We could just call this ‘The Worst of Smackdown Live’. Ever since the brand split, the blue brand has consistently upped the red one in terms of output because of the pacing and a more believable product. Today was (hopefully) an off day for the brand, who put on an atrocious show that had us dozing off on more than one occasion.
We sure hope it’s an anomaly because the quality of wrestling has spiraled down, through the week, after what was a pretty decent ‘Clash of Champions’. Today’s episode of Smackdown Live came to us from Cleveland. Here’s what we liked and disliked from today’s show.
THE GOOD: Only two points this week
1: Fairly decent main event
This wasn’t the best AJ Styles match in history. Heck, it probably wasn’t in the top 100. But every time The Phenomenal One A.J.Styles gets in the ring, he makes us watch him. Dean Ambrose held his own, despite no-selling a lot of the offence that A.J. hit him with.
Of course, it was a match that did not matter, with more advertisement breaks than in-ring action and a finish designed to make Super Cena look invincible. But it was the in-ring highlight from a lackluster show.
2: The Miz-Dolph Ziggler promo
The Miz exaggerates like most heels do when he calls himself the greatest Intercontinental Champion of all time. But truth be told, he’s brought the belt a level of legitimacy that it did not have since Kevin Owens’ reign. Every time he steps through the ropes, it's ‘aweeesome’.
Ziggler cut a brilliant promo too and looked on the verge of tears as very real emotions flowed out of him. The Miz complemented Ziggler’s emotion, by playing the perfect heel and setting up the ideal ‘title vs career match’ at No Mercy.
THE BAD: That’s about all we liked from today’s show. Here’s an extensive list of what we disliked.
1: JBL
We cannot remember the last time we had a nice thing to say about this man, so regular readers of our website probably are used to our criticism of JBL. But today, JBL was at his worst, interrupting the AJ Styles vs Dean Ambrose match with comments that meant absolutely nothing.
As if John Cena distracting us with comments about his legacy wasn’t enough! Why is Jerry Lawler on the pre-show, and JBL in the main one? Can Corey Graves pull a double shift maybe?
2: The Randy Orton-Bray Wyatt horror show storyline
The Bray Wyatt-Randy Orton feud has really gone nowhere since it began. Today, it reached a whole new level of ‘lameness’ with a horror movie storyline, which was more comedy than horror. We understand the limitations of the PG era, but good storytelling is good storytelling. Every moment of this chase (Randy, the prey, hunting for the predator Bray Wyatt) had us holding our heads in utter shame.
We do hope that the match delivers, because if not, this will be the waste of our time, Bray’s time, and certainly Randy Orton’s time too. Perhaps the funniest moment of the entire show was Orton locking Erick Rowan who was hiding behind a door. Wait? Didn’t Wyatt and Rowan split up not too long back? WWE logic as always makes no sense at all. Typical.
3: Advertisements
Every single match on Smackdown Live is interspersed with so many advertisements, that we lose track of them by the time that the action is back, once again. Is there no way at all, to go into advertisements at the end of a match? Because when a show is already failing to deliver, advertisements make the experience even less tolerable.
As always, we have been complaining about this for a while, but since ads make WWE so much money, nothing can and will be done in this regard.
4: Matches that meant absolutely nothing
Neither the 8 man tag team match nor the women’s tag team match today were of any consequence. In fact, Becky Lynch getting clobbered in the ramp by her arch rival, top contender Alexa Bliss probably got more heel heat than either of these matches got the ladies.
This is just lazy booking, where a bunch of workers are put together for absolutely no reason at all, but to kill time.
In conclusion, Smackdown put us in such a bad mood, that only Alexa can cheer us up
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