Big E is a 2x Intercontinental champion, and it looks like he has done the inner work necessary to become the most authentic person of himself and embody his own energy. While E is IC champion, perhaps Sami Zayn could do some work with Kevin Owens; they work so well together, and Kevin has seemingly wrapped up his storyline with Roman Reigns for the Universal championship. This would be fitting as both men have just lost title matches.
The push of Big E has been a slow burn over the past 8 years that has required some serious patience. Roman Reigns, who debuted on the main roster about a month earlier and was chosen as the next phase of the company after John Cena, had more of a direct path to the top. The Shield lasted for less than two years and his rise to the top of the company started immediately after that. Big E had roughly a two-year run on the main roster which included an IC championship reign. The New Day was incredibly successful over six years before splitting in October for E to officially begin his singles run again.
After feuding with Sheamus (and coming out although rivalry looking strong) back in August, one could have conceived that it would make the most sense for WWE to continue that momentum of E by booking him in a title feud immediately following this. However, Vince McMahon decided to wait a few months before orchestrating for E to win the Intercontinental championship for the second time in his career. No one will forget this title victory because it took place on Christmas. While he has already accomplished this once before in his career, this was still an excellent idea because it has been a very long time since Big E was a singles competitor (most kids under 10 years old don’t even remember). He will still absolutely weighing many world titles throughout his career, and this second run with the Intercontinental championship will serve to remind fans of why he has earned it over the years (Patience is a virtue).
The match between Daniel Bryan and Jey Uso was one of DB’s better performances of 2020 (excluding Pay-Per-Views). Jey Uso has also become a top-level main event superstar on SmackDown; his brother Jimmy will instantly be thrown into that same position when he returns from injury in January or February and joins The Bloodline with their cousin Roman Reigns giving orders as the Head of The Table.
Back to Daniel Bryan, he appears to be in an excellent place in life – nothing appears to be weighing too heavily on his consciousness right now. He is in a transitional phase in life in which he is wrapping up his full-time WWE career and looking toward the future where his family is the top priority. This man appears to have an excellent conceptualization of his priorities in life. His family is at the top of the list, and everything else just kind of falls into place.
Even though Bryan is looking toward the future and what that may bring with two kids and a wife to take care of, for now he is 100% focused on accomplishing the one thing he has never done in WWE, and that would be to win a Royal Rumble match. Back in 2015 – the year Roman Reigns won it – the entire WWE universe was clamoring for Daniel Bryan to get the victory. The two men would meet again in the main event of the Fastlane 2015 the following month before Roman went on to face Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 31 (Seth Rollins walked out of that event with the WWE World Heavyweight championship after cashing in his Money in the Bank contract). Bryan captured the Intercontinental championship for the first time in his career