Wrestlemania 28 Dark Match

[Diet Soda]

First of all, a quick recap of previous years' real show starters...

Last year, Daniel Bryan challenged for Sheamus' U.S. title in a lumberjack match; a brawl broke out and Smackdown GM Teddy Long holla'd up a battle royal, won by the Great Khali, achieving nothing. Essentially meaningless.

The year before at WM 26, there was another battle royal, won by Yoshi Tatsu - the beginning of a massive push which unfortunately ended shortly before 'America the Beautiful' was sang.

At the 25th anniversary of Wrestlemania, an historic moment occurred wherein the WWE went from having two tag team titles to one, unified in match between the Colons and Miz and Morrison. This of course was a lumberjack match.

Before that Kane won a battle royal, earning the right to squash Chavo for the ECW title, another tag team lumberjack match, and two other battle royals.

It goes without saying, there is a trend of making sure every superstar gets to show their face for at least 5 minutes on the grandest stage, even if it just a WWE.com exclusive or a DVD extra.

So, going off WWE's recent history, what do you think this year's dark match will be?

I'm going to pick the Usos challenging Primo and Epico for the Tag Team Championship in the Devil's playpen that is a Lumberjack match.

 

[SickJames]

You pretty much hit it right on the head. I couldnt imagine anyone debating this as it's obvious. I mean name me anyone else who would really be the dark match over a great Tag Team Championship match, the only titles not featured on the card in some fashion. It makes sense. Especially since any other midly big name is already in a match on the actual card or injured. There's no one else relevant enough to have a more meaningful dark match.

What doesnt make sense is Brodus Clay needing to be thrown into PPVs out of nowhere. Fucking sick of it. It's one thing to do it on a lower PPV, but not WrestleMania. Especially what could be the greatest of all time since WMX7.

I'd rather just see two dark matches if they really go through with the reported pending squash match of his. He doesnt deserve Mania time. It also sucks they waste the talents of the best female wrestler they have, Naomi, as a dancer along side him in his cheap Funk Master Flash rip off.


And people call the Divas bouts bathroom breaks, I love the Divas. Their match will be fun for me, but not some squash match not even confirmed in advance or promoted, just randomly inserted. Impromptu bouts dont belong at Mania, save for Hogan/Yokozuna which was acceptable. Not this bullshit match. Any match before it will be totally disrespected by it, especially if the event kicks off with the WWE Championship match.

 

[Dagger Dias]

It's hard to guess what the dark match might be. They could do a tag team titles match, but who would they even offer the title shot to? Ziggler and Swagger are in the GM match. Kofi is too, Bourne is nowhere to be found. Hawkins and Slater could team up as a jobber team or something. Poor Hawkins, it'd just be a rerun of his Gatecrashers team. If they do make the dark match a tag team title match I just hope that it's not The Usos who get the title shot. I hate them so much and they do not deserve to do a thing at Wrestlemania.

Brodus Clay needs something to do. He could always squash someone in the dark match. That would give the crowd in attendance something interesting to start off the night with and the rest of us can still see it as a DVD extra later on. They have really begun to run out of jobbers to feed to Brodus though. Perhaps one of the NXT guys or someone from FCW who they want to showcase before promoting to the main roster could be called up for the dark match? It's either that or move on toward feeding midcarders to him. That's my prediction though.... Brodus Clay winning a random filler match will be the dark match because it will get the crowd excited while also giving Brodus something to do at Wrestlemania.

 

[SD619]

I think that it should be a battle royal. If they want to have Brodus on the card, they should have him in a dark match rather than a pointless squash. He could win the match and dance around a bit to get the crowd excited.

The other option would be a tag-team match. It will most likely be Epico/Primo vs the Usos.

 

[Beastmode 24]

I couldn't agree more. The tag team match before the main card is really where the titles need to be right now. The tag team division is so weak right now that it would be ridiculous to put the belts on the main card.

 

[BigThunder]

I'd like to see the dark match as Joe Hennig (billed as such) vs. Tyson Kidd. The two have worked their butts off, and the NXT fued has been a good one.

Have the tag belts defended on the show --against Mick Foley and a returning Rey Mysterio, if he's ready. That would probably garner one helluva pop.

Brodus should replace Zack on Team Teddy, after some shenagins by Eve, with a Brodus vs. Mark Henry confrontation being a major part of the tag match.

 

[PlayTheGame]

Well, I'm really glad that they put the tag match here, and not take a match off of the advertised card like they did last year for the dark match. I was kinda disappointed they took off Bryan/Sheamus for the US Title last year, not because I was dying to see it, but I just felt jipped a little. So I'm glad we won't get a repeat of last year. And it'll be available online for free, which is nice I guess. Not sure if last year's dark match was available online, it probably was, but I feel like it was poorly advertised- I actually know about this one, and hopefully I'll watch it. I'm also glad they didn't resort to just having an overused battle royal. While not that bad, they just seemed to be overused as WM dark matches, so its nice to see something different and fairly unique.

I'm sure the match won't be that special, but maybe there will be some fast-paced action to get the crowd going and pump up their adrenaline a bit before the main card. As for the result, I would guess that the tag champs retain.

But overall, I'll say it again: I'm glad they chose this and decided not to jip us out of a match again this year. Good move WWE.

 

[TBK]

I gotta say, they picked a really good match to get the crowd hyped for the rest of Mania. 3 very flippy teams, not to mention guys like Tyson try to work hard to put on the best match about every show they're on. I wouldn't be surprise if they end up better than one or two matches on the actual show no matter what time limit they give them.

 

[RhymeaverseCena ok]

I was extremely dissapointed last year when Sheamus and Bryan didn't have their US title match. I just realized that they are having a rematch as a main event at wrestlemania. It is impressive to see what these two superstars have done this year. Aside from that If the crowd falls in love or hates one of these tag teams you can just have the division comeback. I really wish they gave the Harts vs Usos more time last year.

 

[klunderbunker]

For the tag titles and likely a dark match.This was announced the week of the show and is going to be streamed for free on the WWE’s Youtube channel and WWE.com. The champions have had the belts now for about two and a half months but were actually being used as jobbers on Raw for Big Show earlier this week. I love the Usos but for the life of me I don’t get why they added in Gabriel and Kidd. Apparently the team was formed on Superstars with the question from Kidd of “hey, wanna be a team” and a reply of “sure”. That gets you in the title match at Mania now I guess.