Previously on the Best and Worst of WWE Smackdown Live: Rusev stacked fools, Aiden English hit a ****1/4 frog splash, and Daniel Bryan continued his months-long passive-aggressive argument with Shane McMahon. This week, one of those things continues. Guess which one!
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And now, the Best and Worst of WWE Smackdown Live for January 2, 2018.
Worst: Please Look Directly At The Authority Figures
There’s no need to rant about this again, but
- it took Smackdown 12 minutes to finish this opening segment, which didn’t accomplish anything but saying “welcome to Smackdown” and adding a bunch of useless shit to the already announced main event, and
- Smackdown continues to make the story here be Authority Figure Shane McMahon against Authority Figure Daniel Bryan, sometimes involving Authority Figure Stephanie McMahon and sometimes involving Authority Figure Vince McMahon, at the expense of AJ Styles, Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn
That’s not, “at the expense of Heath Slater and Rhyno,” or “at the expense of Sunil Singh” or whatever. We’re talking arguably your three top, most versatile and proven WWE Superstars. You’re wasting AJ Styles and Kevin Owens on a YEAR of Shane McMahon booking, and you wonder why it’s never as good as it should be. You end those matches with AJ getting his foot caught in a table or whatever instead of booking fun pro wrestling shit with three of the best wrestlers on the planet. For a feud involving (1) a guy we love who cannot physically wrestle, and (2) a guy we don’t who won’t stop, and looks like he’s going to shoot pass out and die every time he tries.
12 minutes, though. For something that could’ve been accomplished by Shane and Daniel Bryan just showing up at the beginning of the match. Or, better yet, neither of them coming anywhere near it.
As for the main event itself, you know where this is going.
Sami Zayn Has Pinned The WWE Champion!
Raw did the “challenger has pinned the champion” trope on Monday with Asuka defeating Alexa Bliss, meaning WWE (counting just Raw and Smackdown as “WWE” proper) is now 2-for-2 doing this finish on shows in 2018. They’re 3-for-2 if you count them doing a non-title finish in the middle of a title match elsewhere on this episode.
But yeah, it’s the same thing you’ve gotten used to. AJ Styles is WWE Champion and somebody doesn’t think that’s enough star power, or whatever, so he’s feuding with Kevin Owens AND Sami Zayn, and also Shane McMahon’s there feuding with everyone, and also Daniel Bryan’s there feuding with Shane. Styles becomes the fourth or fifth most important part of his WWE Championship match. Fifth here, since he loses.
Weirdly, this leads to Daniel Bryan making a second triple threat title match for Royal Rumble, not doing a lot to distance Smackdown from that joke about how they write it by doing the Hulu version of Raw on Tuesdays. It’ll now be Styles defending against Owens and Zayn in a handicap match, which … I guess is to cause some friction between Owens and Zayn, but will be interpreted by Shane as “favoritism.” So the match doesn’t get to make any sense, we’re robbed of the better combinations of talent, and the story is YET AGAIN about how the authority figures are too busy walking on eggshells to start punching each other.
Who knew “Kurt Angle when the edible kicks in” would be the more effective power hierarchy?
Best/Worst: The Two Tag Team Championship Matches
Here’s a good example of how Smackdown’s creative works against its Superstars.
The Usos vs. Chad Gable and Shelton Benjamin is good, bordering on very good, because they’re great, hungry tag teams with something to prove. The crowd’s into it, too. Then, we get to the finish. Benjamin and Gable win clean with their finisher, but it turns out that PERHAPS THEY DIDN’T, as they pinned the wrong Uso. And also Shelton was legal, but Gable made the pin. Or something! The referee is confronted by additional referees who run down to contest the decision, which I wasn’t sure was a thing that happened, and they send it to an immediate instant replay, which I’m SURE isn’t a thing that happens. The referee realizes he’s made a mistake and they restart the match, causing anyone with a halfway decent memory to go “HEY BUT WHAT ABOUT” and then remember like 60,000 other times when a referee made a call that couldn’t be reversed because the “referee’s decision is final.”
It’s good work that doesn’t need the weird steroid they’ve injected into it. I guess the point is to show that the challengers can beat the champions without actually pulling the trigger on a Tag Team Championship change, but didn’t they already show that when the challengers pinned the champions without a title change two whole Smackdowns ago?
I dunno. I don’t want to keep harping on how badly this is put together, but I’m starting to wonder if Smackdown is written by ANYBODY.
