An interesting bit of news broke on Thursday that many are struggling to wrap their heads around about Brock Lesnar. According to multiple sources the former WWE, UFC and NCAA Division I heavyweight champion remains in the USADA anti-doping testing pool despite being poised to return to the WWE. Which begs one simple question…why?
There’s no question that Brock Lesnar is going to return to the WWE in a month at SummerSlam, one of the company’s biggest annual events, where he will face longtime B-plus player Randy Orton in one of the card’s premiere matches. The WWE has been heavily promoting the match over the last two weeks of programming, and Lesnar left no mystery about whether or not he would live up to his wrestling obligations, saying he was “booked through August.”
After that, though? Well, that’s anyone’s guess.
As we discussed shortly after UFC 200, the WWE heavily featured Lesnar in the first quarter of 2016, which nearly ran through all of his contracted appearances for the calendar year, which is what opened the door for him to fight at UFC 200. He hasn’t been seen in the ring since WrestleMania 32 in April, and his program with Orton will probably be an abridged one, with Lesnar appearing sporadically before the match in August.
Given Lesnar’s mostly empty schedule for the coming months and the fact that he remains attached to USADA, there is a real chance that he might be lined up to return to the UFC. He might not come back in any permanent way, of course, but given the rousing success of UFC 200 for both the UFC and WWE (who got a load of free advertising through Lesnar’s media rounds), Vince McMahon and company may have softened up a bit to the idea of Lesnar bouncing between the cage and the ring.
The most likely landing spot for another Lesnar fight would be in November at UFC 205, the UFC’s debut show in Madison Square Garden. If that pans out…boy, I’m excited.
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