The Best And Worst Of WWE Smackdown Live 8/28/18: Becky 3:16

Previously on the Best and Worst of WWE Smackdown Live: WWE continued to try to make Becky Lynch a heel for some reason, Samoa Joe continued psychosexually stalking AJ Styles’ wife, and Randy Orton tried to pull Jeff Hardy’s ear over his skull like a sweater in a hockey fight.

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And now, the Best and Worst of WWE Smackdown Live for August 28, 2018.

Best: The Five-Timers Club

Sorry, wrong link.

There we go. Alternate title: “Prince Check On A Jackass.”

So here’s something I never expected to happen, but am happy to have experienced: The New Day celebrating their fifth Tag Team Championship run, Big E getting to mark out about finally getting to “five” on the actual show, and Booker T showing up as KING BOOKAH to knight them and welcome them into the five-timers club. It’s only here so everyone involved can have fun and make the crowd happy, which is a billion percent a valid reason to write a segment into your show. Sometimes I wonder if Raw remembers we’re supposed to like watching it.

This is completely adorable from start to finish. King Booker has got to be one of my favorite wrestling characters ever, because dude spent like 20-years in various forms of “surprisingly large, threatening guy from The Neighborhood who is COMING FOR YOU, etc,” wearing flame pants and growing out his dreads and karate kicking people in the back of the head, and then suddenly was like, “you know what, I’m gonna put on some king clothes and do a Peter Dinklage-quality British accent and have my wife yell about how everyone should hail me.” And then suddenly he’s yelling at Cryme Tyme about how he “doesn’t speak Ebonics!” and trying to get ZZ Top to “kiss his royal feet.” It’s never not completely stupid, but it’s also never not completely committed, and that’s what makes it work. Booker rules. I love that King Booker keeps showing up without explanation every few years, and I hope it keeps happening. Booker T, G.I. Bro, and King Booker are the thinking man’s Three Faces of Foley.

Furthermore, Big E doing a spinaroonie:

Woods’ spinaroonie was legit, though. He should keep that in his arsenal and break it out when he’s firing up. He’s been knighted by King Booker; he got it honest.

Worst: If Next Week We Don’t Get A Segment Of Samoa Joe Politely Chilling At A Family Barbecue

I’ve enjoyed Samoa Joe living rent-free in AJ Styles’ brain over the past month, but they really should’ve pulled the trigger on WWE Champion Samoa Joe at SummerSlam and ended it there. A month of “I’m going to murder you and usurp your family” drama can work, but two months starts to drag a little. Shouldn’t Styles be desensitized to this by now? Does he not talk to his wife between Tuesdays? It’s actually pretty funny that “hurry up and murder the guy’s wife or whatever” is a thing you’ve got wrestling fans asking for, but here we are.

I’m still assuming TNA canon that this is all a big Court of Owls situation, since we’ve seen Joe get abducted and brainwashed by cultist ninjas, draw a tribal dick on his face and start slaughtering people with a machete. Also, how are the New Day not in the Court of Owls?

Worst: Three Quick Observations

• If you’re chanting “what” at someone who’s just speaking English with a thick accent and not like, trying to get you to boo them by speaking a foreign language in ‘Merica or whatever, you’re the worst. Actually, let me rephrase that: If you are still chanting “what” at anybody for any reason in 2018, you should get punched in the ear.
• Does Brie Bella get to be on both brands? Is anybody gonna bring that up? Does it matter?
• Zelina Vega is so much better on the microphone than Brie Bella it’s ridiculous. She should have all the fame and clout the Bellas get. Although frankly that dog who said “I love you” on America’s Funniest Home Videos is better on the microphone than Brie. And better at believably telling someone she loves them.

Best: I’ll Be Cien You

Aside from bRiE mOdE, there’s no way in God’s green name I’m giving anything less than a Best to Daniel Bryan vs. Andrade ‘Cien’ Almas featuring Mike The Miz on run-in. Anything less than a Best is a felony.

One thing I don’t get, though … what exactly are they doing with Almas on the main roster? I guess they’re trying to “get us used to” him or something, but they keep setting up this incredible matches just to halfway do them, pull back on them, or avoid them completely. We got a pretty good Almas vs. Styles match on Smackdown last month, but it was clearly holding back. We had an Almas vs. Rusev feud that turned into a mixed-tag beef without a big payoff match, and now we’re doing Almas vs. Daniel Goddamn Bryan and having it end early with a run-in to put over a different match. Do they not have faith in Almas, or do they have TOO MUCH faith in him, and are “protecting him” to the point of never actually letting him be an important part of the show? He’s there, and he’s wrestling, so that’s something, but it’s like buying a Ferrari and parking it in the garage. Drive this beautiful motherfucker on the streets, Smackdown.

Still, this was good while it lasted, and furthered the Bryan vs. Miz issues as expected. Smackdown’s suspiciously stocking up for another Mixed Match Challenge with this feuds, aren’t they? Rusev and Lana, Almas and Vega, Miz and Maryse, Bryan and the mannequin from Mannequin 3. So many teams!

Worst (With A Little Best): The Future Is The Same As The Past TBH

Billie Kay vs. Naomi was the in-ring low point of the show, not so much because of the performers involved, but because it was two minutes long and like 115 seconds of the IIconics cheating. I guess if they’re the only people on the show doing that gag it’s fine, but at some point you Honky Tonk Man a character so much you’re never able to see them as anything but a shitty Jerry Lawler in an Elvis costume, you know?

Still, the IIconics always bring the delightfulness. Peyton Royce calling Billie Kay “Bill” is an excellent development, and these two can’t be on TV for more than a few seconds without providing GIF excellence. Suggestion: Let them seem like real wrestlers sometimes, so the over-the-top trolling and best-friends-forever cheating seem like character traits instead of 100 percent of their characters. They are worth the investment!

