Welcome to the ring, it's rich and atom.
Breaking down the fights with flair and passion.
Tag teams grappling, belts are clashing.
Finishes and factions catching action.
Hey everyone and welcome back to this week's Smackdown.
This was from Austin, Texas.
You've got myself Rich and we've got Adam too. Adam, welcome in.
Thanks a lot. We were in the moody, I believe it was the moody centre in Austin, Texas this week.
What an absolute card this was.
This card was huge as far as my notes went.
But I actually really enjoyed this episode of Smackdown.
So yeah, let's jump in.
So we started off with an interview in ring with Cody Rhodes and Joe Tessitore and basically just talking about how the segment on Saturday night main event is going to go with HBK watching over the contract signing for both Cody and Kevin Owens.
The fact they're going to get both their titles taken off them and suspended above the ring so for the next week until the Royal Rumble, neither of them are going to have their titles.
And I think in the next week we're going to see some brawls as well.
But we'll see how that goes.
I mean, that is basically what's been happening between Cody and Owens anyway.
It's been fantastic to watch. As soon as you hear one of their music, especially if it's Kevin Owens, he's going to try that Pile Driver somewhere and Cody's going to come running out.
And just the fact that they're just going to get it on there and then and there's no fucking around, there's no waiting until next week and there's no running to Nick Aldis.
I want this much. It's just going down on site anywhere it is.
Yeah. And I mean, this week the attempted victim of the Package Pile Driver was Joe Tessitori himself.
But we had, I believe we had Mr Matthew McConaughey in situ as well who got a bit of flak from Kevin Owens during his initial promo.
Yeah, someone's so laid back getting into professional wrestling. We got to see quite a lot of celebrities in the crowd this week.
Not only did we have Matthew McConaughey, we had some of the pro ball riding guys ring side as well, which was an interesting one.
Haven't seen much about that, but I did enjoy watching the little VT they threw about about that might make me look at a YouTube video too.
And I'm chilling out on the sofa a little bit later just to see how that goes down.
Yeah. And I believe Mark Henry was in attendance at SmackDown this week as well.
I think you've got the wrong program, my dude.
Have I? I may have to go back and I may have to go back and rewatch that.
Mark Henry was definitely a Saturday Night Main Event, which we'll be talking about in our next episode.
But yeah, I don't think he was at SmackDown.
Fair enough.
I didn't make a note of him being there anyway.
But yeah, we've had in the Cody Road segment, it being pointed out that it's Dusty Road's hometown, the American Dream.
But I mean, you couldn't have had two more polarizing fan reactions as to when Cody came out.
And Kevin, he got viewed hard like he has been recently, but that pop that you get when Cody pops out and I think his entry music definitely helps.
Oh, 100%.
He's definitely got one of the most hype entry tunes at the moment.
I'm going to go slightly off topic on this one when it comes to hype slightly, but Jey Uso's got, he is the most over singles competitor at the moment.
And I think if you gave him a more hyped intro, like music sort of style, I just think that would be the icing on the cake.
But Cody's definitely got one of the most pumped up entries at the moment.
Yeah, I mean, the entire crowd sings along with it.
It's being used in different online videos to compare fan noise in different locations.
And yeah, any of those videos that I've seen, I think Europe pretty much beats out America every time.
Yeah, just saying.
But yeah, I mean, it just showed how much Cody's over as a face versus how much KO is over as a heel.
And yeah, it's sometimes it's an underrated skill being able to get yourself over as a heel.
And it's just something that Kevin Owens has always done really well.
I mean, he grew up watching the ultimate heel Hulk Hogan and everyone loves to boo him still to this day.
So, you know, it's done something right.
This is it. This is it.
But Cody's last message to Kevin Owens during that promo to wrap it up was basically having owns just pushed his luck one too many times.
I quite with this.
I think no, it says yes, Kevin, maybe I smile and shake hands and I appear to be the good guy, but you can't push my buttons and get away with it.
Yeah, it's Kevin's response was something on the lines of.
You may be the son of a plumber, but I'm the student of Randy Orton, which I thought was quite an interesting little snapshot there.
That was.
Yeah, I like that.
Yeah, fair enough.
But we move on because we move on to after the in ring promo, we had a backstage promo featuring the current tag champions hashtag DIY.
And pretty deadly.
And this is sort of just carrying on their their rather one sided partnership as it goes.
But Johnny Gargano had a match against Apollo crews later and then pretty deadly.
Obviously got a match against Motor City machine guns.
This was basically just Johnny Gargano and.
Tomasa Champ are basically telling pretty deadly you need to handle your own business. We can't be there to back you up.
You know, we're with the tag champions with.
We've got our own stuff to deal with.
But at the same time, it's a case that pretty deadly are calling DIY out on the fact that they're expecting DIY expect pretty deadly to do things for them because they're the tag champions, but they don't really give anything to pretty deadly in return.
So it's it is very much a one sided affair with it all.
But but yeah, I mean, pretty deadly due to be facing the guard or delphan Tazma at some point there is that that will happen, especially after what happened last week on Smackdown where pretty deadly got involved in a match between the Motor City machine guns and at the guard or delphan Tazma and cost.
And the guard or delphan Tazma, the the victory on that one, which I don't think was the which I think we pointed out at the time wasn't the plan.
Yeah, so that went that went from the backstage promo into the most sitting machine guns versus the pretty deadly.
So I will note here that motor city machine gun are the number one contenders for DIY tag team championship.
So but this wasn't a match for the number one contendership.
This is just a standard tag match to carry on their storyline, I suppose.
We then went into a small vt for WrestleMania, that's this April 19th and 20th, we will be doing special bonus episodes for that one.
And then it went on and spoke a little bit about the match going on at Saturday Night main event for Bronn Breaker and Sheamus Intercontinental Championship.
Yeah, a match that I'm I mean, I'm genuinely, genuinely pretty excited for us to watch Sheamus go at it with anybody realistically.
But yeah, another opportunity for Sheamus to try and claim that most elusive title in his the most elusive title in his career, that IC champion.
Yeah, it's nice as a European British podcast as well to be able to still have some top quality European talent over in WWE.
We've got both.
We've got a handful of British superstars over there really well at the moment.
So it's nice to see Sheamus kind of leading the forefront on that one for gold when some of them already hold gold in is it.
Yeah, I mean, it's nice generally just to see that the roster isn't back to the brim with just American talent.
It's not just American talent.
It is European.
We've got Australian.
We've got a lot of Japanese talent in there as well.
It's definitely worldwide entertainment.
You've got so many more so now than it has been in the past.
Oh, yeah, of course, we don't have our favorite Jamaican anymore, though he's now Ghanaian.
Well, yeah, I mean, he always was.
He was.
That that prime.
Yeah, this rent free in my head forever.
Do want to go back very quickly just to that that men's tag match that match one there the motor city machine guns versus pretty deadly.
I was actually really I mean, I enjoy a motor city machine guns matches.
It is anyway, but I actually quite enjoyed watching pretty deadly this time round.
They were pretty deadly.
There was someone we've not really seen before.
They really were.
It was it was a really sort of ultra aggressive style, whereas normally they're quite sort of flamboyant and it's can be described as unfocused.
This time they were really hearing it.
They definitely even commentary notice that they were stepping up a couple of notches and I don't actually personally think they had that in them.
But it was nice to see how they've progressed and definitely they seem a lot stronger this week than they have in other weeks.
And it'd be interesting to see, you know, how far this this feud with motor city machine guns goes, especially towards sort of like WrestleMania and how far they can go.
I personally think we'll see them with gold at some point in the next 12 months, but that might be the later end of the 12 months to the earlier.
Well, they wrestled a really good match.
They wrestled strategically.
They really isolated Chris Saban out of the motor city machine guns.
Alex Shelley didn't really get a look in and for Saban even managed to pick up a small amount of color on his chest, which I made a note of here for it.