Speaking Of …
Here’s this week’s six-woman tag team match. With the concurrent rises of Absolution and the Riott Squad, WWE women’s wrestling’s been nothing over the past couple of months but an endless string of interchangeable six-mans where the winners don’t really matter and it’s just to get a bunch of people in the ring at once. I promise I’m not trying to be nihilistic about this stuff, I’m just observing trends and patterns.
The Riott Squad win here, taking advantage of Tamina’s one weakness: being terrible at wrestling. Sarah Logan wins with a cartwheel — a DEADLY CARTWHEEL — and the Riotts declare themselves for the Women’s Royal Rumble match. There are 30 spots and only like 20 of you employed by the company, you don’t need to keep declaring. That brings out Charlotte, which brings out Nie-omi, which brings out the returning Becky Lynch.
Best: Welcome Bex
Yes, yes, throw them at the ground!
Between Becky Lynch finally being back on Smackdown and The Miz returning to Raw, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier for a WWE Studios film to be done shooting. If we’re gonna lose stars for a month, can The Marine 7: One Ration Under God star Shane McMahon and Natalya?
What Are We Doing
The Bludgeon Brothers now have three-ish squash victories over Breezango, with Breeze and Fandango barely being able to punch them once before being completely and utterly bludged. The Ascension finally made the save for Breezango last time, then booked them in a match they didn’t want, then come back out AGAIN for ANOTHER save here just to get their asses beaten.
This going anywhere, guys? No? I mean, that’s fine, but can we get Breeze and Fandango back doing something that isn’t “try to convince the crowd that the Wyatt Family’s now the Killer Elite Squad?”
Best: Finally, Rusev
Rusev doesn’t do a lot on this episode, but he DOES steal a man’s candle wish, which is pretty hardcore. I hope they use it later this year, with Rusev randomly making a wish to management and having it granted, citing this incident. If we’re gonna turn the Smackdown mid-card into golden age Chikara, let’s just do it already.
With the winner moving on to face Jinder Mahal, the result for Aiden English vs. Xavier Woods was pretty obvious. It was fun, though, didn’t outstay its welcome, and once again made English look like a functional pro wrestler people could get into.
I hope there are better things ahead for Rusev (who wasn’t even IN the tournament), but Woods moving on is the right call. The idea that maybe Woods could pull off a tournament victory and “Freebird” the United States Championship is a fun idea, especially since they could do a “U.S. Open Challenge” type situation with three guys, and not fall victim to that thing where the champ’s having good matches with everyone, but they’re all kinda the same. I imagine Jinder’s a lock for at least the finals of a tournament with “United States” in the name, so here’s hoping they do the right thing and put him against his dread rival Mojo Rawley instead of serving up another helping of babyface Bobby Roode.
Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Week
LUNI_TUNZ
AJ Styles: “Why don’t you just put me in a handicap match?”
Daniel Bryan: “Kay, also it’s for the title.”
AJ Styles: “I’ve made a huge mistake.”
Baron Von Raschke
You kids quit it or I’m turning this show around!
Blade_222
Bryan trying anything he can to get fired to make it to Japan in two days.
Just Heather
*sigh* Byron, you ignorant slut.
AwkwardLoser
This is the 1st time Styles and Zane have shared a screen since Julia was cut from 1996’s The Phantom
6forSorrow
I’ll be fine with these “declaring for the Rumble” bits if we can have the “wrestlers drawing their number and looking upset” bits.
Mr. Bliss
So Sara Logan’s finisher is just me failing to do a cartwheel?
AshBlue
Riott Squad’s new t-shirt looks like it was reconstructed from shreds of old Ziggler shirts.
shockabra
They threw that to Malone so smoothly. Is Stockton the cameraman?
Harry Longabaugh
Xavier took care of the wrestler who sings. Next up, facing a wrestler with Singhs.
Best: Diamonds Are Forever
That’s it for the Best and Worst of WCW Bash at the Beach ’98. Can you believe how that Stevie Ray vs. Chavo Guerrero match ended? Crazy.
As always, thanks for reading. Drop us a comment to let us know what you thought of the show, and click those social share buttons to spread the word of the column on Twitter and Facebook, and whatever else you use. Join us next week when Kevin Greene shows up to watch a women’s six-man and Shane McMahon ruining AJ Styles vs. Kevin Owens. Probably.
Have you listened to this week’s McMahonsplaining podcast?
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