Way-Too-Early Predictions for WWE Survivor Series 2018
SummerSlam only just wrapped up, but Survivor Series 2018—the next of the Big Four WWE pay-per-views in line—will be coming up quicker than we know it.
Scheduled for November 18 at Staples Center in Los Angeles, there are still three events that are set to take place beforehand. However, while WWE takes care of Hell in a Cell, Super Show-Down and Evolution, the card for Survivor Series will become clearer.
There is still a logical progression to some of the current storylines and some predictable ways events could play out that allow us to speculate on where it will all end up in November.
Granted, Superstars can get injured, the writing team could have surprises to pull out and any number of things may disrupt the plans, but part of the fun is looking ahead and filling in the gaps with our projections.
With that in mind, let's gaze into our crystal ball to see what might be in store for fans come Survivor Series 2018.
Brand Supremacy: Universal Champion vs. WWE Champion
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AJ Styles and Samoa Joe are locked into a feud for at least a little while, and if Joe wins the WWE Championship at Hell in a Cell, Styles will probably get his rematch at Super Show-Down.
We know that Daniel Bryan and The Miz will face each other at that event to determine who gets a shot at the champion thereafter, but if Survivor Series follows last year's pattern of having each brand's champions face each other, Bryan or The Miz won't get their opportunity until TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs in December.
With that in mind, it's easy to see Joe as the WWE champion heading into Survivor Series. The Universal Championship picture, meanwhile, is a much wilder jungle.
Roman Reigns, Brock Lesnar, Braun Strowman and, to a lesser extent, Kevin Owens, Finn Balor and Bobby Lashley are all hovering around the title scene, and nothing has been announced for Hell in a Cell.
The safe bet is to assume either Reigns is still the champion by November or he's succumbed to the Money in the Bank briefcase-toting Strowman somewhere along the line.
Despite the crowd's reluctance to warm up to Reigns, he's technically a babyface. As is Strowman, so it would make sense to pair either of those up with a heel champion like Joe, similar to what happened last year with Lesnar and Styles instead of having The Beast Incarnate fight Jinder Mahal.
If it's Strowman, he would probably take down Joe. But if it's Reigns, there's a chance WWE would book him to lose to offset their Backlash match and to paint The Big Dog in a more sympathetic light.
Brand Supremacy: Raw Women's Champion vs. SmackDown Women's Champion
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Continuing with the theme of champion vs. champion, the top women of Raw and SmackDown would also be scheduled to face each other, and it's highly unlikely that Ronda Rousey will be dropping the red brand's championship anytime soon.
She is the given of this situation, as she will probably hold the title going into WrestleMania 35, if not longer. But the SmackDown side has more flexibility.
Clearly, WWE wants to get as much mileage out of the Four Horsewomen vs. Four Horsewomen feud as possible, and since Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair are going at it, one of those two is going to be the champion around November.
Given the circumstances, Lynch is far too over with the crowd to ignore, and Flair vs. Rousey is the bigger match that would be better suited for WrestleMania. Therefore, the play to make would be to have Rousey face Lynch at Survivor Series.
For that to happen, Flair would have to drop the title to Lynch somewhere along the way, and if that doesn't occur at Hell in a Cell, Super Show-Down or Evolution, it will be shocking.
Rousey is a clear-cut babyface, and Lynch would be positioned as a heel—at least in the eyes of the WWE writing staff—so that would coincide with the dynamics mentioned with the Universal and WWE Championship pairing too.
Naturally, Rousey would win this match, and it would be one more feather in her cap heading toward the Road to WrestleMania.
Brand Supremacy: Intercontinental Champion vs. United States Champion
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Following SummerSlam, the Intercontinental Championship is back in the hands of Seth Rollins, while Shinsuke Nakamura remains the United States champion on SmackDown.
There are plenty of contenders on Raw who could scratch and claw to dethrone The Architect, but Nakamura doesn't have anywhere near as many challengers waiting to face him.
Since AJ Styles and Daniel Bryan are the top two babyfaces and Nakamura has already had his feud with Jeff Hardy, there isn't anybody left to fight for the United States title outside of Rusev.
