WWE Battleground 2016: Results and observations from the show

For the past three years, Battleground has been just another pay-per-view on WWE's calendar.

The 2016 edition of Battleground was anything but.

That is because this year's show was a turning point of sorts for WWE, as it was the final pay-per-view before the company officially kicks off its brand extension Monday night.

What that means is that seeing both Raw and Smackdown superstars on the same pay-per-view — in theory — will only happen four times per year. That is until WWE ditches the brand extension for a second time.

Due to these circumstances, my expectations for the event itself were not all that high. I expected the show to have quality wrestling, which is typical for WWE pay-per-views, but there was just something about the show that gave it a lame duck feel heading in.

I am happy to say that for the first in I can remember, Battleground exceeded my expectations with a couple of fantastic matches and a long-awaited WWE debut.

Before I delve deep into my observations, here are the full match results from the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C.:

- Pre-show match – Breezango def. The Usos

- Sasha Banks & Bayley def. Charlotte & Dana Brooke

- The Wyatt Family def. The New Day

- WWE United States championship – Rusev def. Zack Ryder

- Sami Zayn def. Kevin Owens

- Natalya def. Becky Lynch

- WWE Intercontinental championship – The Miz vs. Darren Young ended in a double disqualification

- WWE championship – Dean Ambrose def. Roman Reigns & Seth Rollins

Ambrose takes WWE title to Smackdown

As of right now, Smackdown is the place to find the only world champion in WWE, and his name is Dean Ambrose.

Ambrose, Smackdown's No. 1 pick in last week's brand extension draft, retained the WWE championship after a stellar match against Rollins and the returning Reigns.

I fully expected another disputed finish, which would have given WWE a way to split the world title again, but that thankfully did not come to fruition. Instead, what we got was a clean finish, where Ambrose pinned Reigns to win the match after delivering dirty deeds.

All of the authority figures were at ringside witnessing the match and did not play any part in how it ended. They were simply innocent bystanders cheering on their respective draft picks.

When Ambrose clinched the victory, Smackdown's Shane McMahon and Daniel Bryan ran around the ring in celebration that their top pick was bringing the WWE championship to the blue brand.

The entire Smackdown roster even came down to the ring to celebrate, including The Usos, who hoisted Ambrose up on their shoulders despite the fact that he pinned their real-life cousin moments earlier.

Although there was no indication that WWE was creating a second world championship at Battleground that does not mean it can't do so moving forward. I could certainly see a miffed Stephanie McMahon creating her own world championship just so her show has one. I don't know if she'd go as far as to simply reward it to Rollins a la Eric Bischoff and Triple H back in 2002, but I would not be surprised if a tournament was announced by which the winner would earn Raw's world championship.

Reigns takes pin fall in return

The former WWE champion served his suspension and returned to television Sunday night to compete for the title he lost at Money in the Bank.

As expected, he received a chorus of boos throughout the night.

Although Reigns was power bombed through a table and took the pin fall, he was still sort of protected during the match.

Yes, those two spots are indicative of a man in the doghouse for receiving a wellness policy violation, but the story of the match made Reigns out to be the biggest threat among the three former Shield members. John Bradshaw Layfield even said as much when Ambrose and Rollins put him through a table.

With Sunday night now in the books, the most intriguing part is what happens with Reigns moving forward. Does he remain among the top two or three men in the company or does he receive a temporary demotion of sorts because of his suspension?

With the rosters now split, both brands need to present as many main-event players as possible to give fans incentive to watch. Love him or hate him, there is no doubt that Reigns is a main-event level talent and outside of his recent suspension, has shown that he is worthy of being at or near the top of the card.

Unfortunately for Reigns, his suspension will loom large like a dark cloud not only within the company, but also with the fans, who were not all that enamored with him to begin with.

Zayn, Owens probably should fight forever

When WWE first announced that it was splitting up the rosters, I automatically thought that it meant that Zayn would be sent be to one brand and Owens would be sent to the other simply to keep them away from each other for a little while.

If not, the two may have to fight each other every single week. I also thought that keeping them away from each other would make their next confrontation even more significant.

After Sunday night, however, I have changed my tune. After watching Zayn and Owens put one of the best matches of 2016, I have no idea why I even entertained the idea of splitting these two guys a part. I don't what I was thinking.

