WWE held a press conference on Friday to confirm what everyone already knew, Cain Velasquez will be challenging Brock Lesnar for the WWE Championship and lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury will face Braun Strowman at the Crown Jewel event on Thursday, October 31 at King Fahd International Stadium in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Read a 5Dimes review so you can see why this reputable sportsbook is so popular among wrestling bettors.
WWE Championship: Brock Lesnar (c) vs. Cain Velasquez
According to ESPN’s Marc Raimondi, Cain Velasquez signed a lucrative multi-year deal with WWE on Friday and he also told the UFC that he will retire from the Octagon. The former UFC heavyweight champion had already been removed from USADA’s drug-testing pool and from the company’s heavyweight rankings.
Velasquez appeared on the inaugural Friday Night SmackDown show on Fox on October 4, which shocked both MMA and pro wrestling fans and he obviously has a lot of history with Lesnar.
The seeds for the Lesnar vs. Velasquez feud were planted on the September 30 episode of Monday Night Raw after Lesnar brutally attacked Rey Mysterio and his son Dominick. Lesnar won the WWE Championship in a match against Kofi Kingston on Friday Night SmackDown in just six seconds and Rey Mysterio would then show up with Cain Velasquez, who entered the ring, took Lesnar down and punched him repeatedly. Lesnar retreated and WWE later confirmed the match.
Cain Velasquez took the heavyweight title from Lesnar at UFC 121 on October 23, 2010, with a first-round TKO. He went 14-3 in his MMA career with 12 wins via knockout. The 37-year-old lost his last MMA fight against Francis Ngannou at UFC on ESPN: Ngannou vs. Velasquez on February 17, 2019. He then started training to become a pro wrestler and he debuted at AAA’s Triplemania 27 on August 3 where he was part of a six-man tag team match with Psycho Clown and Cody
Rhodes against Texano Jr., Taurus, and Killer Kross. He applied a Kimura Lock to Texano, securing the win for this team in front of 18,000 fans at the Arena CDMX.
How should WWE book this match? Velasquez is a threat to Lesnar but he should not win the WWE Championship in his first match with the company and just the second wrestling match of his career! Brock Lesnar just won the belt so he should keep it for a while, the problem is that Velasquez should not lose either. I would make these two superstars have a long feud so this match has to end with a double count-out or with both of them unable to continue.
Braun Strowman vs. Tyson Fury
Lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury was sitting in the front row at SmackDown’s Fox debut and Braun Strowman stared him and then threw Dolph Ziggler at him, making Fury jump the barricade. Security had to separate them back and WWE let Fury make an appearance on Monday Night Raw to talk to Strowman but once again they had to be pulled apart by security and other wrestlers in a brawl.
This match is being done as a way to help Fury (29-0-1, 20 KOs) promote his rematch with Deontay Wilder, which could take place next year. Fury battled Wilder to a split draw on December 1, 2018, in Los Angeles and as far as this match with Strowman, I’m not really looking forward to it, I’ve never been a fan of Strowman, especially now that he is basically Big Show 2.0 and I can’t see Fury losing this.
Team Hogan: WWE Universal Champion Seth Rollins (Captain), Rusev and three superstars to be named later vs. Team Flair: Randy Orton (Captain), King Corbin and three superstars to be named later
The Survivor Series pay-per-view is on November 24 but WWE Crown Jewel will give fans a chance to enjoy a five-on-five elimination match, with WWE Hall of Famers Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair in the corner of each team. WWE announced the match in a Miz TV segment on the September 30 episode of Monday Night Raw. Back then, Hogan and Flair teased one last match between them and The Miz then said that WWE already decided to let each of them have a team of five hand-picked superstars for a match in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
For now, Team Hogan has WWE Universal Champion Seth Rollins as their captain and Rusev while Randy Orton will lead Flair’s team. Team Flair has Orton and King Corbin but Bobby Lashley, who started an on-screen relationship with Rusev’s wife Lana, will likely join them. Corbin has had a rivalry with Chad Gable, so it would not surprise me if Hogan recruits him to his team.