So Jinder Mahal is still the WWE World Champion after beating Shinsuke Nakamura at Hell in a Cell. This time, they changed the script, and had referee Charles Robinson finally get it right and eject the Singh Brothers, but Nakamura couldn't cash in.
Why? Because the stubborn old mule in charge of the company doesn't want to take the belt off Mahal until after the tour of India in December, which, oh, by the way, is a Raw team tour. Vince McMahon is so insistent on pushing Mahal as the champion to a nation that isn't totally sold on him, as I've been reading. All McMahon is concerned with is his bottom line at this point, increasing the revenue stream for his network in India, but he's using the wrong guy.
Mahal can say all the right things to sell himself to the Indian people, but being that he's not a native of the country (And neither are the Singhs, as all three are from Canada), plus the fact that he has rarely won without the Singhs' help, he has zero credibility as champion. Mahal should've lost the title well before this point, but McMahon is being just as stubborn with Mahal as he is with Roman Reigns over on Raw. He won't listen to reason, and won't read anything negative about Mahal's impact on India.
The truth hurts, doesn't it, Vince? Of course, it does. Mahal is as much a fraud as champion as Miz is as Intercontinental champion, too dependent on others to do his work for him. That's your lazy way of putting the champion(s) over. There's no psychology here. I've heard that Mahal is working through a shoulder injury, and his suddenly jacked frame has begun to shrink. The second Mahal loses the title, don't be surprised if he gets popped for a Wellness violation, and that should've already happened, too, but for McMahon's obsessive-compulsive need to build his base in India around a fraudulent champion.
Based on the fact that he lost the US title without figuring into that decision at Hell in a Cell, AJ Styles would be next in line, but in my opinion, Nakamura is owed one more rematch, with the Singhs banned from ringside. In fact, I'd have Smackdown GM Daniel Bryan revoke the Singhs' ringside rights indefinitely, since they don't have manager's licenses any more than Bo Dallas & Curtis Axel over on Raw. It's this lazy approach on the creative end that has Smackdown stagnating more so than Raw, and that has to stop, preferably yesterday. Styles, some think, per the events of Hell in a Cell, may be reinserted into the Shane McMahon-Kevin Owens feud that now includes Sami Zayn. We'll talk about that another time.
Meanwhile, it's time to skin a tiger that should've been extinct.
