WWE Backlash 2026: Some Highs… Some Lulls… And that John Cena Announcement...

WWE Backlash 2026 delivered one of the wildest nights of the year — huge matches, breakout performances, chaos, and a shocking John Cena announcement that could change WWE forever.

Tonight’s Backlash card featured only five matches, but every single one mattered:

🔥 *Seth Rollins vs Bron Breakker* — Bron Breakker just made a massive statement by defeating Seth Rollins clean after surviving Pedigrees, chaos at ringside, and interference attempts. This was Bron’s biggest win yet and could officially mark the beginning of WWE’s next monster era.

🔥 *Trick Williams (United States Champion) vs Sami Zayn* — Trick retained in controversial fashion thanks to outside distractions and shenanigans involving Lil Yachty. Sami had moments where it looked over, but Trick escaped with the title — and fans are going to be divided on how it happened.

🔥 *Danhausen & mystery partner vs The Miz & Kit Wilson* — Easily the weirdest match of the night. Minihausen clones, cloning machine chaos, comedy madness, and complete insanity. This was either genius… or absolute nonsense. Wrestling fans will be arguing about this one for weeks.

🔥 *IYO SKY vs Asuka* — Match of the night contender. Pure wrestling brilliance. Counters, submissions, near falls, and insane athleticism. IYO Sky survived Asuka and proved again why she’s one of the best wrestlers in WWE, period.

🔥 *Roman Reigns (World Heavyweight Champion) vs Jacob Fatu* — Jacob Fatu became a made man tonight. Roman retained, but barely. Fatu looked like an unstoppable killer, mauled Roman, and after the match left him laid out in horrifying fashion. Even in defeat, Jacob may have become WWE’s hottest act.

👀 *JOHN CENA’S HISTORIC ANNOUNCEMENT*
John Cena officially announced *The John Cena Classic* — a brand-new WWE competition designed to spotlight current stars and future stars, with fan voting helping decide the winner. The winner earns a major championship opportunity, making this potentially WWE’s next huge annual event alongside Money in the Bank / King of the Ring. Huge news… but fans are already debating whether this is revolutionary or another TKO-style corporate gimmick.

Was Backlash 2026 a home run?
Did Jacob Fatu steal the show?
Was Cena’s announcement massive… or overhyped?
And what in the world was that Danhausen segment?

Drop your grade for WWE Backlash 2026 in the comments.

