The Smackers Thread

[Devon Malcolm]

That was more like it. More evidence that, like I said, the story wasn't Cody but the Bloodline all along even if the way they went about it on Sunday and Monday was dispiriting. Beautiful bait-and-switch with Jey, almost like he's saving things to go for Roman himself.

Could this storyline even make Matt Riddle enjoyable? If they pull *that* off then it truly is the greatest wrestling storyline of all time.

[TildeGuy~!]

So another draft then where wrestlers just cross over onto another show within weeks of it? 

Amazing.

[DavidB6937]

23 minutes ago, TildeGuy~! said:

So another draft then where wrestlers just cross over onto another show within weeks of it? 

Amazing.

Yes. It's a good marketing tool for them and the networks. That's all. Just like "season premieres" and stuff like that. Meaningless in the grand scheme of things.

[Nick James]

The heat Dom had in that segment was nuclear, kids a star. 

[Devon Malcolm]

7 minutes ago, Nick James said:

The heat Dom had in that segment was nuclear, kids a star. 

Damian Priest was superb too. I love that guy, I hope they do something more with him at some point.

Look at him in this.

 

[TheBurningRed]

Give Dom the US Title just on that reaction alone. Austin Theory could never get that heat. 

[Fatty Facesitter]

3 hours ago, Nick James said:

The heat Dom had in that segment was nuclear, kids a star. 

Brilliant, isn't it? Can barely get a sentence in without getting dog's abuse. I know Michael Cole isn't everyone's cup of tea but I love how he absolutely batters him on commentary as well. A proper arse. Long may it continue. 

3 hours ago, Devon Malcolm said:

Damian Priest was superb too. I love that guy, I hope they do something more with him at some point.

+1. After Rhea, Dom and Finn got their respective Wrestlemania programs I was pleased that he got more spotlight on him in one of the few good things from Raw by taking the lead on the Bad Bunny beatdown and it looks like he'll be the focal point of that as they build to it. Judgement Day in the HHH-era is so much better off for the direction its taken compared to its original incarnation and they've all benefitted massively, Priest included. That BT promo also made me think of something slightly unrelated - I'm glad BT won the rights from Sky because their coverage has been absolutely brilliant since it kicked off. They haven't just broadcast the shows on their channels - they've actively engaged in some great content creation with them, including all the ads like these, the interviews with Ariel Helwani, etc. 

3 hours ago, TheBurningRed said:

Give Dom the US Title just on that reaction alone. Austin Theory could never get that heat. 

They could certainly do much worse than this - it would strengthen the wider Judgement Day as well by adding more gold to the mix. 

Edited April 8, 2023 by Fatty Facesitter

[Fatty Facesitter]

👍 Attitude era-style opening pyro! 🎆🎇

👍 Solo/Riddle - More of an angle in the end than a match but some good business done tonight to keep the intrigue of the rivalry going between the babyfaces and the Bloodline. Interesting that Heyman turned to the Usos to suggest that Reigns was losing patience with them and they either no-sold it or didn’t realize he was talking about them - a nice little nugget for us to chew on there. Solo is quickly cementing himself as a main event star - I didn’t think he’d pull up many trees based on what I saw in his NXT days but he looks like an absolute killer at the moment and always makes for essential viewing. Thumbs up for all Bloodline-related bits throughout the night. 

👍 Priest/Escobar - A little ripper between these two. Good business done tonight between the two factions to keep all of that lark going. 

👍 Woods/Knight - Fine and dandy without blowing the roof off the joint. Woods/Gunther for the IC title could be a cracker once they get to that. Interesting that Woods won by grabbing the tights - I personally don't mind it when babyfaces are bit cheeky and get one up on heels like this from time to time. 

👎 Women’s tag titles promo - Car crash. Morgan has the most annoying voice and personality on the planet. Sonya could barely get her first couple of sentences out. Green/RR rescued it a little bit but otherwise this was terrible. But at least the tag titles were made to feel like they mattered by virtue of being on the show with some dedicated promo time. 

