Last night, SmackDown rolled out its penultimate episode before the Battleground pay-per-view. It what turned out to be a decent enough show, last night’s episode proved one thing: SmackDown simply does not have the firepower of RAW.
Tamina Pins Charlotte
Shame on us for turning the channel when Shane McMahon ordered a women’s tag match. We all thought, or at least I did, that Charlotte and Becky Lynch would beat Taminaย and Natalya in a glorified house show tune-up.ย
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Oh, how wrong we were.
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Instead of SmackDownย continued to feed theirย top heavy division to Becky and Charlotte, we got just the opposite. Using a distraction from Carmella, Taminaย planted oneย hell of a super-kick on Charlotte’s jaw, and would pin her in the middle of the ring.ย
Don’t you sleep on Taminaย Snuka!ย Even though her music sounds like a bad acid trip in the Rainforestย Cafe, she’s starting to make a teeny bit of noise. She had a nice showing at the first MITBย match and is featuredย weekly on SmackDownย and even has lines to say!
Hey, Lana got 3 title shots. Can’t Taminaย get 1?
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Sami Gets Flower Potted
I think we all had begun to hit the snooze button on Maria and Mike Kanellis. Their gimmick seemed overtly corny and egregiouslyย temporary.ย
In one instant we all were jolted back to consciousness.ย
Samiย Zayn, like the rest of the WWEย world, just wasn’t taking the couple seriously. The Kanellis’ made sure he attendedย his and our collective sins for doubting.ย
Maria snapped off a pretty firm slap and before Samiย could ask a question Mike smashedย his vase of flowers over Sami’sย skull.
Yikes.ย
This all came after Zaynย refused to apologizeย for his transgressionsย and turned the tables fittingly asking them “What do you even do here?”
He’ll never have to ask again. But we can expect much more of Zaynย vs. Theย Kanellis’ in the future. Last night, Samiย learned the lesson for us, do not underestimate this program.ย
Xavier Wood and the Elbow of Revenge
When Xavier Woods was elected to represent the New Day in singles competitionย against Jeyย Uso, we all assumed he’d be losing. We can’t be totally at fault as WWEย has conditioned us to believeย that Xavier only talks trash and blows trombones.ย
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So when Xavier hit a majestic elbow from that top that nearly buried Jeyย Usoย under the ring and pinned him, I think the entire WWEย Universe lifted an eyebrow.
Woods got to exactย his revenge after suffering quite the public take-downย on last week’s Rap Battle. Now we know that Woods has a little be of thump to him and adding just a sprinkle of seriousness to the New Day could go very far.ย
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Cena/Styles 2020
A year ago, John Cenaย and AJ Styles were in the hottest rivalry in WWE. Their highly personal dueling promosย kept us glued as they took turns degrading each other’s career. Even better, they put on legendary matches that will be treasured well into the year 3000.ย
And now, they’re pals.ย
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AJ adjusted his attitude since he last was running against Cenaย and now they both fight for the same team. They’re a compelling dynamic as they both standย as the relative kings of their world, Cenaย representing sports entertainment and Styles the figurehead of professional wrestling.ย
It what will likely prove to be a one-off it waย cool to see the men supporting one another. Who knows, maybe they could formally team up in one of WWE’sย patendedย odd coupleย tag teams.ย
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