411’s WWE SmackDown Report 06.08.12

WWE Friday Night SmackDown!
June 8th, 2012
Colonial Center, Columbia, South Carolina
Attendance: Unknown at this time

Welcome back everyone to another edition of 411’s WWE SmackDown report with your resident recapper. We’re inching closer to the No Way Out PPV and apparently Vince has gone into panic mode again and wants CM Punk and all sorts of other bigger name guys back on Smackdown now to help that show’s ratings, so let’s see what we have in store for us.

Your hosts are Michael Cole, Booker T, and Josh Matthews

We open the show with Alberto Del Rio making his way out to gloat about his attack on Sheamus on last week’s show. He says maybe two sentences before we hear Sheamus’ music, but instead of the World champ it’s Ricardo Rodriguez dressed up as Sheamus.. Ricardo falls on his ass and Del Rio mocks him a bit before the real Sheamus comes out to interrupt. Sheamus tosses Ricardo and he and Del Rio trade strikes before Del Rio tries to high tail it out of the arena. Sheamus catches him up the rampway though and tosses Del Rio into a stage structure. Ricardo comes and saves Del Rio long enough for him to attack the arm of Sheamus a bit before some refs come out to break things up. Teddy Long, who is apparently in charge again while John Laurinaitis gets ready for his job evaluation on RAW (that makes little to no sense) comes out to book Sheamus in a match against Kane later tonight as well as Del Rio against the Great Khali, and that match is up next.

Alberto Del Rio (12-10) vs. The Great Khali (9-8)
Khali should just become a modern day 911 and not actually wrestle, just come out and wreak havoc and then leave. Big chop from Khali at the bell but Del Rio quickly takes Khali’s legs out from under him and targets Khali’s knee like everyone does. Ricardo distracts Khali long enough for Del Rio to apply to the cross armbar and Khali taps at 3:23. Your usual “heel targets the Khali’s limbs to beat him” match, which seems to be all Khali is capable of working anymore. Very dull. 1/2*

They replay the Big Show’s pretaped heel promo from the last week. Afterwards we cut to Teddy Long backstage with Brodus Clay, who is informed by Teddy that he’s off RAW and on SmackDown now apparently.

“The Funkasaurus” Brodus Clay (5-4) vs. Derrick Bateman (0-2)
So after getting squashed by Big Show it’s back to midcard jobber matches for Brodus. He’s much more aggressive tonight though, taking Bateman into the timekeeper’s area and brawling with him a bit before tossing him into the ring and finishing him off with a t-bone suplex and the running splash at 1:06. Your usual Clay squash and afterwards the kids hit the ring to dance with him as usual. You’ve seen this before. 1/4*

Sin Cara (20-5) vs. Drew McIntyre (6-18)

Glad to see Sin Cara back though I’m not sure McIntyre is the best choice of opponent for him. He does a bit of gymnastics before eating a kick to the face off the apron from Drew. Drew applies a chinlock then tries for a press slam but Cara counters with a ‘rana into the corner. He takes Drew down with another headscissors and a springboard back elbow for a two count. Huge boot from Drew and he tries to catch Cara off the top rope into a tilt-a-whirl backbreaker, but Cara counters it into a DDT for the win at 3:18. This could have used a lot more time to develop as Drew seemed game enough to have Cara bump off him like a pinball, but what we got was fairly good anyways. Abrupt finish though. *1/2

Ryback (8-0) vs. Tony Andriotis/Kevin Mahoney
Guess what happens here. Go on, guess. If you guessed anything other than “Ryback wrecks shit up”, you do not pass go and you do not get to collect $200. Ryback finishes them at the same time with the double marching Samoan drop at 1:46. I guess Ryback only does the two on one Goldberg special now. 1/4*

Cody Rhodes comes out while the production crew are still trying to set up the Peep Show interview segment for Christian and he tries to explain that Christian is pandering to the fans agains but Christian’s music hits and the Intercontinental champ himself comes out to interrupt. Christian explains that when he inducted Edge into the Hall of Fame, he had a sudden change of heart in realizing that performing in front of the fans is a privilege that could be taken away at any minute. He claims he doesn’t want to be the guy asking for “one more match” but rather a proud champion like his best friend. Cody scoffs at all this, proclaiming himself a future Hall of Famer in the process and Christian interrupts him again by telling him to shut his mouth and threatening to fight him then and there. Dolph Ziggler decides to come out to interrupt so we he can get to his match with Christian up next.

