Welcome to the week of ALL THE THINGS!Yes, it's been a busy past few days to say the very freakin' least. There's so much to cover so I'll just throw the caveat out here that I'm probably not going to get to it all. You can read my SummerSlam live-blog here , where I went through all the matches and spewed forth my brain thinkings -- it also includes a video of me, Eric Goldman, and Bobby Amos chatting about the event, which you can also see below -- if you want more SummerSlam coverage than I'm about to provide here.



This time next week, I will be Champion of the Universe. @WWE — Kevin Owens (@FightOwensFight) August 23, 2016

So much stuff happened! Firstly, before the abundance of SummerSlam-related/adjacent activities even kicked off, there was a bit of a Wellness Policy violation bloodletting with Del Rio, Paige, and Eva Marie getting the old 30-day heave-ho. Then there was everyone thinking something would go down between Goldberg and Lesnar -- since they were both in New York and at the same WWE 2K17 party on Friday -- that would set us up for a 'Mania match of some kind. Then NXT: TakeOver happened, was awesome, and left us with a new champ and a dislocated Samoa Jaw. Then SummerSlam, then RAW , then SmackDown - TOO MUCH GODDAMN WRESTLING STUFF.But let me yoink this gem out of the pouch. It's from this week's Talking Smack, the SmackDown Live aftershow that's been featuring really candid chatter as of late. Here's The Miz unloading all over Daniel Bryan's mush...Work? Shoot? Worked shoot? Shooted... work? Whatever. I love Daniel Bryan to pieces, but I'm solidly Team Miz here. I'm not saying Daniel Bryan shouldn't have wrestled the way he did, or that others shouldn't stick with the risk-filled indie style they've honed over the years, but he shouldn't be criticizing someone for not wrestling in that style.The Miz is tricky. He's a great heel and one of the WWE's most valuable players when he's used right. And no, he's not the most dynamic performer in the ring, but does he have to be? He still can put on a great match when given the opportunity. But there are people who think he sucks in the ring and therefore that's why they boo when really he's using a more traditional bad guy move-set in an attempt to be a tremendous heel - and that bleeds over into some sort of strange "go away" heat from the fans. It's this odd situation where people hate Miz but perhaps not for the right reasons. We're just so used to liking heels these days, like Rollins and Styles, because their wrestling gets them over with the IWC. So when someone can't really be appreciated for their wrestling alone, they get treated like a gross garbage person.The Miz is game for anything. As he said on Jericho's podcast once, repeating advice given to him by Jericho, act like whatever your doing is the most important thing that's going on because you are there. Try to make everything you're told to do better. The Miz is fantastic and has cultivated a viable character in an era that's had extreme difficulty creating characters. Especially over-the-top ones. They tend to do well on NXT, but then when they come up to RAW - like Adam Rose, Bo Dallas, The Ascension, etc - they fizzle fast.The Miz endures, and he's always there. Like he said, he's never been shelved. Aside from getting knocked out during his 'Mania main event and not being able to remember the finish, he's a stalwart player. In that above clip, even if it was planned, you get the feeling like Miz really had some dark stuff to get off his chest, probably dating back to when he "mentored" Bryan. Good freakin' speech. I'm not sure what it'll lead to, but Talking Smack has become the best part of SmackDown. That and Heath Slater, really - who, like Miz, is really shining in his punching bag role.As a further example of how game, and great, Miz is, here's him dressed like a chicken and going to war with Dolph Ziggler as the new KFC Col. Sanders...I just think cowardly is the wrong word here. What about Bret Hart? He was one of the safest guys around. No flipping or high spots. He protected himself and the guys he worked with. Granted, he looked better doing it, but, to my point, there's nothing Bret did, risk wise, that Miz wouldn't do. We just now look down on that old school style.I'm just saying that there should be guys who don't do 450 splashes. You need a Honky Tonk Man. You need a personality. That being said, I also think Miz is more talented in the ring than people give him credit for. It's just that the guys nowadays are SO talented that there's an extreme grading curve.My love letter to Miz aside, that whole tirade leads me into the SummerSlam injuries that have kind of rocked RAW. Sasha Banks lost to Charlotte so that she could rest up some lingering lower lumbar pain that she's been experiencing. Word came that she'd been taken off house shows for all of September and we all feared for the Wellness Policy worst. But it's just so she can heal a bit. Not great, but not as bad as a violation. And I don't have a problem with this, or Charlotte winning, per se, though I do think she should have cheated to win. Anyway......the big bummer coming out of 'Slam was Finn Balor's shoulder trauma that came after getting powerbombed into the ring barricade. Balor's shoulder went FLER-CRUNCH! and now he's out for six months. Seth's taking a few rounds of interwebs heat for once again injuring someone with that move (he's blamed by some for putting Sting out of the game even earlier than Sting wanted to leave the game), but I think it's not as simple as that. All of these moves are damn dangerous as hell and mistakes can happen during any maneuver. Rollins has a move where he literally hurls guys - of different weights, shapes, and sizes - into hard things. How much control does he really have? Or CAN he really have? I'm just saying, piggybacking off the confrontation about career-shortening styles, a majority of the WWE roster is currently "at risk."But yeah, Finn having to relinquish the WWE Universal Championship right away sucks for a few reasons. One, Finn's gone right as he was being given the ball. Then the entire thing made us focus even more on how hideous the belt is. You know, because it looks like it's made of Fruit Roll-Ups, Kane's Mask/Nakamura's Pants, etc. It was something that twitter went wild with on Sunday night, as twitter is wont to do, looking for any humorous distraction. I'm guilty af too. It looks silly. And I think we all noticed it more because we still all hate the name of the title. Though I'm glad Jericho and Kevin Owens have taken to passively mocking it a bit...So, honestly, we were set up to mock the belt. I mean, it would have had to look absolutely amazing, better than we could have anticipated, for us to give it a pass. As it turned out, it looked like Play-Doh smeared on a cutting board. But enough about that. The OTHER worst part of this entire situation is that Roman Reigns is back in the title hunt. And rumors, as of right now, have him going over next Monday.I know, it doesn't make much sense story-wise given how he still have unfinished business with Rusev and the U.S. belt, but we'll see. Rusev could actually cost him the match to keep all that going. But I could see the WWE having a short memory about Reigns and his violation (and perpetual/inescapable inability to catch on), and with the indie New Era folks getting sidelined, they could go back to the safer choice.

Continue on for NXT: TakeOver injuries, Lesnar/Orton, Bayley, and more...