The Best And Worst Of WWE Smackdown 1/14/16: I’ll Take What I Can Get

Hey, Blue Team. Before we get to this week’s report, let me take a moment to thank all of you for the warm welcome I received after my first column last week. I really appreciate it. Some of you may have even turned me around a bit on Mauro Ranallo. I was truly overwhelmed by the amount of people I saw sharing last week’s column on social media. Thank you. If you continue to enjoy The Best and Worst of Smackdown, please consider sharing, liking, and commenting. While you’re at it, follow With Spandex on Twitter and like us on Facebook.

I mentioned last week that I do a monthly comedy show in Los Angeles called Tournament of Nerds; our next show is tomorrow night and our special guest will be WWE’s Lana. That’s right, I’m going to be on stage doing comedy with the Ravishing Russian herself. I don’t really know what else to say about that other than I have a very weird life.

I won’t be hammering you guys with self promotion every week — just thought that info would be pertinent to our mutual interests.

Without further adieu, the Best and Worst of WWE Smackdown for January 16, 2016.

Worst: There Is Just No Need For Any Of This

Smackdown kicks off this week with the announcement of a triple main event. What I love about this is there are only five matches on the show. More than half the matches are main events. I guess you can just flip the channel over to The Blacklist to see what Red Reddington is up to during the other two matches because who cares.

After running down the card, they cut backstage to Renee Young; she tells us she is waiting for Dean Ambrose to show up so she can interview him. Of course Ambrose appears right then and there because lunatics are extremely punctual. Dean pulls up riding shotgun in a pickup truck that’s apparently being driven by one of the Duke boys. As with all the other attempts to make Ambrose look “crazy” and “unhinged,” it just comes off as wacky and stupid. It works here because it serves to set up an in ring promo from Dean that is also wacky and stupid. Dean challenges Kevin Owens to a last man standing match for the Intercontinental Title at the Royal Rumble. Ambrose says his reason for doing this is to see if Owens can do the one thing nobody has been able to do – put Ambrose down and keep him down. I’m pretty sure everyone other than Kevin Owens has been able to keep Ambrose down. Inanimate objects have been able to keep Ambrose down. I can only assume this match was set up so Dean can lose the belt back to Owens at the Royal Rumble due to wacky shenanigans. Maybe two exploding televisions or a hologram ghost of Kevin Owens’ son?

Anyway, this leads to Sheamus coming out to say stupid nonsense until Kevin Owens arrives to respond to Dean’s challenge. Owens accepts because duh, he’s a prize fighter and there is a prize on the line. Sheamus and Owens beat down Ambrose until Neville makes the save. We now have three of my all time favorite wrestlers in the ring and I couldn’t care less. Thanks, WWE.

Worst: Everything Old Is Old Again

This week, the Wyatt Family decided to restart every feud they have had in the past year. Monday, they showed up on RAW to once again say “anyone but you Roman,” then on Thursday they went back to feuding with The Dudley Boyz. Kane should keep one eye open because he is totally next. As of now The Wyatt and Dudley families have been feuding longer than the Hatfields and McCoys, at least that’s what it feels like. Tonight, it’s Harper & Rowan representing the family in the match with Braun Strowman advocating on the outside. This is the first tables match on Smackdown in over four years so if you had some kind off glitch with your cable box and your TV has been stuck on the SyFy channel for the last four years, this is going to be very special for you. For the rest of us, it’s the first tables match between these two teams in at least two weeks. Byron Saxton runs down the rules of a table match and I’m glad he did because they change with every tables match WWE has. Sometimes only one person from a team has to go through a table, sometimes it’s both, sometimes it’s elimination style, sometimes I turn the channel and watch The Blacklist.

The match starts with Harper and Rowan getting the jump on the Dudleys with their teleportation powers, but it’s not too long before the Dudley Boyz turn things around and control most of what’s a perfectly fine match. If you have seen any of the other Dudley/Wyatt tables matches then you have seen this one. Minus the fun of Old Man Dreamer wandering aimlessly around ringside. Unlike the other matches we have seen a million times that come later in the show. This Dudley/Wyatt match does nothing to heighten from the others and doesn’t advance the story at all. Even after months of this, I would still really like to see a regular plain old one-fall-to-a-finish-two-on-two-tag-team match between Harper & Rowan and the Dudleys. I still have so much faith in Harper & Rowan as a team and the Dudleys seem like the perfect match for them on paper. Dudleys get the win this time when Bubba pushes Harper off the ring apron and through a table. It’s fascinating, the Dudleys seem to be suffering from the same thing Alberto Del Rio is. Some weeks they look alive and in the present in their match, and some weeks they look they are in TNA. Tonight they looked pretty good. The three Wyatts give the Dudleys a fun post match beat down, including a great double choke slam to Bubba Ray off the announce table and through another table. I can’t wait for the Dudleys to get their revenge in a… nother tables match I guess? Maybe next time they’ll change up the rules and you’ll have to put both members of the opposing team through the same table at the same time.

Best: J.O.B. Squad 2.0 meets J.O.B. Squad 2.1.

Smackdown continues the Teddy Long Memorial Right Man Tag Team Tournament they started last week. This time it’s the Social Outcasts vs. the team of Goldust, Damien Sandow, Jack Swagger, and a very unhyped Zack Ryder. Byron Saxton calls them a “group of personalities” and there is no better way to describe them. In case you haven’t been following WWE as close as I have, and no one should be, let me get you up to speed on what the deal is with the team of Heath Slater, Bo Dallas, Adam Rose, and Curtis Axel. The Social Outcasts are a group of weird wrestlers who are all talented in their own way but don’t fit WWE’s definition of main event stars. They have all been horribly misused and underused for years but have grown a strong cult following on the internet. WWE finally realized people want to see these guys but still don’t know what to do with them, so they have been thrown together as a team. Their opponents tonight are a group of weird wrestlers who are all talented in their own way but don’t fit WWE’s definition of main event stars. They have all been horribly misused and underused for years but have grown a strong cult following on the internet. WWE put them on TV this week because the rest of the main roster is injured or on a tour of India.

