The Bella Twins’ SummerSlam match almost had a very different build. Not because they changed the story. Because, according to Nikki and Brie Bella, WWE cut it.
Speaking on The Nikki & Brie Show, the sisters revealed that material they filmed for SummerSlam was pulled just days before the premium live event, leaving them frustrated heading into one of WWE’s biggest shows of the year. Brie was the first to bring it up.
“Even though our stuff got cut on the Friday before, which, you know…”
Nikki immediately finished the thought: “Whatever, which we were bummed about.” That wasn’t the end of it. Nikki said they were also told the package would be released online, but she never found it anywhere.
“Very bummed. Yeah. I’m like, where did our package go, by the way? I never saw it online. They said they posted it socially. I never saw it on social media. Our package we filmed.”
Brie had the same reaction: “I… I didn’t see it either. I don’t think it did.” For Nikki Bella, that made an already difficult assignment even harder. The sisters had to follow the emotional GUNTHER vs. Nick Aldis match, and Nikki admitted the crowd was still completely invested in what had happened before they even walked to the ring.
“I thought Nick was gonna win at one point. I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh, Gunther’s gonna tap.’ And he didn’t. But I felt like in that moment, the crowd wanted Nick so bad that I wish Gunther would’ve tapped in that moment. It almost gave me the feeling of when we had to go after Taker lost his streak. Obviously the crowd wasn’t as upset as that. But going out there after Nick and Gunther, people were really upset about Nick. I’m like, ‘Dang, we’re in that hard spot again.'”
Still, Nikki doesn’t think following a hot match was the biggest problem. She believes the real issue was that the story never got the television time it was supposed to receive.
“And also having no build, we had no package going into SummerSlam. We had nothing Friday night. We literally had one show in Oakland to tell a story.”
The Bella Twins still walked out of SummerSlam with everyone talking after turning on Paige following their loss to Fatal Influence, but they’ve now revealed that fans were only shown part of the story. From their perspective, the rivalry heading into one of WWE’s biggest events was supposed to have a lot more behind it than what ultimately made it to television.
Do you think WWE should have done more to build the Bella Twins’ SummerSlam storyline? Let us know in the comments below.
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