#wwebacklash  #johncena #romanreigns #jacobfatu  #trickwilliams


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Transcript

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Backlash is in the book, so let's do our one take, one shot backlash review where I do the immediately following backlash. No edits, no nothing. You get my gut reaction. And my gut reaction is this was a decent, a decent B P L E. Not the greatest, but it did have some really good highs and it did have some lows. Not lows, lows. L-U-L-L. Everything made sense though. And let's go over each matchup after I tell you about the belt giveaway. If you want to win this belt on my shoulder, just because Jacob couldn't win it, maybe you can. All you gotta do is comment below and subscribe to the channel. At 30,000 subscribers on my quest to quit my day job, I'm gonna give it away. People, it's not a toy, it's a replica, and you can win it. Yes, like 30,000 subscribers. So comment, subscribe, all that good stuff. So we start off with Braun Breaker and Seth Freaking Rollins. I like this match. In fact, I had low expectations for this match. Ever since the beginning of the year, before Braun went on, like he was out for his surgery. I didn't like how they were booking Braun Breaker. He lost a lot of momentum, and I was not enthused over the direction of his character, and I kind of just lost hope in the guy. But this match right here made me remember why I liked him and why I like Seth Rollins too. Seth and Braun put up a really, really good match. They had really good chemistry. There were a couple botches here and there, but at this point, if TKO isn't gonna let them do house shows, it's hard for me to blame the actual, the actual wrestlers because TKO is literally telling, making them where they don't get to practice, even though I'm hearing wrestler after wrestler say we need more house shows. Regardless, regardless, these two in the ring, I liked their chemistry, and I like that Braun Breaker actually beat Seth Rollins. Now, was it totally clean? No, the vision did come out, and I don't know why the Street Profits didn't come out, but they didn't. But the vision does come out. Well, I get it that Street Prophets don't like Seth Rollins, but as they said in the past, the Street Profits are focused on the tag team titles and not necessarily helping Seth Rollins. So, but regardless, this the vision comes out, Logan Paul, Austin Theory, but but they never actually land a punch or a chair shot on Seth, and Seth kind of runs them off. So it wasn't technically, nobody interfered. Technically, but it does cause a distraction that does allow Seth Rollins to eat a spear and lose. I'm happy with this. I'm happy with this because Seth is a little protected, but Braun Breaker, he he wasn't like, it wasn't like he he could definitely argue I didn't need those guys to come out at all. So Braun Breaker, this is a step in the right direction. I thought Braun was gonna lose and they would let Braun win next time. So I'm hoping, I'm hoping that we can kind of move on from this, but I don't, I don't, I doubt we will. But I don't want Braun to lose this feud. I just wonder what we do with I wonder what we do with Seth freaking Rollins. Then we go to but but that said, that said, this was a really good opener too. I liked we were like two minutes in and we started we started the P.L. E hot. We did start the PLE hot. Sorry, sorry. And it just kept going and going and going. And great opening matchup. Hard hitting, the right winner, great stuff. Then we had Sami Zayn versus Trick Williams with little Yachty. Little Yachty comes out with the cane, the uh the candy cane, which is a with his which is a Singapore cane, a kendo stick, kendo stick, and trick Williams will win. Sami Zayn totally leaned into being a heel. He multiple times he he got involved, or he tried to do some underhanded stuff. He does Huluva kick, little Yachty, little Yachty does cheat for Trick Williams as well. So Trick Williams is now, I think he's a baby face, but he's not the traditional baby face where he still does bad things. Now he's not, you know, he definitely has a different attitude than Stone Cold Steve Austin, but Stone Cold Steve Austin could cheat and still be a baby face, and it looks like that's what Trick Williams is gonna be. Kind of like if you introduce a chair, well, I'm gonna use that chair and not feel bad about it. Trick Williams beat Sammy Zayn. This probably means Sammy is done now with with Trick Williams because it was a clean loss, and there was nothing, there's nothing that Sammy can do about it. Sammy can now go and then complain about the fans and how how the fans turned on him for no reason whatsoever. And I think that's the right call. Another thing about Backlash, I did notice that this was very much a good, a good epilogue to WrestleMania, how I feel it should be. Backlash historically had has dealt with the fallout of WrestleMania, and here we had we had a rematch of Sammy and Trick Williams. We had we had Braunbreaker who interfered with Seth Rollins. So Seth Rollins trying to get revenge for something that happened at WrestleMania, and then Danhausen attacked the Miz and everything at WrestleMania. So three storylines based off of WrestleMania, that's a proper backlash to me. That's a good backlash. And you could argue even Jacob on the come up, Jacob on the come up for his win at Backlash allowed him to face Roman, who also won at Backlash. So this was a good epilogue storytelling of Backlash. Although three of the five matches did deal with mentorship, like mentor mentee. So I thought that was a little like we shouldn't repeat those kind of story beats. That like, because you had them, you had Danhausen wanting the Miz to be his mentor. You had Eosky facing her mentor E or