The US title tournament reaches its unexpected conclusion as Jinder Mahal, Bobby Roode, Mojo Rawley and Xavier Woods compete in the semi-finals AND finals; the Mixed Match Challenge debuts featuring Nakamura/Natalya vs Balor/Banks; members of the roster take turns cutting promos on their cellphones in selfie mode; TJP tries to hide his tears on 205 Live.
A discussion of recent news including Jey Uso’s DUI arrest, Impact’s deal with Twitch and Daniel Bryan’s increasing odds to win the Royal Rumble.
Boring show that put over the wrong people. If you ask me, the most interesting character that had the most to gain from a US title push right now by far was Mojo. His character is getting a much needed push, he feels rejuvinated and his in ring style stands out among the crowd in my opinion. The man is fired up and showing some real passion.
So how do we start Smackdown? By putting boring old face Rhoode over. No one cares about Rhoode right now. He’s literally an entrance pop followed by disinterest until the bell rings. The ultimate one note face whose not even showcasing great work in the ring.
Okay so we dropped the ball on Mojo. At least we can salvage this tournament with Mahal, right?
After all Jinder looks like a champion, acts like a champion and just needs a minor tweak here or there to really make his character land with the masses. Will Jinder suddenly be great in the ring? Nope! But neither will Rhoode so between the two its clear which way this needs to go.
Oh…Rhoode wins. Lets just continue to job out our 6+ month brand champion. Great.
This weeks Smackdown was never going to showcase great wrestling. That was a given. But to also deliver such uninspired booking while burying your characters who have the most potential was just mind boggling.
I’m surprised Rusev Day didn’t get utterly squashed with Rusev eating the clean pin by Ascention this week. That would have been the cherry on top of this weeks goal of how to bury the future of your product in just one week.
You guys summed up my thoughts on the AJ promo perfectly. It might have been his worst promo since joining WWE… KO is fat, and if you mix their names together its a girls name… what a savage burn!
In hindsight, I’m glad a bunch of people got a week off, as more people on the roster could use the time off, but we were left with a wasteland of a show (not the Ascension kind). Nice to have an hour or so of wrestling matches, but half of that was devoted to Jinder Mahal. No thank you.
SmackDown is home to my two favorite female wrestlers in Becky Lynch and Ruby Riot. I’m glad to see that they left an impression out of the other ladies’ promos. Even if the latter got on your nerves, I’ll count it as a success as any wrestler hopes to leave some sort of impression. I know when your watching the women’s Royal Rumble, a voice in the back of your head will be echoing “Royal Riot”.