WWE: Brock Lesnar's Return Isn't a Waste, Just a Disappointment

Brock Lesnar’s part-time return hasn’t been a complete failure. His match at Extreme Rules was a brutal brawl unlike anything we’d seen in a long time. His match against Triple H was equally vicious, and once again a departure from the tired WWE main event scene.

That said, this year will come and go and be known as that period of time in which Brock Lesnar popped a few extra PPV buys and didn’t contribute to the long-term success of the company. Gee, that actually sounds a lot like his first run with the company.

He arrived and took aim at Cena immediately. It made sense, but it did feel rushed. The match was great standing alone, but didn’t have any real payoff. Then he broke Triple H’s arm. Apparently the COO of the WWE heals faster than Wolverine and came back without missing a step rather quickly.

Now Lesnar has defeated Triple H and with all of this forward momentum looks to be setting up—wait for it—another match against Triple H. A match that he will likely lose, and then find a way to finagle a match out of The Undertaker at WrestleMania, where he will once again lose. Nothing will have been accomplished.

May 2013 will arrive and the WWE will not be any different than it was the year before despite one of the biggest draws not named The Rock having been on the show regularly for the last year. Lesnar will have moved on with his life, $5 million in his pocket and the viewers will be left with the same product they snored through in 2011.

I’m an unabashed Brock Lesnar mark. I was in the house the night he busted open John Cena to kick off their feud toward Extreme Rules. My friends and I hadn’t planned on attending that episode of Raw until the week prior featured Lesnar hitting the F-5 on Cena in the middle of the ring to close the show. Needless to say, I had high hopes for his return, but have been consistently disappointed in the execution.

As Lesnar and Heyman stood in the ring to open Raw this week after he defeated Triple H at SummerSlam, I couldn’t help but hope someone new would come out to defend the honor of the WWE. Someone who could speak on behalf of the crowd, the locker room and the industry. This someone would need to have recognizable authority, while still benefiting from the rub.

Two obvious names come to mind: CM Punk and Sheamus.

Holding the WWE and World Heavyweight titles, respectively, these two would each bring a different perspective to the confrontation. Sheamus, who has a history of “stepping up to bullies” has the physical stature to stare down Lesnar in a way few others on the roster could. He has no reason to be physically intimidated. He is the one that stood up to Mark Henry this time last year, after all.

Sheamus, who is known to be a close friend of Triple H’s backstage, can bring this into the storyline. He can play up the fact that Triple H is the man that brought him to the WWE and gave him this opportunity. He doesn’t appreciate scum like Lesnar strolling back into this company and bullying the roster. Unlike others, Sheamus wasn’t around when Brock was the Next Big Thing, so he’s here to introduce himself, the Great White, and challenge Lesnar to a fight.

Unfortunately, Sheamus has been as boring a champ as we’ve seen in a long time. He hasn’t faced much in the way of competition. His feud with Alberto Del Rio isn’t doing anyone any favors. He needs something definitive on his record that legitimizes him in the eyes of the adult fan that he’s lost since turning into a smiling goon that play super hero to an even more nauseating degree than John Cena.

With Triple H in his corner, a victory over Lesnar would go a long way in creating a marketable star.

The best choice, though, is CM Punk. Not only is he more established and closer to being a draw on his own, but there is a much more interesting backstory to be told.

On Raw, were Punk to interrupt the Heyman-Lesnar love fest, the roof would’ve blown off the building. It would be something new for Punk. It would have put him at the center of the program where he belongs. It would also have given us a reunion between Punk and Heyman, considering that we never did have a follow-up to Punk revealing that he was “A Heyman Guy” during the pipe bomb promo last year. 

Punk could play the hero of the masses. He states that he doesn’t like Triple H. In fact, he actually gets along with Paul E. a lot better than he ever did with his boss. Unfortunately though, he also doesn’t see much he likes in Heyman’s client, Brock Lesnar other than a “hack part-time MMA failure” that likes to grandstand in the WWE ring, hogging time that should be saved for full-time guys that live and die for this business like himself. 

This could set up an interesting tension between Punk and Triple H, who is forced to rely on his sometimes unhinged champion to stand up for the honor of the WWE Universe in the face of this renegade force determined to destroy the company from within. We could get teases that Punk retains a loyalty to Heyman that he doesn’t have for Triple H and this could all be a plot to get more power. 

Not to mention the match would be a classic. Punk can run any style and you know Lesnar would respect him through his connections with Heyman. If there was one guy on the roster today that I believe Lesnar would put over and make famous, it’s Punk, and WWE would be wise to leverage this opportunity for the potential to make a lot of money off Punk in the future.