BRM Reviews the 9/11/2020 Smackdown (terrible)

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 9/11/2020 Smackdown (terrible)

Post by Big Red Machine » Sep 13th, '20, 23:34

OPENING SEGMENT- fine
The official tagline for Roman vs. Jey is “the Big Dog vs. the Underdog.” They tried to spin some dumb web about how Jey has always been the “underdog” and “third wheel” in the combination of him, his brother, and Roman because he was the youngest. So after YEARS of telling us how close Jey and Jimmy are, while Roman’s relation to them wasn’t even brought up for his first few years on the roster, all of a sudden it’s always been Roman and Jimmy with poor Jey left out? F*CK. OFF. Just let Jey be the Underdog because he’s a tag wrestler who wasn’t even supposed to be in this match originally and Roman is a multi-time world champion.
Jey’s comment to Heyman that he goes way back with their family had me baffled for several minutes before I remembered that he managed the Samoan Swat Team in WCW in 1989. You might want to give some context with comments like that when you’re talking about things that happened OVER THIRTY YEARS AGO.
Jey is also already starting to annoy me with his mannerisms. He’s like a hyena that ate sugar. Much better than him were Heyman and especially Roman.
First Corbin and then Sheamus came out and made decent points about Jey’s insertion into the match not being earned. Jey cut a promo challenging them to a tag team match. If you were paying as close attention as I was to the Thunderdome screens, you would have noticed in the fourth row back and three screens to the right if the middle, Teddy Long burst out into tears because he realized that he was now obsolete because the wrestlers can just book tag team matches themselves.
The babyfaces then beat the heels up. That didn’t seem necessary. I thought the way they set the tag match up was fine, but I’m not a fan of the stupid narrative they’re trying to push.

SAMI ZAYN RUNS WILD IN THE PRODUCTION TRUCK- bad, on the simple principle that it’s ridiculous that no one in the company has done anything about this by now. Talk to Sami and tell him he’s not the champion, then enforce the decision. Either that, or just book him against Jeff for the title already!

WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE MATCH: Jeff Hardy(c) vs. AJ Styles- 5/10
Before the match, Sami Zayn came and ranted a bunch. Adam Pearce and two security guards showed up to try to remove him from the building. Based on their success at doing this to Drew McIntyre on Monday, I assume we’re getting a f*ck finish DQ here.
AJ jumped the bell on Jeff. They actually had me scared there that Jeff was going to win in thirty seconds. Instead, Jeff missed the Swanton, and holy f*ck they went to a commercial even though no one had just done a dive to the outside!
These guys did a great job with the time they had, and probably went a lot more all out than they needed to give that the finish was- yup- a run-in by Sami Zayn, causing a DQ. If we’re going to do this sh*t can we at least make the segment feel worthwhile by having Sami do the logical thing and steal the Jeff’s IC Title belt so that Jeff can’t defend the “sham” championship?
Jeff sold very big after Sami’s attack and collapsed on the ramp. I’m sure AJ’s work on the knee was supposed to be some of it, but this felt very overdramatic.

ALYSE ASHTON’S UPDATE ON JEFF HARDY’S CONDITION IS INTERRUPTED BY AJ STYLES- Jeff was apparently dehydrated. Well, in that case, I don’t feel bad for him at all because that’s his own fault. AJ cut a great promo saying he could beat both Jeff and Sami.

Cole confirmed that the “once a quarter” thing on the Brand to Brand Invitational is part of the rules now. It’d be nice if they could acknowledge that there was a change instead of just pretending that it had always been this way. Well if you can only do it once a quarter, then how are these guys having a match next week on Raw if Cesaro and Nakamura used their invitation to show up on Raw this week?

CESARO, NAKAMURA, & THE STREET PROFITS BACKSTAGE- bad
All of them acted completely unlikable, and everyone but Cesaro were goofs as well.

LUCHA HOUSE PARTY IN-SET PROMO- Kalisto is also a cartoon. This happened during their entrance. You’d think we’d have the match next that Cesaro had also told us was about to start, but instead we cut to…

SAMI ZAYN BOTHERS JEFF HARDY IN THE TRAINER’S ROOM- Jeff attacked him and kicked his butt. Again… Adam Pearce SUCKS at removing wrestlers from the building. In fact, since he has gotten an on-screen name, I don’t think Pearce has done a single thing right.