It’s so sad. WWE has so many talented wrestlers who they have turned into losers. Any of these eight men could be in the Social Outcasts. Every piece of information the announce team says throughout this match could apply to either team. Let’s play a quick game. Guess which team they are talking about in each of the following statements:

“They feel like they have been pushed aside here in WWE.”

“All four of these guys have been champions.”

“They have all achieved moderate success here in WWE.”

“They came together out of desperation to recharge their careers.”

Bo Dallas gets the win for his team with a pin on Zack Ryder after a Running Bo-Dog off the back of Heath Slater. The match is over way too fast but I’m still giving it a Best because, much like last week’s eight man tag team match, I’m just happy to see all of these guys on television. I’m not completely sold on the Social Outcasts just yet. I love all four of these guys. I’m a Bo-liever, an AxleManiac, and a Leo Kruger Cougar. But the thing that made me fall for them was their characters. I’m afraid they may lose their individual personalities by being in this group and that would be a shame. But for now I’m keeping an open mind, even if WWE has given me no reason to. As for the other team, say hi to Fandango over on Superstars for me. Maybe you’ll get another shot on basic cable during the next tour of India.

Best: The Peaceful Tranquility Of Giving Up Hope

When Kalisto won the U.S. title from Alberto Del Rio earlier this week on RAW, I broke the one cardinal rule that comes with watching WWE in 2016 — never get your hopes up. I fantasized about what Kalisto as champion could do for the U.S. title scene, not to mention what it could do for Kalisto. Think of all the fresh new matches we could have. Kalisto has had next to no singles matches on the main roster. Outside of one-on-one matches with members of tag teams the Lucha Dragons were feuding with, Kalisto has pretty much just wrestled Del Rio. That leaves fresh match ups for him against LITERALLY EVERYONE! Kalisto vs. Neville, Kalisto vs. Stardust, Kalisto vs. Dolph Ziggler. I closed my eyes and had visions of little Kalistos flipping in my head. I imagined the great drama the next few months would bring. How long can the scrappy underdog hold on to the belt? How will he outsmart his opponent this time? The answers turned out to be three days and he can’t. I guess Kalisto really is like Rey Mysterio, someone will have to die for him to get a major WWE singles title run.

Del Rio attacks Kalisto as soon as the bell rings and controls the beginning stages of the match, including a hell of arm breaker from on the top rope. Del Rio was on fire throughout the whole match, proving once again he’s as good a hand as anybody when he wants to be, but when he doesn’t want to be, hold on to your mask it’s a bumpy ride. We come back from a commercial break with Del Rio still in charge but Kalisto soon pulls off a counter to Del Rio’s top rope stomp and we have a great back and forth match from this point forward. They both wrestle smart. They know each other by now and know how to counter each other’s moves. That’s the kind of match everyone on the roster should be having by the time they get to the fifth or six TV match of their feud. At some point during the back and forth Bad News? King? Wade? Barrett wanders out to ringside and helps Del Rio get the advantage back over Kalisto. Alberto Del Rio makes Kalisto tap out to regain the U.S. Championship and that’s perfectly okay with me. This was a great match no matter if I liked the outcome or not.

It’s totally fine that Del Rio won the belt back because let’s be honest, we were never going to get any of those matches I fantasized about. It doesn’t matter if Kalisto is the champion or Del Rio. Either way, we are just going to get three more months of Del Rio/Kalisto matches. Every RAW and Smackdown every week Del Rio vs. Kalisto. Then when Sin Cara is back we’ll get Lucha Dragons vs. Del Rio & Barrett on RAW and then again on Smackdown, and then again the next Monday and Thursday, then Rusev comes back and we’ll get him and Del Rio vs. The Lucha Dragons on RAW then again on Smackdown then again the next Monday until I’m doing the best and worst of Red Reddington because I just can’t take it anymore. Most of these matches will be good, some will be great, but it will be more of the same and that’s one of the biggest problems with WWE right now. But in the end, this is a Best for me because the match was just so good. Or because WWE has broken me. I’ll let you decide.

Worst: Kalisto Is So Small. How Small Is He? He’s So Small That Jerry Lawler Couldn’t Go Fifteen Seconds Without Bringing It Up

Speaking of one of WWE’s biggest problems. Ugh! I don’t want to spend too much time on this because it’s well-worn territory but Oh My God Jerry Lawler!!! If you didn’t watch the U.S. title match and just listened to it, you would have no idea a wrestling match was happening because it sounded like The Roast of Kalisto. What follows is a partial list of the zingers the King made during the match.

“How can Del Rio take this guy seriously?”

“Enjoy your five minutes of fame, they’re about up.”

“I’ve never seen Kalisto and Hornswoggle in the same picture.”

“This match should be on the Food Network because Del Rio is wrestling shrimp.”

“He gets fan mail from the seven dwarfs.”

Was Vince giving Lawler an extra five dollars for every time he could poop on Kalisto? Jerry got so excited when Kalisto lost, that his voice shot up high like it used to in the Attitude Era when he would see “puppies.” On the flip side, Byron Saxton is really starting to grow on me. I have liked him way more on Smackdown then I ever have on RAW. He is a voice of reason. He actually pays attention to WWE storylines and continuity but every time he tries to bring that stuff up Lawler is there to jump down his throat and call him a wrong idiot. Can I watch Smackdown with the Spanish commentary like I do Lucha Underground?