Eosky facing her mentor Asuka, and then you had Braun Breaker facing his mentor, Seth freaking Rollins. So yeah, so good and bad, good and bad. This backlash on some of the story beats. Our third match was Dan Housen. I had 20, 20 possible partners for Dan Housen, and I was completely wrong on all of them. He had a mini clone of himself. Yes, a clone of himself. It was obviously a mini wrestler, and I think it's El Totoro. The he was like a bull. He was a bull and he was with the El Matadors, or I'm forgetting their names right this second, but like this was from way back in the day. And if you want to see a really good match with him, he fought Hornswoggle actually in a Wii LC match. Just a Hornswoggle Wheel C, you'll see what he fought back in the day. It was a great matchup, actually. It was a great matchup, and this was a decent, entertaining match. Now, I personally I did enjoy it, but I will say this if I if I was like, I don't know if I would want to show my wrestling fans it, you know. Ever notice how like when you're watching wrestling, there's certain times somebody will walk in the room and you're a little embarrassed that they walked in the room and they're watching you watch what you're watching on WWE TV. I wonder if I would be embarrassed by this or if I would say, come and watch this. I have seen a lot of people actually who are not wrestling fans really captivated by Danhausen. So I think, I think that Danhausen, like people would have liked this. Non-wrestling fans would have liked what they were seeing here. It was silly, it was silly fun, and yeah, I don't really got much to say about it. I was kind of hoping for for something bigger. I was a little let down by the mini housing, but at the butt at the same time, I didn't like it didn't ruin anything for me, and I was quickly able to get into the match. There were a couple times where they like I felt like the Mini Housen was getting beat up a little too long. It did get a little uncomfortable at times, but that's okay as well. Because you know what? That made the that made the victory all the greater. There was one funny sequence when Kit Wilson chases the Mini Housen back to where to whence he came, a a like the cloning machine, the cloning box, and he he goes in the box, he closes the box, but then the box starts to activate again. Smoke comes out, and it's all the mini housens from WrestleMania. Again, a callback, backlash being the epilogue to WrestleMania. So callback to WrestleMania, and then the the mini housens are kind of there the whole time, and it's just it's just fun, it's just silly. I do think that maybe it's time to to to end the program, but at the same time, like I've really enjoyed this program that Miz and Danhausen has had together. And there was also a video package that I highly recommend going and watch. I really like the editing style of the how they they they told the story of what was going on between the Miz, Kit Wilson, and Danhausen. So funny stuff, good stuff. I could see why people would hate it though. Uh, you know, comedy, comedy is subjective and goofy wrestling. There's a fine line. There's a fine line from this is silly goodness to this is really cringe. And I think Danhausen definitely walks it, definitely walks it. So I'm giving it like good stuff. So these first three matches were really great, really great. Did I talk about the the Trick Williams? Trick Williams won, right? I did, I talked about that, right? Trick Williams, he just won and he was the right winner too. But these three matches, great stuff. I really enjoyed it, and then after this, it did kind of start to dip for me. It did kind of start to dip for me, and I think it's because of my own expectations. So we then go to EOSky and EOSky and Asuka. I could tell this was a good match, but like the crowd, I wanted Kyrie saying Kyrie, Kyrie saying she was a vital part of this storyline, right? And the crowd chanting, we want Kyrie. I'm hoping for Kyrie, she doesn't come, she doesn't come. And I felt that was a missed opportunity. I don't know if they were given if they gave her the option or not, and if they gave her the option and she said no, more power to her. But from a fan's point of view, on a storyline that's been going on for six or seven months, where Kyrie was getting bullied by Asuka, I wanted to see that payoff. And so I kind of myself, I am fully admitting that my expectations kind of ruined the match for me because I kept waiting for Kyrie. And then when she didn't come and the match was over, I was like, oh, okay. So I was let down. So I'm not gonna really judge this matchup. I could tell it was a good match, but at the same time, I was disappointed because not of the wrestlers, but because of the the budget cuts or the talent cuts and all the real world stuff that happened. That said, after the match, EO does win, and she did a really cool thing that I've never seen before. I love when a wrestler can do something that I've never seen before because I've been watching since WrestleMania V. They do the spit, right? Asuka spits and and EO blocks it with a trapper keeper or or like a notebook or something, and it's like, yeah, why hasn't anybody ever thought of that before? So, yes, that was cool. EO does win, and then at the end, Asuka gives Eo a big old hug. So either Asuka is now a babyface or she just quit and retired. