10 times WWE decisions made the fans shake their heads in 2017

2017 was a very exciting year for WWE. Not only were fans treated to dream matches like John Cena versus Roman Reigns, Finn Balor versus Shinsuke Nakamura and 'The Money in The Bank' Ladder match, they also witnessed one of the best WrestleMania's in recent memory, a reunion that took many fans by surprise and a mid-level star becoming a WWE Champion.

Unfortunately for WWE, every good decision was often overshadowed by a poor decision. In fact, WWE has had several down spells throughout 2017 and while their decision making has gotten better after SummerSlam, there are still a plethora of mistakes that they need to answer.

#10 Randy Orton defeating Bray Wyatt at WrestleMania 33

Bray Wyatt, Randy Orton, — Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt making their way to the ring.

WWE made a lot of bad decisions during the storyline between Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt leading up to WrestleMania 33, but the worst of them all had to be the fact that Wyatt came out the loser. Not only did this rob The Eater of Worlds of a WrestleMania moment that could have cemented his career for years to come, it also destroyed his momentum for the rest of the year.

After losing to Orton at WrestleMania, Wyatt was unsuccessful in his house of Horrors rematch and was then traded to Monday Night Raw in The Superstar Shakeup. Wyatt did spend a little time chasing The Universal Title once on Raw, but that quickly devolved into a subpar feud with Finn Balor that fizzled out when Wyatt was hit with a viral infection.

With all that in mind, Wyatt has been slowly crumbling in 2017 and without some kind of jump start to his character in the next couple of months, he is just going to drift further and further into obscurity.

#9 Finn Balor not competing at WrestleMania 33

Finn Balor might have been out with an injury for almost a year, but that didn't stop fans from rooting for "The Demon King" when he finally did make his return to the squared circle. While Balor was greeted with an extremely warm reception when he made his triumphant return on the night after WrestleMania, one has to wonder why they couldn't have done it 24 hours ago.

Sure, it's understandable that WWE wouldn't want Balor taking the attention away from the other stars they were hoping to establish at The Show of Shows, but they could have stuck him in there somewhere and still made it interesting. In fact, WWE had the perfect chance to do just that during the street fight between Seth Rollins and Triple H.

It's no secret that WWE could have used this match to stage a Finn Balor run in and have him come to Seth Rollin's aid in some form or fashion during the bout. The crowd would have received him with a loud pop just like they did during The Hardy Boyz return and it would have opened the door for the two to form a tag team that could have won the title.

In the end, it probably would have been a great ending to see Balor and Seth Rollins fight side by side and could even have given both the Superstars some much-needed momentum heading into the coming months. Instead of doing that, Rollins floundered in the mid-card for much of the middle of 2017 and Balor still hasn't gotten all of his momenta back that he had last year.

#8 Bringing Asuka onto the main roster

WWE fans have been waiting for Asuka's debut on the main roster for a long time and while she is a very talented performer and very exciting to watch in the ring, she also couldn't have come at a worse time. Maybe the problem would have been fixed by sending her to Smackdown Live and building her up there, but WWE just had to have her on Raw.

Of course who could blame them for wanting her on Raw, especially since Monday Night Raw is WWE's flagship show and the place where many stars of the last couple of years have been made, but WWE obviously didn't take into account what effect Asuka would have on the Raw Women's division when making the decision.

With that being said, WWE creative didn't seem ready for Asuka on the main roster and this idea was made obvious by how minimalist her impact has been so far and how many Superstars they are currently trying to protect and build on Raw. In fact, WWE might have booked themselves in a huge hole here and the only way out would be to have her take a loss.

Absolution, Alexa Bliss, Sasha Banks, Nia Jax and Bayley all being huge stars and people that WWE wants to protect only hurts Asuka's character on the main roster and gives the company very limited options when booking her next feud. Sure, WWE could probably throw a couple of curve balls by going off of NXT history, but even that won't last forever.

#7 Miss Money in the Bank match

Carmella, The Princess Of Staten Island.

Great decision. Horrible execution.

That is the only way to describe WWE's decision to have the first ever miss Money In The Bank briefcase match and while it did create a lot of fanfare during its build up, WWE completely ruined that by having James Ellsworth as the one to retrieve the briefcase and just toss it to Carmella.

Of course, the match received a lot of backlash from fans, especially since many of the thrilling moments between the combatants were overshadowed by the controversial ending, but WWE did try to make up for it by redoing the match a week later on Smackdown Live. Unfortunately for WWE though, the previous decision made it impossible to take it seriously.

Make no mistake about it. This was a chance to put the women's division on the same level as many of the male competitors on the roster and WWE decided to squander it by allowing James Ellsworth retrieve the briefcase. Furthermore, their original decision also took the momentum away from Carmella when she did finally earn the win herself.

Hopefully, WWE chooses to make better decisions than this is the future, but WWE seriously almost put the women's revolution on life support with this decision.

#6 Sami Zayn saving Kevin Owens at Hell In A Cell

Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn, — Best friends, Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn,

What was the point of this? Yes, Kevin Owens versus The McMahon family was a very intriguing idea and a great way to make Owens one of the greatest heels SmackDown Live ever offered, but it also seems to have been put on the back burner by WWE in favour of other storylines.

