On this week's episodes of Raw and SmackDown, WWE effectively had another draft, trading many Superstars between the two brands in an attempt to “shake things up again.” With just a few moves, WWE managed to do just that.
After nine months, the rosters have been revitalised and the promise of some new, fantastic feuds are sure to come to freshen things up. However, with everything good, there will undoubtedly be some bad.
Not all of the trades fixed all of the problems on the roster and some of them even created a few other issues that wouldn’t have come up had certain Superstars not shifted from one side to the other.
With that being said, here is a list of just a few of the biggest missed opportunities and blunders from what was overall a fantastic Superstar Shake-Up.
#1 Saving Sin Cara
In what seems like an even swap in many regards, Kalisto was traded to Raw while Sin Cara is now going to be wrestling on SmackDown Live. At first, that doesn’t appear to be a problem at all. Both men are masked, wrestle a similar style, and neither is significantly higher on the roster hierarchy than the other.
However, that’s exactly why this is a missed opportunity.
Kalisto had two United States Championship reigns that bombed rather miserably. Sin Cara has never held singles gold with two performers under the mask. Right now, both Raw and SmackDown could use another proven babyface tag team and given Sin Cara’s track record, that’s the best course of action for his career.
Keeping them both in singles competition isn’t going to do either one any favours. Sin Cara is likely going to be near the bottom of the midcard, jobbing to Jinder Mahal and Aiden English while Kalisto is used as fodder for The Miz and if he’s lucky, Braun Strowman.
At best, Kalisto is looking at a run in the Cruiserweight division where his presence will diminish the importance of Gran Metalik and Lince Dorado, but that still leaves Sin Cara with no real benefits to his spot on SmackDown.
Reteaming The Lucha Dragons could have set them up for a potential tag team title run in the future, or at the very least, an interesting feud down the line with Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson to revitalise their importance on the card.
Now, both men will be lucky not to get lost in the shuffle, and will likely not have many wins to their names for the rest of 2017.
#2 Enzo and Big Cass to SmackDown is more advantageous for all
By the time Tuesday night came along, it was obvious SmackDown desperately needed a babyface tag team on the roster as American Alpha is great, but can’t handle the pressure entirely on their own.
WWE chose to put The New Day in that spot, which makes sense as far as picking a popular team to motivate people to watch SmackDown. A wiser move for everybody, though, would have been to move Enzo Amore and Big Cass, for a multitude of reasons.
First off, this would reunite Big Cass with his real life girlfriend, Carmella. The two have been separated on different brands since Enzo and Cass moved up to the main roster and Carmella stayed behind in NXT. Undoubtedly, this is a strain on their relationship, which is a shame.
Enzo and Cass are popular enough to handle the burden The New Day is responsible for fixing, so that isn’t a downgrade by any means.
Plus, on SmackDown, they would be bigger fish in a smaller pond. With The Hardy Boyz on Raw, Enzo and Cass aren’t likely to touch those tag titles any time soon, which is astonishing to think has still never happened.
That would be a different story on SmackDown as they likely would have come up straight into a feud with The Usos—something not beaten into the ground yet like Enzo and Cass feuding with Gallows and Anderson or Cesaro and Sheamus.
Meanwhile, The New Day staying on Raw would have allowed for a feud between them and The Hardy Boyz, which is arguably the biggest tag team match available in WWE at the moment. The New Day also never had a chance to properly feud with The Revival, while Enzo and Cass have had their matches with them in the NXT.
Essentially, The New Day and Enzo and Cass will see no real newer opponents for themselves on their current brands and there’s a good chance Enzo and Cass get lost in the shuffle on Raw.
#3 There are more options for Samoa Joe on SmackDown
One of the primary objectives for a shake-up or draft like this is to open up the possibility for new and exciting feuds while preventing old and stale ones from continuing for the next few months.
Sadly, Samoa Joe is in a position where there aren’t too many interesting options for him on Monday Night Raw, but SmackDown has a bevy of opponents he could have had great feuds with.