Christian (18-13-1) vs. Dolph Ziggler (4-17)
Non-title affair here as Cody joins the commentary team and we’re off. Christian sends Dolph out to the floor and nails him with a baseball slide dropkick, but he gets caught with a stiff knee on his way out to the floor as we take a commercial break. When we return Dolph is sending Christian chest first into the corner turnbuckle for the Bret Hart bump. Dolph spears Christian’s torso in the corner a few times and then looks for the Fameasser, but Christian counters into a sitout powerbomb for a near fall. Drop toe hold/right fist combo from Christian and he tries for the sunset flip but Dolph counters out right into the Fameasser for a close two count. Reverse DDT from Christian and he looks for the spear, but Ziggler nails him with the dropkick and looks for the MAIN EVENT SLEEPER HOLD (all rights reserved Scott Keith) but Christian avoids that hits the frog splash out of nowhere for the pin at 6:04 (shown). I really would have loved to have seen this get another five minutes, but maybe Christian isn’t comfortable working a long match back yet? More likely they’re just cramped for time on the show and booked it short, but what we got was really good and I’d actually love to see these two wrestle on a PPV sometime after the Cody feud ends. **3/4

Raw Rebound shows Cena triumphing over evil by single handedly defeating the entire Viet Cong army on horseback Braveheart style. Wait, wrong show. No this is just Cena beating Tensai and then that incredibly long, drawn out beatdown of Cole. Afterwards Cole gets on the mic but is interrupted by JR’s theme music, which the crowd pops huge for. Unfortunately for them it just turns out to be Hornswoggle dressed up as JR and not the real deal. Oh die in a raging kerosene fire Vince.

Damien Sandow comes out to interrupt all of this nonsense, because wrestling is serious business damnit! I like this guy. As the avenging sword of taste and decency, Sandow will not allow this charade to go on. Sandow informs Hornswoggle he’s welcome before Tyson Kidd runs in to make the save with a springboard dropkick. Kidd challenges him to a match on the spot and Sandow pretends to take off but returns to the ring to nail Kidd with his neckbreaker anyways and gloat a bit. I demand a Kidd/Sandow match on a show like Superstars where they’ll get some time to work with.

Backstage Matt Striker wants to know how Kane feels about potentially defeating the WWE and World Heavyweight champions in the same week if he beats Sheamus tonight. Kane isn’t concerned with it though, just with the title match at No Way Out. Striker asks about AJ’s “look” at Kane on RAW but he won’t answer that one and he takes off as we see AJ lurking behind in the shadows, watching all of this from afar. Creeeeper.

Antonio Cesaro (2-0) vs. Jimmy Uso (4-10)
Teddy has to introduce Cesaro with his “lover” Aksana still, even though he’s in charge for the night with Johnny nowhere in sight. Jimmy gets some feisty babyface offense in on the former King of Wrestling at the bell but it’s not long before Antonio nails him with the pop-up European uppercut and then finishes him with the inverted cradle piledriver at 1:00. These short squashes against guys who can get great air for the pop-up European uppercut spot just make Claudio (excuse me, Antonio) look great. I can’t wait until they book him into an actual feud. 1/2*

Sheamus (35-16-1) vs. Kane (18-14)

Non-title match here for our main event as well. Kane dominates to start with some dull brawling in the corner. Sheamus tries fighting him off but gets booted off the ring apron as we take our last commercial break. When we return Kane is working over the champ with a chinlock. Sheamus breaks it up with a boot and then hits a diving shoulder block from the top rope. High knee and clothesline get him a two count. Bodyslam from Sheamus but Kane comes back with a dropkick. Sheamus hits the Irish Curse backbreaker but again Kane kicks out. Kane gets caught in the ropes and eats the ten big hammerfists but he blocks the follow up suplex attempt. Sheamus tries to superplex Kane but he gets knocked off. Kane tries for the clothesline from the top but misses and gets nailed with the White Noise from Sheamus. Kane blocks the Brogue Kick and tries for the chokeslam but Sheamus counters out of that and out runs Del Rio for the lame DQ at 9:13 (shown). Much better than I was expecting honestly, Kane may be incredibly stale and unhelpful in his current role in the main event between Punk and Bryan but he seems to have his working boots on most nights these days so I can’t fault his effort, this was a solid match that would have been even better with a clean finish. **1/2

After the bell rings Kane chokeslams Sheamus anyways and AJ comes prancing out to smile and wave at Kane a bit. Sheamus gives Ricardo a Brogue Kick and we go off the air with Del Rio and Sheamus trading angry eyes.

Bottom Line: Ho-hum show this week, really paint-by-numbers stuff. There was some good stuff on here like the Christian/Cody promo segment and the subsequent match between Christian and Ziggler and our main event was once again solid (though once again with a lame finish) but everything else was just the usual parade of meaningless jobber matches and squashes. If they want people to start watching SmackDown more, here’s an idea: cut down on the 15 minute RAW Rebounds and highlight packages and fill that time with more wrestling. Fans might be more inclined to watch if they know guys like Christian and Ziggler are going to get 10-15 minutes to work with instead of 5 every Friday night. Could go either way on tonight’s show, not bad but not really good either, Thumbs in the Middle.

Score: 5.0/10

Thanks for reading! For more of my reviews and an extensive archive of match ratings, check out my personal site: X’s Wrestling Review