Due to the fact Vince McMahon shied away from pushing Luke Harper to a main event level, his current status is unknown. Harper lost his #1 contender match against AJ Styles twice on Smackdown Live, even though it appeared as though he was being set up to win the second fall.
It’s practically unheard of for a match to be restarted after a referee didn’t notice something like a foot on the rope and then end again in the same way. Dave Meltzer says it’s odd AJ Styles won both of those falls with finishing moves if he’s supposed to be going into the WrestleMania feud as a heel against Shane McMahon and we totally agree with the writer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter on that one.
Recent reports have come out saying Bray will become the sympathetic babyface character in the WWE Championship storyline against Randy Orton (because it’s hard to watch a guy’s temple get burned down and not feel sorry for him). CageSideSeats notes that Luke Harper is expected to re-align himself with Bray Wyatt in the fight against Randy Orton leading to WrestleMania.
It’s unknown how things will play out seeing that many thought Harper would be placed into the WWE Championship match at Mania making it a triple threat. One thing is for sure things are apparently changing on a daily basis in creative at the whim of Vince McMahon.
I have doubts that VInce has major involvments in the abrupt changes in the storylines being played at the blue brand, because if he is, he would have done better for the Raw storylines, but we all know by now that Smackdown is having way better storylines these days. They are full of surprises, shockers, unexpected twists, and its now becoming hard to foresee and predict that what will happen next, and that is what is making Smackdown a better show.