A locker room looking over its shoulder

The hangover after WrestleMania is always a strange period for WWE. The confetti is swept up, the stadium echo fades, and the reality of the grueling weekly schedule sets back in. But this year, the road to Backlash feels remarkably tense.

As WrestleTalk highlighted this past week, the sheer volume of departures has left a massive void:

"On April 24, WWE had its latest slate of talent cuts with 25 wrestlers known to have been released from the company as of this writing."

Those cuts were deep, largely unexpected, and cut across both the main roster and NXT developmental. The feature analyzing which of those released names might eventually return highlights a cold truth about modern wrestling. Nobody is ever truly gone, but nobody is ever completely safe either. You can get cut on a Friday and be back on television two years later. But right now, the sting is fresh.

You can feel that nervous energy bleeding into the television product. Matches on Raw and SmackDown over the last week have had a stiffer, more frantic pace. Guys are working like they are one bad television rating away from a phone call from talent relations. It makes for compelling viewing, sure, but it also means the stakes at Backlash are unnaturally high for a B-tier premium live event. The talent knows management is watching closely.

The Backlash board

This brings us to the May 9 card. The main event is locked: Cody Rhodes defending the WWE Championship against Jacob Fatu.

It is a match we should have gotten six months ago. Fatu has been the most protected asset in the Bloodline saga since his debut. He does not take pins. He does not get outmuscled. He works with a terrifying velocity that makes standard main event pacing look like slow motion. Fatu moves like a cruiserweight but hits like a Mack truck.

Rhodes, meanwhile, is entering a tricky phase of his title reign. The chase is over. The immediate post-WrestleMania 41 glow is starting to fade. He needs a gritty, physically punishing defense to remind people why he holds the belt. He needs to bleed a little. He needs to show vulnerability.

Tactical breakdown: Grounding the Samoan Werewolf

If you watch Fatu’s matches from the last six months, a clear pattern emerges in how he dismantles opponents. He rarely initiates grappling sequences. Instead, he waits for the opponent to close the distance and uses their momentum against them.

His pop-up Samoan Drop is a perfect example. He absorbs a strike, creates a half-step of separation, and explodes upward. The entire sequence takes less than a second. It is a devastating counter-attack.

For Rhodes, the game plan has to be built around lateral movement and limb targeting. Cody loves to work a classic NWA-style main event. He wants to trade holds, build heat, and hit his signature comeback sequence. That will get him killed against Fatu. If Cody runs the ropes, he is playing right into Fatu's strike zone.

Cody needs to target Fatu’s base. We saw Kevin Owens try this back in January, chopping away at Fatu’s lead leg. Owens abandoned the strategy too early and paid for it. Rhodes has the discipline to stick with a leg-work strategy for twenty minutes. He needs to lock in the Figure Four early, not as a finisher, but as a wear-down tactic. Make Fatu carry his own weight.

If Fatu’s vertical leap is compromised, his entire offensive arsenal shrinks by half. No springboard moonsaults. No explosive pop-ups. Fatu becomes a stationary target, and that is a fight Cody Rhodes can win.

The Bloodline interference factor

You cannot preview a Bloodline match without talking about the ringside math. Roman Reigns’ shadow still looms over everything this faction does.

At WrestleMania 41, the Bloodline’s ringside coordination looked disjointed. Tama Tonga missed a cue. Solo Sikoa looked frustrated. They are a faction in transition, trying to figure out the hierarchy in real time.

This is where I have to be critical of WWE’s booking lately. The constant run-ins have lost their heat. We have seen the referee bump followed by a Samoan Spike so many times that crowds are actively groaning before the move even connects. If WWE books another dusty finish at Backlash, they risk completely cooling off Fatu’s singles run.

Fatu needs to look like a monster on his own. If he loses because of a miscommunication with Solo Sikoa, it protects him in theory, but it makes him look like just another henchman in practice. He needs to be protected from his own stablemates just as much as he needs protection from Cody.

Where the releases fit in

There is an interesting ripple effect from the April 24 cuts that plays directly into this main event scene. With 25 people suddenly gone from the roster, the margin for error for everyone else shrinks.

The WrestleTalk article openly speculated on who might return down the line. It is a smart angle. The current WWE regime loves a surprise return to pop a rating. But right now, the roster is tightening its belt. The midcard depth chart has been gutted.

Fewer warm bodies means more television time for the top guys. It means Cody Rhodes cannot take a month off to sell an injury. He has to carry the brand. He has to work the dark matches, the house shows, and the international tours.

The physical toll of that schedule is real. Rhodes is already wrestling with heavy tape on his shoulder. Fatu’s offensive style is notoriously stiff. This is not a night for Cody to coast. He is going to feel every single bump on May 9.

The undercard stakes

Beyond the main event, Backlash is leaning heavily on WrestleMania rematches.

We are getting the highly anticipated rematch between Gunther and Ilja Dragunov. Their encounter last month was a brutal clinic in striking. Dragunov lost, but he looked like a made man doing it.

This time, the dynamic is different. Gunther has nothing to prove. Dragunov has everything to lose. If Dragunov drops two straight matches to the Ring General, he slips right back into the upper-midcard shuffle.

Watch Dragunov’s pacing in the early minutes. In their first match, he sprinted out of the gates and burned himself out by the 15-minute mark. He needs to pace himself here. Gunther is a master of cardio. He wants you to exhaust yourself throwing bombs while he waits to chop your chest into raw meat.

Dragunov needs to force Gunther to carry his weight. Grapple him. Take him to the mat. Make the big man burn oxygen. It is the only way Dragunov survives the final stretch.

In the women's division, the picture is equally fraught. Bianca Belair steps in against Tiffany Stratton. Stratton has been on a tear, but Belair is the ultimate gatekeeper to the main event. Stratton needs a definitive win, not a roll-up with a handful of tights. The releases last week cleared out a lot of the women's midcard, meaning whoever loses this match might not have an obvious feud waiting for them on Monday morning.

Final prediction

Backlash feels like a trap game for Cody Rhodes.

The crowd expects a clean, triumphant defense. They expect the classic babyface comeback. I am not so sure we get it.

WWE needs to establish Jacob Fatu as a legitimate main event threat, not just a scary enforcer. A clean loss hurts him significantly more than it hurts Rhodes.

However, stripping the title off Cody just weeks after WrestleMania 41 makes zero commercial sense. The merchandise numbers alone justify keeping the belt on him through the summer. He is the face of the company at a time when the company needs stability.

So, how do they thread the needle?

I expect a violently physical match that ends in a draw or a disqualification. Fatu is going to put Rhodes through the absolute wringer. I predict Rhodes retains the title, but Fatu walks out looking like the moral victor after laying Cody out post-match.

Rhodes will survive May 9. But he is going to leave a piece of himself in the ring to do it. The Bloodline story is far from over, and with the locker room noticeably thinner after the recent cuts, Cody has an exhausting summer ahead of him. The margin for error is gone.