This year’s Survivor Series is a few hours away and when a PPV is on the horizon, you can always expect some predictions from this site! It’s yet another SmackDown vs. Raw affair, with seven matches on tap for the evening. So let’s go ahead and get into my predictions for WWE Survivor Series 2020!
Dual-Brand Battle Royal
Aaaaaand we start off with a match with zero announced participants! Yeah this is a Kickoff special that was added at the very last minute to help assure there would be an odd number of matches; kind of a necessity when you have a gimmick like this. It’d be a bit of folly to predict this when they haven’t named a single person for it, so I think what I’ll do instead is predict which brand will win, I think that’s fair given the theme. And so I’ll go ahead and say that Raw takes this one.
Champion vs. Champion: Raw’s WWE United States Champion Bobby Lashley vs. SmackDown’s WWE Intercontinental Champion Sami Zayn
For many reasons Sami Zayn is the defacto heel here. He’s taken the opportunity to rail against America as much as he can, and besides the Hurt Business are pretty used to being defacto babyfaces after their feud with Retribution. This could easily be a very good match, though I can’t help but think Sami’s going to be spending a lot of it running away given how he’s been acting of late.
Bobby has been fairly protected all year and it seems likely that he’ll go back to being a world title contender at some point in 2021, whereas Sami Zayn, a little less so. I do think there’s a chance Sami cheats his way to a fluke win, but the more likely thing seems to be Lashley taking this one.
Women’s Five-On-Five Survivor Series Match: Team Raw (Nia Jax, Shayna Baszler, Lana, Lacey Evans & Peyton Royce) vs. Team SmackDown (Bianca Belair, Ruby Riott, Liv Morgan, Bayley & Natalya)
Team Raw’s angle has been that they hate each other and can’t properly work together. In particular Nia Jax really doesn’t appreciate Lana’s existence, Samoan Dropping her through announce tables nine times in the past few months. Of all the angles WWE have done year, that’s certainly one of them. Meanwhile Team SmackDown… doesn’t really have much of a narrative as a whole. Natalya struggled to qualify for weeks until she finally did, that’s about it.
That said, SmackDown’s side looks hilariously better than Raw’s. Not only on paper but also, they get along with each other! Atleast by comparison, they’re much more cohesive. The story of this match will definitely revolve around Nia Jax and Lana in some way. I think Nia’s likely to be the traditional large wrestler eliminated early for shock value, and Lana will prove her worth by being the last survivor on her team and if not winning, coming very close to doing so.
Lana does need to bounce back eventually, it always seemed likely that they would try for her big underdog comeback story after burying her deep enough. But… do you really sacrifice Bayley for that? I can’t see it. Team SmackDown to win in the end.
Champion vs. Champion: Raw Tag Team Champions The New Day vs. SmackDown Tag Team Champions Street Profits
This is one of few matches on the card that feels relatively built to, thanks largely to Big E still being on SmackDown to mess around with the Profits every week. There’s also a story here of the Street Profits framing it as a passing of the torch, given their similarities to the New Day. Considering these two teams just traded titles, the Profits have been tag champs since the beginning of March. So it’s coming up on 10 months for them, not something that happens too often in WWE. I’m actually pretty sure the New Day are the last team to have such a lengthy reign, which is cute.
This is a bit of a sleeper match. New Day have really been tearing it up ever since they got back, they’ve been putting in one TV match of the night after another. Here back on PPV in a match with some significance, I expect good things for sure. Given the story though, I feel like it’s a much smarter thing for the younger dudes to win. Not to say that WWE tends to make the smartest decisions, but they have been big on pushing Dawkins and Ford all year and I don’t see that changing, this would do a lot to establish them as a top flight tandem. Street Profits over.
Champion vs. Champion: Raw Women’s Champion Asuka vs. SmackDown Women’s Champion Sasha Banks
This has a very good chance of being the match of the night. It’s definitely the strongest match they can do in the women’s division right now, Asuka and Sasha are both just awesome. Definitely looking forward to this one. And Sasha is coming in with a ton of momentum after her incredible series with Bayley. Asuka meanwhile has had a pretty quiet few months.
I feel like given their placements right now – and given my predictions for the rest of the show – I’d say that Sasha Banks getting the win makes sense here.
Men’s Five-On-Five Survivor Series Match: Team Raw (AJ Styles, Keith Lee, Braun Strowman, Sheamus & Riddle) vs. Team SmackDown (Kevin Owens, Jey Uso, King Corbin, Seth Rollins & Otis)
Team Raw’s angle has been that they hate each other and can’t properly work together. Huh… deja vu. Meanwhile, Team SmackDown uh, has no real narrative to speak of. Like even less so than their Women’s team. Commentary sometimes discusses who should be the captain but everyone actually on these teams barely even mentions it, and it’s not like anybody anywhere cares about these captain angles anyway.
That said, given we only have six main card matches here, and this is a fairly star-studded match, I imagine this might last a really long time and have some good action as well. It’s also expected to be the last time we see Seth Rollins for a while as he’ll be going on paternity leave soon. However while both teams are pretty good, I can’t say they’re equals. Team Raw has the big boy advantage for sure but moreover, more of that team feels like it’s being actively pushed than the SD! side. Besides it only makes sense that the two Survivor Series matches have different outcomes and one of the Team Raws have to put their differences aside so, I’ll say Team Raw wins this time.
Champion vs. Champion: Raw’s WWE Champion Drew McIntyre vs. SmackDown’s Universal Champion Roman Reigns
And here’s the big one. A match that I wholly feel should’ve been saved for WrestleMania instead, unless they’re going to be able to get The Rock to come in to face Roman Reigns. That’s really the only exception I could give you that’d be better than this one for a WrestleMania main event right now.
And yes they faced each other at Mania a couple of years ago, back when McIntyre was nowhere near the level he’s at now and when Roman was just coming off of his cancer scare and honestly probably wasn’t in shape to wrestle if you look back on him in those days. This would be an upgrade in every sense. But either way, this should be a fun one to see for tonight.
And if the rest of the card goes as I predict, the score between Raw and SmackDown will be tied 3-3 going in, as you’d ideally want to see. It’s very tempting to just say shenanigans forces a draw here but I don’t see them having the proper foresight to protect the result in that way. I figure someone will win and all things considered, it’s most likely to be Roman Reigns, though likely by dubious means. So yeah I’m thinking a SmackDown overall win, they’re by far the more important brand these days.