Read on for my thoughts on last night's Smackdown.
I liked the brief pre-match with Bray Wyatt to set the match up instead of going right into action with no exposition.
That was a pretty damn good opening match. Sheamus is an underrated worker. I don't think the loss hurt the champions as long as they rebound well.
Nice post-match! I can only imagine where the Wyatts could go if Bray beats Cena. Rowan and Harper as tag champions is an obvious move, and I could see Bray trying to go for the WWE Title.
Wow. Just... wow. There was some humor in that segment, but I think I would have rather seen something more substantial in its place. I hope we're done with Torito vs. Hornswoggle after Extreme Rules.
I like Cesaro coming to the ring for this one.
You didn't expect RVD to put someone over clean, did you? I would have preferred Swagger to get the win, even a tainted one, over the former WWE Champ to show himself as a credible threat for Sunday.
I liked the post-match to get Cesaro further over. I could see there being some kind of cop-out finish in the triple threat so RVD doesn't have to do the job.
The Russian reference would have been more topical before now. Either way, I'd like for their to be more focus on Rusev than U.S. politics.
Good match to set up the payoff to the feud at the PPV. This added fire to things without hurting either side's standing.
I'm guessing Rusev will get his heat back at the PPV with a big win over two guys.
Great segment for Bryan vs. Kane. I'm liking this feud and hope there's more to it.
Ouch. Did WWE really need to drag the Magneto joke out to Smackdown? The sooner we move on from this, the better. Sandow has much more to offer.
Good stuff between Titus and Big E from the standpoint of a pure physical encounter. It wasn't "technically sound", but not every match needs to be.
Big E vs. Titus makes a good title feud as far as I'm concerned. It seems like they're ignoring Titus' standing for the last few months, but at least for the moment he looks strong enough.
GREAT Bray segment. I really hope he continues to be in a prominent role after Extreme Rules. It's not like Cena's standing will be hurt with a loss given all his accolades (and the win at Mania).
That match was kind of all over the place, but the action was pretty good. I'm glad Ambrose retained. Hopefully he'll have a real feud for the title after Extreme Rules. As for Del Rio's placement here, it's still a case of WWE presumably not seeing him as someone sticking around for the long haul, so they're using him to elevate other people they do think will be in the company for a while.
Pretty cool of WWE to headline with the U.S. Title match. I don't necessarily see that as them pushing the title all that much in of itself, but it's a good gesture. The post-match was good to sell The Shield as a threat to Evolution.
More wrestling coming up.
Extreme Rules predictions:
ReplyDelete- El Torito
- Big E, since it looks like he might be feuding with Titus next
- Paige since she just won it.
- Rusev to continue his push
- I'm leaning toward Cesaro but wouldn't put it past WWE to throw in a curve ball. I hope they don't throw a win away on RVD only for him to disappear before Summerslam.
- Cena unfortunately, because it feels like he always wins.
- The Shield since Batista's probably going off to promote his movie soon.
- Bryan since he just won it.
Logical predictions. We'll see what will happen.
ReplyDeleteI honestly could care less about the El Torito v. Hornswoggle matchup. I like comedy in most situations, but this is a bit odd of a match to have, especially when they've already "wrestled" twice already. That being said, when does 3MB ever win two matches in a row? If pressed, I'd say El Torito.
I think Barrett will win. He's really been hyped well and has received a ton of promo/television time while Big E has been spinning his tires a bit. Big E will continue to do well, but I think Barrett will take the title.
Paige will win. WWE has the habit of building up the No. 1 contenders to make it seem like the match will be toss-up, but it's clear the company is fully behind Paige.
Rusev will win. The best that Truth/Woods will do is losing by DQ the last couple of weeks and getting the upper hand on SmackDown. It's clear that the company wants to continue the winning streak for Rusev. I will be interested to see where they take him from here and if he goes beyond the threshold for so many other big guys that have had their pushes halted.
One thing I will say about the Cesaro/RVD/Swagger match is that Swagger definitely isn't the focus with how he's been booked by losing to both men. It will be between Cesaro and RVD, and it's a tough one to call. On one hand, it's clear WWE likes RVD, but on the other hand, it seems they are also behind Cesaro. I will say Cesaro wins, but RVD still looks strong during/after the matchup. It will also be interesting to see where both men, and Swagger, go from here.
The Cena/Wyatt matchup is definitely tough to call. WWE rarely allows Cena to get up-ended and always find a way for him to look strong, so regardless of what happens I think he will be built strong. Part of me thinks that with this being a WrestleMania rematch and with how Wyatt has been booked that he can't lose twice. I'll say Wyatt will win in a very close and tough-to-call matchup, but I'm not certain of that prediction.
The Shield/Evolution matchup is VERY tough to call, as well. The "reuniting" of Evolution after almost 10 years makes me think it may lead to something more, then again, The Shield are clearly in high favor by the company. You mentioned Batista may promote his movie soon and who knows how long HHH will be competing for and how long Orton will compete as a member of a group, so that may tip the scales in favor of The Shield.
It's clear WWE wants to make Bryan look like a hero, and rightfully so. Him coming back after three tombstones would do just that. He will win. The only question is will he continue his feud with Kane or move on to another one.
I think WWE might be thinking to do something lighthearted to balance out all the extreme matches on the actual card. Or maybe they're just having fun. They probably wanted Hornswoggle back in an important-ish role to promote his movie and to play off him being in the Muppets movie, but that's not a hard and fast rule or Otunga would have been on TV to promote The Call.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't be shocked to see Barrett take it and still have a Big E/Titus feud. It's also possible Smackdown's match didn't mean anything at all toward Titus facing Big E.
I honestly don't see any reason for Paige to drop the title here, especially after AJ was champion for so long as a heel.
I'd like to think WWE has learned from the last 984 halted pushes, but you never know. They have given Rusev a lot of TV time these past few months, so it looks like they're behind him for now.
Having RVD go over Cesaro only to disappear again in a few months would be very disappointing. There's a lot of potential in Cesaro now that Heyman's behind him.
Cena vs. Wyatt will also be interesting from the standpoint of where they go from here.
It wouldn't be hard at all to keep the members of Evolution as main eventers in a loss given their histories as top acts and champions.
I hope we get more from Kane vs. Bryan after the big return Kane had.