The 2021 WWE Elimination Chamber pay-per-view is coming up this Sunday, February 21st and it will feature two of the titular cage matches with implications of both the WWE Championship and Universal Championship going forward.
Drew McIntyre will defend the WWE Championship inside the cage against five fearsome opponents, while Roman Reigns will have a much easier path ahead of him. The Tribal Chief has used his stranglehold over WWE management and Paul Heyman's knowledge of contract negotiations to circumvent having to defend his title inside the cage.
Instead, six competitors will fight it out in SmackDown's Elimination Chamber match with the winner being declared No. 1 contender. That person will then immediately get a title shot against Reigns. It's a brilliant move, and if you want to play smart with your bets on places like comeon, here's who you should put your money on next weekend.
Raw Elimination Chamber Match for WWE Championship
As it stands right now (as the card is always subject to change), WWE champion Drew McIntyre's field of opponents he'll have to fight off to keep his title consists of AJ Styles, Jeff Hardy, Kofi Kingston, Randy Orton and Sheamus.
We've already seen the lineup change as The Miz was originally in this match before he opted out of it and was replaced by Kofi Kingston. The Miz is already Mr. Money in the Bank. It's strange WWE even put him in the match to begin with. He's guaranteed a title shot and could just cash-in his contract afterward while sitting this out. However, Braun Strowman might have been the planned person in this spot until he suffered an infection in his bloodstream. That whole situation is odd, because Strowman's now questioned why he wasn't put in there. Perhaps Mustafa Ali replaces Kingston or Strowman attacks Kingston or Jeff Hardy and gets put in there. None of those have much of a chance of winning, though.
Speaking of The Charismatic Enigma, he hasn't had a title shot against The Scottish Warrior yet, but he's a former multi-time champion like everyone else on this list. There's always a chance he or anyone else could win, but since he's lost so many matches against Elias and Jaxson Ryker and Bobby Lashley and others over the past few months, he's the one with the least likely chance to win.
The Phenomenal One already lost to McIntyre at TLC 2020. There doesn't seem to be much momentum on his side, either. He's been lingering without a solid feud for weeks and it's doubtful WWE would put the title on him now just for the sake of it.
The only true threats to McIntyre's title are Orton and Sheamus, for different reasons.
With Sheamus, he's already turned on his former best friend and winning the title from him could set up a rematch at WrestleMania 37 that would be more of a bitter rivalry. With Orton, though, it could be to set up an entirely different match, as his feud with Bray Wyatt is still lingering.
WWE has pivoted to putting the title on Wyatt in the past at Elimination Chamber 2017 just to set up a title match with Orton. Maybe the plan is to do that again. It might even be to set up Edge vs. Orton, but that's probably not the case, as they wouldn't have had their blowoff match on Monday Night Raw a few weeks ago.
WWE could want to put the title on the Orton vs. The Fiend match, but that would be a mistake. That feud is probably best set for a gimmick match of some kind, rather than a normal title match, which would better benefit McIntyre against whoever he fights.
At the end of the day, your smart bet is to say Drew McIntyre will retain the WWE Championship. It may be a struggle, but he'll pull it off.
SmackDown Elimination Chamber Match for Universal Championship
Things are much different for SmackDown's Elimination Chamber match. This is all just to set up a challenger for Reigns who is doomed to fail.
Immediately, you can rule out the three heels. It wouldn't make any sense for Jey Uso to win and fight his cousin. They've already done that feud before and they're on the same side now.
Sami Zayn and King Corbin are villains and WWE doesn't typically put heel characters against other heel characters. In particular, this is a sympathetic spot, having someone go through an Elimination Chamber just to have a title match. It works better as something a good guy would be stuck doing.
The three babyfaces who are fighting up that hill are Kevin Owens, Daniel Bryan and Cesaro.
Owens has already lost to Reigns numerous times and no matter what the excuse, he's failed to get the job done. WWE might want to keep that going, though, so he's got a solid shot.
Daniel Bryan makes the most sense as far as a viable contender who would go through the whole gauntlet just to be screwed with a fresh Reigns. But does WWE want to do that and throw it away, or does WWE want to save that for WrestleMania or another event later this year?
Cesaro is the oddball. He never gets title shots. Maybe there's a reason for him being in this one. He's freshly babyface and Daniel Bryan has been putting him in good spots for his creative role on SmackDown. Maybe the idea here is for Cesaro to get to the title shot level, finally, after all these years, just so he can lose in a sympathetic way and people can boo Reigns even more.
Smart bet? Go with Daniel Bryan. If you don't feel that, go with Cesaro or Owens. It absolutely has to be one of those three.
However, the smartest bet of all is betting on Roman Reigns beating whoever he fights, no matter who it is. There's no way he drops that title at Elimination Chamber.
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