SHINSUKE NAKAMURA & CESARO vs. LUCHA HOUSE PARTY (w/Lincé Dorado)- 1/10
The match was fine for about three minutes until predictably, the Street Profits showed up on the Tron having invited a bunch of random goofs into this “Champions’ Lounge” and were making a mess everywhere. This distracted the tag champs, who then got pinned by Lucha House Party. I appreciate that the puzzle pieces fit together nicely in that in addition to “building up” the champions vs. champions match on Raw, this also sets up new champions and allows Kalisto to now have something he can point to when he tells Lincé Dorado that Lincé should listen to him, but the reason I put “building up” in quotes above is because I think it actually completely fails at doing that on any level other than a theoretical one, as fans nowadays just get annoyed at distraction finishes (especially in WWE, where they are WAY overused) rather than distraction finishes generating any sort of heat on the heels.

BAYLEY PROMO- fine
This was exactly what you expected: I was using you just like you were using me, so I turned on your first.
After Bayley finished, Nikki Cross came out for her match, but she didn’t wait until Bayley had left, so Bayley hit her with a chair. This felt forced. Also, Nikki seems to be the jerk here, as waiting until someone else is done and all the way in the back is the general practice we’ve seen most of the time.


FATAL FOUR-WAY MATCH FOR A SHOT AT THE WWE SMACKDOWN WOMEN’S TITLE AT CLASH OF CHAMPIONS: Alexa Bliss! vs. Nikki Cross vs. Lacey Evans vs. Tamina- 5.75/10
Alexa Bliss! came out to tend to Nikki after Nikki’s injury. She got in Lacey Evans’ face when Lacey got too close to Nikki during her entrance. They had a very good finishing sequence and Nikki won, but the big news here came right before the commercial break when Alexa got all weird, then hit Nikki with Sister Abigail. Then she walked out of the match, with the announcers describing her as “in a trance.”
After this happened, I was shocked that they didn’t have Nikki run out after her, simply because that’s how these things usually work. Instead Nikki stayed in the match and won, so I guess we can expect to see a f*ck finish at the PPV, though whether it will be by Alexa or Sasha is up in the air.

A HOT BLONDE GETS DRESSED BACKSTAGE- I’m not sure who this could be, but I’m also not thinking too hard about it. She didn’t look muscular enough to be Dana Brooke, Charlotte isn’t ready to return, and those are the only two blondes on I can think of in the company not already on TV right now.

JOHN MORRISON vs. OTIS DOZOVIC (w/Tucker Knight)- 2/10
Miz was on commentary. His point about Otis having really earned MITB because the briefcase just fell into his hands instead of him climbing the ladder to get it rung a little bit true to me. Miz managed to steal the MITB contract lunchbox but Otis didn’t care, so I assume he switched it back into the real briefcase this week. Why did Miz even do this. Just last week he pointed out to Morrison that stealing the contact doesn’t make you the rightful owner.
Otis beat Morrison, because G-d forbid the guy with talent not job to the goofmaster general.

XAVIER WOODS WILL GIVE US AN UPDATE ON BIG E’S CONDITION TOMORROW ON TALKING SMACK- Hey, look! Something that might actually get people to watch that show!

MONEY IN THE BANK BULLSH*T- dumb
I was 99% right. Otis brought a decoy lunchbox, while actual lunchbox with the contract is in the briefcase. Then Otis put the contract in his mouth and starts to chew on it because he’s a moron.

MIZ & MORRISON BACKSTAGE- Oh. Wow. They actually did explain why Miz thinks stealing the contract will accomplish anything (his lawyer thinks he can find a loophole to exploit). They open the lunchbox to find Otis’ lunch again. Miz says he is “calling in a favor,” which WWE.com would later say was Miz getting Mandy Rose traded to Raw.

FIREFLY FUNHOUSE- dumb
Dumb sh*t happened. The new character is a “Special Advisor” “Wobbly the Walrus,” because of that one promo The Rock cut on Paul Heyman OVER EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO calling him a walrus clapping for Brock Lesnar on a beach. That being said, I have very vivid memories of that promo, and understanding the reference isn’t necessary to understanding what is going on, so I guess it’s fine. But that doesn’t mean the whole thing isn’t stupid. It’s been almost a year and a half now and I’m still waiting for the Firefly Funhouse to actually wind up meaning something.