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe Asuka is like, yeah, this ain't fun without Kyrie. I don't know. But they did hug, and I kept, I was like, ooh, is EO is Asuka gonna attack her? And she didn't. So I guess they're friends again, which I don't know about that because in theory, in theory, Asuka alluded that she kicked Kyrie out of the country because of Eo. So now if Asuka is suddenly a babyfain, Kfabe-wise, Asuka should bring back Kyrie Saint. So yeah, you know, whatever. Let's not overthink it. Just the the unfortunate budget cuts really did damper what was a really good storyline. One of my favorite storylines of last year, actually, which just sucks. Just sucks. They definitely deserved better. All three of them, all three of them. John Cena, John Cena comes out. He does his he does his speech and he tries to sell that it was a good good call that he tapped out to Gunther. And he's just, you know, he's in his pinstriped suit and he's just doing the John Cena thing where he's just all polite and well-spoken and all that stuff. Great stuff. John Cena, Unseen 17. He does say that the announcement is this. I'm glad the announcement wasn't Club WWE, but he makes an announcement saying that, okay, we're gonna do a John Cena tournament. There's gonna be a John Cena title, and you guys are gonna vote, even if they lose, they can still win all these things. So I'm gonna hold judgment on this. I wasn't thrilled by this announcement. I I wouldn't say I was disappointed, but I would say on a scale of one to ten on the Chopo meter, I'd have probably given John Cena's a four, but I did see in the chat that some people were super hyped about it. So maybe it's just me, I don't know. But I remember when we used to make fun of AEW for too many title belts, and it seems like there's a lot of title belts in WWE right now. You know, if we're gonna make fun of them, we gotta like, you know, there's like three fingers pointing back at you. I'm gonna withhold judgment. I'm hoping the John Cena tournament and title and everything is gonna be a good thing and doesn't become the Andre the Giant Battle Royal, which is kind of just an afterthought when when we don't have anything for you at WrestleMania, just throw you in the Andre the Giant Battle Royal and attach a legend's name to it. I'm really hoping it doesn't, it's not that. At one point, the first Andre the Giant Battle Royal was a big deal. So I'm hoping that this Giantsena thing is a big deal and it continues to be a big deal, but we'll see. We'll see. Overall, not impressed, but who cares? Maybe I just don't fully understand it. We'll see. I'll see later how good it is. I hope I'm proven wrong. I am totally okay with being wrong. I'd rather be happy than than right. I think that was Douglas Adams. He said that. I'd be I'd rather be happy than right. Right now, I I I'm not excited about it, but I hope I can get excited about it. So let's just wait and see. And uh yeah, so then we go to the main event Roman Reigns versus Jacob Fatou. They really made Jacob Fattu out to be a beast here. He pretty much dominated Roman Reigns. Roman Reigns does get his licks in here and there, but when it's all said and done, Roman Reigns will, I wouldn't say Roman cheated because it seemed to be all accidental. He had the tongue and death grip in, and Roman is just like, ah, he's just like reaching for his life. And when he does it, he takes off the exposed turnbuckle, and then out of survival, he hit Jacob hits the turnbuckle. Now the referee did see it though, and the referee should have said something. Maybe not a disqualification, but at the same time, the referee should depend it him. So, like, I do feel they buried the referee a little bit, but at the end of the day, I don't think that Roman cheated either. And Roman will get the pin on Jacob, but he barely survived. And that's the story they're telling here. He barely survived Jacob because then Jacob attacks him after the bell. After the bell. I don't do play by play, I hope you know. I kind of just focus on the story elements of each match. But Jacob attacks him after the bell and destroys him after the bell. Where were the Usos? Where were the Usos? It's like that doesn't make sense that the Usos did not come out and help Roman Reigns at this point. Because yes, maybe it's one thing to not interfere in the match and to see who's the better man, but after the match, they could have came out and pulled Jacob off. So that doesn't make sense right there. But yes, now Roman, Roman, like he won the battle but lost the war. So now we are set up for another matchup. Roman does say in a post, in a post PLE pay-per-view, PLE uh interview that he's like, this is why we don't we didn't want Jacob in the WWE, even though he said he signed off on Jacob like two or three weeks ago. He's like, Yeah, this is why. And so yes, we're definitely continuing this story B. Overall, that was that was backlash, no real earth shattering surprises. And I guess I mean you don't need a swerve for swerve's sake, but I think I would have liked something more, just something a little bit more to stick my teeth in. I am gonna give this a seven, maybe a 6.8. No, I'll give it a seven. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Because even the Asuka match and EOSky match, I was disappointed, but it wasn't their fault. It probably wasn't even uh Creato's fault here because it's it's like you know, they can't help that EOSky got fired, so it's just a sucky situation, and I think that just affected things. But yeah, I will give this a uh the the broadbreaker, broadbreaker Seth Rollins was the surprisingly best match for me. And and then Sami Zayn and Trick Williams was like that was the best storytelling for me, and Dan Housen match was the most entertaining from just a shut your brain off, shut your brain off of shut your brain off of real life and just be entertained type of match for me. So yeah, seven six point eight to seven chops on the chop o meter. And I apologized when I left the live stream. I kind of just like bounced. That's because my power went out. My internet went out, and then my power went out. So there you have it, boys. There you have it, girls. My backlash review. See you bye.