This is where things get tricky. If WWE realizes this lack of babyfaces on SmackDown and doesn't ship in someone from Raw or NXT like Finn Balor, Bobby Roode, EC3 or Johnny Gargano to help make up for it, Rusev could take the title off Nakamura just to give that division more options to play around with.
At that point, Rusev could continue his feud with Nakamura before moving on to The Miz or Randy Orton and would probably be champion around this time if the belt isn't still on Nakamura.
One of those two will represent SmackDown, while Raw has the quartet of Rollins, Dean Ambrose, Dolph Ziggler and Drew McIntyre to sort out.
Rollins and Ziggler can't keep this feud going until November, and something has to give. But there's no guarantee Rollins doesn't drop the belt to McIntyre to set up a match between the Scot and Rusev.
However, that isn't as big or exciting as a match between Rollins and Nakamura, so WWE would be better off booking those two against each other to give the fans a more spectacular card.
Brand Supremacy: Raw Tag Team Champions vs. SmackDown Tag Team Champions
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The Raw tag team division has been a complete joke for the past few months, as a 10-year-old has been a champion, followed by the failed duo of The Deleters of Worlds and now The B-Team.
They are fun, but they aren't credible champions, and their act is eventually going to wear too thin. At that point it will be time for them to drop the titles to The Authors of Pain.
Over on Tuesday nights, The New Day has just won the SmackDown Tag Team Championships from The Bludgeon Brothers, and the team's only credible threat is Sanity.
We've already seen The Authors of Pain and Sanity go at it in NXT, and it went over rather well. But since that would be a heel vs. heel setup—circumstances WWE tends to avoid—the smarter bet is to say The New Day will retain those titles until Survivor Series and put over Akam and Rezar.
After that, it's fair game for Sanity to take the titles from The New Day and for another team like Ambrose and Rollins to take a shot at The Authors of Pain, who will look much stronger by taking down the SmackDown tag team champions at Survivor Series.
Brand Supremacy: Women's Tag Team Championships Match
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No set of tag team titles exists for the women's division in WWE.
However, plenty of hints have been dropped that the creation of this championship could be in store for Evolution, with that event being when the inaugural champions are crowned.
If that comes to pass, it's highly unlikely there will be a set of belts for each brand because there just isn't a deep enough roster to sustain two lots of titles.
Instead, with all pay-per-views being co-branded, one set of champions would likely fight any contenders from either brand. Since this is set to be the first event after Evolution and will have a Raw vs. SmackDown gimmick, it would make sense for the titles to be on the line between two teams on opposite shows.
Similar to how The Shield fought The New Day last year, we could see something happen with the women's tag team titles, such as Raw's Sasha Banks and Bayley facing SmackDown's Peyton Royce and Billie Kay.
This would be the seventh match between the two brands, allowing for a definitive win between one of the two shows, and it's reasonable to assume whoever the champions would be going into the event would probably retain the titles to avoid a hot-potato situation.
Brand Supremacy: Men's Survivor Series Elimination Tag Team Match
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There is a good chance WWE has no idea which Superstars will be picked for the Survivor Series elimination matches until just a few weeks before the event, so predicting that lineup in August is particularly hard.
Still, if everything else that has been mentioned comes to pass, there are some names that stand out as the most viable candidates.
On the Raw men's side, Constable Corbin could lead his team or be on the sidelines as a cheerleader if five other Superstars are able to take up the fight for him.
Bobby Lashley seems like an easy pick. As does either Braun Strowman or Roman Reigns depending on who is holding the Universal Championship.
If Rollins is holding the Intercontinental Championship, he's busy elsewhere, but Dean Ambrose stands a good chance to be in this match along with Drew McIntyre, Finn Balor and Kevin Owens, although there is always a chance WWE throws in a wild card like Mojo Rawley.
Sadly, Bobby Roode doesn't appear to be a priority, so he should be counted out.
The blue brand has a smaller roster to work with, which makes this a little easier to decipher, but there are still some variables.
Assuming Joe is the WWE champion, AJ Styles will be on this team. Daniel Bryan is another safe bet, and since he and The Miz would never get along, WWE could book a match between the two to determine who gets a spot on the team, forcing The A-Lister to sit this one out.
