Wrestling preview time!  Payback is the new name for the June show.  Last year this show was called No Way Out (except in Germany, long story, don’t ask), but this time they’ve come up with a different name for what remains an un-themed show.  Come to think of it, it does feature all six titles being defended, which is going to be presented as a gimmick when we get to Night of Champions in September.  Here, though, it’s just a coincidence.

It’s an odd card – a promising undercard, but with a sprawling main event that doesn’t sound very good and surely has to drain time from everyone else.

1.  WWE Title – Three Stages of Hell Match: John Cena (c) v Ryback.  So here’s where we stand.  John Cena regained the WWE title at Wrestlemania in April, after chasing it for months.  In May, he defended it at Extreme Rules against Ryback.  This was problematic.  Cena had only just got the title, but Ryback had only just turned heel (and has been desperately short of credible wins ever since they decided to push him to the main event).  So it didn’t make enormous sense for either to lose.  The result was that the two somehow managed to have a Last Man Standing match that ended in a no contest by referee stoppage.  Even more bizarrely, they then had Ryback leaving under his own power, while Cena was stretchered off – which surely should have meant that Ryback was the last man standing, and therefore should have won.  But that kind of got forgotten about.

So.  We have another rematch, and it still doesn’t really seem like a match that either side can afford to lose.  But for reasons best known to themselves, the WWE have decided to make this a Three Stages of Hell match.  It’s basically a 2/3 falls match with a different stipulation for each fall.  In this case fall 1 is a lumberjack match (ring surrounded by other wrestlers), fall 2 is a tables match (win by throwing your opponent through an inexpensive item of furniture), and fall 3, “if required”, is an ambulance match (win by getting your opponent into the ambulance provided and closing the door).

This is not a commonly used gimmick.  It’s been done three times before, in 12 years.  And the reason for that is because it’s only worth doing if you’re effectively going to provide three substantial matches.  (The first two both ran to around 40 minutes.)  I’m not all that excited about one Cena/Ryback match, let alone three, and if anything the presence of this bloated affair at the top of the card leads me to suspect that the more interesting matches further down the chart aren’t going to get the time they deserve.

Likely result: Cena wins by two falls to one, with Ryback getting the first fall so that he can at least claim to have scored the only pinfall.

2.  World Heavyweight Title: Dolph Ziggler (c) v Alberto Del Rio.  The World Title is notionally the Smackdown title, but since the roster is no longer split between the two shows, it’s not entirely clear why they still have separate titles and separate authority figures.  Hopefully we’ll see some of these superfluous titles being unified away later in the year.

Ziggler won the World Title the night after Wrestlemania, cashing in his Money in the Bank title shot.  He was meant to defend it last month in a Triple Threat match, but ended up being out of action for weeks with a (genuine) concussion.  The match was changed to a number one contender’s match between the two remaining competitors, which Del Rio won.  We’re left with Del Rio getting the rematch that they always needed to burn off anyway.  It would obviously be folly for Ziggler to lose in his first significant defence, so I expect a decent but routine match which Ziggler ought to win in order to move on to other challengers.

3.  WWE Tag Team Titles: The Shield (Roman Reigns & Seth Rollins) (c) v Daniel Bryan & Randy Orton.
4.  WWE United States Title: Dean Ambrose (c) v Kane.

The Shield members won these titles last month, and have continued to have consistently strong matches on free television – frankly, better than I expect them to have on PPV given time constraints, which is part of the problem with the WWE’s model these days.  The Shield have generally been fighting a combination of the former champions, Daniel Bryan & Kane, with some other main eventer helping them out.  The main focus of that storyline has been Bryan’s increasingly aggressive attempts to prove that losing the titles weren’t his fault – which seems to be building up to a renewed push for him as a singles star.  Since he’s one of the best wrestlers in the company, that’s entirely welcome.

The oddity here is that Kane is challenging for the US title on his own, while Bryan is going after the tag titles with Randy Orton.  Orton is not exactly a team player – he’s more of an antihero, and has been on the verge of turning heel for ages – so it’s probably a safe bet that the Shield will retain the tag titles thanks to the usual squabbling among their challengers.  Ambrose also ought to retain, since it’s way too early for the Shield to lose the belts.  They did finally lose a six-man tag on Smackdown, but that’s probably just intended to send a signal that they’re potentially vulnerable.  I really don’t think they are – not at this stage, at any rate.  They need to hold those titles for a good bit longer before it’ll mean something for them to lose.