The biggest thing for me was actually once Alex Shelley had managed to get involved, motor city machine guns started picking up the pace to the point that they did one of their classic baseball slide out of the ring moves,
ended up breaking some of the ring off at one point.
But just overall a great opening match.
And I will throw out there that I really do enjoy watching motor city machine guns.
I've never seen them up until the start of the Netflix era.
I've got really into them the last couple of weeks and their finisher that's skull and crossbones and the modified 3D theoretically.
It's beautiful to watch.
I just really wish it just reminds me of the divan get the tables.
You knew what was coming.
Yeah.
And as soon as you hear skull and crossbones and you see them send that up, you know, someone's about to feel the pain in it.
It's a really, really cool finishing move.
Yeah.
And I mean, the trick to a good finishing move is that you're able to do it on any opponent.
Big, small, heavy, light.
Doesn't matter.
It's a case that if you can pull that finisher off, I mean, RKO, perfect example.
Doesn't matter whether you're Braun Strowman or Ray Mysterio, you're still going to have to take that front bump.
You're still going to have to take that RKO.
I mean, there's been some great examples of people taking it.
I know for Evan Bourne was a great one.
Nia Jax is a brilliant person to take.
She took an RKO and a men's royal rumble.
I think it was last year or the year before.
And she did.
Yeah.
No, she sold that really, really, really well.
I know she, you know, her and Randy got in a bit of trouble for doing it, but I think it was definitely worth it.
I know a fan favourite RKO moment.
I think it was WrestleMania a good couple of years ago now.
The match between Randy Orton and Seth Rollins where...
Yeah, the curb stomp reversal.
Oh, beautifully timed.
I will admit, the Evan Bourne one always sits slightly above that one for me,
only because Evan Bourne's signature move was a 450 splash,
which is not an easy thing to try and pull off and he always did it really well.
And it was something that in interview,
Evan Bourne and Randy Orton have both said that they were never planning on doing it.
Well, they couldn't get it done in practice, could it?
They couldn't get it done in practice and they were going to scrap the idea and then it just clicked.
It just landed.
I'll tell you something though, guys.
I'm going to be listening and you've got a better RKO moment.
Please email us and let us know if it's finished and factions at gmail.com.
We read all your emails and we will start responding to them on our latest episodes of the podcast as well.
Yeah, 100%.
But we moved on from match one to another backstage promo featuring Nick Aldis
and one of our favourite superstars, not The Miz.
Oh, yep, we got that one.
So Miz is having a few issues at the moment.
He's just been moved to SmackDown.
Nick Aldis tells him it's time for him to go and make some new friends.
Obviously, Miz is an annoying little bitch and no one likes him.
Well, in fairness to him, this was when he found out he was being moved to SmackDown.
Most superstars that are being moved around in the transfer window are aware that they're being moved around.
But this was something that Miz was completely unaware of.
He thought he was there just to cut a segment as almost on loan from Raw, which should be fair.
The Miz has been a part of Raw for a very, very long time.
He was due to have a bit of a shake up, but I think the Miz's biggest issue or worry is the fact that he has now been
separated from Karrion Kross and is back in the crossheads of the Wyatt Six,
who have been strangely absent since the start of the Netflix era.
Well, I have seen a few bits on social media regarding the Wyatt Six,
so it looked like Alexa Bliss was due to make a return a couple of weeks ago.
But there have been some issues with contract negotiations.
She wanted a little bit of extra cash by the looks of it.
WWE were like, well, hold on a minute.
We've just extended your contract, but she went off to have a baby.
And last I saw, she had removed all WWE ties from her social media.
So we could be getting Alexa Bliss back, which could end up faltering with the Wyatt Six eventually.
I mean, that'll just make me incredibly sad as Alexa Bliss is one of my ditch.
I mean, she's one of my favorites as it stands, especially in the women's division.
The work she did with the late, great, great wire was absolutely immense.
And it just, she seemed to really settle into that role as, and yeah, played a brilliant game with the Wyatt Six when she was still in active competition.
I mean, yes, she went away to go and start a family, which nobody can begrudge her.
I hope everything's going well for her with it.
And honestly, I can't wait to see her back soon.
Sooner the better.
Yeah, definitely.
But yeah, so as you alluded to earlier on that the backstage promo, Nick Alders basically told them is you better go and make some friends before you get your ass kicked more or less.
I'd love to do it myself. I'm not gonna lie.
Yeah, well, this is it.
But we were then treated to a VT recap of the history, the tale of the tape, if you like, between Braun Strowman and Jacob Fatou.
And there was only one thing I took away from this, from this VT.
And it was Braun Strowman shoe size.
That fucker has a broad has a shoe size of a 16 quadruple E, which is absolutely frigging huge.
So I don't know about you as such, but my mum always used to make the joke when I was a kid that it would be cheaper to buy the boxes than the shoes because of how like my shoe size.
I'm a 15 myself.
So in some shoe, mostly a 14.
But still, I can't, yeah, I wouldn't want to be paying Braun Strowman's material costs.
That's put it that way.
They charge by the inch.
He's going to be broke.
No, this is it.
I mean, 16 quadruple E is absolutely.
I don't even know how to how to sort of quantify that.
I don't even think I've seen a shoe that size.
Well, take a turkey serving tray.
And basically the base of that is what Braun Strowman's foot covers.
We're talking a turkey that can feed 15 people at Thanksgiving here.
Not the sort of thing that a family of two stick in the oven.
No, this is it.
This is it.
But yeah, I mean, there was a few, a few statistics they threw out partway through the episode on this week's on this week's.
Smackdown, one of which being this is the fifth Smackdown to occur in Austin, Texas.
Yep.
The first one was on the 10th of February 2000.
And the last one was the 24th of June 2002.
But what's special about that 10th of February 2000 episode of Smackdown was that wasn't just the first episode to take place in Austin, Texas.
That was the first ever episode of Smackdown.
It was the first ever episode of Smackdown.
And 25 years later, almost, we are sat here podcasting that same program.
Yeah, this is it.
So, but moving swiftly on from that, I always like to throw at least a little bit of trivia,
whether it's provided for us on the program or whether it's something that I go away and research myself.
But we were then treated to a ringside promo with Kevin Owens and Joe Tessitore.
It was a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit of a reply to the was pissed that he didn't get an interview with Joe Tessitore.
You know, and the fact that he misses Michael Cole and but you know, Michael Cole was too busy kissing Pat McAfee's ass over on a Monday night raw.
You also says that everyone's sucking up to Cody and Cody's using betrayer and Kevin or prove that he's the true champion.
And then this is where we get to see a little bit of comedy, I suppose, from Kevin's character when he goes to rough up the smoothest guy in the world, right, Matthew McGonaughey.
You want.
At what point do you think you're going to piss off the guy who looks like he smoked an ounce a day.
He's just like, all right, all right, all right.
Yeah, this is it.
You're not going to be able to get one of that man's skin, but I think he was close on a couple of occasions.
But one of the one of the highlight of the night when it came to promos, if you take matches out of it, you just you've got the interviews, the promos, this next little section after after Kevin Owens has a pop of Matthew McGonaughey for me,
chef's kiss, best segment of the night.
Well, it wasn't just Kevin Owens and Matthew McGonaughey that we saw in this.
Because, I mean, KO does what KO does.
He runs his mouth.
He gains.
He tries to use a little bit of cheap heat and salt in the recent, the local sports teams recent, recent loss and things like that.
Just really, really trying to get under the crowd skin, which I mean, Kevin Owens is phenomenal at doing.
But somebody else that didn't somebody else's skin that we seem to get under was Jimmy Uso, which was somebody I wasn't expecting to come out.
Me neither.
And it was kind of a strange one.
But for me, just when we just kind of walks up with Kevin Owens, like, what do you want for Jimmy Uso to just be like, dude, you talk too much, slap him in the mouth.
I was like, yes.
Oh, yeah.
