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Should Goldberg win the WWE Universal Championship?

Monday’s Rude Awakening wonders if there is another way, sees the latest on Triple H, and wishes Ric Flair happy birthday.

WWE.com

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Goldberg is probably going to win the WWE Universal Championship from Kevin Owens this Sunday at Fastlane. It’ll give the title more prestige, as Goldberg is an eventual WWE Hall of Famer, and the title’s history at this point is just Finn Balor and Kevin Owens — no offense to either performer, of course, but Goldberg is Goldberg, and the desire for the title by a future Hall of Famer adds something to it. Goldberg holding the Universal will also give Brock Lesnar a chance at it, since Lesnar and Goldberg are already booked for a showdown at WrestleMania 33, and the same thing about Goldberg and prestige can be said about Lesnar.

Does Goldberg have to win the Universal title, though? Lesnar vs. Goldberg is plenty of hype on its own without throwing a belt in the mix, and giving the top men’s championship on the show to a part-time performer who will then fight another part-timer for it a month later seems a little off. Plus, Owens is just coming into his own as Universal champ — it might be better if he gets more time to be this version of himself instead of the one who always needed a hand.

Of course, to make that happen, Owens would need some form of help at Fastlane, be it Chris Jericho interfering on his behalf because Jericho wants a Universal Championship shot at WrestleMania 33, or maybe Brock Lesnar interfering to wreck shop and screw Goldberg out of the title. The problem with the latter is that Lesnar would likely want a shot at the Universal Championship, so keeping it on Owens when he’s already set to fight Goldberg in Orlando is counterproductive. The Jericho thing, though, that could work, especially since it might seem like, at first, that Jericho is still committed to his friendship with Owens despite the beatdowns*, but only long enough to get his own cheap shot in. We’re probably going to get the Occam’s Razor version of all of this, though, with Owens losing — maybe because of Jericho — and Lesnar and Goldberg facing off at Mania for the Universal. Maybe WWE will surprise us, though.

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