Would you like to read 10 reactions to Smackdown’s syndication debut? I sure hope so!
1. The opening 8 man tag was a ton of fun. The crowd was hot (even if it sounded suspiciously canned; I can never entirely tell), nobody outstayed their welcome in the ring, and there was a minimum of resting. Really, though, it was Hornswoggle wearing the Kendrick’s jacket that really put it over the top for me.
2. So, Helms’s new thing is doing in barely coherent pop up video comments on the matches? Well, at least he’s not a Green Latern inspired jobber again.
3. I love Big Show as GM. He should just take random people’s jobs every week, based on the fact that, hey, would you be able to stop him?
4. Everything from the new video package to the commentary seemd to really be catering to possible new or lapsed fans. Maybe that was just me, but they seemed to be trying really hard to make this show accessible for people who aren’t WWE diehards. Much more so than the new NBC SNMEs, although they haven’t really put much effort in to those since the first couple bombed.
5. I actually think Michelle McCool vs. Beth Phoenix could be an awesome one on one match. As is, they had a solid one in a gimmick that never produces anything better than that, the lumber/divajack match. Seriously, have you ever seen one that cracked ****, or donuts, or whatever rating system you use to measure worthiness? I hear tell of a good one between Owen and Bret, but even if it was any good, did any match those two had in 1994 not crack ****?
6. Punk was mad over in that six man. So, yeah, that booking in his world title reign sure buried him. Admittedly, I’m not sure anyone has said that since he beat JBL, but I still like taking shots and whiney indie boy strawmen.
7. Is anyone else amazed at how Santino became one of (if not the most) over people in wrestling/WWE through sheer force of broken English?
8. If Manu can develop in to an adequate power worker, where does that leave Umaga?
9. Shelton lost to a Santino roll up set up by R-Truth’s rap in. It annoyed me. I kind of hate but can deal with guys getting distracted by run ins that are happening ring side. Killings was in the audience. Unless he can teleport, there is no reason why Shelton could not have pinned Santino after hitting the Paydirt. So, yeah, Shelton’s plot induced stupidity here bugged me more than usual. But hey, there’s no shame in being another notch in the Honk-A-Meter, I guess.
I am also interested in seeing how that feud goes, though; A-Glaze doesn’t think of much of Killings in the ring, but he is a natural font of charisma, so we’ll see how he works with one of the few solid technicians WWE has these days in Shelton.
10. The triple threat/champion of champions thing was fine if rote. Everything from the tower of doom spot (is it mandated by law that all three ways have that now? Is that TNA’s one contribution to wrestling at all?) to Hs pinning Hardy, we all knew how it was gonna go in advance. Still, by residual talent alone, these three can at least put on a watchable match, and this was that.
Kind of bemused by Kozlov’s continued push/existence, though; he just does nothing for me. Given his lack of talking and methodical stomping of jobbers, he reminds me of Samoa Joe when he started in TNA, if Joe was exceptionally boring in the ring and didn’t squash people who could make that sort of thing entertaining. I mean, he’s not even a good ethnic stereotype heel; he’s not evil or overly Russian or anything, he’s just surly. But hey, if it keeps the Hs from burying people I care about for a while, I guess I can live with his main event push.
Overall, I thought this show was a lot of fun, and a very good debut for SD in a non-real-network setting. The last few free TV shows in this milieu (the last two three hour Raws, in other words) were damn good, and this continued the trend, I thought. These tend to make a better argument for combining the three rosters all the time than make me excited for the product as is, though, although Smackdown usually is the most consistent of WWE’s three headed tv show monster.
