The Smackers Thread

[d-d-d-dAz]

Persisting with Solo absolutely boggles my mind. He's the ultimate floppy chopper at the orgy. Get him gone.

It does Cody zero favours too having to keep schlepping about with a man who's major characteristic is he's not Jacob Fatu.

If Cody has to defend his title at Elimination Chamber, I think literally anyone would have been a better choice. The Chamber match is going to be absolutely stuffed full of stars, so they could have had fun with the Cody match.

 

[DavidB6937]

Depends where they go with Solo really. I'd hope Jacob would turn on him at some point but who knows. There's a place for Solo but obviously not at the top. Could always have a four way with Cody against Solo, Jacob and Tama. Although I need Jacob in the EC really.

But yeah they need to wrap up this part of Solo's story and move him on to something different pretty soon.

[d-d-d-dAz]

1 minute ago, DavidB6937 said:

Depends where they go with Solo really. 

I have suggestions.

None of which are Raw, Smackdown or Dynamite.

[Supremo]

No problem whatsoever with Solo losing another Title shot, blaming Jacob Fatu, and Jacob beating the living shit out of him. “I loved you, Solo!”

Speaking of people having the living shit beaten out of them, another phenomenal car promo from Kevin Owens.

“You’re a horrible friend, you’re a disgusting human being, and I’ll never forgive you, but I am gonna make you pay.”

Hopefully I can get the day off work to attend Sami’s funeral. Always was a big fan. Going to be really sad (but completely justified) to say our last goodbyes.

 

[Snitsky's back acne]

Amazing promo from Kevin Owens. A grown man crying in his car about what a shitty friend Sami Zayn in. Brilliant.

Liked the Street Profits vignette too. About time they gave them something to sink their teeth into. 

[The King of Old School]

Preist is 100% pinning Strowman in that triple threat next week.

Wonder if Solo losing to Rhodes again at EC is the start of building to Solo/Fatu at Mania?

[Arch Stanton]

Kevin is right. Top babyface in the company for me right now.

[NeverYield]

Really enjoying watching Jacob Fatu, genuinely looks like a man who could seriously hurt you, and it doesn't seem like he's trying too hard and forcing it.

There's an oldschool raw feel to Fatu, like this man would punch your head in if you upset him, and that's missing from a lot of guys these days.

 

[thatvinylgeek]

21 minutes ago, NeverYield said:

Really enjoying watching Jacob Fatu, genuinely looks like a man who could seriously hurt you, and it doesn't seem like he's trying too hard and forcing it.

There's an oldschool raw feel to Fatu, like this man would punch your head in if you upset him, and that's missing from a lot of guys these days.

 

And yet with his hair in bun hugging Jey in gorilla, he looked like a big teddy bear. 

What a guy ?

[RedTwoster]

2 hours ago, Supremo said:

No problem whatsoever with Solo losing another Title shot, blaming Jacob Fatu, and Jacob beating the living shit out of him. “I loved you, Solo!”

I’m pretty certain that’s where this is going - Solo hopped right back in to attack Cody, after giving Fatu time to realise he’s far more dangerous than Solo ever was; that he doesn’t need him to achieve his eventual goal. Solo/Jimmy vs Fatu/Tonga at Wrestlemania seems likely, with all three brothers celebrating with Jey when he wins the title later that night.

Solo has won me over in his role as fake tribal chief, he’s improved over the past year. I’m fine with another Cody/Solo match, as predictable as the outcome may be.

I loved Kevin Owens’ promo - he’s been outstanding since his heel turn. Smackdown has the three most enjoyable heels in the company on its roster in McIntyre, Owens and Chelsea - they really won big in the transfer window. That would never have happened in the Vince era, and I’m surprised it happened this time round. The show should be a blast in the run-up to Wrestlemania.

EDIT: Make that four most entertaining - I forgot about Fatu!

Edited February 8, 2025 by RedTwoster

[air_raid]

I again had chance to (start to) watch SmackDown while doing meal prep this morning, so here are my thoughts. I’ll stick to presentation/booking as others no doubt will cover the quality of the actual matches…

A rare negative - should I park this in the thread? - I really wish they’d do away with “which champion will the Rumble winner pick” segments, and just go back to “will challenge their shows champion” set in stone. It was novel when Benoit was allowed to jump to challenge HHH but in the times of picking, these segments have always been boring filler telly, a thinly disguised “We don’t want to give any of the card away this far out” and have never created any real suspense apart from the very first year with Batista, and last year for the wrong reasons. The suspense should be about who’s holding the title after the PPV inbetween, or if they really wanted to ramp it up, force the Rumble winners to make one defence of their shot at said PPV like New Japan do of the G1 winner, and if they want to cast even more doubt as to possible Mania main event, have that defence be cross-brand. Get some more of those all-important STAKES!1 into another match without a title, and either keep that challenger in hot form or shuffle if so inclined.

