Torch Passed: Lesnar Puts Oba Femi Over in SummerSlam Night One Shocker
The biggest party in wrestling opened with a legend stepping aside for a rising star
By Dexter "Box-Office" Reel
Brock Lesnar has spent the better part of two decades as the guy other wrestlers get measured against. On Night One of SummerSlam, he was the guy doing the measuring — and he came up short on purpose.
According to ESPN's rundown of the show's biggest moments, Lesnar's match against Oba Femi ended with the veteran symbolically "passing the torch" to the newcomer, one of the takeaways ESPN flagged as defining the night. The report also pointed to an "unforeseen babyface" emerging from the card — wrestling shorthand for a performer the crowd decided, on instinct, to cheer for rather than boo.
We don't have match-by-match blow-by-blow beyond what ESPN reported, and SummerSlam's second night still loomed at press time, so any verdict on how the two-night event lands as a whole is premature. [Full card results and Night Two outcomes were not available in the source material.]
Still, torch-passing angles are rare currency in pro wrestling — companies don't hand them out for just anyone. Lesnar, a former UFC heavyweight champion and one of WWE's most bankable attractions since the early 2000s, has mostly worked as a wrecking ball in recent years, not a mentor figure. Putting him in the ring to elevate Femi, rather than simply beat him, is the promotion signaling where it wants its next decade to go.
Whether Femi is built to carry that weight is a question only time — and ticket sales — will answer. For one night in a packed arena, though, WWE bet its most reliable veteran on a newcomer, and the crowd apparently bought it.
Loved it, hated it, or wasted my afternoon — here's which: this one's a genuine swerve worth your attention, even if the verdict on Femi is still TBD.
— Compiled from reporting by ESPN.
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