Best: Bar None

The in-ring high point for me (since I pessimistically assumed Almas/Bryan was going to be another tease on a show already featuring a weird amount of cuckolding) was the triple threat tag team match between The Bar, The Good Brothers and The Colons. My only complaint, because of course I’m going to make this complaint, is that we’re doing another tag team tournament, upping the amount of teams involved to six, and yet we’re still doing a four-match tournament. Can’t we add two more teams and do an actual tournament? Or at least have three first round matches and have the finals be a triple threat? Something to extend this beyond three weeks of Smackdown, or two weeks and a pay-per-view pre-show.

That said, hey, the Colons are still a team! And it looks like someone at Smackdown finally woke up and realized they’ve got Sheamus and Cesaro on their roster now and should probably be doing something with them, because Sheamus has won pretty much every championship and accolade in the company and Cesaro is literally a super man who can do anything and should win everything Sheamus has won twice. Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson look like cartoon wrestlers compared to them. Like, they aren’t even really wrestlers, Cesaro and Sheamus are just wrestling stuffed animals.

I’m going to guess the bad timing of the Rowan injury meant the New Day kinda-sorta HAD to win the Tag Team Championship again, and that they’re going to lose it pretty quickly to The Bar. A Bar/Rusev Day finals is gonna be dope, and possibly where Aiden English finally pools da strinks, but this is the Bar’s brawl to win. Unless we’re insane and still not pushing Cesaro in 2018.

Best: Jeff Hardy, Theater Dork

After a couple of months of trading dick stomps and letting Carol Burnett’s grandmother know they’re okay, Jeff Hardy and Randy Orton are blowing off their nut feud the only way a couple of guys from 2005 know how:

And you know, Jeff Hardy’s mic skills never really advanced beyond Cletus the Slack-jawed Yokel, but I can’t give a Best to Peyton Royce impressions and King Booker and not throw some love in the direction of this A.V. club nerdlinger painting “RKO” on his face in magic marker, yelling “HAIL, IN A SAIL,” and popping a terrible Randy Orton pose.

Jeff Hardy is The Room of wrestling characters. He’s objectively so, so bad sometimes, but he’s so sincere about it that you can’t help but enjoy it. Matt weaponizing this is what gave us the Broken Universe in the first place.

Best: Beck And Call

Finally we have the continuation of the Becky Lynch vs. Charlotte Flair vs. Carmella feud, featuring the very strange occurrence of Charlotte Flair being the weak link in and out of the ring. Not that Charlotte isn’t great at what she does; I feel like I have to type this a lot, but she’s a top shelf performer, iffy gymnastics moonsaults onto nothing aside, and has had some of the very best women’s matches in the history of the company. And she has them regularly! But since coming back from injury she’s been off a step, and that’s only made more obvious by (1) Carmella working her ass off to prove herself as a legitimate wrestler, and (2) Becky Lynch’s supernatural attachment to the audience turning her into Stone Cold Steve Austin all of a sudden.

Seriously, watch this match and tell me Carmella’s not the one doing the work. Her rana off the top rope was fantastic and her bullet tope a la Austin Aries was even better. Plus, it actually connected, like dives are supposed to!

And I think we’re all on the same page with Becky Lynch. The announce team is spouting “betrayal” and “bizarro land” out of one side of their mouths and “Becky Lynch once again has to climb that mountain” out of the other, positioning her as a dreaded heel and a beloved babyface at the same time. And they’re still trying to convince us that current Female Roman Reigns Charlotte Flair is a hero with a broken heart while she saunters into championship matches she barely earned, takes away opportunities from her friends, and does that Hogan/Triple H thing where she lingers in the ring after attacks looking for sympathy cheers and gets booed instead. I’d say they should understand the alignments again, but hell, maybe they do, and that’s why Becky can beat down her friend and call her a bitch to thunderous applause.

Best: Top 10 Comments Of The Week

Amaterasu’s Son

Becky 3:16 Says: I just whipped your Lass.

Brocky

Becky attacks Charlotte

audience cheers

Becky attacks Charlotte again

audience cheers

Becky trashes the locker room

audience cheers

Becky doesn’t help pay for gas

audience cheers

Becky has a chance to pet a puppy, and doesn’t do it

audience cheers

Becky says that she doesn’t think the star wars prequels were that bad.

audience cheers

Becky thinks ciampa did nothing wrong

audience cheers

The Real Birdman

Just give me all the Becky Lynch you have. I’m worried what you just heard was, “Give me a lot of Becky Lynch.” What I said was, “Give me all the Becky Lynch you have”. Do you understand?

You think it’s the Coquina Clutch, but it’s actually the Cuck Hold

AddMayne

A tear just fell from Sami Zayn’s eye

Pdragon619

Oh shit he gone be at your house! Eating YOUR BBQ!?

Zinger

I feel like he should be standing there with Wendy’s severed head at this point.

blacksnakemoan

AJ: “You know, I should call Wendy at home before my promo to make sure she knows I’m okay. I mean, Joe shook her up good when he kept saying he was the kids daddy now…”

(dials)

(*click*) “Hello? Joe here…”

AJ: “DAMMIT!”

troi

Don’t get too excited about that Brie chant there is an international cheese symposium in town

Dave M J

Brie’s theme still sounds like dying Chocobos.

That’s it for this week. Join us next week for a show that could not possibly top King Booker and a Stanley Cup full of pancakes. Comments are appreciated, likes and shares are even more appreciated, and being here to read this again in the future is appreciated the most. Stack that appreciation!