Final Picks for John Cena, Undertaker and WWE WrestleMania 2020 Match Card

Final Picks for John Cena, Undertaker and WWE WrestleMania 2020 Match Card
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1Full Match Card and Picks
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2What Will Rob Gronkowski's Role Be?
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3What's Happening with the SmackDown Tag Team Championships?
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4What Can We Expect for the Firefly Fun House Match and Boneyard Match?
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5Which Champions Are in the Most Danger of Losing Their Titles?
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6How Will WWE Divide the Shows?
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Final Picks for John Cena, Undertaker and WWE WrestleMania 2020 Match Card

Apr 4, 2020

Final Picks for John Cena, Undertaker and WWE WrestleMania 2020 Match Card

WWE WrestleMania 36 will be unlike any other. It's been pre-taped in front of no audience at the company's performance center and will be spread out over two days because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Despite having already been recorded, no one knows what WWE has in store for the show—particularly as this was never the plan even a few weeks ago. In fact, it hasn't even been revealed which matches will take place on which night.

Before everything kicks off at 6 p.m. ET tonight, let's take a look at the card, toss out some picks and break down some other predictions of what may happen at WrestleMania 36.

Full Match Card and Picks

While the card is always subject to change, here is the current full lineup for the weekend (predicted lineups in italics):

WWE Championship Match: Brock Lesnar (c) vs. Drew McIntyre

Universal Championship Match: Goldberg (c) vs. Braun Strowman

NXT Women's Championship Match: Rhea Ripley (c) vs. Charlotte Flair

Raw Women's Championship Match: Becky Lynch (c) vs. Shayna Baszler

Last Man Standing Match: Edge vs. Randy Orton

Firefly Fun House Match: Bray Wyatt vs. John Cena

Boneyard Match: AJ Styles vs. The Undertaker

SmackDown Tag Team Championship Match: The Miz and John Morrison (c) vs. The New Day or The Usos (Note: This match may not happen as scheduled.)

Intercontinental Championship Match: Sami Zayn (c) vs. Daniel Bryan

SmackDown Women's Championship Fatal 5-Way Elimination Match: Bayley (c) vs. Lacey Evans vs. Naomi vs. Sasha Banks vs. Tamina

Raw Tag Team Championship Match: The Street Profits (c) vs. Angel Garza and Austin Theory

Women's Tag Team Championship Match: The Kabuki Warriors (c) vs. Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross

Singles Match: Kevin Owens vs. Seth Rollins

Singles Match: Otis vs. Dolph Ziggler

Singles Match: Elias vs. King Corbin (Note: This match may not happen as scheduled.)

Singles Match: Aleister Black vs. Bobby Lashley

What Will Rob Gronkowski's Role Be?

Officially, Rob Gronkowski is supposed to be the host of this year's WrestleMania. In the past, that role has had a variety of responsibilities—almost none of which can happen this year.

There will be no crowd to hype up. The tradition of announcing the record-breaking attendance is gone with an empty arena. There isn't even an Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal he could get involved in like at WrestleMania 33.

What he may do, though, is replace Elias in some fashion.

Last week on SmackDown, King Corbin tossed Elias off part of the set, causing him to crash to the concrete below. This week, it was teased Elias may not be medically cleared to compete.

WWE is undoubtedly hoping that air of mystery is a draw. For the payoff to be worth it, something has to happen other than just Elias wrestling as scheduled.

Instead, Gronk may step in and fight Corbin. This match came about because of Gronkowski's request and a segment where he, Elias and Mojo Rawley embarrassed Corbin.

If Corbin tries to win by forfeit and cut a promo, Gronk may step in and challenge him to a fight. That would be a WrestleMania moment far greater than a Corbin vs. Elias match with little build.

What's Happening with the SmackDown Tag Team Championships?

Weeks ago, after The Miz and John Morrison won the SmackDown Tag Team Championships from The New Day at Super ShowDown, it seemed clear the progression for WrestleMania would be to build to a Triple Threat match between those teams and The Usos.

Eventually, that prediction turned into reality, but that doesn't appear to be what will actually air.

PWInsider and Dave Meltzer's Wrestling Observer Radio (h/t Marc Middleton of WrestlingInc.com) broke the news days ago that The Miz was set home from the WrestleMania tapings.

What's strange is that there has been no consensus of what exactly went down instead for this match as a result of The A-Lister's removal.

Is Morrison representing his team solo and fighting both The Usos and The New Day? Does he get a replacement partner, similar to how Austin Theory took Andrade's place in the Raw Tag Team Championship match? If so, who? Or will there be one member of each team in a three-person ladder match?

That would make the most sense, but logic is frequently thrown out the window in WWE. Even then, no one knows whether Jimmy or Jey and Big E or Kofi Kingston would represent their teams.

Instead of clarifying what the game plan is, WWE ended SmackDown acting as though nothing has changed and this match is still on, as scheduled. It's prerecorded, but fans are in the dark.