I literally like as a grown man to be sat in my office, like this pumping the air like, fuck you, you little prick.
Oh, it's beautiful.
I could say I got so into it.
So into it this week.
Yeah.
And I generally as much as I hate Kevin Owens and that just proves that he is, you know, in theory doing his job as a heel very, very, very well.
You know, which we keep alluding to with you, however he is as a heel.
It's nice to see someone else kind of step in and go, you know, I've just had enough of your shit.
Shut the fuck up.
It would have been too easy for them to cart Cody Rhodes out to come and shut his mouth.
So I think, yeah, Jimmy Uso was just he was involved enough for it to make sense, but just out of it enough to be a surprise, which was a nice balance for them to hit.
I mean, they could have got anybody to come out and shut Kevin Owens his mouth.
And I think Jimmy Uso was probably the perfect choice in all fairness.
But this setup and the main event for tonight, which was Jimmy Uso versus Kevin Owens, which we'll talk about a little bit later in the episode.
And personally, I would like to have seen Chuck having owns up more than Jimmy Uso would have been the second city saint CM punk purely because I think you get punk and Owens on the mic at the same time kind of promo with each other.
By the way, Triple H, if you listen in this needs to happen at some point in the next sort of like six months.
I think you'd have some of the best promos of the last sort of five years.
And I mean, if we if we are addressing Mr. Paul Levec, I think we need to be asking the question like, I mean, at some point during at some point over this weekend, he's invited a rather popular internet
sensation, I'm assuming I don't really know much about much about the creator myself, but he's got in touch with him personally and invited them to wrestle to the Royal Rumble this year.
And I was just wondering, my phone's been on I've been waiting for my phone call.
Yep, I've not received a text message or anything of us.
So I'll leave my phone on you've got our numbers.
Yeah, not you can email us that finishes and factions at gmail.com.
100%.
But yeah, we'll digress from that just plug in randomly plug in for last minute Royal Rumble tickets and flights and
Libations and accommodations.
We'll move on to the next promo now this was I actually found this promo rather interesting in the sense that this ends up being a bit of a two part promo.
This is between Nick Alders and Carmelo Hayes.
Carmelo is not really very happy about the fact that Jimmy Uso has just been put into a match with Kevin Owens when I think Carmelo was
basically facing Jimmy and out back a second.
Oh, okay.
Have you forgotten about Chelsea Green, Piper Nevin versus Mission and beef up.
So no, this is why it was a two part promo.
Because the first part of the promo occurs before the Chelsea Green before the women's tag match which makes up the second match.
The second part comes after that matches concluded.
It might help if I scroll up my notes realize that's my bad.
That's all good.
We were one mistake each so far.
Next one takes that takes the victory, I think.
But yeah, no, besides my nose.
That's a mistake on its own.
I try not to look at your notes if I can get away with it.
Not for any other reason and then I don't want to know what you want to talk about.
No, sir.
Oh, no, sorry.
Big fucking thing on the front of your face.
Well, yeah, you can't miss that.
Like Paul Lavec.
There's cave divers that go want to go spelunking in your nostrils.
Oh boy, there's no spunk going anywhere near my nostrils.
Thank you very much.
That's not what I said and you know it.
I'm not even going to say that.
But yes, basically this part, this first part of this two part promo was Carmelo basically
bitching at the fact that he wanted a piece of Jimmie Uso on this card.
It was something he was promised and things sort of one thing led to another.
And Carmelo was basically getting a new opponent.
Maybe he hadn't really got time to got time to prepare for him.
I'd stuck in here that I thought he was going to get the Miz.
For some reason it kind of set up in my head where they were like, you know,
Miz, you're going to have a mystery opponent and then they've got Marshmallow running round
going on, I need an opponent.
I thought they were going to set him up with a match against the Miz.
Little did I see coming with who we actually ended up facing.
So yeah, we'll get on to the women's tag team match in just a second.
We'll wrap this backstage promo up and trail back to the women's tag match because part
two comes after the conclusion of that match and that promo sees that one Damien Priest
has been moved to SmackDown during this transfer window, which was huge news and has huge repercussions
as well because one of the big stories after SmackDown was after so many years of being
sort of in each other's pockets is that Rhea Ripley and Damien Priest are no longer within
the same promotion in WWE because Damien Priest has been moved to SmackDown.
And Rhea put up, I think it was an Instagram post basically saying that she kind of felt
like she'd lost quite a chunk with that move, you know, she'd lost her travel partner or
a gym buddy, her best friend all at the same time.
So I'm not entirely sure if we're going to see a storyline there maybe where Damien
Priest ends up moving back to Raw or whether we're going to see a changing of titles at
the Royal Rumble and we end up getting Rhea Ripley on SmackDown.
Well, I've seen in, so when I originally watched this none of the stuff about Ripley and Priest
had come out yet other than the fact we knew Priest had been moved.
We didn't know what that meant between Ripley and Priest.
What I'm more interested in now is what does this mean for the story with the judgment day?
Obviously he's just come off the back of a huge win of a street fight against Finn Balor
who's now out of action because, well, yeah, he looks like he got beat up by Damien Priest quite frankly.
But what does that mean for what happens with the judgment day?
Is that it now? Is that them drawing a line under that storyline?
Is that or are we going to see potentially a judgment, a split up of the judgment day where they transfer some of them over to SmackDown?
I've been seeing a lot of cracks coming up in judgment day.
So we know the judgment day aren't doing as well as they were.
So maybe this week they could just be slowly writing it out but not to finish them all off on a bad note.
More like they could reform judgment day a little bit later down the road after a couple of pay-for-views.
Let them all get a bit of a singles go in or some tag matches so to speak and see what happens.
Yeah, I think we're going to have to wait. It's going to be a wait and see job, isn't it?
We've still got a Monday Night Raw before Royal Rumble which could end up explaining an awful lot.
We've also got another episode of NXT and SmackDown as well so we're going to find out an awful lot between now and the Royal Rumble.
But if we backtrack just a little bit because we did sort of tie two pieces of the same promo together just for ease.
We did have in between this massive transfer news come through.
We had a women's tag match which was Chelsea Green and Piper Niven versus Mishin and BFAB.
I wasn't mad at this match, I will be honest. It made sense. There was a storyline developing for it.
I didn't take a lot of notes for this match and I can't work out whether it's because I got too into the match
and I forgot to make notes or whether I got bored and went to make a drink and by the time I got back we were already back in the Carmelo Hayes promo.
It was a lot of very quick action from what I can remember.
Some of the main points that I took away from it was Mishin and Niven to start off the match and Mishin just goes to town on Niven, takes it to Chelsea Green as well.
Niven at one point is offering a distraction for Green to get an advantage.
I did pick up a statistic here and it's not really a statistic. If you've been following the podcast you'll know this.
Mishin's last three matches have been against either one of these two ladies.
She's either been against Chelsea Green or Piper Niven in her last three matches. She's starting to know these women very well.
This is where we're seeing a little bit of incohesiveness between Piper Niven and Chelsea Green because at one point Piper Niven drops a very stacked elbow meant for I believe, I didn't take a note of who it was supposed to be aimed at.
I believe it was aimed at B-Fab but Chelsea Green sort of aimed herself in the elbow.
Oh 100% and I think Chelsea Green ended up taking more damage from that than B-Fab did if I'm completely honest.
But that sort of spelt the beginning of the end as Mishin managed to pick up a pinfall victory over Chelsea Green which wrapped that match right up.
And it was nice to see actually Piper and Chelsea taking L in this match because they've seemed a little bit too dominant when they're in singles matches together and they're coming out and covering each other's back.
It was nice to see that that's the only reason that they're winning. They're not playing the numbers game.
So we've gone the lines of L's while we are there that brings us on to the next section.
So we had a Royal Rumble VT and then we had a VT declaring the return and the entry into the Royal Rumble of Charlotte Flair.
And I think we made our feelings on Charlotte Flair quite clear in previous episodes. We're not going to go back into that too much.
