It's been nearly a month since we last saw Randy Orton on RAW, with his last match taking place on the June 21 episode of RAW. During that show, The Viper lost to John Morrison in a Money in the Bank qualifying match after Matt Riddle inadvertently caused a distraction at ringside.
The plan was for Orton to compete in a second chance bout, but when he was M.I.A. from RAW, Riddle took his place and ended up going on to wrestle in the ladder match. Clearly, WWE had something planned for these two heading into the PPV, while there have been rumours for a while now that they were set to have a big match at SummerSlam.
Whether that was going to be a tag team bout or a singles one is unclear, but Fightful Select is now reporting that the reason Orton has been off TV is that he's been placed on WWE's internal disabled/inactive list. There are no issues between him and WWE, and the hope is that the former WWE Champion will be back by the August 2 episode of RAW.
As for those original SummerSlam plans for Orton and Riddle, it's said "the unforeseen circumstances of Orton’s absence required an audible be called."
Clearly, Orton has suffered some sort of injury or is just unable to appear on TV for personal reasons, but we're hoping everything is all good on his end and that he can return as soon as possible.