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What's the story?
If you found yourself confused as to why WWE is booking John Cena vs Roman Reigns for No Mercy instead of WrestleMania, don't worry. You're not alone. According to a report from DirtySheets.com, WWE made the decision to go with the match at No Mercy a mere four hours before Raw went on the air last night.
In case you didn't know...
Cena vs Reigns has been on the cards for months now, as speculation began circulating around the time Reigns finished up his feud with Braun Strowman. Seeds were planted for this new feud on Twitter, with the two men taking shots at each other over the social media platform. However, things shifted into a higher gear with Cena moving to Raw and confronting Reigns in person. Next thing you know, it's Cena/Reigns at No Mercy.
The heart of the matter
According to the report, original plans for No Mercy involved Samoa Joe vs John Cena and Roman Reigns vs The Miz (presumably to get Roman the IC title and, therefore, a "Grand Slam"). Then, the idea of Cena and Reigns teaming up to challenge Ambrose and Rollins for the Raw Tag Team Championships was floated.
The idea was to have Cena/Reigns win the tag titles at No Mercy, drop them at TLC in October, followed by Cena vs Reigns at Survivor Series. However, as with most things that go wrong, a Michael Bay Transformers movie screwed everything up. Cena informed WWE officials that he won't be able to appear on any WWE shows while he films his role in the Transformers spin-off movie, Bumblebee.
What's next?
As much as this throws a monkey wrench in their plans, this new situation did lead to both Cena and Reigns cutting some of the best promos of their careers. When you look at this situation with others going on in the company, it eventually means that WWE is looking at a Survivor Series without Cena or Brock Lesnar.
Author's take
As much as I'm sure WWE would rather this matchup at Survivor Series or WrestleMania, it's certainly going to draw more eyes to No Mercy than would be there without it. Between this match and the Lesnar/Strowman match, this is already a pretty stacked card.
What WWE is really missing out on, though, is the opportunity to re-release the classic N64 game WWF No Mercy - with updated rosters - in conjunction with this event. Or maybe that's just me.
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