So we've got a couple of minute VT of Charlotte Flair and all the things that she's accomplished and that she is coming back for the Royal Rumble on Saturday evening.
Saturday Sunday. Saturday evening.
So Saturday 1st of February 11 p.m. start in the UK. The start times for US time zones escaped me right at this second.
But yes.
It was 4 p.m. and 2 p.m.
There we go.
So yeah we've got one more lady declared themselves for the Royal Rumble which is something we didn't really have a lot of up to this point.
Yeah that was a noy.
Jack's declaring herself.
Oh have I jumped ahead of myself?
It's possible. I mean this next section was an in-ring promo. It was supposed to be just sort of Tiffany strattin' on her own.
But yeah I remember.
Basically this was Tiffy time making out as though she was the only one to face whoever wins the Rumbles going to go after Tiffy and Rhea came out to basically say no bitch.
She reminded us there should be no more last week which was last year's Royal Rumble winner.
And then like I said we had Rhea appear.
Which is never an unwelcome sight let's face it.
I must admit I love her entry music and the fact that she obviously loves it just as much because she's one of the only superstars that walks down to the ring singing her own music.
Oh yeah 100% and it's every week with a giant grin on her face.
But yeah so Ripley comes out to remind Tiffy that she's a champion too.
The winner of the Royal Rumble could just as easily choose Rhea Ripley as the target for that guaranteed main event at WrestleMania.
And we got a small plug for Rhea Ripley versus Nia Jax at Saturday Night's main event.
I made this so Rhea tells Tiffy Stratton that she respects what she did to Nia Jax but she's could have done so much worse at the Saturday Night main event.
I've loved the build up for this match at the Saturday Night main event.
The build up for this one is almost on par with Cody Rose Kevenowins Royal Rumble match.
It has been a fantastic build up for both of them I feel personally.
I mean I would argue that only that the Cody Rhodes Kevenowins stuff's been building for a little bit longer.
They've ramped, they've don't get me wrong they've started on a high heat with this Nia Jax and Rhea Ripley but I think they could have potentially played this out a little bit longer.
It feels a touch rushed to build this heat for Saturday Night main event.
But I mean again as a certain Scottish wrestler on a different promotion is known for doing, if you mention their name and they will appear,
Nia Jax seems to do exactly the same thing as her Aunt Candice LeRae come out to some of the loudest booze of the evening.
Yeah, no it was um, I always like watching Nia getting booed but again she's one of those people that plays a heel so so well.
Nia's face character is never as good.
No and I think we discussed this a little bit last week where it's a case that unfortunately for her size doesn't lend her very well to being a face character
because there's not many superstars that can present a credible enough threat to Nia Jax to be able to say oh yeah well Jax is absolutely bricking it because of Tiffany Stratton's obviously going to rip a sodding head off.
I mean you're never going to say that and believe it and that's no slight Tiffany Stratton but Nia Jax is about three four times the size of you.
It just doesn't make for and this is why it was never a straight, it was never going to be a straight contest for Tiffany Stratton to dethrone Nia Jax as champion.
It was always going to have to be.
What was she not helping? She needed it.
It was always going to have to be some somewhat of some form of like I'm not going to say underhanded tactic because everybody knows the best way to use the money in the bank contract is by surprise.
I mean we've seen a few superstars John Cena being one who declares when they're going to cash in the money in the bank championship and because they've given their opponent time to prepare.
They've ended up screwing up a guaranteed Brigham championship run.
I mean there are some people that didn't need to announce it and still managed to screw it. Dolph Ziggler.
Yeah, but that was the start. That was the first loss that a money in the bank contract holder had when they challenged for the title was when Cena announced it.
After that it's not so much of a guarantee.
It's not so much of a silver bullet to championship gold anymore.
But Nia Jax and Candice LaRae come out to, as I said, some of the laziest booze I've ever heard and for Nia Jax to declare herself for the rumble.
I don't know if you've heard it, but when Nia Jax and Candice LaRae entered there's a fan that says something to Nia Jax and Nia Jax's responses.
Your mum sucks, kid.
Yes, I did see that and I'm so glad you reminded me of that.
It was like, yeah, that was the cheap hit.
There have been some brilliant moments the last few weeks where wrestlers have made some comments to fans and all just some off the cuff comments and that for me this week was brilliant.
Just the way she walks past it, she's a mum sucks kid. Everyone heard it. It's a real, real cheap heat.
But that kid, Nia Jax spoke to me. Oh my God.
So again, using that as a way of being able to push over a heel face, only the way that Nia Jax can.
And then at the end of, you know, it was not even the end, was after Nia Jax and Candice LaRae decide they're coming in to announce their entrance to the Royal Rumble.
We've got the women's tag champions run out Bianca, Belair and Naomi come out, both of themselves declare and they're going to win the Royal Rumble.
And they then realise that they both can't win the Royal Rumble. But if one of them is going to win it, they're going to have to throw the other one out.
And I think if it comes to me having to be a betting man, I would put my money on Bianca tossing Naomi.
You reckon? I don't know. Always go with the underdog, right? You make slightly better money if it comes in.
But yeah, it could be an interesting way. I wouldn't ever put Bianca Belair as the underdog, only because we've seen some of her championship reigns.
And don't get me wrong. I've got to think I've, I do have a thing against Bianca Belair's braid being a being a weapon that I think should not be a she should not be allowed to use.
But regardless of that, she has been dominant within her set within her championship, within her championship reigns in the past.
There is a reason she keeps getting championship gold.
I'm not saying she's a poor wrestler. I mean, I could say that Naomi's probably a little bit distracted at the moment because there are some rumors floating around that her husband has been, well, three pinning someone else.
Let's put it that way.
Yeah, but we're not going to give any credit to those rumors only because nothing's been substantiated, especially not been released to the media just yet.
But yeah, we have Naomi and Bianca come out and both declare themselves for the rumble, but we're not quite done there yet.
We then have...
Entrance of Liv Morgan and Raquel.
Raquel Rodriguez. Or Mami 2.0, if you will.
Both come out and declare themselves for the rumble as well.
Don Mysterio might disagree on the Mami 2.0. That would be Michelle McCall according to him.
Well, yes, this is it. That was an old promo that I think both of us came about on social media at one point.
Yes, no, we haven't seen that one in the last few days.
But yes, we have Liv Morgan declare herself for the rumble and...
Well, Raquel Rodriguez doesn't declare herself for the rumble. She's declared.
No, we've not really heard an awful lot come out of her mouth, but we know as long time wrestling fans, when you've got this much talent in the ring,
I mean, at this point we've got Tiffany Stratton, we've got Rhea Ripley, we've got Nia Jack, Candice LeRae, Naomi Bianca Belair,
Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez.
This one way is going one way and one way only. Fucking south. And that's the way it went.
I mean, Nick Alders channeled a little bit of Mr Theodore Long in this...
Well, it sort of got broken up by a bit of an advert break at the time, I believe.
That was annoying.
There was a brawl that broke out. I noted that it left Naomi Belair and Ripley left in the ring.
We see just before the advert break, Nick Alders running down the ramp with some security to try and break it all up.
We then go to an advert break. We come back from the advert break to be told that Nick Alders has declared that they're all going to sort it out in a tag team match player.
Well, we knew they weren't going to go one on one with the Undertaker, so that was the only other option they could have had, I suppose.
Well, yeah, this is it. But yeah, this blends almost seamlessly into match three of the evening, which was a six woman tag team match which saw
Rhea Ripley, Naomi and Bianca Belair versus Nia Jax, Candice LaRae and Liv Morgan with Raquel Rodriguez out on the apron.
I hope this is Rhea starting off against Candice LaRae.
So not quite. So Rhea started off against Nia Jax. This is how it was supposed to have gone, but Nia ducks out and Candice LaRae.
Candice LaRae ends up being left to Mummy's Mercy a little bit.
