When the King and Queen of the Ring tournament brackets were announced, fans immediately noticed that Finn Balor had been quietly moved from RAW to SmackDown.
That ends his feud with his former Judgement Day allies Dominik Mysterio and JD McDonagh, and closes the door on the repeated teases that Balor might turn Roxanne Perez against Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez.
WWE made the move official during Monday's RAW, with McDonagh taking a shot at his former mentor and making it clear that the faction would have put The Demon down had he not been moved to the blue brand.
Talking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer explained why WWE sent Balor to SmackDown. "I never heard anything about a draft," he started. "The idea is they just want to get him away from Dominik Mysterio and JD. He beat JD, and if he stays on Raw, theoretically, how does he not work with those guys?"
"So they just figured they’re done with that, they’re done with Finn Balor doing that, and they wanted to give him a fresh start, and there you go," the insider continued. "I mean, that’s kind of a lot of times they do that, they just run a feud, it’s over, and it’s the nature, the nature of the feud is they just don’t want these guys interacting."
It remains to be seen what WWE has planned for Balor moving forward, but getting him away from The Judgement Day certainly isn't the worst idea in the world. The Irishman still has plenty to bring to the table, despite recently admitting he has concerns about what being a WWE Superstar means for his personal life. Talking to Stephanie McMahon, Balor said:
"I'm with my wife in the United States, and it's the two of us. Her family liveS in Mexico City. My family lives in Ireland. So we're kind of like here, like we've got our own little island, which is beautiful. And we've a great relationship, but there's certainly an aspect of, like, loneliness, like where we don't have a support system. And that's always the kind of the thing that I question, like, 'Should I be doing this job?'"
"I don't know if I want to give up WWE, right? Because I want to perform at the top. I want to be on the biggest shows. But deep down, I struggle daily with like what I'm giving up for that. And it's not like I get so, I want to say jealous, but I'm so envious of the guys who have their families here in the United States. And they just like fly home on Tuesday morning after Raw. For me and Vero, we just come home from work, but our families are still far away."
You can watch the full interview below.