WWE must think it's worth upsetting people who tune in and are disappointed to see the match has been downgraded, rather than risk some viewers not watching by divulging that information ahead of time.

Either an announcement will come out of nowhere on social media or during WrestleMania itself. Until then, there's no way of knowing who will win this match, as we don't know who is even competing in it.

What Can We Expect for the Firefly Fun House Match and Boneyard Match?

Two unique matches happening this year are John Cena vs. Bray Wyatt in a Firefly Fun House Match and The Undertaker vs. AJ Styles in a Boneyard Match.

Neither have ever happened in WWE, and as Cena mentioned on this week's SmackDown, nobody knows what those gimmicks even mean.

An educated guess is that the Firefly Fun House will operate similarly to the House of Horrors match Wyatt had with Randy Orton at Payback 2017. It's likely to be a highly stylized, cinematic affair filmed more like a vignette than a match.

While Cena is never the underdog, his assurance that he'd destroy The Fiend came off just cocky enough that Wyatt should win this. He's beaten everyone but Goldberg and, as a regular part of the roster, could use the momentum more than Cena.

With the Boneyard Match, don't expect the part-time veteran to lose. The Undertaker has only lost twice at WrestleMania and will seek to punish AJ Styles for disparaging his wife, Michelle McCool.

The match may not have as much of a movie-like atmosphere. It could very well be just a graveyard set, with or without a ring.

No matter what the rules, the fact that it's WrestleMania and the scenery is better suited to The Deadman gives him the advantage.

Both matches could be surprisingly amazing or laughably terrible. At the very least, they're intriguing.

Which Champions Are in the Most Danger of Losing Their Titles?

WrestleMania is usually a hard reset for the roster. Multiple new champions being crowned freshens up Raw and SmackDown going forward, along with the draft that usually follows shortly after.

This year, with a strong likelihood WWE won't be able to film for several weeks, we're in uncharted territory. There's no formula for how to position the title scenes in an era of clip shows.

But while WrestleMania won't have the same feel, WWE can't risk holding off on all the title changes. Just because an argument can be made that a Brock Lesnar vs. Drew McIntyre rematch in front of a crowd would be a better moment for The Scottish Terminator than winning in front of nobody doesn't mean that should apply to everyone.

If nothing happens and all titles stay where they are, fans will be furious. It will seem like this event was a waste and should have been postponed.

The Street Profits won't lose to the makeshift Garza and Theory team. Ripley shouldn't  ruin her rise to stardom by dropping the NXT Women's Championship to Flair. It's doubtful fans will be furious if The Kabuki Warriors retain the Women's Tag Team Championships, too.

Most likely, Goldberg will retain over Strowman, who wasn't even given a single promo to promote his chances to win, although WWE could go for the surprise just to get people talking.

Everything else is fair game.

For instance, as it's unknown how The Miz and Morrison will defend their titles, that's up in the air; the odds are against Bayley, particularly with the intriguing idea Banks may win; Bryan is a smart bet over Zayn, who needs his comeuppance.

Baszler has a win over Lynch from Survivor Series, but she beat Bayley, not The Man. There's just as good of a chance Lynch's one-year reign ends for something different as there is that The Queen of Spades comes up short in order to drive home that Lynch is still the best.

McIntyre beating Lesnar makes the most sense. The Beast Incarnate hates traveling, which is obviously worse nowadays. If McIntyre fails, WWE will need to build him back up again for a rematch, which is harder than striking now while the iron is still hot.

How Will WWE Divide the Shows?

Might these be the two main events?
Might these be the two main events?

WWE's marketing spin to try to distract from how odd WrestleMania will be was to split it in half and beat viewers into submission with the slogan that it's "too big for one night."

It's about as good of an attempt to turn a negative into a positive as one could ask for, even if fans can see right through it. It's also rooted in some truth. Originally, it would have been seven or eight hours straight, just like last year.

That was hard to sit through for most people, and this may be a good test to see if making WrestleMania a two-day event going forward is the right way to handle how packed The Showcase of the Immortals has become.

However, frustratingly, WWE still hasn't indicated just how this card will be divvied up.

Maybe, the idea is to not tell fans so if their favorite matches aren't on Part I, they won't know until after they watch the whole show, so they'll tune in to Part II after being tricked to watch the first night. Perhaps WWE is still even working on editing the show, which would be scary.

In a previous post, I've already talked about the necessity of balancing the card.

Lynch vs. Baszler and Ripley vs. Flair should be on opposite nights, as should Goldberg vs. Strowman and Lesnar vs. McIntyre. The Firefly Fun House Match and Boneyard Match should be split up, too, so each night has a gimmicky match.

We can assume the SmackDown Women's Championship match won't be on the same night as the Women's Tag Team Championship match, and the Raw and SmackDown tag titles shouldn't be together, either.

                       

Anthony Mango is the owner of the wrestling website Smark Out Moment and the host of the podcast show Smack Talk on YouTube, iTunes and Stitcher. You can follow him on Facebook and elsewhere for more.

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