Again, I didn't take a lot of notes on this one and I will tell you why because I got far too engrossed in it. This was a phenomenal match.
It was a brilliant story told, I will be honest.
And with that amount of talent in a ring, like you said, you know you're going to get something on at least a three and a half to a four star rating.
You're not getting a crappy sort of like five minute miss filler. You're getting a really good quality match with this.
Oh, 100% and this match actually ends up being my match of the night for just for how it's all played out.
And yeah, just the star power that you've got in the ring realistically, but it was, it really was anybody's match.
And the momentum shifted so frequently. You could not call it at all.
I know it finishes being set up. There was counters all the way through.
Yeah, we had Liv Morgan who did a little bit of a hat tip to the late great Eddie Guerrero.
Jax with a hat to Rikishi with a stink face at one point.
So watching the rate, the race cheap shot to Ripley and oh yeah, I mean, at one point, once they got they sort of gotten over themselves a little bit.
Because in the beginning I took note that Nia, Candice and Liv were not really sort of jelling very well together as a team.
Then it was almost as if you saw the mo you could see the few moments where it all sort of fell into place because then you've got Morgan and Jax making sure that Ripley and Belair were kept out of this match as much as they possibly could.
And you needed to do that. I made note here that at one point, Ria Ripley and Bianca Belair literally launched Naomi on top of a pretty much half dead Nia Jax in the middle of the ring.
Oh, that was a fantastic move and they've clicked it and put it on social media as well as a fantastic little move early on in this early on in this match before the momentum started shifting.
I did put down there wasn't a lot of huge spots. There wasn't a lot of, oh my God moments, but there were a lot of very good quality moments.
I noticed despite those a few early two counts as well which with the early pinfalls you kind of run a risk.
I find if you put too many in there, it oversells it. You end up making it look stupid.
Where if you don't put enough in, you're underselling what you're trying to tell us. And I think at this point they just about got it right.
They weren't too far one way. They were reasonably direct in the center with it.
I just the one thing that really gripes my gears and I say this every week and I'd love to know who invented it just bitch slapped them. Why are we still trying to use roll up finishes to every other match?
It just feels like it seems to be a fucking finisher of the month at the moment.
So this is the at the end of this match where Liv Morgan ends up stealing a pinfall victory over Bianca Belair by rolling her up when she's not paying attention.
And yeah, it's it can if I make the same argument to you week in week out that it's it's not always a bad finish if it's used properly.
But I will agree with you that they do we do seem to be seeing a lot of this recently where it's it makes an appearance on at least one show.
Yeah, it makes an appearance on every show.
It's like they've been given a list of moves they need to use.
Those two are on that list.
Yeah, it's the it's the weekly it's the monthly challenge. It's a little bit like you get in like Call of Duty, you get daily you get daily challenges get 15 headshots.
They've got to be able to work in 60 60 sunset flips and 20 roll up finishes throughout the throughout the month but still keep the story lines going.
And you've also just if you get there you've got the bonus challenge of getting an at least 10 and a night.
Yeah.
But yeah, fantastic.
A fantastic match bit of a dodgy end but overall really enjoyable match to watch really creative story that they told it was really well told by those in the ring.
And there wasn't anybody that felt irrelevant either.
No, which we only want to last few weeks. We've always had some of in the bigger matches one person who did not need to be there.
Most of these women had a call.
The only one I would argue possibly didn't need to be there was Candice LeRae.
She was making up numbers purely just to give Nia Jax someone to come down with because everyone else was coming had someone.
But she was the argument I would make for that is that Candice LeRae wasn't irrelevant to the match.
She bordered on it only because she's not really playing any real active role other than moral support for Nia Jax.
And yeah, it just I don't know. You could have quite easily swapped Candice LeRae out for Raquel Rodriguez.
Yeah, it wouldn't have made much of a difference.
And still had a really good match. But the thing that saved Candice LeRae from becoming irrelevant to me was was the fact that she played such an active part in the match.
It wasn't as though she was shoved off to one side. She was given about a minute and a half of bring time just to say that she was actually in and she participated.
It was a case that she played quite. She did quite a fair chunk of the work.
Maybe then trying to kind of burn off some ring rest and try and see if they can give her a bit of singles push eventually.
Maybe a couple of singles matches, not necessarily a push with just a few matches, just as even a wall up for someone else.
But moving swiftly on from here, we go to, I believe at least unless you're going to unless we went back to Chelsea Green backstage.
We did. Piper Nevin and Chelsea Green basically having Mishin and B Fab come up to say Mishin has a title shot next week.
So we're going to see Chelsea Green versus Mishin on Smackdown just before the Royal Rumble for the women's US title US title championship.
Also get to have a look at the damage that elbow drop that Chelsea Green received from Piper Nevin did as well.
She was quite roughed up on her face from that elbow drop.
She was and in fairness, I think there is, there's going to be slightly more to this title shot because the one thing that they meant,
the one thing that they made a point of mentioning towards the end of this little promo segment was Green and Nevin talking about needing a bigger security detail.
So while we are about to see somebody else being dragged into this being sort of brought in on this, this little storyline that they've been cultivating between
Chelsea Green, Piper Nevin, Mishin and B Fab because I'm sure the setup is going to be, at least before we know any of the other players,
is that it's obviously going to be Mishin versus Chelsea Green.
Chelsea Green will have Piper Nevin at ringside.
Mishin will most likely bring out B Fab at ringside to try and neutralise Nevin to try and make it as fair a match as possible.
And I think we're going to get a run in next week on this match.
It's going to be somebody we don't expect.
Well, is there anyone that's out injured at the moment that we can think of that could possibly be looking to make a return?
We know Alexa Bliss isn't coming back at the moment.
No, it wouldn't make sense for Alexa Bliss to get involved in this particular storyline as it is anyway.
No, but I'm just trying to think, have we had any injuries recently or anyone who's had any time off that's looking for a return?
Well, let's turn it over.
Possibly the man.
I mean, Royal Rumble's coming up in a few days.
We've got a week to rumble.
Anybody out?
Squash, just to get her a warm up before she enters at the rumble.
I reckon we'll leave that return to the rumble. I personally leave it to the rumble.
She may not necessarily make a return at all. We don't know.
I'm not even sure she's under contract at the moment.
That's just me speculating. I've not seen anything to suggest that.
It's Royal Rumble season. OK, we're allowed to speculate.
Oh, 100%.
If you guys can think of anybody else who might be making up this larger security detail for Chelsea Green, I'd love to hear it from you.
Again, drop it in the comments in the YouTube or drop it on email.
And we'll, as Rich mentioned earlier on, we'll get round to replying, reading and generally bringing them into future episodes.
So we were, yeah, we wrapped that one up and we went straight into match four of this card, I believe, which was a many singles match.
Gargano and Apollo Cruise, which we were given a little bit of an insight to earlier on in the evening when DIY we're talking to pretty deadly backstage.
We're just going to throw a few little bits here that were mentioned by the comments routine. So Apollo Cruise is a former Intercontinental and US title holder.
We know Johnny Gargano as the former NXT Tag Team Champion, former NXT champion as well, I believe.
Yes, I believe he did have a small run with that.
And not hundreds of other promotions as well. I believe that Tag Team was on TNA.
Yes, I believe so. But Apollo Cruise found himself specifically in this match because he's in recent weeks, he's been sticking his or in backstage between pretty deadly and DIY.
Almost so in seed, trying to sow some seed of discord.
He's looking for some excitement, I reckon. It's getting quite boring backstage and Smackdown at the moment. It's not really any major drama.
So tossing a little bit in there just to try and have a bit of fun, you can understand that, both me and yourself have done it in the past to other people.
Yeah, of course we have. I think everybody's done it at least once. So yeah, but this match was, I'll be honest, this match was, it felt like a bit of a throwaway.
Not because of anybody's individual performance, but because it very much felt like it felt kind of squashy.
