Heyman’s Mastery
Paul Heyman is an absolute master of ring psychology. There is a major difference to how he behaves as Brock Lesnar’s advocate (with a much more free-flowing, confident authoritative tone in his voice) and the way he conducts himself as the “special counsel” for Roman Reigns (with a more subservient attitude and he pulls back on the reins of his level of authenticity). The reason Paul is doing this is very strategic; it is Mr. McMahon’s primary goal to orchestrate a scenario where Heyman can do some of the talking while Roman acclimates and becomes comfortable with the idea of cutting heel promos.
Hopefully, this will evolve to the point where it can be more of a 60:40 split in favor of Reigns doing the bulk of the talking (this is the ultimate vision – so The Big Dog can one day captivate the WWE universe in the same way John Cena did on a regular basis not too long ago). Jey Uso is currently serving as a placeholder as Reigns opponent in order to buy time for The Fiend, as this is somewhat of an incubation time right now in order to transition The Fiend into the top babyface on SmackDown.
WWE fans might have to imagine that the company will look to keep The Fiend out of Hell in a Cell simply to avoid stirring up negative memories for the WWE universe of The Fiend’s debacle inside the Cell in 2019 against Seth Rollins. Personally, I thought the match was solid, but it was horribly received by nearly everyone else. As wrestling fans, we need to remember and respect the fact that the performers are always busting their asses to entertain us – so we need to be appreciative of that. We couldn’t do any better, so we need to simply appreciate what they have on any given night – it’s going to fluctuate some nights and not be as good, and the performances will be fantastic other nights. This is an unpredictable phenomenon happening in real-time, which is one reason it is so appealing.
In other news, even though WWE just started the ThunderDome presentation format for SmackDown on FOX less than a month ago, Mr. McMahon is reportedly already preparing for the future of WWE after ThunderDome. WWE is currently preparing for the WWE universe to return for live shows around early November (right around the time of the Hell in a Cell Pay-Per-View on November 1).
McMahon is currently looking at finding an outdoor venue in the state of Florida to hold all WWE events for the foreseeable future (possibly a minor-league baseball stadium). WWE would begin with about 10 – 20% capacity of fans and increase the number by a small amount every week to acclimate the WWE universe to having fans in attendance at every show again. The end goal is by WrestleMania 37 (which is scheduled to be held at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, home of the Los Angeles Rams) in late March 2021, the general public in the United States will be fully comfortable moving on from this pandemic.