The Case for A WWE Light Heavyweight Division, Part 3: The Tournament

Ziggler's first opponent would shock him bad Photo Credit: WWE.com

In Parts 1 and 2 of the series, we showed you who the Ace was going to be, what the roster looked like, and even the design of the belt. Now, with all of that out of the way, we have to crown our first champion. Now, the typical way that WWE does things like this would be to crown the Champion via battle royale. But we're not going to do that. Instead, we're going to have a All-Brands-Invited tournament.

Side Note: This is where different people being in charge of the different shows helps. The Authority picks four, Smackdown's Poobah picks four, and NXT picks four, thus creating a 12-man single-elimination tournament for which the finals would be held at SummerSlam.

Through lots of machinations, including a surprise run to the finals for Heath Slater that will be sure to send Rhiannamator into something approaching a full-body seizure, Dolph Ziggler wins the tournament over Slater after a great match. But as he's celebrating with the title, out walks... THIS MAN.


Instantly, and this is where I place more trust than is perhaps warranted in the commentary, KENTA comes out and we all realize instantly that there is a real challenger.

In their first match, Ziggler is fucked. Not that he gets fucked, because in there is a difference. Ziggler getting fucked would be losing in the same way that every WWE babyface not named John Cena loses, and that's not what ought to be happening here. What we want here, what is the best thing here, is for Ziggler to know he's doomed as soon as the bell rings. WWE got close to this with the build to Cena-Lesnar, and then they had Cena win. For this to work, Ziggler can't win. He has to get mauled.

And in the rematch, Ziggler wins because he figures out where KENTA is weakest and attacks accordingly. That's how you build the division. You build Kenta as a monster who can rend flesh from bone, and Ziggler as a brilliant strategist. And everyone underneath trying to get to the top.

Will any of this happen? Of course not. The WWE, for whatever reason, has a list of guys they want the crowd to respond to and Dolph Ziggler isn't on it. They also have a list of things they're willing to try, and re-starting a light heavyweight division isn't on that list either. But I can dream.