Ten Reasons Why Smackdown Live Will Always Be Considered The B Show

It's time to face it: Smackdown Live, no matter how great things get at times, will always be the redheaded step child compared to the three hour juggernaut that is Monday Night Raw. Of course it's not exactly Smackdown Live's fault that they will always be second best, especially with things outside of their control, but that doesn't make it any easier to watch.

But what exactly is the problem with the blue brand as a whole and why will they always be doomed to this secondary status? Furthermore, what can Smackdown Live do better in order to ensure that they that they don't lose any more ground to Monday Night Raw?

While it's impossible to know these answers for sure, there are a countless number of things that show just how lower tiered Smackdown Live is compared to Raw. As always, let us know your thoughts in the comments below and be sure to tell us if you think that Smackdown Live is actually The B Show or not.

Here are ten of the main reasons for why Smackdown Live is the B Show.

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#10 Too short

Does Smackdown Live deserve a third hour?

The WWE Universe has been arguing for Smackdown Live to get a third hour for years now and while their new deal with Fox Sports could open the door to that possibility next year, they are stuck with a two hour show for now. Unfortunately for many of the rising stars in the blue brand, this means constantly fighting for television time and trying to make the most out of every opportunity.

With that being said, the obvious solution to this would be to give Smackdown Live the third hour it so rightfully deserves. Not only will WWE eventually be able to parlay the move into building Smackdown Live’s undercard and building the blue brand for the future, it also finally puts them on equal ground with Monday Night Raw

#9 Use of Daniel Bryan

Is WWE doing Daniel Bryan wrong again?

Let’s be honest here. Daniel Bryan’s return to WWE isn’t going exactly how everyone hoped it would and it only continues to get worse as time goes on. While Bryan’s return started off promisingly enough with a win at WrestleMania 34, he was then put in a lackluster feud with Big Cass that was scrapped after the seven footer was fired.

Things only got worse from there, however, as the former champion was knocked out of the title picture and put in a feud with Miz, which resulted in a loss at Summerslam. He and his wife, Brie, later took on The Miz and Maryse in a mixed tag team match at Hell in a Cell, but again lost. With that being said, WWE isn’t capitalising on Bryan’s star power like they need to and they are probably going to pay for it before long.

#8 Incredibly weak women’s division.

Let's face it. Smackdown Live's women's division is incredibly weak.

Maybe this is due to the fact that Smackdown Live is only a two hour show and women don’t exactly get the same amount of time that they do on Raw. That’s not exactly WWE’s fault and might even be solved if Smackdown Live gets a third hour, but the show definitely has a lack of depth when it comes to The Women’s division.

Think about it! Besides Charlotte, Asuka, Becky Lynch and Naomi, who does WWE really have in its women’s division right now? Sure, there are women like Sonya Deville, Mandy Rose and The Iconics, but WWE keeps screwing those teams over with 50/50 booking that allows the bigger stars to come up big when it counts!

#7 Overusing AJ Styles

Is WWE overusing AJ Styles on Smackdown Live?

What happened to Smackdown Live being the land of opportunity? While that used to somewhat be the brands moniker and rightfully so, it has now become nothing more than the house that AJ Styles built. Of course that’s not exactly a bad thing, especially with how popular Styles is as a babyface, it becomes problematic when no one else seems to get a shot with WWE’s top built.

In fact, Styles has held The WWE Championship since November of last year and while he has had a couple of amazing feuds during his run, the superstars that he has defeated along the way doesn’t seem justified. Furthermore, his feud with Shinsuke Nakamura, which should have been a passing of the torch moment for Nakamura, turned into Styles retaining at WrestleMania 34 and defeating him two more times later on.

In the end, there are a lot of WWE superstars on the blue brand that haven’t gotten the respect they deserve due to the company wanting to keep Styles as champion. Of course this isn’t Style’s fault and should be a huge honour for him to come this far in his career, but tis hard to watch when its your favourite superstar getting fed to this guy!

#6 Use of Asuka

Can WWE make Asuka great again?

What the hell has WWE done to Auska? The once great Empress of Tomorrow has been pretty much jobbed out since WrestleMania 34, and is now stuck in the midcard. Sure, she had a feud with Carmella for The Women’s title, but she lost both of her matches in embarrassing fashion and was relegated to competing against James Ellsworth on Smackdown Live.

It’s not exactly known why WWE has given up on who used to be one of the most popular superstars in the company, but tis starting to hurt her credibility and could lead to her having none before long. Maybe WWE will eventually rebound her character and allow her to have that title run fans have wanted for a while, but until then, she’ll just a midcard act on The B Show.

