The match
John Cena lucked his way into a team of monsters and a wrestler who loses all the time but looks great doing it to battle the forces of evil in The Authority, who put together a squad of killers and a guy who loses all the time and looks awful doing it. If Team Cena wins, The Authority lose their power. Conversely, if The Authority wins, everyone on Team Cena will be fired.
The players
Team Authority
Seth Rollins: In the absence of Triple H actually wrestling (which appears to be a big oversight considering the stakes, no?), Rollins is the leader of this rag tag group of misfits. He is the glue holding it all together, much like he was during his days in The Shield. Or so he claims.
Kane: The corporate lackey who does what he's told because ... uh ... look, he just does, okay? He's not particularly good at wrestling and/or winning but he's big, he can still summon fire near the ropes, and he's got cool entrance music.
Mark Henry: One night he just sort of showed up as a member of the team. He was scouted first, of course, but the recruitment process occurred entirely off camera and we were never really told what motivated him to join. He's a bad guy and bad guys stick together in wrestling. That'll do.
Rusev: Stephanie McMahon gave him a US title shot, then made sure he won the title, then made sure he successfully defended it. This was enough to convince Lana to give the go ahead. They go. Crush.
Luke Harper: He's a team playa. Why? Who the hell knows, but he got an Intercontinental championship match for joining the bad guys and he promptly won the title.
Team Cena
John Cena: The face who runs the place, he didn't so much recruit a team as luck his way into four guys providing unending support despite the fact that he failed to reciprocate at every possible opportunity (and there were many). He's so confident his team will win, he even threatened to use multiple small children if his team was taken out before the show. This guy.
Dolph Ziggler: Having been held down by the powers that be for months on end before all this nonsense broke out, he was eager to jump on board with the idea that defeating The Authority would get them out of power. Then he was put through hell, lost his Intercontinental title, and was severely beaten time and again. Still, he perseveres.
Big Show: After Mark Henry joined The Authority, he was eager to offer his services to Team Cena on the basis that it would give him another opportunity to go after the friend who recently betrayed him. That's been put on the backburner now, however, because he's fighting for his continued employment. Hey, wait a minute, doesn't Show have an iron clad contract?
Erick Rowan: He just showed up. No, really, he stopped searching for Renee Young and/or pretty blond haired women long enough to apparently realize that Luke Harper was a member of Team Authority and decided he wasn't standing for it. So he just showed up and everyone just sort of accepted him into the team. Hell, John Cena jumped for joy. I guess he doesn't watch WWE programming.
THE BIG GUY: He was the focus of a heavy recruiting push from both Cena and The Authority. While Cena attempted to manipulate Ryback into joining his squad with some not-so-clever reverse psychology, Triple H and Stephanie McMahon put together a well-reasoned argument. Initially, THE BIG GUY chose Team Authority because, well, they sign his paychecks. Then they treated him poorly and he decided he was choosing Team BIG GUY. That somehow resulted in his joining Team Cena.
What to expect
You can be fairly certain the heels are going over here, especially considering they showed ass on the go home episode of Monday Night Raw. The "fire all the babyfaces" angle smells funny, like it could lead to Vince McMahon returning and wondering if The Authority have extended the long arm of their law a little too far.
Then again, maybe it's time for a change of scenery at the top of the card. But would they go through with such a thing at an event like Survivor Series, even if it's being offered free on the WWE Network?
We shall see.