We’ve already seen the tag match on Smackdown, and the US Title match on Raw.  They both ended in DQs, but it’s probably safe to say you got the longer matches for free already.  It also tells us that the tag match will probably be very good, and the US title match will be a bit more average.

5.  WWE Intercontinental Title – Triple Threat: Wade Barrett (c) v Curtis Axel v The Miz.  This was originally meant to be a three-way between Barrett, Miz and Fandango, but he’s out with a concussion.  Instead, we’re getting Curtis Axel, recently repackaged after years lurking at the bottom of the card under the unfortunate name “Michael McGillicutty”.

The idea is supposed to be that legendary heel manager Paul Heyman sees the overlooked potential in this hapless jobber, and is making him into a star.  This means that (since his repackaging) he’s been undefeated, but he’s only achieved proper victories over midcard wrestlers, while his wins over main eventers have been on technicalities.  The WWE has a track record of doing this sort of thing, but in this case it does seem to be an intentional storyline; his undefeated streak isn’t all he’s talking it up to be, but he can legitimately claim that he’s fought some of the company’s top babyfaces, and none of them could beat him.

Given Axel’s push, it would be very surprising if he didn’t win here.  Miz is presumably in there (a) to give him something to do, and (b) because it would otherwise be a heel/heel title change – not that Miz is really working as a babyface.  Match quality is a bit of an unknown, though I’d guess at middling to above average.

6.  WWE Divas Title: Kaitlyn (c) v AJ Lee.  AJ won her title shot weeks ago, but for some reason it’s been delayed until now.  I’d hazard a guess it’s something to do with AJ being an associate of Dolph Ziggler, and wanting to hold off this match until he was back in circulation – though quite why, I don’t know.  Kaitlyn’s got “transitional champion” written all over her, and still doesn’t have a very clearly defined character, while AJ is associated with one of the company’s top acts and gets a ton of TV time – so I’d be pretty confident that she’s winning.  It’ll probably get about five minutes if they’re lucky, but by the dubious standards of the WWE’s women’s division, I imagine it’ll be okay.

7.  Chris Jericho v CM Punk.  An unusual piece of booking.  CM Punk was defeated by the Undertaker at Wrestlemania, and then walked out the next day – presumably taking a well-deserved break.  Jericho has challenged him to this match, which his manager Paul Heyman has accepted on his behalf.  But Punk has made no appearances to promote the match, leaving Heyman to sign the contract and do all the build-up with Jericho.  We’re assured he will be there – and I doubt even the WWE would devote this much build-up to a bait and switch – but there’s certainly a question mark about how Punk’s character feels about having this match at all.

A further complication, which they’ve gone out of their way to flag up on TV, is that although Punk is a heel, he’s probably going to get cheered by this crowd, because the show is in his home town of Chicago.  (It’s not, actually, it’s in Rosemont, but that’s close enough.)  My guess would be that the match is intended to set up a split between Punk and Heyman.  That would leave Heyman free to focus his attention on Axel and Brock Lesnar, and also leave Punk free for a babyface turn.  I’m not sure that’s the best use of his character, but on the other hand, he’s frozen out of the WWE title picture as a heel anyway, since Cena/Punk has been done so many times of late.  As a babyface, he could be a decent opponent for Ziggler.

On paper this is an excellent match, but I have real doubts about how much time it can possibly get with such a lengthy main event.

8.  Sheamus v Damien Sandow.  This is the pre-show match on YouTube – evidently a last-minute decision, because a ton of TV skits have been used to build this up, out of all proportion to the five-minute match they’re actually going to do.  Sheamus will probably win, but given how much they’ve invested in this feud, there’s something to be said for putting Sandow over – he needs the win more, and it would keep the storyline going so that they can do a proper resolution in future.

Worth getting?  Tricky.  Jericho/Punk and the tag match both ought to be good, but I just can’t believe they’re going to get the time when there’s such a long main event – and frankly, I can see the Shield having great matches on free television.  I’m going to go for “no”.  If Cena/Ryback were doing a one-fall match, it might have been a different story.