WWE Raw Contest with Potential WrestleMania Ramifications Appears to Have Altered

On WWE Raw it was announced that there would be an Gauntlet event next week in order to decide who will take on Intercontinental Champion GUNTHER at WrestleMania. Six names were announced; however it seems that two names were originally scheduled for the match but were subsequently pulled.

WWE has announced the Gauntlet match will include Ricochet, Chad Gable, Sami Zayn, Bronson Reed, Shinsuke Nakamura, and JD McDonagh. WWE has been teasing a few names below as potential contenders for GUNTHER, but only the two names…McDonagh and Reed seem to have come from nowhere.

This week, WWE seemed to be making fun of the likes of R-Truth as well as The Miz as possible rivals. This was discussed via Wrestling Observer Radio. Dave Meltzer said, “The interesting thing is if you remember last week when they were building this up, two of the key guys they were building up for this were The Miz and R-Truth and they were nowhere to be seen.”

Alvarez stated the fact that Miz And Truth were present on the show, but only during a segment, they were playing video games, and not in an actual Gauntlet match. Meltzer added, “I think the deal must have been that they were gonna go with them and then they just decided, whatever they’re gonna do, they want better wrestlers. Because you can see they loaded it up with Ricochet who hasn’t been around, JD who came from nowhere.”

Whatever the strategy was to go about to go with the Gauntlet event, WWE seems to be constantly hints that it could include Sami Zayn and/or Chad Gable to fight against each other for the IC Title at WrestleMania.