Wrestling’s 4Rs: The Right, Wrong and Ridiculous of WWE Smackdown

How the 4Rs of wRestling Work!
Here is a quick explanation of the 4R’s. The column will run TWO-THREE times a week. We will group our feelings on the shows in various categories: The Right, the wRong and the Ridiculous. The Right is stuff that worked very well: a great promo, a great match and so on. PuRgatoRy is a section between the right and wrong. It shows equal traits from both sides that cannot be ignored and needs discussed. It is not a bad place per say, as things can get remedied or go the wrong way the very next week. The wRong is what it sounds like: bad matches, bad or boring promos and so on. The Ridiculous is stuff that had no right on TV: Stupid angles and so on. And there is always a possibility of a 5th R, which is as bad as they come. This column is supposed to be analytical, and at the right time very critical of the shows, it was the whole reason it was created. This is not a “mark” column, nor a “smark” column, our goal is to analyze the show from many different fronts, reward the good and call out the bad. We will not apologize for our opinions, they are as they are, whether positive or negative.

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SMACKDOWN 9.12.17
– WWE US Championship- AJ Styles © defeated Tye Dillinger [**]
– Las Vegas Street Fight for the WWE Smackdown Tag Team Championships – The New Day defeated The Usos [***1/2]
– WWE Smackdown Women’s Championship- Natalya © defeated Naomi [**1/4]
– Shelton Benjamin & Chad Gable defeated The Hype Bros [*1/2]

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THE Right:
The Kevin Owens/McMahon Saga Continues: Kevin Owens opened Smackdown, talking about his plans to sue the WWE and officially make Smackdown the Kevin Owens Show. He ordered Mr. McMahon to confront him but Shane’s music played and Dolph Ziggler came out doing Shane’s entrance. Daniel Bryan came out and reminded Owens that he still ran the show. Bryan warned him that he wasn’t going to like what Vince has to say but Owens makes it clear that Vince won’t like what he has to say either. At the end of the show, Vince came out and met Owens in the middle of the ring. Vince called Owens a coward for threatening to sue when he got his ass handed to him by Shane last week. Vince told Owens that if he followed through with his lawsuit, then he will be immediately fired because Vince doesn’t fear lawsuits. Vince said he didn’t suspend Shane for attack Owens; he suspended him for not finishing the job. Vince decided to reinstate Shane for a match with Kevin Owens inside Hell in the Cell. Owens accepted the match on the condition that Vince promises that he can attack a McMahon if he is provoked. Vince agreed and they shook hands, giving Owens the opening to head butt Vince. Vince tried to fight back but Owens laid him out with a super kick and a frog splash. This ended up being a fantastic segment. The attack on Vince by Kevin Owens was perfect, providing us with that shocking moment and big time angle that this show has been lacking. The Owens attack adds a ton of juice to the Hell in the Cell match and now you’re invested in seeing Shane try to come back for revenge for his father. Maybe the best angle Smackdown has done this year and the Owens/Shane build has been the best this year by a mile, with this potentially being the cherry on top.

WWE Smackdown Tag Team Championship Las Vegas Street fight – The Usos © vs. The New Day: Big E and Kofi represented the New Day here. Everyone brawled on the floor to start with the Usos gaining the upper hand. Jimmy super kicked a chair into the head of Big E and the Usos took turns nailing Big E with a kendo stick. Kofi made the save and he broke the stick nailing Jimmy repeatedly with it. Kofi hit a double stomp driving a chair into Jimmy for a near fall and he went for the Trust Fall to the floor but the Usos caught him and drove him into the barricade. Big E ran wild for a bit, hitting a big splash on both Usos. Big E caught Jimmy with the Big Ending for a near fall as Jey saved. The Usos nailed Big E with a double superkick and they went up top. Kofi shoved Jey off the top through a table that was set up on the floor earlier in the match. The New Day hit the Midnight Hour on Jimmy for the win and the titles. A great brawl that was another strong chapter in the WWE’s best in-ring feud this year. It was wild and chaotic as their other matches that was more tam on near falls and more heavy on brutality. The kendo stick spots where nasty but extremely effective in putting over the brutal nature of this fight and the big table spot was a great payoff toward the finish, so from start to finish this match was a blast.

