The least popular of WWE’s so-called Big 4 PPVs is over, and while there were quite a few surprises, there’s one shocking moment that clearly stands above the rest. Shinsuke Nakamura beat LA Knight clean for The United States Championship. No outside interference. No flukey roll up victory. Nakamura hit him with a Kinshasa and gave him three the hard way right in the middle of the ring. He didn’t even need the mist.
Given Nakamura is a former United States Champion, Intercontinental Champion, tag champion and Royal Rumble winner, that might not sound that shocking, but let me run down some facts to illustrate how lonely it’s been as a Shinsuke fan for the past few years. In late 2023 and early 2024, he feuded with Cody Rhodes. He ultimately took three losses and not a single one even made a PPV. Before that, he feuded with Seth Rollins and while their matches at least made PPVs, he lost both of them. Before that, all the way back in 2022, he got pretty over in a tag team alongside Rick Boogs (who I miss by the way), but they lost to The Usos at WrestleMania 38 and promptly broke up.
And before that? Well, I just spent like 15 minutes trying to think of the last time Nakamura won a PPV match, but eventually, I had to give up and just look on the Internet for the answer. It turns out you have to go all the way back to the pre-show of Survivor Series 2021 where he defeated a pre-Judgment Day Damian Priest by disqualification after Priest stole Boogs’ guitar and hit him with it. If you don’t want to count that because it was on a pre-show, you have to go all the way back to Extreme Rules in 2020 for a Performance Center mid-Covid match where he teamed with Cesaro to defeat The New Day. That’s more than 4 years ago!
So, yeah, it’s been a rough road for Nakamura and his supporters. In fact, he was completely off television for most of 2024 until he unexpectedly returned in mid-November with a spooky new look to attack LA Knight and set up this match. I had Knight winning easily in my predictions, as did most fans, who assumed Triple H just added this to the Survivor Series card because they needed to fill it out with a few non War Games matches. Guess not.
It’s now the morning after Survivor Series, and most of the initial shock has worn off. I still, however, have a few big questions. So, let me ask those and talk out some related theories.
Is LA Knight Going To Stay In The Mid-Card Or Is He Headed For The Main Event?
LA Knight has cooled off a little bit since he was arguably the most over guy on the entire roster last year, but he’s still incredibly popular and routinely gets monster crowd reactions. He’s also clearly one of the best microphone workers on WWE’s entire roster (right alongside The Miz), and many fans think he has the potential to be World Champion some day. Now, it’s fair to wonder whether that time might be sooner rather than later.
Right now, Triple H, Bruce Prichard and the rest of the writing staff have two options for Knight. He can either continue this feud with Nakamura and attempt to get his title back, or he can move past it and try his hand at the main event scene. He certainly is popular enough to stare down Gunther, Cody Rhodes or anyone else on the roster, but the thing about the main event is there’s a limited amount of screentime at the top and everyone competing for it is super over.
I think Knight is probably going to stick it out with Shinsuke and eventually win the Championship back. I think this little bump in the road is to help him build some character and allow him to chase the belt for a bit, but we’ll just have to wait and see.
What Does This Mean For Shinsuke Nakamura’s NOAH Match?
Over the last few years, WWE has started working much more closely with other companies not named AEW. This has been the most pronounced with TNA, as we’ve seen Jordynne Grace in The Royal Rumble among other appearances and Joe Hendry has been all over NXT. Nakamura has also popped up a few times in NOAH, which is a Japanese wrestling promotion. Nakamura is scheduled to wrestle at NOAH’s event on January 1st against Ulka Sasaki, which now begs the question, is that still going to happen? And if it is going to happen, will it be for The United States Championship?
It’s hard to imagine WWE would have Nakamura lose the belt to someone who isn’t technically employed by WWE, but a match seems like a good way to build some interest in Japan. Over on Cultaholic, they even theorized LA Knight could show up in that match to interfere, which could further their WWE storyline. I have no idea what’s going to happen, but I’m absolutely fascinated.
Is This A Nice Moment For Nakamura Or The Start Of A Big Run?
Less than a year after debuting on the WWE Main Roster, Nakamura shocked everyone and won the 2018 Royal Rumble. At the time, most fans assumed it would be the start of an absolutely massive career. Well, it’s not six years later, and that’s not exactly what happened. To be clear, 99.9% of all people who aspire to be professional wrestlers would trade careers with Nakamura in a second, but a lot more of Nakamura’s six plus year tenure has been spent in the mid-card than the main event. He’s lost way more big matches than he’s won, and a case could be made that he’s one of the least successful Royal Rumble winners of all-time.
So, is WWE giving him a nice little moment here in the spotlight, or is there a long-term plan to build Nakamura up to what many fans originally wanted him to be? He’s 44 years old, and if he’s going to ever have a run with the World Championship, now needs to be the time to do it. He has a spooky new gimmick. This win has breathed a lot of life into him. It’s now or never.