👎 Nakamura/Moss - Great entrance for Shinny Shin Shin but to me this was too short, they blew a spot early and Nakamura’s offence didn’t look that convincing or vicious. It felt like a bit of a waste in terms of his return. They’d done a good job of making it seem like a big deal heading into the show, but once the entrance was done this whole thing went down like a damp squib. And now it looks as though he’s going to feud with Karrion Kross and I think I’ll be using the skip function for that when it happens. Personally, I'd have had Shin do his entrance, prepare to speak to an adoring crowd and then have Kross just come out and batter him. That sets you up for a big return match and you go from there. Otherwise I'm not really sure about all of this Karrion (carry on). 

Overall - A beige Smackers this week - watch through all of the Bloodline bits on YouTube and maybe Priest vs Escobar, but you can probably skip the rest. However, some exciting matches coming up over the next couple of shows, so maybe this sort of in-between show was a necessary evil to transition into those. Backlash is still shaping up nicely as well, so there’s lots of exciting stuff going on even if this particular show wasn’t memorable. 

Edited April 15, 2023 by Fatty Facesitter

[RedRooster]

I know I’m not the first to say it, but @Fatty Facesitter’s show reviews are always must-read posts for me.

I really want to get excited about Nakamura’s return, but that wasn’t the best. He’s someone who often feels like a megastar - he has such a presence about him - but in WWE at least, he’s never quite backed that up in the ring. 

I might be alone in this, but I really think they should be doing more with LA Knight. He’s very over, his promos are generally excellent and his ring work is solid enough for the deficiencies not to matter. I hope he gets given more of a chance after the draft. 

9 minutes ago, Fatty Facesitter said:

Solo is quickly cementing himself as a main event star - I didn’t think he’d pull up many trees based on what I saw in his NXT days but he looks like an absolute killer at the moment and always makes for essential viewing.

This is the only thing you say that I’m not sure I agree with. The body of evidence in terms of ring work and promos just isn’t there yet. Don’t get me wrong, he’s been a worthy addition to The Bloodline, but I’m curious to find out just how much he’s been carried by the wealth of talent around him. There’s definitely room for growth with Solo, so even if he’s not there yet, I suspect he will be soon enough.

[Fatty Facesitter]

3 hours ago, RedRooster said:

I know I’m not the first to say it, but @Fatty Facesitter’s show reviews are always must-read posts for me.

3 hours ago, RedRooster said:

[Solo being a main eventer] This is the only thing you say that I’m not sure I agree with.

[Arch Stanton]

Solo's obviously not yet a main event star in the sense of being the main man in a headline programme, but he's already perfect for your TV main event slots, designed to push the stories along. The way they have booked him since his main roster debut has been brilliant. I sense Heyman may have had a big influence on how he's been used, he always used to swear by that simple philosophy of booking guys to their strengths whilst hiding their weaknesses and that's exactly what they have done with Solo.

[d-d-d-dAz]

I just think Smackdown really struggles without Roman. It’s just lacking a real top star.

I think the shows would benefit from a red hot Champion willing to work both Raw and Smackdown week in, week out.

A blonde Champion, maybe.

With a rubbish tattoo.

It’s a shame they haven’t had the opportunity to make that happen.

Edited April 15, 2023 by d-d-d-dAz

[Fatty Facesitter]

6 hours ago, RedRooster said:

I might be alone in this, but I really think they should be doing more with LA Knight. He’s very over, his promos are generally excellent and his ring work is solid enough for the deficiencies not to matter. I hope he gets given more of a chance after the draft. 

Add me to the pro-LA Knight crew as well - it's very strange to me that he didn't even get some sort of backstage cameo at Wrestlemania. He might be 40 but he's a great personality, can still go and is always good for a giggle, also works well as a either a babyface or a heel in this persona. He's one of the few WWE acts where I think he really strives for that sort of audience participation factor. 

2 hours ago, Arch Stanton said:

Solo's obviously not yet a main event star in the sense of being the main man in a headline programme, but he's already perfect for your TV main event slots, designed to push the stories along. The way they have booked him since his main roster debut has been brilliant. I sense Heyman may have had a big influence on how he's been used, he always used to swear by that simple philosophy of booking guys to their strengths whilst hiding their weaknesses and that's exactly what they have done with Solo.

