Hey, Blue Team. I know it’s been a rough week in the world of professional wrestling, but hang in there, it’s almost over. Let’s just get through Smackdown and then we can start fresh on Monday. And by fresh, I mean watching RAW redo the exact same segments over and over again for months at a time.
If you enjoy me watching Smackdown so you don’t have to, please consider sharing, liking, and commenting. While you’re at it, follow With Spandex on Twitter and like us on Facebook.
I’m gonna be honest. I didn’t want to watch Smackdown this week. And not for the normal reasons, like Roman Reigns handicap matches. My heart just wasn’t in it. I haven’t wanted to watch any wrestling this week. Even though it’s been a long time coming and I should have been prepared for it, Daniel Bryan’s retirement has been devastating me. I watched his speech on Monday, but couldn’t bring myself to watch the rest of RAW. Too much anxiety. I couldn’t sit through two and a half hours of build-up to his announcement. I thought I would go back and watch the rest of Monday’s show after I watched his speech, but I just couldn’t do it. Even after seeing the speech and knowing how RAW ended, I still couldn’t do it. Bryan’s retirement announcement, much like Edge’s before, is a real wake up call to what these men and women are doing to their bodies, their brains, and their lives every time they step in the ring. It’s weird, I’m always aware of this, but I’m somehow able to block it out and enjoy the show. Even when I hear about some of my favorite guys like Cesaro and Rollins going down with injury, the toll the sport takes still doesn’t truly sink in until something like this happens. Hearing on SportsCenter that Bryan has been experiencing seizures really made my heart sink. I haven’t been able to get through a full Chris Benoit match since he died, because every time he hits his head, I wonder, “Is that it? Is that the one that did it?” I fear the same thing could happen with me and Daniel Bryan. Like most of you, I love Daniel Bryan. I have from the first time I saw him wrestling. I don’t have to explain to you why — you guys know. But on top of all of those regular reasons that you fall in love with a professional wrestler, there’s a reason that was unique to Bryan. He gave me hope.
I love WrestleMania. I mean, LOVE WrestleMania. As a kid, it was the thing I looked most forward to all year, more so than even Christmas. The way that I’ve always been able to remember important dates in my life is based on WrestleManias. I can tell you what year I got my driver’s license, graduated high school, lost my virginity… because I associate just about every event in my life from ages nine to twenty-two with WrestleMania. For instance, I know I got my driver’s license in 1996 because WrestleMania XII was in 1996. Sad, I know, but everybody needs mile markers in the road of life, and WrestleMania has been mine. But something happened. It was probably right around the point that Bobby Lashley and our next president were shaving Vince McMahon’s head that I stopped enjoying WrestleMania. By the time I made it to WrestleMania XXVII, the bad WrestleManias went from being just bad to next level horrendous. WrestleManias XXVII-XXIX all left me horribly depressed. I vividly remember sitting on my couch after WrestleMania XXIX and wondering out loud to my wife if there would ever be a good WrestleMania again. And then one year later, it happened. At WrestleMania XXX, Daniel Bryan put on the performance of a lifetime and saved WrestleMania. It gave me hope for the future of WWE for the first time in close to a decade and left us with another truly classic WrestleMania after a lot of years of garbage. It’s that kind of hope that I felt last year as I was driving in to the Bay Area for WrestleMania XXXI. On paper, last year’s Mania did not look good. But in the back of my mind, there was a little voice that kept saying, “Remember last year. Remember how it turned out.” No matter how bad WWE gets, and how bad this year or future WrestleMania cards could look, there’s always going to be a part of me that still gets excited because I’ll think of Daniel Bryan and the hope he instilled in me that WrestleMania can still be great. So, I’m sorry if my heart’s not in it this week. There’s probably going to be a few less jokes and a little less snark because I’m feeling very appreciative to all the Divas and Superstars who go out there every week and put their health on the line to bring us this glorious form of entertainment. Maybe that’s why I especially enjoyed this week’s Smackdown. Or maybe it was just a really solid show.
And now without further ado, and with the best of my abilities in my current fragile state, try to enjoy The Best and Worst of Smackdown for February 11, 2016.
Best: Social Housecats
Smackdown is set to kick off with a rematch between AJ Styles and Chris Jericho, but before they can lock up, they’re interrupted by three of the four Social Outcasts — Heath Slater, Adam Rose, and Curtis Axel. The Outcasts hit the ring and soon after Adam and Curtis are arguing with each other over what the tag team should be named. Curtis thinks they should be called Axel Rose, but Adam thinks they should be called the Social Housecats, and does a kind of growling meow. That’s enough for me to give this segment a best. The interaction between the Social Outcasts members gets better every week. I want to see these guys get even more time on the mic. I’m excited to see how their characters and relationship with each other are going to progress over the next couple of months. Heath Slater gets in Jericho’s face to mock him, this leads to Jericho hitting Heath Slater over the head with a microphone.