In my eyes, Zayn and Owens can indeed fight forever and I don't think the fans would ever get tired of it.

There were so many things that made their match at Battleground special. There were so many moments, so many spots, but the top reason why the match was so great was because of the story.

Almost any match is made better with a quality story underlying it and this was no different.

That is not to say there wasn't some tremendous action during this match because there was.

How about Zayn almost killing himself when he tried to springboard outside of the ring? How about Zayn delivering a brain buster to Owens on the ring apron?

Both of those spots were insane, but so was Owens' cannonball that sent Zayn into the ring post.

There was also Zayn's back-to-back suplex spot that received a standing ovation from the fans in the middle of the match.

And finally, there was Zayn's back-to-back helluva kicks, which had the storyline element of Zayn holding Owens up after the first one, looking him in the eyes, propping him up in the corner and delivering a second one to finally end the match.

It was amazing and something tells me that this will not be the end just yet. I know WWE has been touting for weeks that this would mark the end of their long feud, but SummerSlam would make the perfect place for a rubber match between these two.

Randy Orton sends verbal venom to Brock Lesnar

The only thing I expected from Orton's appearance on Chris Jericho's Highlight Reel was for the latter to receive an RKO from the former. That did happen, but so did so much more.

For one, we got a clearly rejuvenated Orton. As he mentioned at Battleground, he has been sitting on the sidelines recovering from injury for nearly a year. That was plenty of time for him to come back with his proverbial batteries all charged up.

This rejuvenated Orton then teamed with an always entertaining Jericho to have a pretty entertaining and noteworthy segment.

The biggest thing that people will remember was Orton taking a major jab at Lesnar's recent failed drug tests from his other profession of mixed martial arts. Orton said that it may take 20 suplexes to get to Lesnar's "Suplex City," but it only takes one RKO to get to "Viperville" — "no enhancements needed."

Jericho, who was hilarious during this segment, said that Orton may have pay for that statement. Orton agreed.

At the end of the day, this conjured up more interest in the SummerSlam match between Orton and Lesnar, as there was no real reason to see the match heading in other than the fact that the two hadn't really crossed paths in WWE before.

Since that's really all WWE wanted to do, the Highlight Reel was a success.

It's Bayley!!!

Good news: Bayley was Banks' mystery partner for the tag team match against Charlotte and Brooke and received a massive — and I mean massive — ovation when her music played at the Verizon Center.

It was a heartwarming moment to see Bayley finally walk down the aisle on a main WWE show and that feeling was expressed by Banks, who I've never seen smile so much during her time in WWE. She grinned from ear to ear when Bayley's music hit and looked as though he was about to cry when the match was over.

All of the fans have been waiting for Bayley to finally get that moment and they were fulfilled Sunday night.

Bad news: This apparently does not mean Bayley has been promoted to the main roster for good. JBL said during the match and Bayley said in an interview on WWE's web site after the match that this was a one-time favor for Bayley and that she is still focused on winning the NXT Women's title a second time.

Why WWE isn't quite ready to call her up to the main roster? I honestly have no idea.

I understand that NXT still needs stars, but it's not as if Bayley couldn't pull double duty like Owens and Zayn have done before her.

But for whatever reason, her time has not yet arrived. Maybe some important people's minds changed after hearing the loud ovation she got from the fans.

For one night, though, fans got to see Bayley on a main program. I suppose we can enjoy that for right now.

Wyatt Family vs. New Day left a lot to be desired

A couple of weeks ago I was on board with this feud. I was digging the dynamic between Bray Wyatt and Xavier Woods and I was big fan of WWE going to the Wyatt Family's compound to film a match. I wasn't a big fan of the execution, but the idea was still a good one.

After seeing the "swamp fight" and the six-man tag at Battleground, I have slightly changed my tune (again). That is because it felt like we got nowhere after all of these matches and encounters.

The New Day are still WWE Tag Team champions and the Wyatt Family are still essentially in the same spot they were when they first returned to television. If anything, the group is in a worse position with only Braun Strowman headed to Raw.

I just have a feeling that the brand split will give WWE a reason to essentially flush all of this down the toilet and quickly move on as if none of it ever happened, starting Monday night on Raw.

I think that would be a mistake, but I don't think there is another way to handle with the way the rosters are set up.