Mick Foley: Bray Wyatt was 'the real winner' at WWE Payback

And now for a different opinion on the events of WWE Payback last night (June 1, 2014) in Chicago, here's Mick Foley's take (via Facebook) on "the real winner" in the John Cena vs. Bray Wyatt Last Man Standing match:

Winning is all relative in sports-entertainment, and in this wrestling fan's eyes, Bray did indeed emerge victorious. He may not have made it to his feet by the 10 count last night, but in his promos and in his matches, Bray Wyatt has shown me that he is more than capable of standing on his own two feet at the very forefront of the new generation of WWE Superstars.

Unfortunately, there is no mathematical formula for making a star in pro-wrestling. But if I had to boil down all the ingredients of the star-making process into one word, that one word would be "feuds". Fans remember feuds, and Wyatt's character and promos put him in a great position to create memorable feuds with just about any of the top stars in the company. Besides, there just might be some gas left in the Wyatt/Cena tank.

This more or less echoes what Cena himself had to say at the kayfabed post-event press conference (read his comments here). Wyatt is a force to be reckoned with from every standpoint other than the fact that, well, they've shown he cannot defeat Cena.

Yet.

Wyatt has a fully fleshed out character, one the creative team will never struggle to come up with stories for. That's the real reason his fans shouldn't be worried that he was "buried" in this feud. He wasn't. In fact, he proved he can have an outstanding match with the top star in the company.

There's plenty of time to regroup and further establish himself before coming back for more.

And, as Foley and Cena said, that's almost surely what's going to happen.