It wasn't a straight squash match, but it weren't far off.
Yeah, again, I think they've just used it as an opportunity to build a little bit of heat.
So as you go through this match, you do get to see both a showcase of strength from Johnny Gargano and Apollo Cruise.
You know, they're both kind of trying to over muscle each other, which when you look at paper, you don't really think there's going to be much of an issue there, but Johnny Gargano definitely held his own with that one.
I did make note that he did get in a cheeky little low blow. Got a lover, an older plum punt occasionally. It wasn't a punt this time.
This is it. And it's not just that, but we had tomato champa on the outside.
Oh, with the running knee.
Getting a sneaky attack in from there. Apollo Cruise, I mean, realistically, the numbers were against Apollo Cruise in this match.
He didn't really stand much of a chance, but I think you're right.
I think this was used to build a little bit of heat behind DIY, especially as in the closing seconds of this.
The Lotus City machine gun come out and basically just kind of stair DIY down long enough Apollo Cruise to get the to get the roll up on Johnny Gargano.
This time, I will say it was needed. You know, Gargano's attention was completely elsewhere, apart from popping him with a low blow and hitting him with a finisher, which wasn't needed.
And the roll up in this situation, I will grant it was definitely the best way to finish this match, I think.
Like we've both said, a bit of a squash match and a bit of a heat builder for most machine guns against DIY.
Obviously, most machine guns are the number one contenders for DIYs championship.
I'm not sure if that is being defended at the Rumble, not really had a mention of it yet, but we'll probably get a look in it this week's Smackdown next week's Smackdown.
Sorry to let us know what's going on there.
Well, I actually believe you're right. I think it is being defended at the Royal Rumble.
It is one of the matches that will separate out the two Rumble matches, which are traditionally sent to bookend the book and the pay-per-view.
We normally have one Rumble match at the beginning of the night and then the last match is the last main event match is normally the, I think last year it was the women's Rumble, the main event at Royal Rumble.
I believe it was, yes.
The men's Rumble started off the show, which traditionally, especially as, well, I say traditionally, we haven't really had enough women's Royal Rumbles just yet for there to be tradition.
But historically, at least with the women's Royal Rumble, that's normally started the show.
But obviously with the shift in, shift in equality over recent years, we've seen that the women have been taking on more main event spots, which is not an unwell thing to say.
We won't necessarily say it's a shift in equality. I'd like to say it's a shift in the women's division.
If we go back to when the women's division was first introduced and a lot of these women were portrayed, a lot of brahapanese matches, a lot of very vulgar demeaning sort of attitudes towards them.
Now you've got such a higher quality of female superstar.
I myself never really used to be a fan of watching the Divas. It's normally a great opportunity for me to get something to eat in a cup of tea.
I do find myself a lot more interested in some of the diva matches these days, or the female superstars than I am some of the males.
So it's definitely helped with me. I think the better quality of wrestler, better quality of product, it deserves its main event.
Yeah, 100%. I mean, I think the issue was, and no disrespect to Divas gone by, and it certainly doesn't apply to all of them.
But there was a lot of Divas that were llama models turned wrestlers.
This was a different way of giving them their big break, was that they had a few two, three minute matches in WWE and then moved on to bigger and better things from there.
But that could also be the fact that as we've since learned from that time that Vince McMahon is definitely a massive pervert as much as he cut that promo claiming he wasn't.
Well, yeah, I mean, I think the less said about old, old grabby hands with man, it is probably the better.
But yeah, we'll move on to the next match, which I believe was the men's singles match.
It was but we started off with a backstage part. I'm quite enjoying how they're doing this with a going backstage and that and some of the guys cut promos on the way into the ring.
And this time we got to see Jacob Fatou and Tomatonga talking about.
Jacob Fatou's match with Braun Strowman and then they both came out for Tomatonga's match against the mega star LA nine.
I mean, the the the promo the pre promo on the way into the ring. I'm not I'm not against that at all.
I am against however the way Jacob Fatou decides to go about doing it.
I can't understand it. Yeah, I can't make out a single word he says. I've literally got here.
Got here written word for word Fatou running his mouth with complete nonsense.
I've assumed that he's running his mouth because well, it's WWE.
Most of them run their mouths.
Basically, if I remember correctly, this is where he bought back one of his old promos where he said that.
You know, this this match that he's having against Braun Strowman at Saturday Night's main event.
It's Godzilla versus King Kong.
And you know, they can't be one or the other because Jacob Fatou is both.
So yeah, he was just trying to build a bit of a bit of hype I space for his match at Saturday Night's main event with Braun Strowman.
Yeah, but but you were quite right. I mean, as I say, it was Tomatonga accompanied to at ringside by Jacob Fatou versus the mega star LA nine.
So there was a bit of trivia thrown in here quickly that I want to throw out is Tomatonga's last singles match was the King of the Rings semi final.
So that was actually quite a while ago.
Okay.
And see, the thing I latched on to more than anything else was that the LA night's pop where he came out.
Oh my days.
In a world devoid of Jey Uso, which as we've said is probably one of the most over singles competitors in WWE today.
LA night guy.
Oh 100%.
100%.
I've noticed apart from Jey Uso with the LA night is the only other superstar that gets that level of crowd interaction with the with the years.
And then when LA night got down to the ring, he cut.
He did this in TNA when he was Drake Ellis or Drake Elias. Sorry.
Elias Drake.
Elias Drake. That's the one. He's very good at cutting promos and that turnbuckle promo he cut was fantastic.
Making a reference to kicking Jacob Fattu so hard in the head if he got involved that he wouldn't be able to stop shaking and then just imitated him on the on the turnbuckle.
I'd like to throw in there. You know after that match was done, they both went back and Jacob Fattu slapped him on the back and turned around and said you motherfucker you almost break character.
You could see the look on his face. We was trying not to smile. So he just rearranges his lips or licks his lips or does something like that.
And you're like, yeah, you know, you almost had him.
I mean, it's it's not the first time that LA night, I think has been compared to sort of the rock in the way that he does is in the way that he does is in ring.
Well, any of his promos. But the thing that the insult that got me more than anything else was calling them cross-eyed half wits.
That had me absolutely in stitches. I just thought it was them. It was a dead simple insult that just seemed to cut so very deep.
Yeah, so I think WWE here are currently experimenting with Netflix to see what they can get away with what they can't get away with.
They're in a mind that they are also still on cable television in the United States that do have limitations with those providers being, you know, in their contract.
So we might possibly get a little bit of a turn up in in language, but not a huge amount.
I think some of these insults are just testing the waters there to see what they can get away with with their broadcasting distributors.
Yeah, but yeah, this match, I will be honest, very nearly made it into my match of the night.
I would have much rather have seen just a straight match between Tamatonga and LA night.
No Jacob Fatou involvement, nothing like that. I would much rather have seen Tamatonga go at it with LA night without Jacob Fatou lurking in the background because I just think I don't think it was necessary.
It wasn't I don't think he needed to be there.
I am going to break the fourth wall a little bit with this one. So at the time this is being recorded, we have also watched Saturday night main event.
I'm going to throw out that during Jacob Fatou's match in main event, Tamatonga actually disappears.
He doesn't stay ringside. So I think that Jacob Fatou should start giving Tamatonga the same respect.
Well, in that thought process, it's a case that you're right, he should be he should be giving Tamatonga the the space he needs to be able to build himself as an individual because at the minute with Jacob Fatou sitting out there at ringside,
it almost makes Tamatonga out to be a lesser of the two men.
And also it just makes them feel like they're a tag team that one of them is just either nursing an injury or whatever. We know that neither of them are, but having one outside the ring all the time while the other one's competing, it literally just makes it feel like you've got a tag match or tag team in a singles match.
Yeah, and it splits the opponent. I know the reason Jacob Fatou's out there, it splits the opponent's focus. It means that Tamatonga realistically should have an easier night with it.