With that being said, having Owens and Zayn together is a great idea but not if you don't do anything with it after the big reveal. Again, it was a great moment to see Zayn come to the rescue of Kevin Owens at Hell in a Cell, but absolutely meaningless if they don't push the envelope with the story at all.

For example, The Smackdown Live after the Hell in a Cell pay per view featured Zayn and Owens in a tag team match against Shinsuke Nakamura and Randy Orton. Not only was this probably the worst way ever to get an anti-Authority angle off the ground, it killed the momentum that the previous night had created.

Another problem with the storyline is its pacing, which has been incredibly slow from the start and really lacking those moments that could make something like this special. Maybe WWE has something big planned for the duo and it will eventually involve some title gold, but it just seems to be pointless for now.

#5 Baron Corbin's Money In The Bank Cash in attempt

Whether you agree with Baron Corbin's behaviour backstage or not, WWE really missed the boat by having Corbin fail to cash in his Money In The Bank briefcase the week before Summerslam. Not only was the move a huge hit in momentum for "The Lone Wolf", its also just left him in storyline limbo for much of the year.

What makes the situation worse is the fact that this was supposed to be Corbin's big break and WWE seems to have no plans to build him back up to that status in the future. Furthermore, Corbin's failed cash in came at the hands of John Cena, which is a huge sign that WWE might be done with Corbin as a main event star for a long time.

In the end, WWE let backstage politics play too big a role in their storylines this time and they really missed out on the chance to build a future heel mega star in Baron Corbin.

#4 The Jason Jordan experiment

There just no positives in WWE's current experiment with former Tag team champion, Jason Jordan. In fact, not even being revealed as Kurt Angle's illegitimate son was enough to get fans behind Jordan and now he continues to lose matches after making against big names.

Even worse, WWE continues to try to use a storyline leg injury to protect Jordan from looking too weak in defeat. Not only this storyline failed and just served to make him look even worse than he already does but also made WWE start to bring out more of a heel character in him that the fans seem to hate even worse.

WWE can't do a lot here to fix this and they would be better off either putting Gable and Jordan back together or demoting Jordan back to NXT so he can work on his character some more. Either way, he has no reason to be in the situation he is in right now and is getting absolutely destroyed by the story WWE is giving him.

#3 Enzo and Cass not winning the Tag Team titles at WrestleMania 33

It's no secret that Enzo and Cass were one of the best tag teams of the modern era of WWE. Sure, their characters were a little gimmicky at times, but it constantly sold merchandise at the same level as many of the company's top stars and had fans all around the world, chanting their ridiculous catchphrases every time they appeared.

Again, a little gimmicky at the time and Enzo Amore was hit or miss on the microphone at points, but this was something that The WWE Universe was firmly behind. Furthermore, WWE themselves seemed to be fully behind the pair rocketing up the ranks in the tag team division but never pulled the trigger on giving them a title run.

Unfortunately for Enzo and Cass, backstage issues eventually ended up breaking them apart and Cass's leg injury a few months ago only hurt both superstar's stock within the company. With that being said, WWE made a good decision by putting Amore in The Cruiserweight title picture and giving him his own stable, but it's not going to make up for what has already been lost.

#2 Keeping Brock Lesnar off the television

Don't get it twisted. Having Brock Lesnar as Universal Champion isn't necessarily a bad thing, it just becomes a bad thing when it's not defended on a monthly basis. While doing this might have worked in the past, it fails when you start to consider that The Universal Title is the only title on either brand not defended on a monthly basis and it's still a relatively new championship.

With that in mind, WWE has only made matters worse by not having Lesnar be regular on Monday Night Raw. In fact, Lesnar, who last made an appearance in November at Survivor Series, hasn't been seen or heard of since then and its starting to be rumoured that he won't be defending the title at the upcoming Royal Rumble or Fastlane pay-per-view either.

These problems are only piling on to dumpster fire which is Lesnar's reign as champion and if WWE ever wanted the title to be taken seriously, they really shouldn't have put what was supposed to be Raw's most prestigious title on a part-timer. Hopefully, WWE learns from their mistake here, but it's only going to hurt the title until then.

#1 Roman Reigns defeating The Undertaker at WrestleMania 33

The Undertaker, Roman Reigns. — The Undertaker versus Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 33.

It was the shot heard around the world.

It was probably the most unbelievable moment in recent WWE history and while IT solidified Roman Reigns as a top tier star for years to come, it also left a big hole in the heart of The WWE Universe. A hole that will seemingly never be repaired after The Undertaker retired at the conclusion of WrestleMania 33.

Not only did this rub The WWE Universe the wrong way, it also completely ruined WWE's plan to make Reigns the new top babyface of the company. WWE even ended up being forced to take Reigns off the television so that the heat could die down enough and they could start building him as a babyface again.

In the end, the match and the result failed to accomplish what it set out to do and that's why its here on the list. The match made Reigns a huge villain for the WWE, completely halted his push for several months, and gave The Undertaker what had to be one of the worst send-offs in WWE history. Just an all around the bad decision and WWE will probably pay for it for years.