THE DOWNHILL OF SMACKDOWN / ANALYSIS OF THIS WEEK’S SHOW
Things have pretty much gone downhill on SmackDown. After the leave of Brock Lesnar, and the injury troubles of Big Show and Kurt Angle, the brand finds itself in a tough position. The lack of solidified stars results in the push of John “Bradshaw” Layfiled to the main event spot, and the excess of young talent booked into bad storylines, mixed with a “special attraction” booked as the main event result in one of the darkest ages the show has seen storyline-wise. The combination is all but doomed to explode any minute now. This has been the tale of SmackDown. With The Great American Bash, the feeling of “Let’s put all of this behind us, and start fresh” comes to mind. Can WWE and their new “Manager” of creative fix the situation, and will the company treat the once top-notch brand, led by Paul Heyman as an equal-to-its-counterpart RAW show? Time will tell. Until then, here’s my analysis of this week’s show.
SmackDown this week opened with a segment backstage where Charlie Haas and Jackie Gayda told John Cena that what he’s planning could result in “suicide.” For perhaps the fourth straight week, there’s no pyro on the show. Is WWE cutting cost, or are they trying to cement (pun intended) the fact that this is their B show?
Cena came out and challenged Undertaker to a match, being respectful of the Dead Man’s legacy and all. Kurt Angle and Luther Reigns came out, and after a rap of his own, Angle said Cena will be facing Undertaker in the main event tonight. I like that they’re trying something new with Cena by cutting off his rap routine in recent weeks, but they can’t cut it off completely. He already looks lost on the roster, and that was the one part of his gimmick that stood up. On the other hand, it was getting stale, and having him do something different is a good idea.
Layfield suggested backstage that Luther Reigns fights Eddie Guerrero tonight so that Latino Heat could be tired for The Great American Bash. Surprisingly, Layfield has done a good job with most of his mic work, with sometimes even being more than good. Angle’s role as GM is horrendous, as he comes off as “a wrestler in a suit” who has no idea how things are done. It isn’t far from the truth.
A tremendous 10-men battle royal was held, where Chavo Guerrero was the winner over Spike Dudley, Shannon Moore, Akio, Nunzio, Funaki, Billy Kidman, Jamie Noble, Paul London, and Scotty 2 Hotty. That way, Chavo became the #1 Contender for Rey Mysterio’s cruiserweight title at Great American Bash. That was easily the second best match of the night. They couldn’t do much of a story here due to the fact that Chavo Classic had to drop the belt only a week earlier, so the match at the PPV makes sense as it is. WWE can’t allow to get rid of this division, nor to throw into the ground. It’s quite possibly the best thing that SmackDown has going on. Putting the belt on Mysterio was the right decision for the time being, as he wasn’t used on the show, and he’s also a profitable champion.
After some horribly done segments backstage, we find out that Hardcore Holly will be taking on Mordecai at the PPV this Sunday. We saw the two brawling without having been explained why this is going on. The debut of Mordecai has been another horrible move by the creative. His gimmick is one that could have somewhat worked fifteen years ago, but not today. He’s not a good worker, but somewhat holds his own. The lack of writing and planning on the show was obvious, as this match was made in the last minute, and will serve as filler at the PPV.
In what will be another filler match at the PPV, Billy Gunn set up a bout with Kenzo Suzuki at the Great American Bash after winning their match on SmackDown via DQ, when Hiroko threw salt into Gunn’s eyes. Another example of the poor booking on the show. Again, no real purpose behind this. Suzuki has been everything but impressive since his debut. It should be noted that he seems to have a lot of charisma and character, but he’s lacking the in-ring work. Hopefully he’ll pick up a thing or two.
In the final filler match of the Great American Bash, Torrie will take on Sable. The match was set up backstage when the two dissed each other about their bathing suits. I believe that’s the 29th match between them.
Before Guerrero came out to ringside for his match with Luther Reigns, they played a video summarizing the events leading up to the Texas Bullrope match. At least they’re trying to hammer the point down that there’s a WWE Championship match this Sunday. Eddie’s lowrider was described as the “Batmobile” to me by TBL’s Trevor Hunnicutt. Anyway, the two actually had a good match, and I was surprised with Luther Reigns. That was definitely his best match in WWE so far. He has potential, and Eddie carried him well. Layfield interferes at the end, but Guerrero manages to get the better of him to end the segment. Interesting set up for the title match on Sunday, but probably to not open the mouths of the Internet folks who will say “JBL went over Eddie on SmackDown, hence Eddie should keep the belt.” Dear God if he doesn’t. Guerrero will have to bleed even harder to save the PPV on Sunday. I must admit that Layfield gave it his all at Judgment Day. I am sure he’ll give a great effort again at the Bash.