Randy Orton isn't a team player, but he's too big of a name to leave off the card, and Andrade "Cien" Almas would be the newcomer to highlight as the fourth option.
Rounding out the team would be either Rusev or Shinsuke Nakamura depending on who is holding the United States title.
Brand Supremacy: Women's Survivor Series Elimination Tag Team Match
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As far as the women's elimination match, with Sasha Banks and Bayley fighting in the Women's Tag Team Championships bout, the biggest players on Monday Night Raw would be Alexa Bliss, Ember Moon, Natalya and Nia Jax, leaving one more spot.
In all likelihood, that final member would be Ruby Riott because she's the leader of The Riott Squad and would take priority over Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan, as well as someone like Mickie James, who doesn't seem to be a Superstar WWE wants to position over the younger talent given the choice.
The SmackDown Women's Championship is going to be on either Charlotte Flair or Becky Lynch, so the woman without gold is a guarantee to be in this match. Since Lynch was the pick for the match against Ronda Rousey, we can add Flair to this lineup as the team captain.
Alongside her should be Asuka. Her stock has fallen considerably since WrestleMania, but she's still higher up on the totem pole than Lana, for instance, and would push her out of the running.
Since the length of Carmella's title reign was decent, she's a shoo-in to bring the count to three.
Those remaining two spots could go to the pair of Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville or the obvious pick of Naomi and either Zelina Vega or, if she gets called up to the main roster in time, Sanity's Nikki Cross.
As far as who would win this or any of the other brand vs. brand matches, since nothing is on the line but bragging rights, WWE probably wouldn't make the call until closer to the event after figuring out which people would get the biggest pushes out of Survivor Series.
Cruiserweight Championship Match
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With so much focus being on Raw vs. SmackDown, 205 Live would still need to get some time, and the Cruiserweight Championship would have a spot on the card.
Not only would this showcase that division, but it would also have actual stakes because a title would be on the line rather than being a bout between two champions for pride.
Cedric Alexander is still somewhat feuding with Drew Gulak, and those two may carry their program into Hell in a Cell, if not just to stretch things out until someone like Lio Rush can step in as the challenger.
Rush is being treated like a star, and it's not a leap to imagine that he could take the title from Alexander sometime before November, either on 205 Live or during October's Super Show-Down.
If that happens, there are four possible matches that could take place at Survivor Series for the Cruiserweight Championship.
The simplest is for Alexander to get his rematch against Rush if he hasn't moved on to feuding with someone else.
If he has, the next babyfaces in line would have to be one of the members of The Lucha House Party, Noam Dar or Mustafa Ali.
The Lucha House Party would be stepping stones, so its members might be better suited for 205 Live matches instead of pay-per-view bouts. Dar seems to have some involvement in the NXT UK division, so he may have less of a presence in 205 Live around Survivor Series.
Ali is continually referred to as the heart and soul of 205 Live, so he's the biggest opponent Rush could have. Their contest would either happen at a big show like Survivor Series or be saved for something like WrestleMania.
Keeping in mind that someone like Ricochet could be called up from NXT at the beginning of 2019 to be a focal point at WrestleMania, the go-to match for Survivor Series could be Rush vs. Ali if it isn't just a rematch against Alexander.
Extraneous Material and Pre-Show Content
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Those eight matches are already big and would take up the majority of the night, but last year, there were 10 matches on the card, leaving room for two more to fit on the lineup, which would probably be on the pre-show along with the Cruiserweight Championship match.
Elias had a random match with Matt Hardy last year, and he has a habit of being booked in a separate segment for the night rather than being factored into something like the elimination tag team match.
His musical performance and possible match against anybody who doesn't have something else better to do could take up one of those spots, but the other is a mystery.
Even looking back to last year's card doesn't help, as Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn defeated Breezango in a match that took place largely because the two heels simply weren't on the card in any other fashion.
It's doubtful a similar story like that will happen again this year, so this final spot is predominantly up to whatever leftovers WWE has to work with.
What matches do you think will happen at Survivor Series 2018? Tell us your predictions in the comments section below!
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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