Rumor Look Back: Jan. 29 - Feb. 4, 2018

Welcome to the weekly Rumor Look Back, where we look at the rumors from six months ago and see which played out as originally predicted. Let’s jump right into it.

January 29, 2018

• WWE plans to have Ronda Rousey challenge Charlotte Flair for the SmackDown Women’s title and Royal Rumble winner Asuka face Alexa Bliss for the Raw Women’s title at WrestleMania 34, says PW Insider. UPDATE: There’s also a conflicting report from The Observer and others you can read here.
• So they’re actually both wrong since the Observer said they’d run the WrestleMania tag team match with the Rock and not Kurt Angle. (0/2)
• Word is Bobby Lashley has stopped negotiating with New Japan, and he’s expected back with WWE soon.
• He’s in WWE now and he’s blowing the roof off. (He’s really not, but it’s not all his fault.) (1/1)
• While it will require WWE to extend Brock Lesnar’s contract past April, it’s believed they want to do a Lashley/Lesnar feud after Mania.
• It doesn’t look like that’s headed our way. (0/1)
• The Raw tag title change was done because of Jason Jordan’s back injury, according to Wrestling Observer Radio. At Saturday’s house show he was unable to take any bumps due to the injury.
• He hasn’t wrestled at all since.

January 30, 2018

• If The Rock can’t do WrestleMania 34, PW Insider speculates WWE may use Braun Strowman as Ronda Rousey’s tag partner against Triple H and Stephanie McMahon.
• The Rock couldn’t/wouldn’t go, but it was Kurt Angle. That made more sense than Braun though. (0/1)
• According to Wrestling Observer, WWE plans to “heavily push women” now that Rousey is on board because she’s “the company’s biggest mainstream star”.
• Gotta say that’s right with Evolution announced. Even though Ronda is new in the WWE, I think her success in the UFC, being their top star, was a factor in WWE’s willingness to push women further. (1/1)
• PW Insider claims the main issue in getting Rey Mysterio back in WWE is that the company wants him on a full-time schedule and he only wants to commit to a part-time one.
• Rey still isn’t with WWE. He talked about how it’s possible, but he’s still got ALL IN in a month first.
• That site also reiterated previous reports of Ivory as a WWE Hall of Fame inductee this year, and add that Mark Henry is also likely for the 2018 class.
• This is accurate. Henry wore the jacket. (2/2)
• An announcement about changing dates for one-man shows Chris Jericho had planned in the UK, including a deleted tweet saying they were moved due to “scheduling conflicts with WWE shows”, have people saying he’ll be back with WWE for a run this Summer.
• He’s the IWGP Intercontinental champion so he won’t be back to WWE this summer. (0/1)

January 31, 2018

• Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins, and Jason Jordan are all expected to be in Elimination Chamber qualifying matches next week.
• The only person in a qualifying match of three on that Raw was Roman. (1/3)
• Trish Stratus was on Lilian Garcia’s podcast and they mentioned Paige is retired as previous reports have indicated and she told them WWE is going to find something else for her to do.
• They did find something, announcing her as the SmackDown GM after WrestleMania. (1/1)
• According to the Observer, Adam Cole was going to be the one to answer Bobby Roode’s open challenge at Royal Rumble but that was changed because he would have had to lose a short match and they didn’t want to do that.
• Glad they’re not throwing Cole out there to lose quickly on the main roster just yet. (Hopefully they won’t at all, but we’ll see.)

February 1, 2018

• Filming on The Rock’s next big project for Disney, “Jungle Cruise”, starts in May and Wrestling Inc reports that the high cost of insuring actors and the potential liability of an injury-caused delay (like the one on “Hercules” after he was hurt at WrestleMania 29) could keep him out of WWE’s plans for Ronda Rousey’s match at WrestleMania 34.
• I don’t know how much insurance had to do with it (though I wouldn’t be surprised since the last time he wrestled, he got hurt), but he wasn’t part of Mania this year. (1/1)
• According to a report at bodyslam.net, a Balor Club vs. Miztourage feud could be in the works, possibly leading to a WrestleMania Intercontinental title match between Finn Balor and The Miz.
• They ran a match, though it wasn’t some huge feud. The Mania match ended up as a triple threat though, with Seth Rollins included. (1/2)
• Sasha Banks, Nia Jax, Bayley, Mickie James and Sonya Deville are currently pencilled in as Alexa Bliss’ challengers in the first women’s Elimination Chamber match.
• This is accurate except for Nia. It was Mandy Rose instead. (4/5)

February 2, 2018

• The current speculation, from places like the Observer, is that while Ronda Rousey said she was full time it’s more likely she’ll work something closer to the schedule Brock Lesnar is currently on.
• She’s here more than Brock. While she’s not super full time, she’s closer to that than she is to Brock’s schedule. (0/1)
• Multiple sites, such as PW Torch, have said the comments made by women within WWE regarding being upset over Ronda Rousey’s appearance at Royal Rumble are not a work.
• Either way, they all changed their tune (at least publicly) pretty quickly.
• Brock Lesnar isn’t expected back on television until after Elimination Chamber.
• That looks about right. They did that bit where he no showed the night after the Chamber to help sell the “Brock doesn’t give a damn” story they’ve been selling for six months. (1/1)
• The Observer says Asuka and Nia Jax were the top two candidates to win the women’s Royal Rumble and obviously they went with the former.
• Both of the women received title matches at WrestleMania.
• Aleister Black is expected to get an even bigger push soon.
• He won the championship at TakeOver: New Orleans. Unfortunately, he happened to be champion when NXT was running the super hot Gargano/Ciampa feud and was always shadowed by that. He’s finally been added that feud, losing the belt to Ciampa because of Gargano. (1/1)

February 3, 2018

• The Observer notes that the WWE plan recently was for Asuka to challenge Charlotte for the SmackDown women’s title and for Alexa Bliss to defend the Raw women’s championship against Nia Jax at WrestleMania 34.
• That’s accurate on both accounts. (2/2)
• Per WrestleVotes, Braun Strowman is the backup opponent for Triple H in the event a mixed tag match involving Stephanie McMahon and Ronda Rousey falls through.
• They did set that up at Survivor Series so it was there if they needed it.
• According to the Observer, Jason Jordan was originally set for the Elimination Chamber match but his injury has put that in doubt.
• He wasn’t part of the Elimination Chamber match. (1/1)
• Bobby Lashley is expected to return to WWE at any time, per the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
• He returned the Raw after WrestleMania. (1/1)
• PW Insider notes that after the lack of success of the couple of 205 Live house shows last month, WWE has no plans on doing any more anytime soon.
• There haven’t been any others. (1/1)

This week: 19/29 - 66%

January 2018: 75/116 - 64.7%

Overall: 2,311/4,181 - 55.3%

Have a great week, everyone!