Smackdown Discussion Thread

[Bus Surfer]

1 hour ago, air_raid said:

Man's got a family and as far as I know, no creative control clause in his contract. He does what he's told. Nobody's sticking anything.

I agree, but isn't his contract up shortly? 

It's seems silly of them to bring him back to slum it mid table when they know he can pack his bags and main event in Japan or whatever once its up. 

And if he has re-signed, then surely they've given him some guarantees as to what his future is. If he wasnt happy with the plan, again he'd tell them to go whistle. 

 

[BomberPat]

3 hours ago, Silky Kisser said:

I mean, it's been what 6 weeks since his return. With the Smackdown title scene revolving around AJ and Nakamura, maybe they didn't wanna just shoe horn him back into the title picture with that stuff going on already. 

But then the downside to that is it's six weeks since his return and he already feels like just another bloke on the roster.

[Bus Surfer]

11 minutes ago, BomberPat said:

But then the downside to that is it's six weeks since his return and he already feels like just another bloke on the roster.

Again I don't disagree. I'm just clinging on to the hope there is some long term plan. It'll be such a waste otherwise. 

[tiger_rick]

I certainly don't think it's their plan to have him slumming it in the mid-card. No doubt they'll roll out the red carpet when he eventually faces The Miz and eventually challenges for the title and expect people to care.

My problem is with the way they fundamentally do not understand the damage wins and losses do to the people that should be stars. It's not a new thing, it goes back two decades since everybody started having a match every week. Some call it 50/50 booking or parity booking. Whatever you call it, it's harmful to the product and has been for so long. It's a big part of the reason everyone is on the same level and very few people have been able to rise above it. Some of the people who do rise above it, like Bryan himself, only do so because of "real" factors. It certainly isn't because of some long-term plan or story that they're telling.

The great thing about wrestling is how in control of the story you are. You do exactly what you want to do. There are some real-life factors that can scupper you but we've seen recently with the Ciampa injury that you can even work around those if you want to. You don't have to book yourself into beating your stars for no pay-off. There is no reason or excuse for doing so. The only reason to do it is you don't understand the damage it does and I suspect that's the crux of the matter. You get deadbeats like Road Dogg barking out insane company lines about wins and losses not mattering. Somewhere there'll be a bunch of Vince-drones who think Bryan can lose whenever you want because he did last time and got over huge totally ignoring the fact that it was completely external to what they were doing on-screen. They bandwagon'ed on it, not the other way around.

[HarmonicGenerator]

Unless I'm wrong, a big reason why we started getting constant name vs. name matches on free TV was because of the ratings war with WCW, and that continued after WCW died because it was what people were used to and they needed the ratings. We're probably never going back to the TV shows being mostly name vs. no name, with a name vs. name as the main event. But I wonder whether, as more and more people watch the shows in highlight form on YouTube rather than wasting three hours every Monday, they might consider a more snappy, highlighty way of doing things. It means everybody gets to win until the PPV, at least, and if people are turning off anyway, at least your diehard fans can be safe in the knowledge nobody's getting 'buried' every week...

[Polish Dad]

The problem isn't necessarily even people wrestling every week, it's that there's no 'tiers' of competition left.

You can't do Hurricane vs The Rock any more, where Hurricane getting some offense in made him look like a megastar, because you've got Reigns losing to The Miz As I'm sure has been said on here before, it's had the effect of lowering the top level of talent, rather than elevating the midcard, and now no-one feels special.

[tiger_rick]

Great crowd for Smackers this week. Even The New Day felt bigger than they have in ages in front of that crowd. I really want to like them. Three talented guys but they just coast along doing the same thing every week. Nice when they feel special.

Not a fan of either AJ or Naka having to lose, it's ludicrous. But Naka's little promo was great and the finish was brilliant. What an acting job!

In the world of 50/50 madness, Becky qualifies for MITB this week. Rightio. Impressive debut for Almas. Good use of a squash match. High School Musical Carmella can fuck off. The tease of Rusev and Lana again is welcome. Is Joe a babyface now??

Brilliant reaction for D-Bry. Good interview to try and rescue last week's travesty. Cass promo was OK if overly long. Kick-in was fun. God knows where he goes now, already. If he beats Joe, I'll scream.

[Supremo]

Is it particularly difficult to mic the crowd at the o2? I thought it was an isolated incident on Raw when they seemingly muted the crowd booing Roman, but it sounded like the same thing was happening during that Daniel Bryan reaction. It was big, don’t get me wrong, but it looked like the crowd were going far crazier than you could hear as a viewer. 

Is this the first time they didn’t cover up Paige’s awful hand tattoos? I only noticed the “Get Bit,” tattoo on one of her hands. Wasn’t sure if the, “Talk Shit,” part was ever visible on TV. Surely the don’t want that?

I like the Rusev-Lana-English trio. They should drop the hints of Lana trying to get Rusev to ditch Aiden and run with them as a trio for a bit. Maybe in a year’s time they eventually split when Aiden makes a move on Lana or something.

Babayace Samoa Joe makes it bit uneven at the top, doesn’t it?

[FourtyTwo]

Is Cass v Joe a MITB qualifier? If so, surely Bryan is getting involved and attacking Cass, getting Joe DQ’d - setting up Joe v Bryan?

[The King of Old School]

1 hour ago, FourtyTwo said:

Is Cass v Joe a MITB qualifier? If so, surely Bryan is getting involved and attacking Cass, getting Joe DQ’d - setting up Joe v Bryan?

I'd have thought they would go down the route of Bryan costing Cass the match somehow, leading to Cass/Bryan rematch at MITB whilst Joe goes in the ladder match?

Not sure Joe/Bryan makes much sense at this point.

[The Dart]

2 hours ago, Supremo said:

Is it particularly difficult to mic the crowd at the o2? I thought it was an isolated incident on Raw when they seemingly muted the crowd booing Roman, but it sounded like the same thing was happening during that Daniel Bryan reaction. It was big, don’t get me wrong, but it looked like the crowd were going far crazier than you could hear as a viewer. 

The crowd was going mental for D Bryan.  Couldn't hear a word Renee was saying and couldn't hear most of what Bryan said.

They probably put the crowd noise down so you could actually hear them.

[Loki]

Styles v Nakamura is one of those matchup that on paper sounds incredible, but has disappointed  every time so far.  Obviously, they're not terrible or anything, but it never feels that dynamic, like they never get out of third gear.  Mind you, I'd lay the blame at Nakamura's door, even with the heel turn he never seems that bothered.

Everyone was super excited about the new Smackdown roster post-draft, but it's just not clicking so far.  I wonder if both shows are actually suffering now because of the joint PPVs?  Less slots for PPV matches to build towards?

Nice to see Becky get a win - I'd have her win the MITB as I think she's due a decent push.

[d-d-d-dAz]

I tell you what, as a Live experience Smackers (fuck it, i'm in) completely batters Raw into submission.

19.00 start, D-Bry's out by 19.15 to a hot crowd going spanners for him. the 'ad-breaks' are much shorter transitions at Smackers so the flow shows much more nicely, the main event is wrapping up at 9 o'clock and then, just as 205 Live is starting, i'm on a train home with a sandwich.

Perfect wrestling experience. 2 hours and away you go.

[The King Of Swing]

Ok show. Looking forward to the internet fallout, when Carmella goes over Asuka.

Normally I would assume that Asuka would win to set up a rematch with Charlotte. But I'm convinced that Carmella is getting a longish reign.

Of course we could also see a cash in on the night.

[300]

Why not have Rusev come out for the live crowd though? Would have been a nice addition to the dark match main event.