It felt weird to see a WWE event in Las Vegas’ T-Mobile Arena rather than the typical UFC pay-per-view event, but the venue was a logical final stop on the road to WrestleMania 41.
There’s not much left to settle with the granddaddy of them all going down tomorrow, and Friday’s “WWE SmackDown” show reflected that. A few fun teases popped up, but not much else. Let’s break it down and move on to the stacked weekend, folks.
Sneak peek?
The conclusion of the road to WrestleMania 41 was essentially an extension of what we’ve already seen between Cody Rhodes and John Cena. They spoke separately, as Cena targeted the crowd while Rhodes absolutely roasted his legendary counterpart. I mean, the WWE Undisputed Champion whipped out a Starrcade ’97 Sting reference. Rhodes just scorched Cena — but not before we finally got at least some (slightly) deeper mentions of The Rock from Cena.
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Just like the last time they met in the ring, Rhodes planted Cena with a Cross Rhodes. (This time countering an Attitude Adjustment.) The somewhat minimal, cookie-cutter build to their match has been entertaining in the most simplistic way, though I wish it had more substance, especially given how crucial that element was. At this point, it will have felt like nothing more than a cash-grab spectacle main event choice if Cena doesn’t win. There has to be more to this, right?
🎥 Intertwining of the Night
It’s happening, you guys. Iyo Sky is hanging onto that Women’s World Championship on Sunday, and there’s no way Naomi doesn’t get involved.
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To start the final pre-WrestleMania interaction between Sky, Rhea Ripley and Bianca Belair, I was pleasantly surprised to see WWE give Ripley the realization that she just randomly got distracted by Belair during her title loss to Sky. Once the champion arrived, Belair cut her off to a bunch of boos as Sky never got to speak a word. The way she’s been such an afterthought has been intentional and crafted sneakily well.
However, the real juice in this segment was Naomi’s arrival to ask Belair why she’s been ignoring her calls and interactions. She’s the crazy, obsessed friend who demands her answer, with hatred for the new friend.
If the tease wasn’t blatant enough, Jade Cargill perfectly cut off Naomi before she could say what she’ll do after finishing what she started. That’s because it’ll be a big attack on Belair to set up the continuation of this lengthy story — and rightfully so. I’m telling you guys, I’ll be wildly disappointed if this doesn’t go where it should — win or lose for Naomi against Cargill.
👑 Uncrowned Gem of the Night 👑
To springboard off intertwining storylines, a Battle Royal is essentially just throwing things together. That’s what we got with the return of the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal — it just wasn’t at WrestleMania.
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Nonetheless, it was an awesome match. The final three were Rey Fenix, Andrade and Carmelo Hayes. That’s a dream triple-threat match, and hopefully it comes to fruition at some point somehow. Ultimately, El Grande Americano emerged out of nowhere to cost Fenix, allowing for another Hayes-Andrade encounter’s brilliance. Those two are just made for each other. Karrion Kross also continued his brilliance with the time he had in the match, as did Ludwig Kaiser and Pete Dunne with a fun sequence.
A Battle Royal is always an easy way to get in some fun, cool moments for those who deserve more screen time, and this was no exception.
💩 Travesty of the Night
The handling of the WWE Tag Team title scene has become embarrassing. If the titles being left off WrestleMania 41 weren’t enough, the great matchup of the champion Street Profits vs. Motor City Machine Guns ended via DQ when DIY interfered. Talk about a pitiful joke of a booking decision.
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This is even worse if my predicted Big E return doesn’t happen in the World Tag Team match with The New Day challenging the War Raiders.
The endgame between all three of the “WWE SmackDown” teams appears to be (and hopefully is) the triple-threat tag team title TLC match that was announced for next Friday’s show. That works for me, but getting to that destination has not been good. And how it gets left off ‘Mania is beyond me. The Las Vegas crowd even booed when Nick Aldis announced it.
👍 UP & UP 👍
1. Seth Rollins opened “WWE SmackDown” and instantly started to cook on the microphone. This was one of the best standalone promos from the whole storyline between Rollins, CM Punk and Roman Reigns. Rollins took to the center of the ring and mocked Punk’s classic pipebomb, sitting and taking off the mic sleeve. There were more AEW mentions and even a Dean Ambrose name drop (R.I.P.). As fun as the interactions are between all three, this was excellent for what it was.
2. During the Andre The Giant Battle Royal, Wade Barrett dropped a brilliant line about Ludwig Kaiser DM’ing him throughout the week.
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3. Unfortunately, the Nick Aldis steam for a Randy Orton match at WrestleMania 41 has appeared to completely cool off. Instead, Orton promised to be at the show of shows in yet another absolutely epic, passionate promo to issue an open challenge.
The Rusev or Malakai Black ideas are fun, but are they really big enough to replicate the Rhodes-Rollins situation of years’ past? Also, Orton shouldn’t lose his match, which makes Aldis even more perfect. Neither Rusev nor Black should lose upon a return.
4. Anyone who watched Fenix in AEW knows he’s a blast of a time in a tag team or trios match, and that was the case when he and the LWO (Dragon Lee and Rey Mysterio) defeated American Made.
5. Despite the thumbs down I’m about to give out, WWE made a phenomenal Machine Head hyped video for Punk vs. Rollins vs. Reigns. Hell yeah.
👎 DOWN & OUT 👎
1. I’ve started to notice that with these three-hour “WWE SmackDowns,” WWE uses a lot of reflection or preview videos to fill time that could be used to give wrestlers screen time. That’s what the whole point of this extra time should be, and I can’t tell you how much time gets lost on these video packages.
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2. Zelina Vega beat United States Champion Chelsea Green clean with a super Code Red. Honestly, WWE, get rid of the belt now if this is how it’s going to be treated. This has been atrocious.
3. Mysterio looks to have a possible injury the night before his WrestleMania match against El Grande Americano. A severe injury would be a huge bummer for the legend. We wish him all the best, no matter the details.
4. I was enjoying the hell out of LA Knight vs. Solo Sikoa — then Jacob Fatu got Sikoa DQ’d by attacking Knight. This immediately turned it into a tag-team match when Braun Strowman made the save, but this was still dumb, and Strowman lost the conclusion of his Fatu rivalry. (At least we thought.) Just make the tag-team match from the beginning or give us a clean match. The interference endings are so out of control lately.
👑 All that’s left is the big show, thankfully. These recent weeks have felt like they’ve been holding off or dragging out until we could reach that final destination. I give this “WWE SmackDown” a Crown score of: 5.5/10 👑