puRgatoRy:
WWE US Championship- AJ Styles © vs. Tye Dillinger: Dillinger surprisingly got the early advantage; shoving Styles back first into the post, bringing him crashing to the floor. Styles fired back and he went for the Phenomenal Forearm but Baron Corbin hopped on the apron, so Styles nailed him with the move. This allowed Dillinger to roll Styles up for a near fall and he hit the Tye Breaker for another big near fall. Styles rolled Dillinger into the Calf Crusher and Dillinger tapped. Baron Corbin laid both men out after the match, with Corbin hitting End of Days on the floor on Styles. Corbin officially challenged Styles for the US Championship next week. The match was fine with Dillinger getting two big near falls to get the crowd to believe he almost pulled off the upset but the commercial break killed the match from generating any sort of rhythm. The Corbin run in added nothing so I really don’t know why they did it during the match, as the post match attack was way more effective in building toward the Styles/Corbin showdown.

Jinder Mahal Discusses Shinsuke Nakamura: Jinder Mahal came out and mocked Nakamura’s facial expressions, describing them as looks of constipation and the looks of someone who’s planning on ribbing off more ideas for his gimmick. He scolded the fans for laughing at his jokes and he warned Nakamura that nothing is worth the pain Mahal will put him through at Hell in a Cell. This promo was a waste of time. Mahal should stick to serious promos cause his attempts at comedy or delivering the lines was brutal here. The overselling of laughter by the Singh Brothers helped things a bit but this really added nothing to the Mahal/Nakamura feud and just felt like something thrown together to get Mahal on the show in some fashion.

WWE Smackdown Women’s Championship- Natalya © vs. Naomi: Naomi fired away with the karate kicks to start but Natalya dropped her face first into the top turnbuckle to cut her off. Naomi caught Natalya with a slingshot guillotine leg drop for a near fall and she missed the follow up split legged moonsault. Naomi blocked the Sharpshooter, knocking Natalya to the floor and she went for a cross body to the floor but missed and hit Carmella and James Ellsworth who were at ringside. Natalya sent Naomi into the post and then locked her in the Sharpshooter, forcing Naomi to tap. I actually thought the match itself was getting pretty good until Carmella got involved. These two have surprisingly good chemistry as opponents so the action was really fun while it lasted. They really didn’t need Carmella involvement here and it just felt doing it for the sake of doing it rather than setting up a potential cash in or any other. It unfortunately gave the match a really flat finish, which is a shame considering it was going well beforehand.

Dolph Ziggler Does More Entrances: Ziggler came out and said he shouldn’t need an elaborate entrance to prove he’s a star but if that’s the fans demand, that’s what they’ll get. Ziggler proceeded to do Bayley and Ultimate Warrior’s entrances. He said while this made the fans happy, the sad reality is that at some point, the bell will ring and these flamboyant stars will actually have to compete. He said no one can hold a candle to him when it comes to competing in the ring but if no one could care less about him then he doesn’t care about the people. The points that Ziggler has been making are fine but I think the fake entrances are overdone to this point and is really pushing this new gimmick into cartoon territory. Ziggler is delivering in the role of having distain for gimmicks and characters that have passed over him but the entrance gimmick needs to go away but this new incarnation of Ziggler is killed dead.

Hype Bros vs. Shelton Benjamin & Chad Gable: Benjamin grounded Rawley to start but Rawley trucked him to take control and Ryder nailed a flapjack. Rawley charged at Gable but missed and hit the post. Ryder caught Benjamin with a second rope dropkick but he ran right into a spine buster. Benjamin & Gable hit the Doomsday Powerbomb on Ryder for the win. Rawley shakes the victor’s hands after the match but Ryder walked off. Benjamin and Gable continue to roll and I hope they continue to give these guys some wins so that they can be elevated into the championship picture to have killer matches with the Usos and New Day. Looks like Zack Ryder is going heel soon so good luck to him and hopefully he’ll be able to do some worthwhile stuff on his own after years of being shunted to the lower midcard.

THE wRong:
NOTHING

THE Ridiculous:
NOTHING

The 1166th edition is over…

7.0

The final score: review Good

The 411

This was a good episode of Smackdown that I felt just lived up to the hype coming in. 2 of the 3 big segments built up on this show delivered and this felt like a very newsworthy and important edition of the show, something that Smackdown has been severely lacking almost since the Brand Split. The rest of the show was decent as well, while it had its share of flaws there was nothing outright offensive. Certainly a watchable episode and coming out of this I'm pumped for Owens/Shane at Hell in the Cell.