RVD faced Rene Dupree in an OK match that Dupree ended up winning. Booker T did some commentary at ringside, and he was pretty entertaining. The four way for the US belt on Sunday will be probably the only match worth buying the PPV for. They’ve set up this one well, and they found a way to introduce Booker T and Van Dam to this storyline. They can only gain from them. Cena will hopefully hold on to his belt here, because a win will help make him strong again, if the match is good. Dupree looked well inside the ring.
Undertaker faced Cena in the main event that went for a little bit less than half an hour. That was a tremendous match. It saved the show. ‘Taker actually sold for Cena and the match went back and forth. At one poitn, Cena had him pinned with the referee down. If they have ‘Taker work like that for most of his matches down the line, there is hope. Cena came off looking good, although the US Champ shouldn’t be getting pinned right before a PPV event. Overall, this was a good match that they needed.
This week’s show was much better than what they have put out in recent weeks. It was nowhere near the quality the program had when Heyman was in charge, nor near the times of Heyman as GM with Lesnar, Angle, and Show involved, but it was definitely better than recent weeks. This isn’t a turning point yet. They badly need a refreshing move after the PPV on Sunday, and hopefully things will turn around then. It’s important to push Cena right now. He was a dying act who might get a big boost after the great match with ‘Taker and hopefully a strong win at the Bash. The storyline with Undertaker and the Dudley (yes, the Dudley) is not what they need right now. Hopefully that will end on Sunday.
I hope you liked the new format of my analysis on TV shows. I’m planning to do more of what I did above. Let me know your thoughts at eddie@thebalrogslair.com. Now, on to the news…
TOP STORY — BRADSHAW RAGES
John “Bradshaw” Layfield once again decided to make a name for himself on WWE.com, when he went public with his thoughts on several controversial topics, including his firing from CNBC, and his views of current political affairs. Layfield managed to once again confuse all the WWE.com readers as to what he was trying to do. Was he trying to share his personal believes on a variety of topics with us, or was he trying to cut another promo out of desperation since nobody buys his push on TV, and the web is his only escape? I haven’t forgotten the words Mr. Layfield used in his previous column, going as far as calling Internet analysis such as myself “homosexual,” which I don’t quite grasp if it’s supposed to be some sort of a Texas Bullrope offense towards the writers or not? At any rate, whether it’s a work or not, Bradshaw has revealed that he’s nothing. He did deliver some good promos recently, but the bottom line for me, personally, remains that using racist remarks, or going as low as offending his own readers is not the type of heat he wants. That’s a horrible move, and it only makes his push even more of a negative. If Layfield was actually being himself, I wouldn’t be surprised. In his latest, Mr. Layfield argues that doing what he did in Germany is not illegal, since it’s entertainment. I think the fact that we have to put up with him as a main event wrestler who can’t gather any heat that’s not cheap, is illegal in itself. Bradshaw goes to argue that even WWE was put to that pressure by the media of the boundaries they were exploring just several years ago. He fails to acknowledge that at this point in the business, anything was allowed, and talent was encouraged to do controversial things with McMahon priding himself in having a group of wrestler say “Suck It” on TV every week. It brought him far, too. However, in the year 2004 such type of entertainment is long forgotten. Then again, Undertaker is still main-eventing and taking souls, so I guess my point is invalid, or illegal. You can read Bradshaw’s genius HERE.
In other news, the feeling of morale within WWE has been pretty low as of late. Many sources today were reporting how it’s not only the wrestlers who are going through the tough times. A lot of the administration and workers behind the camera are also feeling the downhill the company has been taking. To sum things up, it’s a combination of McMahon’s high expectations, tough schedule of work with long hours, and recent failure of a lot of storylines that has resulted into this. I didn’t put it as the Top Story, because I felt that this has been going on for a while, but people are now reporting it.
SmackDown ended up scoring a 3.1 rating this past Thursday night. This is up from last week’s 3.0 score. The interesting thing to note here is that the show started very low and built itself up until the Taker-Cena match that got the highest rated segment of the night. It was in the 4 range.
SmackDown’s house show for this Saturday in Trenton, NJ was cancelled due to a poor advance. That’s the type of thing that doesn’t help the morale in the company, nor does it put money into the wrestlers’ pockets.
In a continuation of the story on Jacqueline’s release, she’s expected to be offered some sort of a position within the company in the future, probably behind a desk. Until her contract runs out, though, she will be still helping out in OVW.
Jeff Hammond, former NASCAR announcer, and Dennis Rodman will be at TNA Impact’s tapings next week. This will be quite interesting. Jeff Hardy, however, didn’t appear on Impact this week, and word now has it that he is scheduled to have appearances with the company this summer. This will also explain the package they showed of Hardy on Impact expecting to see him again on TNA. Also, in other TNA notes, Billy Gunn, Jackie Gayda, and Charlie Haas were watching the tapings of Impact and went backstage to catch up with friends… Shamrock is being rumored to appear at Wednesday’s PPV, but take this for what it’s worth… Raven missed Impact since he’s still suffering from pneumonia. We wish him well.
That will do it for this N & A. I hope you’re enjoying the new format and everything else! Have a good one.