The Housecats attack Jericho, and AJ quickly comes to Jericho’s aide. This leads to the most Smackdown thing of the week, a tag match: The Social Housecats and Jericho/Styles. And of course, this match is made by Chris Jericho. That is not the first time Jericho has done this in the past few weeks. When did they decide that Jericho was allowed to book matches? Is there a cut scene from earlier in the year where Jericho was made Commissioner of Smackdown? I assumed it was Teddy Long coming out during the commercial break and putting those eight man tag team matches together, but maybe it was Jericho all along.
Best: Jerichos Of Future Past
We come back from commercial break to find Jericho and Styles vs. Axel and Rose in full swing. I loved this match due to the performance of Chris Jericho. I’ve been throwing a lot of shade at Jericho since his return and rightfully so, but he’s still great when he puts the microphone down and wrestles. His slightly mocking reactions to watching AJ wrestle while waiting on the ring apron were great. But even better were the heelish things Chris did to get his tag partner worn down for their one-on-one match later, like distracting AJ so he could get hit from behind by Adam Rose, and hitting AJ with a Codebreaker after the match.
Unlike last week’s pointless Roman Reigns/Rusev match which led to a tag mach later in the night, having AJ and Jericho wrestle twice tonight worked. Having Styles and Jericho tag up for this match helped further the storyline, amped up the tension, and got me more excited for their rematch later in the show. Jericho’s been going through a fascinating character transformation over the last few weeks. There’s little bits and pieces from the different versions of Jericho throughout the years, all kind of colliding at once. It’s sort of like the metaphysical version of when Mick Foley would wear the Corporate Mankind white shirt and tie with the Dude Love t-shirt sticking out from underneath it and Cactus Jack boots on. Jericho is calling people juvenile names from the ’90s, while still having hints of his cold heel character from 2010, and wearing the light-up jacket from his last run. He’s even pulling out older moves, like the Double Underhook Backbreaker. It may only be a matter of time before the high ponytail returns.
Best: From The Ashes Of Tables
The Dudley Boyz are one of my favorite tag teams of all time. I was so happy to see them back in WWE for one last run when they showed up last summer. But that happiness quickly wore off. Their nostalgia act wore thin extremely quickly. This had a lot to do with Bubba Ray and D-Von playing up the nostalgia bit, mixed with the lack of diversity in the Tag Division. There’s only so many times you can watch the Dudley Boyz beat the Ascension. But on Monday, they turned on the Usos and started what is hopefully a new chapter in the book of Dudley.
They’re here on Smackdown to cut a promo about their turn and it was a great one. We’re finally once again seeing shades of the Dudley Boyz I love. In a ring surround by tables, Bubba says they’re sick and tired of the way things are in WWE. D-Von follows up by stating that they’re not a nostalgia act, and reminds the WWE Universe that they’re the baddest tag team on the planet. Bubba says they’re two legends who came back to WWE to add to their legacy, and for the first time in a long time, they actually feel like legends. They have a great justification for why they’re turning their backs on the fans; they’re unhappy the fans have been chanting for tables and not for the Dudleys. Bubba yells at the ring crew to come and take all the tables but one. Bubba and D-Von pick up that one last table and carry it to the back after telling the audience that they will not be using tables ever again.
Hopefully we lose “wassup” and other fan service along with the tables. I am all for the return of the scary bad ass Dudley Boyz that terrorized ECW. Some people are just meant to be heels.
Best: Trying
Sasha Bank vs. Naomi wasn’t the prettiest match. It had quite a few hiccups, but I still really enjoyed it in spite of its flaws. It was a very entertaining match, probably my favorite main roster Sasha Banks match so far. Naomi is far from great, but she’s made tremendous improvements and you can tell she’s really trying. Not just in the ring, but with her personality and fashion. It feels like the beginning stages of everything clicking for her. She has a long way to go, but she’s headed in the right direction. She has some nice moves, like her dropkick and her roundhouse kick. She even pulled out a flurry of kicks reminiscent of Speedball Mike Bailey. Some say the Funkadactyls started the Divas Revolution. Nope… sorry. No one’s ever said that. I think I just had an LSD type flashback of Brodus Clay and may have blacked out there for a minute. My favorite part of the match comes at the end when Sasha gets one of her first chances to show the main roster why she’s The Boss. When Tamina attacks Becky who was on commentary for the match, Sasha manages to slip out of the ring, then takes out Tamina with a running boot, and turns her attention back to Naomi in the ring. It looks like Naomi is going to get the win with a distraction roll-up, much like Kalisto did last week over Kevin Owens while he was distracted by Ziggler on commentary. But instead, Sasha kicks out and puts her in the Bank Statement for the win, and as of now I’m looking forward to the Divas Tag Match at Fastlane more than I am the Divas Championship match. Who knew I would ever look forward to anything involving Tamina?