#5 United States title picture

WWE really needs to do something with The United States title.

Remember when WWE used to care about The United States title? Maybe some will think that WWE still does, especially with the feud they are now doing between Shinsuke Nakamura and Randy Orton, but they haven’t been doing a lot with the title lately. In fact, Nakamura didn’t even defend The United States title at The Hell in a Cell pay per view.

WWE even tried to do taped vignettes of Nakamura claiming American as his own, but didn’t follow up on it and instead kept him feuding with Jeff Hardy. Not only was that a huge letdown after the month or so the two had already been feuding, but it also segued into Nakamura being removed from the feud and replaced with Orton.

If nothing else, Nakamura needs to defend the title on a consistent basis. John Cena, Seth Rollins and others have done too much with that title for it to devalued that way.. In all honesty, The United States title has become one of the least reverent titles on the entirety of the blue brand and it’s only going to continue with decision making like this.

#4 Paige as general manager

Paige just isn't working as Smackdown Live General manager.

There’s just something about Paige as General Manager of Smackdown Live that doesn’t work. Whether that is her dry humor and inability to really excite a crowd, or the fact that she is a babyface authority figure with no one to work against is unknown. But neither of those things are helping her much. In fact, it might lead to her getting the boot sooner or later.

Think about it - how much longer are they going to keep a bland and generic authority figure on Smackdown Live, when Raw is on the cusp of having one of the greatest Authority figure angles in history? It just doesn’t make sense for WWE to continue on with The Paige experiment much longer and she will have to be moved to another role, but they have to do something to mix things up a bit!

#3 Lack of star power.

Rusev might be a fan favorite, but he doesn't have the star power Smackdown Live needs right now.

Think about it! For every three top superstars that Monday Night Raw has, Smackdown Live only has one. Of course that probably has a lot to do with Smackdown Live being a shorter show, at least for the time being, but it’s not like the blue brand can’t take on a few extra people. In fact, with WWE’s current format of changing out superstars every week, it could give the company a lot of possibilities to play with.

For example, both Raw and Smackdown Live has been doing a great job of having some superstars only appear every other week in order to make it more special when they actually do. With that being said, why not throw a couple of Raw’s stars on Smackdown Live? That way, they can have the opportunities they deserve and it frees up some room on Raw for some other stars to shine.

In the end, Smackdown Live would benefit immensely from stars like Finn Balor, Ember Moon, Dean Ambrose and Braun Strowman moving to Smackdown Live. It could even lead to a career renaissance and allow them to achieve the heights they were never able to on Raw. Of course that’s going to be up to WWE and how they book these stars, but one would hope that they would be booked better there.

#2 Smackdown Live: Lackluster endings

Smackdown Live hasn't had a good main event segment in months!

Monday Night Raw might suffer from some of the most formulaic openings in WWE’s storied history, but they are able to handle a main event much better than Smackdown Live can even dream of. Not only that, Smackdown Live has been known to try these out of left field experiments that they think will work but end up just looking bizarre.

Take the September 25th episode of Smackdown Live, where Samoa Joe taunted AJ Styles by going to his house. The moment definitely had the audience both at home and in the crowd in absolute suspense, but they never did anything with it. They just had Joe make a vague threat, ring the door bell and then everything cut to black.

Of course this might be just coming from an avid lover of the ruthless aggression era, but it feels like WWE could have done a lot more with that than what they ultimately did. Why have Joe back Styles wife against the wall while the child is crying. Or at least do something that makes it feel that fans didn’t waste their time for investing emotionally in the moment.

#1 No overarching storyline

Nothing on Smackdown Live connects together. Does that concern anyone else?

No doubt, the biggest problem with Smackdown Live is how there is now overarching storyline. Compare that to Monday Night Raw, who have the tag team division, the universal title picture and a chaotic power struggle at play and you see that the blue brand is supremely lacking when it comes to things like that.

It’s almost like if Smackdown Live were a puzzle, none of the pieces would fit together. In fact, it almost feels like each segment on the show is its separate thing, which while that is nice to see at times, it detracts from the chance to tell a overreaching narrative. It also hurts the flow of The Tuesday show and makes it harder to see as a cohesive unit.

In the end, this doesn't mean that WWE needs to instantly put in an authority figure like Monday Night Raw did, but they need to do something that could have overreaching effects on the rest of the division. Maybe something like a new nexus on Smackdown Live that just goes around destroying other superstars and is then put against the best of The Smackdown Live brand. The point is, they need to do something. Something that affects everyone and a new Nexus would do just that!