Ranking All 6 Superstars' Chances of Winning Men's WWE Elimination Chamber Match

The WWE Championship has been in a state of flux since the Day 1 pay-per-view, for which multiple contenders were added every few days until Brock Lesnar ultimately won it from Big E.

The Beast Incarnate dropped the title to Bobby Lashley at Saturday's Royal Rumble, and The All Mighty must defend it against five other Superstars—including Lesnar—inside the Elimination Chamber on February 19.

In years past, the Elimination Chamber PPV has been one of the biggest obstacles on The Road to WrestleMania, with greats such as John Cena being unable to retain their titles ahead of The Show of Shows. Will the same hold true for Lashley? Who stands the best chance to win?

Let's take a look at all six competitors and rank their odds to walk out of the structure with the WWE Championship around their waist.

Austin Theory has "future star" written all over him, but the key to that phrasing is "future." Now is not his time, particularly during this part of the calendar year.

He's competed at WrestleMania before but only in a tag team match at an empty WWE Performance Center during the pandemic. To be heading into this year's Show of Shows with the WWE Championship in front of thousands of fans is far too big a task to put on his shoulders at this point.

The 24-year-old's storyline with Vince McMahon revolves around him making some headway in impressing the WWE chairman, but it's not a consistently good segment.

Theory's time will come, but not yet.

On any given night, AJ Styles could be WWE champion. He's held the title several times before and made a Hall of Fame career purely from his run with the company, let alone everything else he's accomplished in other promotions.

Unlike Theory, The Phenomenal One does stand a chance at winning in the Elimination Chamber, but it's not a great one.

The big hurdle for Styles to overcome is that four others have more momentum on their side after he had his feud with Omos largely dropped in favor of a program with Grayson Waller from NXT.

While the 44-year-old put on a great display in this year's Royal Rumble, his current babyface character works better as someone chasing the title, rather than holding it.

If WWE's goal is Lashley vs. Styles at WrestleMania for the title, it's better if The Phenomenal One is challenging and not defending it.

It's hard to bet on Seth Rollins coming out on top here if you look at how Day 1 and Royal Rumble played out.

Surely, if WWE wanted The Visionary to hold the WWE Championship at WrestleMania, he would have won it at Day 1 and a lot of this mess from the past month wouldn't have gone down the same way, right?

At the very least, Rollins could have beaten Roman Reigns due to interference by Lesnar and it would have been The Tribal Chief earning a title shot at WrestleMania through winning the men's Rumble match, rather than The Beast Incarnate.

Why put the belt on Lesnar, then give it to Lashley and have Rollins lose to Reigns, just to have The Visionary then beat The All Mighty in the Elimination Chamber?

Erratic booking like that isn't something WWE has never done, but it's rare. As much as the creative team may book something repetitive or illogical, it's often because plans unexpectedly change.

However, there's more of a chance Rollins wins than Styles due to how much attention has been put on Kevin Owens wanting to fight his friend at WrestleMania. That suggestion has been brought up a lot recently, so if Rollins wins in order to defend against KO, it wouldn't be the biggest surprise in the world.

Riddle is an outlier and a sleeper pick. If anyone is going to cause a shock, he's the one to watch out for.

Supposedly, he was the original pick to win the men's Rumble match, and WWE even danced around the idea of Riddle vs. Randy Orton for the WWE Championship at WrestleMania. That RK-Bro split could still happen, but with some details rearranged.

Perhaps Riddle does fight Orton at WrestleMania 38, but The Original Bro is the champion and that's what makes The Viper turn on him. Nothing is more important to The Apex Predator than winning titles—not even friendships.

Lashley could have his rematch for the title sometime in February or March on an episode of Raw, which would be a big deal for WWE to advertise, while Orton's jealousy of Riddle would reach boiling point.

Don't bet your house on this one, though. Riddle is more likely in the men's Elimination Chamber match as a fan favorite who comes up short.

We give Lesnar 49 percent chance of winning back the title here, and the only reason he's behind Lashley retaining is because it renders the Royal Rumble events irrelevant.

In all situations, The Beast is like Charlotte Flair in that you can never count him out.

Lesnar has also brought up the idea of facing Reigns in a title-for-title match twice. Is that a red herring, or is this WWE broadcasting the plan in advance?

The Beast vs. Reigns and "whatever Ronda Rousey does" are clearly the two things WWE cares most about for WrestleMania in April, with nothing else coming remotely close to that level.

Don't be surprised if Lesnar dropped the WWE on Saturday belt just to get into the men's Rumble match, only to win the belt back to pad out his numbers and swerve the audience. In fact, be surprised if that doesn't happen.

The slightest edge goes to Lashley over Lesnar, because it's baffling why WWE would play hot potato with the title.

Yes, the company has done it before. There have been 22 WWE Championship reigns that lasted less than two weeks, with many of them being one day long or less.

But why go through all that effort? Instead, it felt like Lashley was groomed to be the biggest threat to Big E's championship at Day 1 and probably would have walked out with the title there if the planned Reigns vs. Lesnar match had gone down.

Who Lashley faces at WrestleMania is the real mystery, and WWE might not even have a game plan. But if The All Mighty isn't defending the title, it proves the company is putting all its eggs in the Lesnar-Reigns basket.

Let's hope this isn't a two-match WrestleMania card spread over two nights and the WWE Championship isn't seen as the lesser belt in a Winner Takes All match.

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.