Day 1 ended with Brock Lesnar becoming the new WWE Champion, and very few fans would have expected the result before the show.
The focus is now on Brock Lesnar's next assignment. According to Dave Meltzer, former WWE Champion Bobby Lashley will get his dream match against The Beast Incarnate.
The latest episode of Wrestling Observer Radio discussed the WWE Day 1 main event. Meltzer said the WWE Championship match was to facilitate Lashley vs. Lesnar.
As seen at Day 1, the show wrapped up with the powerhouses having a brief staredown. Meltzer revealed that while the company could have explored Big E vs. Lesnar, WWE officials believed the Bobby Lashley match was more marketable:
"With Lesnar having won the title, the next step is Lesnar vs. Lashley. You could tell, at the end of the show, they teased that glare with Lashley and everything like that, and that was the last scene. The match was booked specifically for that direction. Big E was the one that was pinned because if Big E wasn't pinned, and obviously, you'd want to go with Lesnar and Big E. But, the decision, for whatever reason, and the reason is that the people who are making the decisions felt that there was a more marketable match, went with Lesnar and Lashley."
How WWE planted the seeds for Brock Lesnar vs. Bobby Lashley at Day 1
The short yet widely entertaining Day 1 main event featured spots where Bobby Lashley looked dominant against Brock Lesnar.
The All-Mighty managed to connect with his spear on a few occasions, and he even got Brock Lesnar in The Hurt Lock until Big E's timely intervention. It's also interesting that Bobby Lashley was the only star in the match that avoided Brock Lesnar's brutal F5.
The booking pattern conveyed WWE's vision to have Brock Lesnar and Bobby Lashley in a titanic clash in the immediate future:
"During the match, if you remember, Lesnar F5ed everyone but never F5ed Lashley, and they set up a couple of spots, which was the Lashley spear through the barricade. There was the Lashley spear in the ring, although Lesnar did kick out of that spear. Then there was the Hurt Lock, which Lesnar was trapped in, with the idea that Lashley proved he could get him in there and probably beat him, but Big E made the save there. They booked spots all to be dominant; all the spots with Lashley and Lesnar were booked for Lashley to look good while Lesnar pulverized everybody else and destroyed everybody else. So that's the story of where they are going with this."
#TheBeast is unleashed! Who can stop @BrockLesnar?!#WWEDay1 pic.twitter.com/Ta6XQK2Z06
— WWE (@WWE) January 2, 2022
Are you excited to see Bobby Lashley finally take on Brock Lesnar? What do you think happens to Big E? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.