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This week’s episode of SmackDown Live had some strong wrestling on it, the beginning of a tournament, the announcements of two huge names for the Royal Rumble match (Orton and Nakamura) and the naming of new number one contenders for the SDL Tag Titles. It was a pretty good episode and like most weeks, the two-hour format is much easier to get through than the three hours of RAW on the night before. Last week, I wrote that I expected the following to happen:
- Gable and Benjamin get a tag team championship match
I was very close on this one, and I’m giving myself three-quarters of a point. They didn’t have a tag title match this week, but they won a triple threat against Rusev & English and The New Day to earn a title match next week. They definitely are positioned more as bad guys than good guys, but they haven’t really done anything other than be extremely cocky in order to really be considered heels.
- Rusev defeats Big E
Wrong on this one. They were involved in a match against each other, but it was the aforementioned number one contendership match for the tag belts. Big E was the one who got defeated though, so at least I got that part right! No points for me, sadly.
- A tournament for the US Title is announced
Out of all of the predictions I made, this was probably the one that I least expected to happen. Bryan was the one who made the decision and Shane was actually against it but reluctantly accepted it, which has become the normal resting pace for the two men. My bracket was pretty close, too. I got Corbin, Roode, Ryder, Rawley and Dillinger right. My picks of Rusev, Sin Cara and Kanellis are replaced instead with Aiden English, Jinder Mahal and Xavier Woods. Not bad on my part, I must say.
- Six-Way women’s match, loser is out of the Rumble
I guess this one was actually more of a longshot than the tournament, because why would I think WWE would actually create a storyline for the Women’s Rumble? I’m silly for thinking they would put thought into it instead of just resting on it being “historic” and just doing a bunch of inconsequential nonsense until January 28th.
- Shane McMahon tries to find a way to keep Zayn and Owens out of the Rumble match
It’s still too far away from the show to start actually… booking it, I guess? It’s now only a month away, and WWE is continuing to just spin its wheels instead of doing something interesting. The lack of focus is incredibly irritating to watch. The show is fine, technically, but at this point, the major story is building up to a possible Shane vs. Bryan match at WrestleMania, and that’s over 3 months away. Build some stories for the darn Royal Rumble!
Overall, I went 1.75 out of 5. I guess it’s too much to ask for them to start building something interesting for one of the biggest PPV events of the year. Let’s just move on to what I think could happen next week.
#5 Mojo beats Ryder and Woods beats English
This is probably pretty obvious even without looking at the bracket, but it’s fully what I expect to see. The first two opening round matches happened this week and the next will be happening next week.
I assume they will do both semi-finals matches the following show, which still lives two episodes of SmackDown Live until the Rumble event. It looks like, according to the graphic, they are going to do the final at the PPV, but what will they do until then?
Stretch it out and do the semi-final matches in separate weeks to only leave a one week gap? I guess that works fine. It’s going to be a boring Jinder Mahal vs. Bobby Roode match in the final anyway.
#4 The Ascension turn on Breezango
Breeze and Fandango took another beating from the Bludgeon Brothers this week before The Ascension interfered in the match, saving them from further destruction. For some reason, The Ascension challenged Harper and Rowan again on behalf of the Fashion Police for next week’s episode of the show.
They either have a plan that will get Breezango the first win over the Bludgeon Brothers, or they plan on turning on their unrequited friends. Remember, throughout the entirety of the Fashion Files, Breeze and Dango have continued to reject Konor and Viktor as friends.
I don’t know if it will happen before or after the match, and if they’re still going to build a feud with BB and The Ascension. But I am worried that this may spell the beginning of the end for the Fashion Police, just digging them an even bigger hole.
These guys were red hot earlier in the year and were legitimate tag title contenders, and now they can barely buy a minute on TV. And when it happens, they’re just getting beat up. And their show was moved strictly to WWE dot com, where everything goes to die.
#3 Shane continues to throw a fit over Owens and Zayn
At this point, I think they have run out of ideas for Shane McMahon vs. Owens and Zayn and they have no idea what the end game is going to be. They are clearly building to a Shane McMahon and Daniel Bryan confrontation, but that’s not likely to happen for another three months, at WrestleMania.
This week’s plot of Shane accidentally helping Owens beat AJ Styles when he was trying to stop Zayn from doing the same, was pretty weak. There’s not much meat on that bone. They are continuing to illustrate that Shane is a hothead who is clearly unable to function with his right mind with Owens and Zayn around, but we already know that.
What happens next week? I bet Sami gets a one-on-one with Styles as well, and somehow ends up winning, again thanks to Shane, before they end up doing a triple threat at the Rumble for the title, since technically both men earned a shot at the champion by beating him in a non-title match. It’s not what I would do, but I would not be surprised if that was the direction they were going. It’s not logical, so it makes sense that they would do it.
#2 More stalling in the women’s division
Nothing is happening! Just like on RAW, they are just doing the same stuff over and over again. It doesn’t look like either of the champions are going to defend their titles on the Rumble PPV, which is fine because they only have so much time now that there are going to be two Royal Rumble matches.
But they are completely resting their laurels on the historic match in lieu of actually doing anything resembling cohesive storylines and it’s disappointing. It isn’t really much of an “evolution” when it’s a bunch of soulless firsts. It’s just a hollow gesture and marketing campaign. The women deserve better.
In any event, we’ll see a meaningless tag match featuring any combination of the women and I’m sure a brawl will break out again as well, just like every week.
#1 AJ Styles lays out a challenge for the Royal Rumble
My expectation for the main card at the Rumble PPV is both Rumble matches, the Universal Title match, a WWE Title match and the US Title tournament final. It looks like they’ve made it clear that neither of the Women’s Championships will be defended, and the IC Title will probably fall by the wayside as well. The CW Title will probably hit the pre-show.
With that in mind, we need a challenger for AJ Styles. I postulated above that it could end up being Owens and Zayn in a triple threat match, and while it would be entertaining that’s not where I would go with it. I don’t know what they are planning, of course, but as a fighting champion, I would expect that AJ wants to defend his title, so he will announce that he will defend the title against anybody who wants to step up.