BARON CORBIN & SHEAMUS vs. JEY USO & ROMAN REIGNS (w/Paul Heyman)- 4/10
The heels tried to attack Jey on the ramp. The bell rang even though Roman hadn’t even come out yet. That was f*cking stupid. Are you telling me you won’t ring the bell when one guy sneak attacks the other in the ring (like we saw earlier in the IC Title match), but you will ring it when one of the competitors isn’t even out here and it’s a handicap situation because of that?
Roman eventually came out at a key moment, distracting Sheamus before he could go for a Brogue Kick. Jey used the distraction to mostly win on his own (other than the distraction, I mean). Roman tagged Jey in as he was going for the splash and speared Sheamus afterwards and pinned him. I get that we’re supposed to think that Roman stole the pin, but Jey was getting his butt kicked most of the match, so I don’t think it’s a fair assumption to make that Jey had Sheamus beaten.
This whole thing was dumb. I just don’t understand what Roman gets out of behaving the way he is behaving. Yes, hit PPV opponents gets beaten down and he gets to conserve himself, but the match is more than two weeks away, so I highly doubt anything that would happen tonight will have any consequence. Roman has been aloof, but otherwise rather respectful to Jey, so why is he now being a heel to him in a situation where he has almost nothing to gain from it? And to accomplish this goal, you’ve sabotaged your main event.
If you really wanted to do this for some reason, I think the best thing to do would be for this to be the semi-main and have the women’s #1 contendership match in the main event spot. It’s not title match like the IC Title is, but it does have title implications, it’s not going to a f*ck finish, and if Alexa wasn’t going to be the new Firefly Funhouse character then there was no reason to have her match- and her turn- happen before that, so you can use her actions as a hook for next week’s show, and it will be more effective because it happened in the main event and thus felt more important.


This was another terrible episode of Smackdown, but at least it was easy to sit through.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

Upcoming Reviews:
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Serujuunin
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Re: BRM Reviews the 9/11/2020 Smackdown (terrible)

Post by Serujuunin » Sep 14th, '20, 22:10

How much is it killing you that Alexa is involved now with this Bray Wyatt garbage?

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Big Red Machine
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Re: BRM Reviews the 9/11/2020 Smackdown (terrible)

Post by Big Red Machine » Sep 15th, '20, 11:50

Serujuunin wrote: Sep 14th, '20, 22:10 How much is it killing you that Alexa is involved now with this Bray Wyatt garbage?
A lot.


Tell me... who has ever escaped from a prolonged interaction with Bray unscathed? MAYBE Roman, but he's a whole different thing because of his own issues.
I'm not saying this will end her career because at the end of the day she's a smoking hot blonde who is also a great promo... but then again, look at Harper and Rowan, who both had looks WWE loves. Look at what has happened to Braun.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

Upcoming Reviews:
FIP in 2005
ROH Validation
PWG All-Star Weekend V: Night 2
DGUSA Open the Ultimate Gate 2013
ROH/CMLL Global Wars Espectacular: Day 3

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Serujuunin
Posts: 2441
Joined: Dec 17th, '10, 19:56

Re: BRM Reviews the 9/11/2020 Smackdown (terrible)

Post by Serujuunin » Sep 15th, '20, 23:14

Big Red Machine wrote: Sep 15th, '20, 11:50
Serujuunin wrote: Sep 14th, '20, 22:10 How much is it killing you that Alexa is involved now with this Bray Wyatt garbage?
A lot.


Tell me... who has ever escaped from a prolonged interaction with Bray unscathed? MAYBE Roman, but he's a whole different thing because of his own issues.
I'm not saying this will end her career because at the end of the day she's a smoking hot blonde who is also a great promo... but then again, look at Harper and Rowan, who both had looks WWE loves. Look at what has happened to Braun.
It’s driving me mental too. I don’t understand how they can’t see that everyone involved with him comes out the other end worse for wear. I have confidence that Alexa will be okay, but whether that’s in WWE or not, I don’t know. Rowan, I don’t really see as a big loss. And poor Braun, I thought he’d be okay with a universal title under his belt but...

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