But I mean, ultimately, this match, there were some fantastic spots in it. I mean, one thing I particularly latched on to at one point, LA Knight catches Tonga midair and just turns it into a snap slam, which I absolutely adored. I thought it was fantastic.
It fantastically put over and just shows the whole power. The only sort of superstar you see using that sort of move similarly is Randall Orton. He uses that move and awful lot of LA Knight put it to the same level of use and probably the same sort of level of quality of product in that move as well.
Yeah, 100%. It was a very well polished move. It was obviously practiced beforehand to make sure that it was safe and it was done safely, securely. It was pristine that move.
But Tonga gets his link licks in as well. I mean, at one point outside of the ring, it managed to slam Knight's head into the steps, which gives Tonga a massive window.
Yeah, no, you know, Tonga reversed and moved that LA Knight was going to pop on and, yeah, based on Tim Square on to the corner of those steel steps. You know, he was seeing birdies for a little while there.
I mean, for a majority of the match that after that point, LA Knight was realistically was he was taking the beating and then just sort of getting his licks in where he could. He was very much trying to conserve energy and just taking and just absolutely took a beating.
Yeah, I think he knew that at some point it was going to turn into a two on one and he was just trying to make sure he'd got enough energy to hold off as long as he possibly could with that.
And eventually, as they set it up for all of us to tell at the beginning of the match, Jacob Fattu does indeed jump in.
Well, he doesn't get physically involved. He just makes himself known on the outside of the ring, distracts LA Knight and Tonga just tries to steal the win again.
It's the similar thing that we said earlier on. If it's used properly, it can work really well.
In this instance, it wasn't even a successful steal because LA Knight still managed to kick out and in the end ended up picking up the win himself after a BFT blunt force drama.
And then after that was pulled off, that's where we get to see sort of Jacob Fattu go in and basically just starts laying the smacketh down on LA Knight and tosses him out of the ring over to the announce table, throws him over the announce table.
I've noticed when it with regards to the announce table, they keep referring to it as their new reinforced announce table.
I'm not sure if they're trying to push the fact that very few people are going through it at the moment. So when people do go through the enforced announce table, I say that with the inverted commas above,
the rotations above my ears. Yeah, I'm waiting for a big spot. I'm guessing at the Royal Rumble, something is going to happen with that announce table and someone is going through it.
I think it could possibly be either Braun Strowman or Jacob Fattu, not necessarily one with the other, but one of those two people could be involved going through a table. The only two people at the moment I could think of that big enough to pop a reinforced announce table.
Yeah, this is it. But speaking of the monster, the monster among monsters, Braun Strowman does come out at the end of this to try and help save Knight's ass basically as Tonga and Fattu end up laying about him.
One big SOP.
Oh, 100% and he earns that monocle very well.
Like we said earlier, he's got like the size 16 quadruple feet. He is one big son of a bitch.
Oh, 100%.
Wouldn't call his mother a bitch to his face though. I'm not that stupid.
Oh, no, definitely not, especially with the speed that man get rowing.
Right and no. Yeah, no, we'll discuss the speed of Braun Strowman in a later episode. But yeah, we get to see Braun Strowman and Jacob Fattu face off in the ring.
They do that. They're macho throw the arms up in the air and roar and Jacob Fattu kind of does whatever it is like a hair flick and a shoulder roll, I suppose, until you see Strowman just literally just do a whole cog and just rip it, share it straight down the middle just and he looks huge at the moment as well.
He's looking better than he's ever looked.
Yeah, no, he he he's definitely been in the gym. I'm not sure was he off with an injury for a while so he's probably rehabbing a lot harder than normal, but he looked absolutely shredded.
Yeah, I think the storyline was that he was out within he was out with injury after an attack from the bloodline when solo so co was still in still very much in charge and seen from him.
So that's an interesting.
Well, when Strowman made his return I noticed and and not many people may have noticed this.
There were lots of little round they look like old bruises. You know the way old bruises tend to go a bit yellow. Yeah.
He had a lot of yellow round yellow what looked like old bruises on his back.
He's had some that broad strokes had some kind of act treatment or something like that.
You're he is not the only person I noticed with that. I made notes about the bruising on Carmelo Hayes's back in his match against Damian Priest, which we'll get into in a little while.
Yes. Moving on, we'll make our way towards Damian Priest and Carmelo Hayes. We are met with a backstage promo with a town down under and everyone's favorite wanker them is.
Yeah, talking himself up big time today when he the Marine seven with with a town down under. That's what he was promising them for a little bit of a little bit of a back scratch when someone finally gets their hands on the miserable little weasel.
Well, this is where the miserable little weasel is is robbed of any opportunity to team up with a town down under so beautiful to watch as well.
Which is when we find out that a town down under is being moved to Monday night raw as part of the transfer window.
And they were really excited about that as long as well as really excited about their opportunity to work with the Maris in with the Miss or in Marine seven.
So that was a great night for a town down under.
Oh, 100% I'm quite a great night for the Miss but Marine seven. I didn't realize we were that far into the series. I've got some films to watch.
I'll swap out here.
I think I'll give them a miss. Thanks.
I didn't watch it. I didn't watch any of the other ones. Let the load. I mean the Marine series started with John Cena if I remember correctly.
It did. But hey, at least it got to DVD. Our movie hasn't quite made it that far just yet.
No, this isn't we're still waiting for that deal. So I'm waiting for the right script. That's what it is.
It's got to be the right script.
I'll definitely take a role as a wish version of Goldberg. I'll show you that much.
Probably got slightly more wrestling ability. I could probably pull off a jackhammer and maybe a few dodgy punches.
But you know, we'll see what happens.
If you play.
It's longer.
Probably last longer in a three minute match.
Anyway, moving swiftly on.
Which is what we always love to do from the Miz. Yeah, we went to Damian Priest and Carmelo Hayes for the next match.
Now, considering Carmelo Hayes's last match.
I think this was last week on SmackDown where I think he was there just to sort of put somebody else over.
And it was it was very much a sort of a disappointing match for him.
I'm going to be honest.
This was actually a really competitive match against Damian Priest.
Carmelo Hayes pranked it up several gears this week.
Yeah, I mean, it was it was an interesting match to watch.
Sorry, I've just scrolled back through my notes.
So actually the last time that we saw Carmelo Hayes was in his match against Jimmy Huso two weeks ago.
And if I remember correctly, that match ended with Jimmy Huso getting in a rather what looked like a rather easy victory over Carmelo Hayes.
Just looking.
I actually know it was that was when Jimmy got his beat down from Tomatonga and Jacob Fatou.
So that went.
No disqualification.
Yeah, no contest.
That's when Carmelo Hayes thought he was getting a bit friendly with Jacob Fatou and Tomatonga and they think I'm a nice five shove and then we got to see so this a co-return.
So yeah, that was two weeks ago.
We got to see Carmelo Hayes in action against Jimmy Huso.
So we had a bit of a break up until his match today with Damian Priest and to be fair, he needed it.
Damian Priest was fresh off a nice match, I believe, on Raw last week.
Yes, possibly.
Well, would it not have been a street fight within Barlow?
Possibly.
I'm just scrolling through my notes now.
We won't dwell on the past too long as we've got the rest of the card to be able to speak about already.
So I didn't get a fantastic amount of notes for this match, but I do remember it being an incredibly convincing match.
There wasn't many spots in this match to sort of highlight.
So for the match started, we had a Nakamura promo in announcing his entrance into the Royal Rumble.
I didn't pay too much attention to this because I zoned out making notes on the end of the previous match.
But yeah, and we had the Nakamura promo about him entering the Royal Rumble.
And all I've got from this one really is that the Carmelo Hayes had got all the bruising on his back from the cupping therapy that we were talking about earlier.
And the Damien Priest, the only highlight I got really was that Damien Priest used the old school into a cross body off the top rope, which was a nice little homage, I suppose, to the Undertaker.
I mean, this is something we've seen him use on a couple of occasions now.
