Just hours before the Kick-Off Show WWE Tweeted that that the WWE World Championship Match (AJ Styles [c] vs John Cena vs Dean Ambrose) will be the first match of the night to start off the main portion of the Pay-Per-View. A lot of people are speculating that this is due to the fact that some shenanigans are going to occur in the match but I think there are a few other explanations for this move.
1. Dolph Ziggler Will Retire - Although I predicted Ziggler to go over and capture his fifth Intercontinental Championship this may be a sign that he is going to retire and will go on with Miz to close out the show. If Dolph Ziggler is going to retire after so many years of service and as a former WWE Champion it would be nice, for once, to have a good send off where he gets his moment as the final face of the PPV before it goes off the air with a heartfelt goodbye speech. No Mercy is even in one of Dolph Zigglers hometowns so it may be the perfect send off (unless he's back from being billed from Hollywood, CA to Cleveland, OH and this was just a pointless sentence). (Authors Note: He's from Hollywood, Florida... my mistake!) Getting a proper goodbye isn't really something we get in the WWE anymore. Wrestlers are pretty much pushed until they physically can't wrestle their last match proper so getting an actual retirement match would be nice for once.
2. Brock Lesnar Returns - The next Smackdown PPV will be one of the big four, Survivor Series which is one of the four shows Brock Lesnar actually wrestles in. I would not be surprised for them to go for Randy Orton vs Brock Lesnar II especially after the way their Summerslam match ended. This would also make perfect sense for Lesnar to show up, cost Orton the match which gives Bray the victory, which he desperately needs and would counter balance the loss he received to Kane on Orton's behalf. Lesnar is one of the biggest draws in WWE history and they need a solid month to hype up any match he is in since he doesn't do much leading up to the shows. This gives WWE about five weeks to bring in a big draw for Survivor Series 2016.
3. WWE Is Worried About the Presidential Debate - Now, I'll be honest I don't really pay attention to WWE's weekly television ratings as they become less and less important with Youtube becoming so prominent. However, last months debate took place during Raw and I would not be surprised if Raw suffered massively because of it. The Presidential Debate is somewhat of a soap opera in and of itself these days with Donald Trump becoming a literal cartoon villain. I don't really keep up with politics but I do know Donald Trump said some pretty misogynistic things over the last week that have garnered him a lot of heat which will certainly bring in the numbers for the Debate now more than ever. It's like a comedy, people want to tune in to watch him crash and burn and WWE might be worried that they won't be able to retain viewership as the night goes on so instead they want to keep fans interested by putting the biggest match on first. People will stick around for a 25 minute match to see who walks out with the belt and then flip over to the debate once the bell rings but WWE are probably hoping to keep a few more of those flipflop viewers. I don't think that there will be any surprise title changes, it's way too soon to take the belt off of Styles (it's his first flipping title defense for crying out loud) and Cena or Ambrose would literally be booed out of the building if he loses. I think this is just to get viewership before the Presidential Debate.
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