Here’s what matters today in wrestling 👇
TOP STORY 🔥
LA Knight Takes Out Roman Reigns After WWE Raw, Gets World Title Shot at Money in the Bank
Image Credit: WWE
WWE’s tour of Mexico City came to an end on Monday night with Penta losing to Roman Reigns in the main event of Raw. The fans seemed totally deflated afterwards by their native son coming up short, until LA Knight came out and dropped Roman with a BFT after the Netflix live event ended. Roman rolled out of the ring and told the camera that he was tired of it and would whip Knight at Money in the Bank in New Orleans. Knight is somebody that Internet fans have been clamoring for WWE to give a top push to for quite some time, so the idea of him getting a title shot should make folks happy.
A lot of people were making the case for Penta to defeat Roman Reigns on Monday night for the World Heavyweight Championship. As a Penta fan I would have been fine with it, but I didn’t expect it to happen for reasons that include LA Knight. The Knight/Reigns issue over a championship has been building forever at this point, switching the title to Penta would muddy the waters. I didn’t think whoever won the tournament to face Roman had much of a chance of winning, but it did get the Mexican fans excited and they were behind Penta and against Roman on Monday night. This might be the moment where some folks behind the scenes see that a Penta World Championship reign might be a good thing. He did the best he could to prove his worth during the last few weeks, and fans seem to be buying in. I know it’s dangerous to be optimistic about the future of a wrestler, but I see Penta’s stock being much higher now than it was.
WRESTLING HEADLINES 👊
•Details on Why Sami Zayn Regained the WWE Title From CM Punk
Image Credit: WWE
While Penta came up a little short on Monday night at Arena CDMX, Sami Zayn shocked the world on Friday night when he defeated CM Punk to become a two-time Undisputed WWE Champion. It was unexpected, but after some reports on WWE’s reasoning behind it I think it makes sense.
WWE Crown Jewel takes place in Riyadh on November 7, and one of the traditions of that event has become matches pitting the men’s & women’s world champions against each other in singles matches to decide Crown Jewel Champions. WWE wants to hold off on a CM Punk vs. Roman Reigns rematch until a later date, and Sami happens to be the most popular WWE Superstar in Saudi Arabia. Sami also has plenty of history with Reigns going back to his days as the Honorary Uce of the Bloodline, and they had a famous match in Montreal at Elimination Chamber 2025 where everybody in the building wanted Sami to win and he didn’t. Enough time has passed and enough things have changed where that could be worth revisiting at Crown Jewel. Of course, Sami still has to get there, and Punk, Kevin Owens and others will be targeting his Championship. It should make for good Friday night television the next couple of months.
(I don’t like the fact that my mind is justifying this because I don’t want to have to care about a Saudi Arabia show.)
Image Credit: WWE
Even when Ilja was having classics with Gunther/Walter in NXT UK, I didn’t really see much of a future for him within WWE. Great in-ring wrestler, but he didn’t fit most of the stereotypical WWE traits. Mind you, a wrestler doesn’t have to be tall, tan & talkative to succeed in WWE, and having those traits certainly isn’t a guarantee that they will succeed, but it sure helps if you have at least two out of three. I see fans worrying that he’ll get lost in the shuffle in AEW, and there’s a very good chance he will because it happens to most people there, but I still think he has a better chance for success there than he did in AEW. AEW fans care a lot more about match quality, and if Ilja can have the kind of matches he’s had in the past they’ll jump on board with him.
MORE MUST-READ LINKS FROM 411MANIA
→Hall's WWE Raw Review 9.14.26
→Winfree's AAA Triplemania 34 Night Two Review
→Ask 411 Wrestling: Could Terry Taylor Have Made the Black Scorpion Work?
Thanks for reading,
– Steve Cook