While he hasn’t had elongated multi-month feuds with Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns, he’s had his interactions with them. Then, with Finn Balor, those two fought enough times that it doesn’t need to be seen again for a while.
The only real person of interest for Joe on Raw is Dean Ambrose, which should be a great feud if WWE lets them go all out on each other.
On SmackDown, though, Samoa Joe could have feuded with AJ Styles (something not seen since their days in TNA), Randy Orton (never been seen before), John Cena (which the two have expressed great interest in doing) and even someone like Luke Harper if he gets pushed to the proper level.
Also read: John Cena was supposed to face Samoa Joe at Wrestlemania
There wasn’t much of a finality to his feud with Sami Zayn, so that carries over. Similarly, if you’re not too bored with Finn Balor vs. Samoa Joe, then the same case can be made for Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Samoa Joe on SmackDown.
Also, what happened to the alliance between Kevin Owens and Samoa Joe? With Owens on SmackDown, that becomes nullified. SmackDown needs another main event heel with the exit of Bray Wyatt, and Joe could have easily fit in that role fantastically.
Here’s hoping he and Brock Lesnar at least clash and it isn't some squash in favour of The Beast Incarnate.
#4 The Miz is deprived of a World Title reign
Few people have had as much of a resurgence in their careers since the brand split as The Miz, who has turned everything he’s touched into gold.
While he’s had his supporters for years, this is the first time in a long while that a good bulk of the WWE Universe is clamouring to see him in a main event position on a regular basis again.
WWE should have capitalised on that by keeping him on SmackDown, where, again, people are bigger fish in a smaller pond.
Even if it weren’t as big of a deal of him being a more important star with less competition, the more influential aspect of why SmackDown is a better fit for him is the sheer lack of title opportunities anybody will see on Raw.
With Brock Lesnar holding the Championship, one of two things will happen: either he will drop it at SummerSlam (meaning only one person gets a title shot from WrestleMania until August) or he’ll keep it until next year’s WrestleMania (wherein only four people at most will fight for the belt at SummerSlam, Survivor Series and Royal Rumble)
Does anyone think for a second that The Miz is going to not only get a shot at Brock Lesnar but also defeat him? Absolutely not! Those few spots will be reserved for Roman Reigns, Finn Balor and maybe Braun Strowman.
Meanwhile, The Miz will spend months on end being a workhorse who can win the Intercontinental Championship for the seventh time, at best, which is great, but not the same as winning the Universal Championship for the first time.
#5 An easy fix to the Mauro Ranallo situation
Nothing is written in stone that the entire reason why Mauro Ranallo is likely leaving WWE can be chalked up to JBL and JBL alone, but it certainly appears that way. If that is the case and Ranallo has no issues with WWE management or others in the company, the solution to this problem wasn’t to just allow the bullying to take place and to let Ranallo leave, but rather, to fix it by separating the two.
If he didn’t consider it a demotion, it would have done wonders for the NXT commentary team for Ranallo to take Tom Phillips’ spot to help add some enthusiasm to Percy Watson and Nigel McGuinness, who are both as droll as can be.
An even better opportunity, though, would have been to swap Corey Graves and JBL.
First things first, Corey Graves already works both Raw and SmackDown as he is present on Tuesday nights for 205 Live. This means moving him to the blue brand would free up a day’s worth of work for him as he wouldn’t have to travel to both shows.
We know Graves has chemistry with Phillips as those two have worked well in the past, and Graves also meshes well with Ranallo in a similar fashion.
Likewise, JBL and Michael Cole are a duo similar to Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler. They’re familiar with each other and they bounce off one another’s work effortlessly. Having those two with Byron Saxton worked before and it would work again.
This or the “Ranallo to NXT” idea could have been a means to shake things up while retaining Ranallo on the broadcast team, rather than switching David Otunga and Byron Saxton, which is better for SmackDown but much worse for Raw.
What do you think are some of the biggest disappointments from the Superstar Shake-Up? Are there any moves you wish WWE had made that could make things even better?
Tell us your thoughts in the comments section below!
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