Aye. For me, it's the aura they've built around him. Look at how Heyman quaked in his boots backstage when Solo cut him off mid-ramble and simply said 'Tell the tribal chief, I got this' - Heyman looked completely shooketh. The way he was looking at Jey last week was cold as fuck, eyeing up his own flesh and blood like he'd drop him at any second if Roman gave the order. There isn't a single main event TV match he's put a foot wrong in so far and the audience totally buy him as a legitimate threat. The addition of the Spike as his finisher is a brilliant and welcome addition - the moment it's administered, you know the opponent is brown bread. He directly influenced the outcome of the Wrestlemania main event and it's been very easy to slot him into the TV main events because he's such as key presence on the shows at the moment. 

3 hours ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

I just think Smackdown really struggles without Roman. It’s just lacking a real top star.

I think the shows would benefit from a red hot Champion willing to work both Raw and Smackdown week in, week out.

A blonde Champion, maybe.

With a rubbish tattoo.

It’s a shame they haven’t had the opportunity to make that happen.

Listen, I'm as pro-Codylicious as anyone, and I too think it makes total sense to have a permanent champion on both shows driving things along. However, I'm at the point now where I don't expect Roman to appear unless it's announced well in advance - so to that end it doesn't actually affect my enjoyment of either Raw, Smackers or even the PLE/PPVs where he's got the night off. That's why the rest of the Bloodline to me have performed so admirably over the course of this run - it would have been so easy to go through the motions on the shows where Roman isn't around, but the Usos and Solo have performed so well and have established themselves in the main event scene along with Sami/KO to the point where you can actually build the shows around them and not just Roman Reigns. Not too sure how that would work if Reigns wasn't a consistent background presence, but you've got to give them their due. So absolutely I hope Cody gets the straps, but even then I don't need the world champion on the same show every week to enjoy the wider picture, if that makes sense. 

[Shane O' Mac Version 2]

On 4/9/2023 at 2:29 AM, TildeGuy~! said:

So another draft then where wrestlers just cross over onto another show within weeks of it? 

Amazing.

I miss the original brand split, from 2002-2007. They really tried hard to keep the brands separate. The first time they started to get wishy-washy with it was when Jeff Hardy came back and they just let them team even though Jeff was on Raw and Matt was on Smackdown. They even had matches in ECW, 'cause reasons. I excused it because it was the return of the Hardyz, but the boundaries really fell down from there. Absolute guarantee that wrestlers cross brands quickly this time around.

The main thing I'm looking forward to with this draft is NXT call-ups, which is what I assume they meant when they said "every superstar is eligible". The Draft happens right after NXT's Spring Break special. Grayson Waller's been ready for a minute, Cameron Grimes has been in limbo and appears ready to burst onto the scene. Plus they've got a fairly deep women's roster, couldn't go wrong with calling up a handful to boost the main roster ranks.

[Fatty Facesitter]

1 hour ago, Shane O' Mac Version 2 said:

I miss the original brand split, from 2002-2007. They really tried hard to keep the brands separate. The first time they started to get wishy-washy with it was when Jeff Hardy came back and they just let them team even though Jeff was on Raw and Matt was on Smackdown. They even had matches in ECW, 'cause reasons. I excused it because it was the return of the Hardyz, but the boundaries really fell down from there. Absolute guarantee that wrestlers cross brands quickly this time around.

Great point - the initial draft definitely had the feel of an actual split, and when the rosters did converge together at the Big Four PPVs it felt like a really big deal and made for a number of fun ‘cross-promotional’ bouts too. 

This wasn’t without its issues in its own right - sometimes one roster would be absolutely smashing it (Smackers in 2002/2003) while another would be really struggling (Raw with HHH leading the charge with 20-minute opening monologues every week). The split PPVs were a mixed bag because sometimes the individual rosters weren’t deep enough to carry interesting enough cards. That said, it definitely felt like both rosters were unique and it did mean that when somebody did crossover, either for something interpromotional, an invasion/attack or something of that ilk, it definitely hit different. 

That Hardys example from 2007 was spot on as the pinpoint for where it started to crumble. It’s also the same sort of time they stopped doing the split PPVs and each PPV became a full roster deal again. This I think coincided with the first brand split’s eventual downfall.