There is talk right now that Tony Khan may be calling an audible and taking the belt off of MJF and putting it on Bryan Danielson, to try and present a "half-measure" to Discovery to not bringing Punk back to keep the Elite/Jericho from going full revolt on him. IE "We don't need Punk, we've got Bryan Danielson, who was even more popular than Punk in the WWE as our champion".

Bryan Danielson has been called out backstage by Tony, that he "needs to do more for the company now that Punk is gone" after Bryan was largely passive compared to Moxley and Jericho after the Scrum incident.

Jericho/Elite don't want Punk back and they don't want Punk/FTR being handed the trios division and belts, with Jericho personally stating he and his running crew (JAS) won't have anything to do with them. This has frustrated Tony considerably, as he is still desperately trying to keep FTR around and get them to re-up while dealing with Discovery demanding Punk back on TV and verbally ripping him a new asshole over giving the Elite their vanity "Best of Seven" series, which has decimated the ratings even worse than before.