REWIND-A-SMACKDOWN 1/23/18: Enzo Amore, State of 205 Live, Royal Rumble Preview

Originally published at https://www.postwrestling.com/2018/01/24/rewind-a-smackdown-1-23-18-enzo-amore-state-of-205-live-royal-rumble-preview/

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John Pollock and Wai Ting review WWE SMACKDOWN 1/23/18 featuring:

The Royal Rumble go-home show where AJ Styles takes on both Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn in back-to-back singles matches, 205 Live announces a new GM, Mixed Match Challenge week 2, WWE Raw 25 ratings and more.

The latest surrounding the release of Enzo Amore and the allegations made against him.

A full preview of this weekend’s Royal Rumble 2018 card discussing our favourites to win and possible outcomes heading into WrestleMania.

Wai discusses this weekend’s Destiny Carnage 4 from Mississauga, ON featuring Austin Aries vs Pete Dunne billed as the first meeting between Impact Champion vs WWE UK Champion.

Plus, Café feedback to the show from the POST Wrestling Forum.

(REVIEW STARTS AT 17:53)

Enter POST Wrestling’s Royal Rumble Pool 2018
http://postwrestling.com/rumble

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Anyone else think Dean Malenko would be a good 205 GM? He’s a cruiserweight legend, connections to Eddie and the Four Horsemen, and I think works for WWE as an agent or trainer

1 Like

Regarding AJ Styles:
Anyone else annoyed with his booking? He has been the weakest champion in recent memory eating the pin every single time the deck is stacked against him.

I’m pretty sure Rey Mysterio Jr had more wins on his title run and that’s just sad.

Babyface champions are known for overcoming adversity. Did Stone Cold eat the pin week in and week out against whatever plan Vince hatched against him?

Did Brock Lesnar get pinned 4 weeks in a row by each competitive leading in the fatal five way last year?
Has Brock been pinned by Braun and Kane several times leading into the Rumble?

What reason do I have to care about AJ Styles right now? If AJ wins at the Rumble he won’t look credible as a champion. WWE has gone out of their way to devalue AJ as champion and the belt as quickly as possible. There were far better ways to get over this handicap match than repeatedly pinning your champion week after week after week.

Brock has been left laying by Braun at every opportunity since the summer…do official matches only count for this?

The pin is whats important.
You can ‘lose’ in segments and scuffles to build tension for the match but don’t repeatedly pin the champion.

You make a good point about Braun vs Brock though. That is a situation of another extreme where on paper Braun vs anyone in the history of wrestling should be a squash match. It was NOT believable that Roman pinned Braun earlier in year. It was NOT believable that Brock beat Braun earlier in the year.

If they were telling the story that Braun was the monster among men who also had a glass jaw then fine I guess…I could believe he might lose a match in a fluke. But no…Braun’s booked as someone that the entire Raw roster cannot contain and yet we’re supposed to believe that in a one on one match people can not only survive Braun’s offense for more than 60 seconds but actually pin the man.

Pretty sure Braun is booked as a monster on a learning curb.

Been around for how long? A few years?

Dean would have to be able to pull off good promos if he were to be a GM. That’s not exactly his strength.

I think Spud not debuting a while back with 205 Live meant that ECIII coming in changed his direction. A while back there were reports that Spud moved to Florida, so I can see him being paired with ECIII in NXT

Honest question: is Rockstar Spud a name that will actually move the needle? I’m admittedly not a TNA guy, but I’m only familiar with the name because he is occasionally mentioned on podcasts.

This isn’t a comment on whether or not he would be good in the role (see above: I don’t know anything about him). But when WWE teases announcing a new GM, the natural expectation is somebody that will get a good pop when he or she appears. And I’m curious if Spud will fit that bill.

Wouldn’t be shocked if they brought back Hornswoggle for the GM…shows already cursed enough.

I have heard that you were wondering why Bryan’s odds are so high. There is a good reason to that. I heard the explanation in a cultaholic video which are the guys from whatculture.

Apparently the idea of Daniel Bryan winning the rumble has been thrown during a meeting. No one knows if it has been followed up or not.