Smackdown! or Can You Dig It…SUCKERRRRRRR

Opening Thoughts

Let’s talk about hair. More specifically, what’s up with the mullet/mohawk hybrid that seems to be going around? Santino Marella, The Undertaker, and as we’ll see later, Randy Orton are all sporting this…odd look. Maybe it’s not odd for some of you, but for those of us that are used to seeing either long hair or short hair or a “normal” length mohawk/faux-hawk, it’s a bit weird. Santino, I believe pulled off the look before anyone else, and Undertaker just doesn’t look the same without the long, black locks. Sorry, that was just something I noticed as I was watching Smackdown…speaking of which, are we ready? We have a (spoiled on Thursday by Booker T’s Twitter account) new era of SMACKDOWN!

The Big Reveal

As I said earlier, Booker spoiled his own surprise. He tweeted out that the new, Booker T era was going to begin on Smackdown. Oh well…I suppose it’s too much to ask people to remember that Friday Night Smackdown really isn’t on Friday Nights. As far as the actual choice is concerned, Booker’s the most logical choice. Three commentators was excessive, and I’m sure his work has been noted as not the best. The opening progression of promos was pretty good, and I like that Booker is not showing exact favoritism by placing Sheamus in a match against Tensai.

Segment Grade: B+

Sheamus vs. Tensai

Sheamus is becoming the completion to the sentence, “If anyone can drag a good match out of (this guy), it’s _____.” This was about as entertaining a match as I can imagine with Tensai. I don’t know if it’s because Bloom moves around the ring with the grace of a bull, or that he has a limited moveset, or that he always breathes REALLY hard when he hits someone, but I just don’t want to see him wrestle. That being said, the psychology was good, and Sheamus really did make Tensai look good. I loved the go home, and obviously, the booking was right.

Match Grade: B+

Backstage with Booker

Remember what I said last week about not having a ton of backstage segments? Keep that in mind everytime we go to a backstage segment. Also, you can toss out what I said about Booker not being partial as he gives Teddy Long an open job right in front of the inquiring Eve. Good job, WWE.

Segment Grade: C

Antonio Cesaro vs. Santino Marella

Saying “hello” in five languages <— Not the way to get heat. At least, not the right kind of heat. That’s the kind of heat where people want you to go away because they’re not entertained. Also, get this man new music. Um, I’m not entirely sure how far they want this feud to go between these two, but if it ended with a US Title match in the pre-show of SummerSlam, that wouldn’t be the worst way to finish it. Cesaro, thus far, has dominated Marella, but dominating Marella isn’t really the way you want to get a push. The finish was very sudden. I’m just not a fan of this feud, and Cesaro hasn’t really shown me anything to be excited about, except intensity.

Match Grade: C

NO!

Well, adapt to survive, right? The fans can now chant, “YES!” as much as they want, and nobody has to be confused now as to whether they’re face pops or not.

Segment Grade: A-

Miz, Daniel Bryan, and Dolph Ziggler vs. Kane, Christian, and Chris Jericho

This was a pretty good six-man, and we got our beginning glimpses of face Jericho in action. It seems like it’s been so long since we’ve seen it that seeing him try to get the crowd pumped and yelling “COME ON BABY” seems like such a foreign concept. The idea and anticipation of the Jericho/Ziggler feud has me all excited though. Come to think of it, so does a Miz/Christian feud for the IC Belt. Again, I’ll say that I like this Miz, and it seems that the best Miz is one that’s seen and not heard. I think out of all of the possible finishes this match could have had, the one that happened was the most logical. I like that Vickie was the one that cost Jericho the match, but Bryan’s the one that got the victory. Also: The return of the old-school Liontamer. I approve.

Match Grade: B+

Orton’s Back

He’s clean shaven, but man, his promo skills haven’t really improved, have they? Also, anyone that knows what happened heard this promo about being away from WWE and laughed.

Segment Grade: C

Jinder Mahal vs. Ryback

This is going to be classified as a segment. The promo by Ryback was awesomely intense and just what I was expecting and wanting from this Mental Machine. It sounded a bit funny though when he said that everywhere he looked, he saw food. I wonder where they’re going with this angle, and I also wonder, “Why Mahal?”

Segment Grade: C+

R-Truth vs. Darren Young

So nobody realized that the best way to get A.W. to shut up is to TAKE THE MICROPHONE AWAY? I’m really surprised nobody saw that thing becoming a PR hazard, especially on live TV. Anyways, we get annoying AW in an otherwise lackluster match. The story of the match was about what was going on outside of the ring, which is a huge mistake. I don’t want to have this facade of a match just so we can pay more attention to the non-match. I get that they’re trying to build the feud between these two teams. But either end the match sooner or get everyone else ejected to put focus back on the match.

Match Grade: C

Backstage with Booker II

Here we are again. The odd interactions between Booker and Layla served only to create an awkward, “Dude, there’s someone in here” moment. I’m not a fan of wasting a few minutes of TV time to create a match for next week – especially because it’s born out of some past feud.

Segment Grade: C

Randy Orton vs. Alberto del Rio

I like the new black tights on del Rio. Unfortunately, it doesn’t improve his in-ring work. Not that this was a bad match, but it was just a “typical” match. There wasn’t really a story here except that Randy’s back, so we have to make him look strong. The intensity seemed to be there from del Rio, especially as he was telling Randy, “Welcome Back,” or, as Cole said, “Why’d you come back?” I’m kind of confused as to why we had the DQ finish as we don’t have a real feud between these two, unless we’re going to have a Triple Threat for the World Heavyweight Championship, like we have for the WWE title. I can’t imagine that happening, so my only thought was, “I guess they don’t want to give Orton a win because he was a bad boy…but they don’t want him to lose, either.”

Match Grade: B+

Recap

In-Ring Action: B- I gave this one a slightly higher grade than I was originally thinking because of the opening and the six-man match. The rest of the “action” on this show was hardly memorable. Ryback’s time was more of a segment, and the Tag Feud match had no focus on the in ring action.

Out-of-Ring Action: C Not a fan of going back to backstage segments. The opening segment was really the most decent part of our promos and segments, and the Antonio Cesaro stuff was just miserable.

Overall: C+ Well, Booker’s first episode of Smackdown was a “looks good on paper” show. Execution wasn’t the greatest. We’re barely getting a picture for SummerSlam on the Smackdown front. Hopefully, we’ll get more to look at next week. I like the new set!

Outside the Blog Zone

Ha, not much here, except that August 18th is MPX: Back to School. I’m in an 8-man tag for control of the company….AGAIN. I have a knack for these kinds of things. Onward to the gym for some training! Until next week, thanks for making me your CHOICE for Smackdown blogging!

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