Worst: Pigeonholed
The only full segment of Smackdown that I wasn’t fully into this week was an in-ring promo from the Wyatt Family. It accomplished absolutely nothing. The Wyatt Family had nothing new to say about all the feuds they are currently in. It was pretty much the opposite of the Dudley Boyz promo from earlier. It moves nothing forward and is just more of the same. Just because Bray is so good on the mic doesn’t mean you have to primarily use him in promos. I don’t know if this is true, but it feels like we get more Wyatt Family promos than we do matches. There’s an old rule in improv; show and not tell. Meaning, it’s much more engaging for an audience if you act a story out instead of standing onstage and telling it. The Wyatt Family promo is all about them being monsters. I would much rather see the Wyatts being monsters in a match than hear them talk about it. I know 80% of the roster is either injured or in Germany, but you probably still could have found a Damien Sandow or Jack Swagger to come out from backstage and get destroyed by a couple of Wyatts. Would you rather see Godzilla attack Tokyo, or see him stand around and talk about it?
Best: The Ascension, Now In Comic Book Form
This week’s Smackdown Trios Match finds Neville and the Lucha Dragons teaming up to face off against the Cosmic Wasteland in a short match. The Ascension must have impressed WWE officials with their work on Main Event and Superstars, because they’ve been called back up to Smackdown. I had no idea the Cosmic Wasteland team of Stardust and The Ascension was still a thing. I’m glad they are, and I hope WWE does something more with them. They work well together, it gives all three of them a little more to do, and I just love the idea of Stardust being the leader of a group of weirdos. The Ascension really needs to get purple outfits to match Stardust. The Ascension and the Lucha Dragons in the ring together still gives me the NXT warm fuzzies. I’m a sucker for nostalgia, even if it’s nostalgia from a year ago. It’s a fun fast-paced match, but I would have liked to have seen it go on longer. But who has time for that when the Wyatts have to talk for ten minutes about nothing. The end comes quick when Kalisto hits the Salida Del Sol, Sin Cara hits the Swanton Bomb, and Neville hits the Red Arrow, one right after another.
The best part of the whole thing wasn’t the match however, it was an image shown before it. Last summer, when Neville and Stardust were feuding, each of their matches were proceeded by comic book-esque cartoon drawings of Neville and Stardust because Neville is kind of a superhero, Stardust is Frank Gorshin’s Riddler from Batman ’66, and that kid who plays Arrow was involved. For some reason, four months after Neville and Stardust stopped feuding, now that they’re in another match against each other the comic drawings have returned. This time also it featured comic book drawings of the Lucha Dragons and the Ascension. That means someone got paid to draw the Ascension as if they were in a comic book. The match itself was less than three minutes long, which means that someone spent way more time drawing the Ascension to promote the match than the Ascension spent in the match. Like, way more time. Probably more time than the Ascension has been seen on television in the past year. Maybe if I get drunk enough during WrestleMania weekend, I’ll get it tattooed on my back.
Best: When Smackdown Is Not RAW
This week’s Smackdown ends with a great back and forth one-on-one match with a clean pinfall victory. I had to hit the info button on my television remote to make sure I was still watching Smackdown. The rematch between Chris Jericho and AJ Styles was a great follow-up to their first match. If you didn’t see it, you should probably go watch it instead of reading about it here. It was everything I wanted, but didn’t get out of their first match. It seems like we’ve only seen the beginning of these two facing off against each other, and after this match I’m ready for more. By the end of the match, the crowd was on their feet. Jericho had Styles in the Walls of Jericho, but Styles punched his way out and gets Chris in the Calf Crusher. Jericho struggles, but grabs the bottom rope to break the hold. AJ immediately follows up with a baseball slide that sends Jericho to the outside, then a slingshot forearm to Jericho on the outside. Styles rolls Jericho back into the ring and then jumps to the top rope looking like he was about to attempt a springboard flying forearm, but Jericho trips him up. Styles falls on the rope and teeters before hitting the mat. Jericho goes for a pin, but they’re too close to the ropes, so Jericho picks him up and gives him a Codebreaker for the pin.
Last week, I talked about the glorious possibilities of a Roman Reigns-less Smackdown. This week, my wish came true, and it really paid off. People talk about how thin the main roster is, but the truth is you still have plenty of talent to put on matches and angles on Smackdown that are different than that week’s RAW. Roman Reigns facing a different combination of League of Nations members on Smackdown than the combination of League of Nations members on RAW the same week just makes Smackdown feel like RAW’s b-side. This week’s Smackdown was, in my opinion, exactly what Smackdown needs to be. It furthered angles that were started on RAW and featured different matches than what we saw on Monday. Go ahead and let RAW be all about guys like Roman, Del Rio, and Sheamus. Leave Smackdown for AJ Styles, Stardust, and Neville. Eventually Smackdown could be a poor man’s NXT instead of a poor man’s RAW.
Thank you, WWE, for a solid Smackdown after such a horrible week.
Until next week, I’m Justin Donaldson and I get to see Zack Sabre Jr. at PWG tonight, so life’s not so bad.