Just imagine a show on which you had -

Cody vs challenger X

Gunther vs challenger Y

Jey vs challenger Z

Elimination Chamber for shot at whichever title Jey/Z isn’t fighting (more suspense and cross brand uncertainty but tell me the story in the ring, not on the mic)

You have 9 slots there to insert, at your whim (in a perfect world) : Punk, Reigns, Cena, Owens, Priest, McIntyre, Jacob, Rollins or Logan and still have oodles of star power to spare and a near uncountable number of Mania possibilities with four different men potentially walking out with a belt for four different possibilities of Jey/Z challenging whoever holds their brands title, and maths I can’t do with 6 potential chamber winners and all the combinations of “if Jey wins and Gunther retains,” “if Jey loses and Cody retains” etc. Far better than endless talk-talk from Jey (and Charlotte) to no consequence or resolution.

Of course, that’s far too “Attitude Era” of my thinking. Too many part timers involved for all of them to show up at a B PLE and since the inception of Seth’s Silver Medal they’ve watered down cards to the point The Royal Rumble only had one of the top belts defended.

I like how Belairs coat matches Naomi’s boots. Too many “wrestler A & wrestler B” teams don’t look like a team, but they do. For now.

I really love that, for once, they had wrestlers (DIY) come out in normal clothes instead of their gear when they weren’t expecting to wrestle. Thus, they had to wrestle in those clothes when an “impromptu” match happened. Kudos. Does that mean I didn’t hate the result? No, it doesn’t.

Tozawa vs Hayes is a perfect telly match as they’re at similar points on the totem pole and thus I didn’t know who would win 100%. Felt like one could become upwardly mobile with a win (STAKES!1??) and who knows, a few more wins could find Carmelo in US title contention.

I see Big Match Drew’s latest strop didn’t last? Time to knock those on the head, I reckon. No idea why him, Big Jim and LA Knight (yeah) had to do some talking right before their pre-announced match that was about to happen, felt like filler so I skipped it.

I see they’ve already gone all the way with turning Smug Cunt Flair back to full blown heel? I wonder if they turned Tiffy face because they had the foresight that any positive reaction would be short-lived at best to Charlotte’s return. I’m not going to lie, Charlotte of Borg coming back to assimilate the life out the division and representing a direction of face Tiffany vs heel Flair at Mania is obviously disappointing compared to my dream of heel Tiffy vs babyface Trish Stratus. But hell, if they are getting Trish to wrestle at Mania, her era didn’t overlap the apparently-returning Nikki Bella, and while I personally couldn’t care less about the latter, Stratus vs Bella “first time ever” looks good on a Mania card maybe? Probably just another fun idea I had that won’t happen.

Speaking of Trish, I’m delighted that Alexa, who I used to consider heiress apparent to 2005 bitch Trish, came back. Although I’d have preferred if she’d just come back as Alexa Bliss rather than a Wyatt Sicks pledge. That match is as far as I got so far.

@Jazzy G Just for your reference… imagine my surprise and joy when Alexa seemed to be setting up The Flashdance but then instead went home with The Last Dance instead!

 

[air_raid]

On 1/6/2022 at 8:23 AM, air_raid said:

Anyway, the real reason I’m in this thread is to ask ; did WWE do an episode of TV where champions lost a non-title match? Yes they did.

Forgot this yesterday. I missed Garth.

Turns out it was only the main event left for me and some more talk talk and endless video packages. Main event tag was obviously going to be FF for me apart from buzzing off Cody’s entrance as champion and Crossrhodes/pin, and

On 2/8/2025 at 6:16 AM, Doog said:

Going back to Solo vs Cody again. 

Eh, not arsed. Maybe this will just be on a “Clash of the Champions” episode while Raw’s belt makes the PLE. Funny, as of yesterday someone had edited the Wiki for the PLE to show BOTH World titles defended vs TBA as well as Green vs Niven vs Michin vs B-Fab for the UST even though Chelsea hasn’t lost her Chamber qualifier to Naomi until next week.

 

I enjoyed SmackDown again. That I chose to (kind of) watch it in my free time instead of catching up on a Raw again suggests something, but in my wildest dreams or American Nightmares, I’m not sure what.

[RedTwoster]

14 hours ago, air_raid said:

Speaking of Trish, I’m delighted that Alexa, who I used to consider heiress apparent to 2005 bitch Trish, came back. Although I’d have preferred if she’d just come back as Alexa Bliss rather than a Wyatt Sicks pledge. That match is as far as I got so far.

I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if we never saw the Wyatt Sicks again. I like them? But I could absolutely see them quietly being cut and forgotten about. They’ve been used in a very inconsistent way, and they’ve barely been mentioned since moving to Smackdown, let alone seen. Their use on Raw was a bit odd too…I wouldn’t be shocked if we saw them disappear pretty quickly after the 2K25 Wyatt Sicks pre-order DLC is released. 

[air_raid]

48 minutes ago, RedTwoster said:

I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if we never saw the Wyatt Sicks again. I like them? But I could absolutely see them quietly being cut and forgotten about. They’ve been used in a very inconsistent way, and they’ve barely been mentioned since moving to Smackdown, let alone seen. Their use on Raw was a bit odd too…I wouldn’t be shocked if we saw them disappear pretty quickly after the 2K25 Wyatt Sicks pre-order DLC is released. 

Given that Alexa just came back on SmackDown I think we’ll at least first see some kind of feud and/or recruitment drive storyline involving Bliss and Nikki and the rest of her motley crew.

Nikki Sicks, heh.

[The Dart]

Apparently Bo Dallas has been off the road for unspecified reasons.  They'll probably return when he is able to.