“I’m Better Than You, And You Know It”

"Every Man Has A Price For The Million Dollar Man"

"The Best There Is, The Best There Was, And The Best There Ever Will Be"

"Whatcha Gonna Do, When Hulkamania Runs Wild On You"

"And That's The Bottom Line Because Stone Cold Said So"

<h3><strong>The Phenomenal Suck-it-up</strong></h3>
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<p>This paled in comparison with the opening segment from this week’s RAW, but this was pretty much as good as it could have gotten. The ever-charismatic Renee Young showed rays of the old days of Gene Okerlund by actually having a personality and not just being another eye candy shoving the microphone to a wrestler and asking some generic question as “How do you feel about ABCXYZ?”. AJ Styles was solid (but not too good today), playing the role of the blue-collar champion accepting that life is not fair and taking on all that comes his way. Then came the couple that would take advantage of every possible means to win (perfect contrast against Styles by the way) –  Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, whose “Yep!” movement actually started to gather some steam and had its own T-shirt now, apparently. To cap it all off, you had Shane O’Mac, who knew too well to lap up the live audience by saying “Birmingham, Alabama” at the end of one of his sentences. And to make things better, Shane set up one hell of a main event, pitting Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens against Shinsuke Nakamura, Randy Orton, and A-J-STYLES in a 2-on-3 Handicap Match. Strong segment to open the show.</p>
<h3><strong>The Riott Got Shut Down</strong></h3>
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<p>Aaaaand this is exactly what we fear the most. The leader of the new evil stable was defeated in 1-on-1 action, and she tapped out to Becky Lynch. We think tapping out is THE WORST and MOST HUMILIATING WAY of being defeated, and here we had the leader of the Riott Squad (the stable was literally named after her) being cleanly defeated within minutes. Leaders of factions are supposed to be big people, and should be protected to the maximum. How many times do you see Minoru Suzuki get pinned, let alone lose in 1-on-1 action? We know Becky Lynch just returned last week and needed some momentum leading to Royal Rumble, but we do not think it is necessary to do that in expense of a main roster rookie. We had bad feelings for the 6 women that graduated from NXT the moment we saw the Riott Squad debuting in almost identical fashion to Absolution, but we did not think the whole thing would begin to fizzle down so quickly. This is bad.</p>
<h3><strong>Fall of the Rise, Part 1000.</strong></h3>
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<p>Squash match. The Bludgeon Brothers continued to establish their dominance, and The Ascension continued the irony with their very team name, as they spiraled down the depths of oblivion. So much potential with Konnor and Viktor. But at least we saw some development in the one-up game between The Ascension and Breezango. Now we know what match will be on the Royal Rumble pre-show.</p>
<h3><strong>Too Hyped for Ryder</strong></h3>
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<p>This was surprising. Mojo defeated Zack in the last first-round match of the tournament for the United States Championship relinquished by Dolph Ziggler in decisive fashion. Where this match was short in quality, it made up for in story-telling. Mojo seemed more aggressive than his usual self in this match. We could definitely see that as Mojo vented his frustration on Zack, possibly after all those losses as a team. It is great seeing Mojo Rawley being given some sort of story to add to his personality (which, up to before the Hype Bros’ break-up, had always been little more than a bad wrestler with ADHD), but then, he is facing Bobby Roode in the semifinals. And we would prefer seeing The Glorious One with the US Championship around his waist any day.</p>
<h3><strong>#FREETHETAGTITLES </strong><span style="color: #337ab7;"><strong> </strong></span><strong> </strong></h3>
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<p>That was what was on Chad Gable’s sleeveless tee when he and “The Golden Standard” Shelton Benjamin went to the ring and air their grievances about their not having been champions after last week’s controversial Tag Team Championship match. We like this segment. Benjamin and Gable had a chance to come out, be on the mic, and express themselves to the crowd. This was necessary, because since their debut as a team, they were portrayed as just very talented, technical wrestlers with slightly too much confident. Furthermore, the storyline progressed the way it should be. Benjamin and Gable’s “victory” over The Usos (and The Usos’ victory over Benjamin and Gable) was a source of debate, so the right thing was done: A 2-out-of-3 falls match for the championships at Royal Rumble, to determine the winners. And in WWE logic, true winners would be able to pin their opponents twice in one match. We always like it when special stipulations were not just added for the sake of stipulations, but as a way to resolve a dispute.</p>
<h3><strong>Rusev Tumbles</strong></h3>
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<p>WHAT? WWE writers, do you even listen to the crazy reaction of the crowd to RUSEV DAY? Do you even notice the rising popularity of RUSEV DAY? How dare you people let Rusev and Aiden English lose in such borderline humiliating fashion? Against BREEZANGO? How dare you. Rusev was dominant the entire time he was legally in the match. At one point, he essentially took on both members of Breezango. And then he lost, not by a bad-ass tandem finishing move (if Breeze and Fandango had one), but by a schoolboy pin. We could not care less what this might have to with the Breezango – Ascension story, but many would not be happy to see their favorite team going down like this. Way to go.</p>
<h3><strong>Restart the Match Once, Shame on You. Restart the Match Twice,…</strong></h3>
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<p>First off, let us just take a moment to say this: Oh man, look at this star-studded main event! This in itself goes to show just how quality the Smackdown Live roster is right now, and the only thing that separates must-see television and channel-changer is the story-telling. And this match was must-see television. Well, not in the way we would like it to mean, anyways. If we look at the bigger picture, we could see that the focus was not on the five-star five stars and their amazing match. The focus was on the rumbling scuffle between Shane McMahon and Daniel Bryan. Shane McMahon came out and restarted the match twice, changing them to No Count-out and Anything Goes, respectively. We are sure this would play into the Smackdown Live’s Authority storyline somewhere next week. And that was the problem, one that WWE never seemed to figure out. A wrestling show should focus on wrestlers, NOT the people who (in kayfabe at least) manage them. Not our way to end Smackdown Live.</p>
<h3><strong>Overall Review:</strong></h3>
<p>The show started strong enough, involving all the main players of Smackdown, but slowly staggered through the hour-or-so before the main event. The main event was, by a far margin, the show-saver. Besides that match, only Mojo Rawley’s dominant performance against Zack Ryder (and to a negative light, RUSEV DAY’s loss) was anything of note. Nonetheless, the star-studded show-closer could not focus the audience’s attention to the wrestlers that did their superb jobs tonight. Instead, all the limelight seemed to be on the authority figures, a perpetual problem since the appearance of Stephanie McMahon. In a show headlined by the likes of AJ Styles, Shinsuke Nakamura, Randy Orton, John Cena, Kevin Owens, and Sami Zayn, not building the show around the wrestlers can be a huge problem for Smackdown Live going forward.</p>

WWE Smackdown Live Review & Results: January 9th 2018

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