wrestling / Columns
Wrestling’s 4Rs: The Right, Wrong and Ridiculous of WWE Smackdown
Loading...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.
SMACKDOWN 10.17.17
Charlotte Flair, Becky Lynch & Naomi d. Natalya, Lana & Tamina [*1/2]
Sin Cara d. Baron Corbin by Count-Out [*]
Dolph Ziggler d. Bobby Roode [**]
Kevin Owens & Sami Zayn d. Shinsuke Nakamura & Randy Orton [***1/4]
THE Right:
Daniel Bryan Confronts Owens & Zayn: Daniel Bryan opened Smackdown to a huge pop since he was in his hometown of Seattle. He ran down the lineup for the evening and then began to address Sami Zayn but Zayn quickly interrupted him, once again with a giant smile on his face. Zayn said that his actions at Hell in the Cell didn’t make him a bad guy and Bryan should understand his reasoning better than anyone. The difference between them is that the people got behind Daniel Bryan to take him to the top but the people didn’t do the same for him. Zayn said if Bryan worked smarter instead of harder like he did, he would probably still be competing in the ring. Zayn said for years he would try to reach Bryan’s achievements but now he would never trade his career for Bryan’s. Kevin Owens came out and he called him a hypocrite for becoming everything he fought against. He said Bryan cared only about business and has become the new authority, leading to Zayn calling him a sellout. Zayn and Owens hugged and Bryan decided to find some guys to punch them in the face tonight. Sami Zayn is killing it on the mic right now. His delivery has been incredible and the reasoning he’s been giving for the change of heart is as well thought out and smart as anything WWE has done at some time. His targeting of Daniel Bryan made him the most hated man in the building, Sami is on fire right now in the heel role and has just been a joy to watch the past two weeks.
Shinsuke Nakamura & Randy Orton vs. Kevin Owens & Sami Zayn: Nakamura caught Zayn with a spinning heel kick and Owens bailed when Orton attempted the RKO on him. Owens was able to cheap short Orton as he went after Zayn and he hit a fall-a-way slam into the barricade. Zayn saved Owens from the corner knee lift and Owens went to work on the leg of Nakamura. They tried to ground Nakamura but he fought back and hit the corner knee lift on the second attempt. Tag to Orton and he cleaned house. Orton hit a back suplex they put Zayn through the announce table but Owens drilled him with a super kick to answer back. Orton hit the snap power slam on Zayn for another near fall and Owens distracted the ref, allowing Zayn to go low on Orton. Helluva Kick by Zayn got them the victory. I loved the booking of the match. The little details and ways Owens and Zayn helped each other throughout the match were clever and the finish was brilliant, with Zayn using Owens’ style dirty tactics to steal a huge win, reflecting his words over the past two weeks. They did the smart thing by both not having Nakamura involved in the decision and having Zayn get the big pinfall victory with his finish, it achieved the goal of building Zayn as a heel and protected Nakamura as he rehabs from the Mahal program.
puRgatoRy:
Charlotte Flair, Becky Lynch & Naomi vs. Natalya, Lana & Tamina: Naomi caught Natalya with a leg lariat to start and she caught Natalya’s team with a slingshot pescado to the floor. Natalya’s team regained control during the commercial break, working over Naomi. Naomi fought off Lana and she tagged Charlotte who cleaned house. Everyone laid each other out and Charlotte locked in the Figure-8 on Lana for the win. This was the weekly sloppy women’s tag that we now get on an almost weekly basis. This was pretty uninspired action but it achieved the ultimate goal of making Charlotte look good for an eventual rematch with Natalya. They just need to find a way to add more juice to these matches, as they are just getting repetitive at this point.
Baron Corbin vs. Sin Cara: Sin Cara fired away early and he caught Corbin with a suicide dive. Cara hit a cross body off the ring post to the floor and Corbin got counted out. Last week I gave props for the way them seemed to give Corbin’s title victory some validation with the strong match against Styles last week. This week they did a complete 180 on that. I don’t know what the hell the point of this finish was. They might do something where Corbin loses non-title matches and then win the championship rematches but it doesn’t make him look like a strong champion as all. I’ll give them this, the match actually made Sin Cara look strong but he wasn’t built up prior to this, so it only made Corbin look like the geek he was in the weeks leading to his title win. They took two steps backwards after doing a decent job building him back up the prior week.
Jinder Mahal’s Survivor Series Announcement: Jinder Mahal came out and talked about how he was treated with a hero’s welcome when he visited India last week and complained about not getting the same respect in the US. Mahal said he needed to beat the WWE’s most dominant enforcer, so he challenged Brock Lesnar to a match at Survivor Series. AJ Styles came out and reminded Mahal that he has yet to beat him in a match yet. Mahal said Styles wasn’t worthy of being in the ring with him so Styles went on the attack. He caught Mahal with the Pele Kick and Mahal was forced to bail. As I predicted last week, AJ Styles is now back in the WWE Championship picture. This was probably the best Mahal promo/segment in weeks but Lesnar/Mahal does nothing for me. I’m cool with Styles entering the picture because if there’s anyone that can finally get a good main event match out of Jinder it’s him, plus Styles is the perfect guy to dethrone him once the India tour concludes.
Bobby Roode vs. Dolph Ziggler: Ziggler went on the attack but Roode cut him off with a clothesline. Ziggler caught Roode with a dropkick on the floor but back in the ring, Roode catapulted Ziggler into the ring post. Uranage by Roode got a near fall and they traded counters until Ziggler rolled him up with the tights for the win. The match itself was actually solid and seemed to get cut short. They sprinkled some physical spots in the match and I was just getting into it before they went to the lame finish. The roll-up with tights finishes aren’t doing anything for either guy and this Ziggler feud which should have been designed for Roode to get over is doing harm to him at the moment. I know they have a good match in them, they just need to be cut loose and move away from this cheap finish garbage.
THE wRong:
NOTHING
THE Ridiculous:
NOTHING
