Early WWE SummerSlam Prediction/Preview

It’s almost time for the biggest WWE event of the Summer! That event of course being WWE Summer Slam! For the 5th straight year, WWE and it’s talent will use the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California as their venue for this years event. Which is LIVE Sunday August 18th on pay per view.

Now the full card hasn’t been released yet, only a couple matches. What this is, as reads in the title of this article, is an early prediction and preview. So let’s take a look at the first 3 matches that have been already announced for this events card.

WWE Champion John Cena vs #1 contender Daniel Bryan – Yesterday on WWE Raw, new general manager Brad Maddox gave John Cena the opportunity to name his opponent for August 18th. To my surprise, it turned out to be Daniel Bryan. I wasn’t really excited about John Cena’s previous title defense against Mark Henry, due to the fact that the match was pretty much just going to be strength vs strength, Cena getting hammered then winning. Which is exactly what happened. But with this championship match, now that a great in ring performer like Daniel Bryan is involved, I’m pretty excited about it. Daniel has been in a couple good championship matches, ones that mainly involved former WWE Champion CM Punk. The in ring ability that Daniel Bryan has, should keep this from being a typical stale John Cena title defense.

I’m not taking anything away from the champ, but you need more than 5 moves, muscle and the ability to suck up to crowds to please fans who have been watching for more than 15+ years. So with this match I do expect John Cena to retain as the WWE could be looking at another Randy Orton/John Cena feud. In the weeks to come between now and Summer Slam, I expect this match to get as much hype as it can get. But as I said before, I see John Cena retaining his WWE Championship. Not really much to say about a match that has John Cena defending the WWE Championship, you know this company won’t pull the title away from him until late in the year.

Brock Lesnar w/Paul Heyman vs  CM Punk – As of right now this is my match of the night. Any match that CM Punk is involved in, is usually a 5 star match. A great in ring performer, awesome mic skills and the ability to promote, this could be match of the year. Another reason why this match will be great, is because of Paul Heyman. You have to give the man credit, Heyman is a genius. The promo between Punk and Heyman last night on RAW had the hair on my arms standing straight up. We all know it’s scripted, but the way they interacted with each other made it seem like it was going to be a real fight and Heyman’s life was actually in danger. You know they are doing an amazing job if they can make a viewer feel that way. Now this match just like John Cena and Daniel Bryan’s WWE Championship match, is more of a David and Goliath show down. You have a monster of a man and former UFC Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar against your not so average sized former WWE Champion who doesn’t back down from a fight, CM Punk.

Out of every match on this card, this one right here will get the most hype. I honestly think this match could be the main event for this years Summer Slam. I have no idea what this out come could possibly be, considering Heyman’s actions at Money in the Bank shocked me. I sort of seeing this feud carrying on for a few months, as did Lesnar’s feud with Triple H. But if I could choose the outcome of this match, I would have Brock over CM Punk and I’ll tell you why. It will lead up to a bigger and better match up later in the year. Paul Heyman or Curtis Axel gets involved as soon as it looks as if Punk has this match in the bag, causing Lesnar to capitalize on a victory. It just doesn’t seem right to me that this match up between Lesnar/Heyman and Punk will be over as soon as Summer Slam comes to a close, we will just have to wait and see.

Dolph Ziggler vs Big E. Langston – Now this match hasn’t been officially announced but after what happened on RAW yesterday, you have to think this is going to make the card. I’m pretty bummed that Zigglers title reign was so short lived and didn’t have the opportunity to pick it back up at Money in the Bank, but I love the idea of the story-line. As soon as Ziggler cashed in his Money in the Bank and defeated Del Rio on RAW a couple months ago, I knew this little stable between WWE Divas Champion AJ Lee, Dolph Ziggler and Big E. Langston was history. The past few months, even leading to Dolph cashing in his brief case on Del Rio, the crowd started to slowly turn Ziggler into the face he is now. Not really expecting much of this match, but I see Ziggler getting over and moving on to becoming the #1 contender for the World Heavyweight Championship again. A guy who has really become one of my favorites in the last 3 years.

Now for the rest of the card, it’s pretty much in the air right now. So let’s take a look at matches that could possibly work for this event.

‘The Intellectual Savior of the Masses’ Damien Sandow vs ‘Dashing’ Cody Rhodes – Former tag team partners who recently split up due to Sandow ripping Rhodes off the ladder as he came close to winning the match himself. I believe it could work best if they decided to put the Money in the Bank brief case up for grabs in this match up. Both men seem to work together perfectly and have good in ring skills. After being 2 of the top heels in my opinion, this is long overdue. In what would make an entertaining match, probably going a solid 8-9 minutes, I see Sandow retaining his World Heavyweight Championship contract, but the feud continuing on until WWE figures out something else for Rhodes.

Ryback vs Sheamus – Feed Me More! Brogue! Brogue! Brogue! This match would sort of be like the ‘SharkNado’ of the pay per view event. They fell off on both Ryback and Sheamus and need to figure out a way to get them back in the spotlight. So why not match them up?

World Heavyweight Champion Alberto Del Rio vs Rey Mysterio – I know what you are thinking, ‘but we haven’t seen Rey in a very long time?’, which is exactly why it would be a good time to bring him back for a title shot since there really is no #1 contender that would make sense. There has been talks of Mysterio coming back to the WWE and knowing it’s in Los Angeles (him being from San Diego) it would kind of be a homecoming for Mysterio. Something the fans wouldn’t expect, could work out great. Would Rey Rey win the World Heavyweight Championship? No, but it would definitely be a good fill in spot for him.

Tag Team Champion(s) The Shield vs The Usos vs The Real Americans vs Tons of Funk – The tag team division has really fallen off before The Shield and The Usos arrived. Any pay per view WWE has, isn’t really complete without a tag team match of some sort. It’s Summer Slam so why not make it a Four Way Tag Team Match? Makes sense right? I think if this does happen, it could end up on the pre-show that airs on YouTube.

Intercontinental Champion Curtis Axel vs Chris Jericho – A typical battle for a young star on the rise, to go up against the legendary Chris Jericho. Kind of like the Fandango/Jericho feud, this could be a top match of the night if this were to be booked. Put the title on the line, build up the  match and see how it turns out on Sunday August 18th.

United States Champion Dean Ambrose vs Rob Van Dam – I was kind of surprised on how good RVD looked in his return to the WWE this past Sunday and on Monday. He obviously lost some muscle because of his age, but his ability to perform in the ring and hit that infamous 5 star frog splash is still spot on. The whole ‘Injustice’ thing with The Shield could really pull in RVD for a possible match up against the United States Champion, Dean Ambrose. This could be a solid 10 minute match.

Anything Divas Related – It’s Summer Slam. You can’t have Summer Slam without the WWE Divas. If they do anything, it will more than likely involve some sort of Bikini Battle Royal, you know, something to catch the guy’s in the audience attention. Keep them interested if a match seems to have been dull. Throw in a #1 contender spot for AJ Lee’s WWE Diva’s Championship and build on from there. If this happens, I see Kaitlyn coming out on top, unless this is where Kelly Kelly is brought back.

There you have it! My WWE SummerSlam Prediction/Preview! Thank you for reading! I just hope they somehow include The Wyatt Family in the mix.

WWE SummerSlam is LIVE on Pay Per View, August 18th in Los Angeles (The Staples Center), California.

Typical air time will be 8 P.M. Eastern/5 P.M. Pacific time.