the Title (And spoilers maybe.)
 

So Bryan is most likely going to be stripped of the title, and they have to figure out what to do with it. Meanwhile all of the company's top guys (minus Cena happily) were already booked in a No DQ elimination tag match. Throw the title into it. Whoever gets the last elimination on their team becomes champion. In the closing moments of the match, HHH gets eliminated, then Batista accidentally spears him, and gets speared by Roman Reigns who becomes champion. Batista gets thrown out of Evolution, beat down by HHH and Orton, and then gets fired. I don't usually approve of hot-shotting titles like this, but it's a circumstance for a hot-shot and Reigns can prove he's ready for this, and it could lead to HHH vs Reigns at SummerSlam (where a returning Daniel Bryan can neutralize whatever shenanigans HHH puts in place.) I really want to see a title belt-adorned Reigns standing face to face with HHH shouting "Are you going to call ME B+ player now?! And they can go on to tease tension within the Shield again. Honestly though I'd love to see them stay together as a well-oiled machine while Reigns carries the belts. Hopefully just one belt soon.

That sounds like a good idea. I read that they were going to drag this out a bit maybe to try to keep the titles on Bryan, but I think this is a good opportunity for some people to step up and show that they are main event material. Let's just hope they don't put the titles back on Orton.

The title would make the feud more about Reigns rather than The Shield. The battles are going on perfectly fine without needing the title. Just seems like it would take to much away from The other members of Shield unless you want to run a jealously angle.

I'd prefer Reigns as champ over Bryan. This Cena-Wyatt feud would have been more awesome with the title up for grabs though. I wouldn't mind them fighting for it.

Batista was an awesome heel just before WrestleMania when he was just shitting all over Daniel Bryan fans for their role in making the business less about "real men" and more about scrawny regular guys. Since then he's become a generic, voiceless stable member who has jobbed more than he's won. I have no desire now to see him as a heel champion at this point.

I posted a scenario in 100,001 replies where I suggested that Triple H use the title to drive The Shield apart. That may be too cerebral for the WWE to do. A simpler storyline, and one that the Triple H character should be smarter than -- but you can always explain that his lust for the title overwhelms any other savvy he has -- is that he just rewards himself the World Title. Randy Orton and Batista don't like it, but Triple H tells them that they can fight it out once The Shield is done with.

The heat on Triple H for this would be nuclear. Can you imagine Daniel Bryan doing the right thing and vacating the title, only for Stephanie McMahon to welcome the new WWE World Heavyweight Champion, before "King of Kings" hits, and a man that Daniel Bryan beat at WrestleMania XXX just strolls on down and takes the titles?

At Payback, you probably have Dean Ambrose eat the first fall. He's my favorite of The Shield, but he seems the one that they are presenting as the weakest of a very strong group. His insanity and personality probably make him the best choice to eat the first fall. Reigns and Rollins are put down and Evolution circle Dean, who is all "Bring it!" anyway. A Triple Powerbomb from Evolution sees Ambrose eliminated.

Next you either have Rollins eliminate Batista or Orton eliminate Rollins. Giving Rollins a pin would probably be a good thing going forward with him. Batista looks like he's about to Batista Bomb Reigns, but he gets a springboard knee across the face and a few seconds later he cops a Piece of Mind onto a chair and Rollins has pinned him. Rollins then tries something tricky on Orton, but gets caught with an RKO out of nowhere, to eliminate him and bring on a chorus of "Holy shit!" chants.

Triple H and Orton think they have Reigns down, but he battles back against both men. They can maybe even do some sort of spot where Reigns grabs a steel chair as an "equalizer," but then Reigns tosses it to Orton and Triple H and says that one of them will need it, in one of those bad-ass action hero moments. Reigns cops a beat-down, but he manages a few spots where he battles back. JBL doesn't give him much chance -- "He's in there with the current champion and the former champion!" -- but Reigns dodges a sledgehammer shot from Triple H, who nails Orton on the gut, clears Triple H out of the ring and Spears Orton into oblivion for the three count. Reigns is left alone with Triple H now...

The Game actually looks terrified and even tries to beg off Reigns, but Roman's having none of that. Triple H tries his heelish techniques, but Reigns has got something for everything. Since it is No Holds Barred, however, Orton just attacks Reigns out of nowhere. Batista makes his way down and it is 3-on-1; until The Shield run out and try to even the odds. The battle lines are drawn for the final fall, but Randy Orton and Batista look at each other...then decide to bail!

Triple H is mortified as his allies have deserted him. He realizes the world of trouble he is in now. He drops to his knees and BEGS The Shield not to beat the crap out of him, but The Hounds of Justice are essentially licking their lips. They swarm Triple H, hopefully to a monster pop, and then all take turns hitting their signature moves on him. Finally, they call for it, and Triple H gets the Triple Powerbomb he has been avoiding for all these weeks -- maybe even though a table. Reigns pins The Game and also scores a fall over the WWE World Heavyweight Champion.

Batista leaves to promote his movie, with the kayfabe reason being he is sick of Triple H's crap and just awarding himself the title. Randy Orton enters the Money in the Bank Ladder Match, looking for a repeat win and finally a way to get back to "his" title. Triple H doesn't want to do so, but perhaps a random Vince McMahon return leads to Roman Reigns being given the Money in the Bank title shot, since he not only pinned Triple H himself at Payback, but Randy Orton as well. Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins are both inserted into the Money in the Bank Ladder Match by Triple H, as a sort of "fuck you, destroy each other in there" concept. It is assumed they will work together, but JBL promises us that when push comes to shove, one of these men will turn on the other. And they do beat the crap out of each other, and probably cost each other a chance at winning. Actually, I'd have Rollins take a huge dump off the ladder and Ambrose looks like he's about to win, but the briefcase is raised, because The Authority doesn't want a member of The Shield as champion. Or you can just have Ambrose win and use the briefcase and the title for some underlying tension.

If the fans are eating up Reigns as a top face (and they probably will be), then Reigns can pin Triple H at Money in the Bank to become the new champion. I don't know how long you'd keep the title on Reigns, but you can give Daniel Bryan some more time off and have him return at SummerSlam for a match against Reigns, or even hold off on Bryan going after the title altogether. Milk his return for what it's worth and create another star in the meantime. Ambrose & Rollins can continue stealing the show and having Reigns's back. Since The Wyatt Family are likely to be your next WWE Tag Team Champions, the idea of having Ambrose & Rollins challenge them and even get a run with the titles is not too unattractive an idea.

Reigns having the title will be dumb, Give it to Kane in the mean time until they figure out whats going on with bryan

The idea sounds interesting but way too early to give Reigns the title. Out of everyone involved, Triple H would make more sense for storyline reasons.

Can use it as an excuse to dissolve Evolution because he's did all the hard work. Batista gets the time to leave while Orton stays in the Authority or gets freed to do new things.

Can use the title as proof of good things eventually come to those who side with the Authority. This lets the Authority to get some new guys or as the start of getting Ambrose and/or Rollins to defect from the Shield.

Him being champion also gets rid of any booking complications once Bryan returns since its already been established the bad blood between them and right now he's the perfect arch-rival for Bryan.

I'm with Savior. Kane wins, we all win.

If Kane gets the title he needs to turn on everyone, including the Authority, and spend all summer destroying everyone until the Authority has to beg Bryan to come back and stop him.

That would be a dream come true.

Put on a tournament, have Lesnar win the title and hold it for a very long time. A guy like Bryan is not Championship material, for a guy that small, it's just not realistic. Don't get me wrong, he is very talented, but for him to beat HHH in a singles match, or really any top star, Batista, Orton, ect... It is really unrealistic.

Yes, because our show that features undead zombie cowboys and fire-demons from hell is nothing if not 100% devoted to realism.

Anyway, I think they're kind of screwed right now when it comes to the title situation with Bryan out of the picture. Nobody wants to see Cena or Randy with the belts again, Batista's gone over like a wet fart, the Shield have kind of proven when they were teasing a breakup that they don't work as singles as well as they do as a team, and Bray Wyatt is still kind of half-baked as a main-event guy (the fact that his feud with Cena won't fucking end certainly doesn't help).

If they can get Brock Lesnar to agree to do more appearances, then I'd agree that he's got the best chance of looking like a "legit" champion right now, especially since he's still got that "holy shit I ended the Streak" feather in his cap. Other than that, they could conceivably put the belt on Roman Reigns (which I don't think would do him any good, and in the long run would turn him into another flash-in-the-pan who flopped because he was pushed too soon), run an angle where Triple H just gives himself the title because he's eeeeevillll, or get Vince to start piling up bags of money outside CM Punk's house.

Yeah... a guy who wrestles like 3 times a year.

How old are you that you still think that wrestling is entirely about who is bigger?

It's not about who is bigger but he is absolutely right. If you can honestly tell me that, if you 'assume' wrestling to be real, that you think Daniel Bryan could week in and week out beat people like Orton, Batista, HHH, Kane, etc.....then you are smoking the best drugs ever. He would get his ass kicked almost every single time if we were going with realism.

So I understand what Kingofdaswing is meaning. Daniel Bryan is NOT a realistic heavyweight champion and he never will be. He's just an awesome, feel-good, Cinderella story that the average Joe can totally relate to.

Why would he get his ass kicked almost every single time, since you say its not about "whos bigger"?

And again, WWE contains people with fucking magical powers and pretends that fictional characters like Scooby Doo and the Muppets are real people......but a smaller guy beating bigger guys, that's what breaks your suspension of disbelief?

No matter who gets the belt, these spots should happen. :y:

Is it the Super Hulk tournaments that DREAM used to run at New Years in Japan, where the put on mismatched MMA bouts featuring guys the size of Bryan against the Bob Sapps of the world? Pretty sure a big guy rarely, if ever, won that.

Wrestling needing realism isn't the reason Bryan on top doesn't work. It's actually the exact opposite. Wrestling succeeds and is at it's best when it's larger than life. A vibe Daniel Bryan does not give off in any way, shape or form. He may have worked as "the man" when people still thought wrestling was real in the pre-Hogan days but now it just comes off as a fake version of something you can readily watch the real version of instead by flipping over to UFC. ROH does the style where everything's treated more realistic and guys like Daniel Bryan can be on top. They do it perfectly fine, too. Yet they'll never make it as a major company. It just doesn't work.

bryan works fine.

Oh, well that settles it.

So did Benoit I guess.

Bryan works as long as he is playing the character he is doing now. Problem is that chracter only works for so long. He's no John Cena and it even became boring on Cena. Now, unfortunately, Cena lost a huge chunk of fans for life.

After reading this I can only conclude that you understand nothing about booking philosophy. Also that you must have thought every one of Ric Flair's title runs was completely unrealistic as well.