So this isn't new things for Damien Priest to use.
He seems to have become part of his regular arsenal, but it's another bad thing to see.
There's not many tall guys that can pull off that kind of agile move to keep their balance on what is going to be a very mobile piece of equipment.
But yeah, I've just got, I mean, mainly my notes, while it's a competitive match, Carmelo Hayes puts up a damn good fight.
Priest eventually picks up the win for this one in what was an absolute war of a match, really.
I think we knew in the end that Damien Priest was going to get a win on his debut at SmackDown.
So we did, but what I didn't anticipate was how much of a fight Carmelo Hayes was going to be putting up.
No, but it's not the end of Carmelo Hayes that we see for this episode either, which was interesting.
So they cut after Damien Priest had won away from the ring.
It wasn't, but they didn't cut anywhere specific.
It was like a different camarangue as Jimmy Uso was walking down for his match against Kevin Owens, which was the main event of the evening.
Carmelo Hayes kind of tried to get a sneaky one in on Jimmy Uso on the ramp as he was making his way up, and Uso was making his way down to the ring.
Yes, but we've got a few other bits and pieces to pick up on before we get to that point.
I did put down about the VT promo with Shinsuke Nakamura about declaring himself for the Rumble.
Not really that excited about that, if I'm honest. I'm not a big Shinsuke Nakamura fan.
He's not really being relevant since he won the Rumble last time, to be fair.
I don't think he was overly relevant then to be honest.
No, he wasn't. They just gave it to him because he was a new debut.
Yeah, pretty much. But there was a backstage promo with Nick Olders, DIY and Motor City Machine Guns, where this is where it's announced that Motor City Machine Guns Challenge for the Tag Champs is at Royal Rumble.
And this is a very different kind of match. It's a two out of three falls match at Royal Rumble.
I remember this being spoken about, but I forgot to make any notes on it yet. This looks like it's going to be interesting. And again, it's a match type we do not see very often.
No, we see it more in NXT than we do in regular roster match. I mean, I'm not even entirely sure. I meant to have a look, but I'm not sure when the last two out of three falls match occurred on either SmackDown or World War 1.
We have seen it recently in one format or another because it has been part of NXT with the...
Oh, what's it called? The Heritage Cup.
Yeah, so we saw it last week on NXT when Lexus King was going against Charlie Dempsey in a two out of three falls match as part of the Heritage Cup events.
I'm going to say it goes as the under Heritage Cup rules, which is two out of three falls, but this is where it will be slightly...
The difference between the Heritage Cup and a regular two out of three falls match. Two out of three falls, there's no rounds. It's just whoever is the first to...
Whoever is the first to two falls, whether it's submission or pinfall, whereas in the Heritage Cup, it's submission, pinfall or ring countout.
And they're like six three minute match types and things like that for the Heritage Cup. So a bit of a difference for that one.
We also had an eight man tag match announced for next week on SmackDown, which will feature,
motor city machine guns, lost Gaza, DIY and pretty deadly. So that will be a real blockbuster of a match.
Is that a championship match or is that just a standard tag match?
That's just a standard eight man tag match. There's no championships on the line.
There's still been great match though.
As we said, the championships have been defended at Royal Rumble in a two out of three falls match.
So it wouldn't make sense to put the tag straps up in an eight man tag when you've got that match booked because you already know what the outcome is going to be.
We also got reminded that we also got reminded that Mission faces Chelsea Green for the Women's US title next week,
as well as another women's singles match, which is going to be Naomi versus Liv Morgan on next week's SmackDown.
So does this mean that Liv Morgan is as well as Damian Priestess?
Is she going to be making her way over to SmackDown in this transfer window?
So that would leave Dam, Finn, even though Finn's out of action at the moment, JD and Carlito.
Because Dam has offered to step in to help defend the tag or to help get the tag championships.
So I think that's the second half of the song, Monday Night Raw with that one.
Yeah, definitely. We also had a small backstage promo with Damian Priest running into Cody Rhodes.
And this is where we basically see that it's a very respectful exchange.
But right at the end, we've got Damian Priest, so that's something that makes it very well known that he has gone in for Cody Rhodes' title.
Once this Kevin Owens feud is done, I think we may well see a feud between Damian Priest and Cody Rhodes in the not too distant future.
That could be a really interesting feud, I actually I'd look forward to that.
And then one last promo before we head into the main event, which was a backstage promo featuring Andrade and The Miz to begin with.
Again, this is Miz where he's trying to make friends and his new promotion and seems to be failing miserably as Andrade just seems to tell him what he wants to hear, I think.
And basically, Scarpa's as quickly as he bloody well can.
I love him and the Miz fails, I really do.
So the next thing that we see in this promo, so Andrade leaves, leaves The Miz on his own.
We then see Jimmy Uso on his way out to his match.
Doesn't say an awful lot to The Miz, but gives him a little yit.
And I reckon this was a bit of a nod to Jay, who's obviously got his world championship match at Saturday Night Main Event the next night.
And yeah, this is where you were alluding to Jimmy then coming across Carmelo Hayes.
They have a bit of an exchange, another yee.
And then Uso gets jumped on his way to the ring by Carmelo Hayes, which is sort of broken up quickly by security and that leads us into the main event, which is a now, and now jumped Jimmy Uso versus Kevin Owens.
Kevin Owens came out wearing a Naomi shirt.
Nice little, this dicket Jimmy there, who's obviously married to Naomi.
Yeah, which I think the commentary pointed out at one point that realistically, if Jimmy just ignores what is intended to be a slight Naomi from Kevin Owens, all he's really done is lined their pockets a little bit more.
Yeah, I find that quite a misnomer point of that. Obviously they were going to get puttsy of the royalties at the purchase of that shirt.
Yeah, this is it.
I wouldn't put it past Kevin Owens just stolen it though. I mean, he did steal the winged eagle trumpet chip, so maybe Jimmy ain't seeing no dollar from that same.
Maybe, maybe, but yeah, this match starts with, well, Kevin Owens focusing on the wrong person and so diving out of the, dips out of the ring to mouth off at Joe Tessatori and Michael McConaughey again.
And then you've got Jimmy basically returning Kevin Owens focus back into the ring.
I've got quite a few, but a few notes for this match. I'm interested to see what you think.
I didn't get a lot of this. So I've got the Kevin Owens came out in an Naomi shirt. I've got that it was reasonably even throughout both superstars managed to put on a reasonable show.
I didn't, I said, I didn't get too many notes here that I did see that. I've written down the Kevin Owens managed to get the three count after a rather nice pop up power bomb.
But then I kind of carried on from the end to be fair, a few of my notes of this, a more the very end of the match, which got me more interested.
There were a few spots in this match that I took note of Kevin Owens with a frog splash dive off the apron onto Jimmy Uso, which I thought was onto the floor.
It looks savage.
It did, didn't it? And we've got Kevin Owens has a sent on bomb reversed during a momentum shift towards Jimmy Uso.
There was an exchange of super kicks at one point.
They both put a super kick off. So well, they kept trying to put a stunner as well. And Jimmy just was not going to let him have it.
No, this is it. But if you got one eventually towards the end.
Yeah, I mean, Kevin Owens eventually picks up the picks up the pinfall victory, as you said, off the back of a impressive pop up power bomb.
And then you've got I think something you were maybe alluding to is that Kevin Owens does his normal shtick of attempting the package pile driver to be foiled by to be foiled by Cody Rhodes yet again from sailing in and
running in and a suit for once. We saw him in sports gear. Normally when you see him running in, he comes running in his Sunday best. I'm off to church gear.
Well, it's always the same suit.
He owns one suit, I'm sure, either that or with our doing mass tapings and he's not where they say they are.
I mean, as it stands, I can't say much because I only own one suit, but that's not really the point.
Yeah, but we are human. Here's the face of WWE at the moment. He's on talk shows. He's making wrestling appearances here, there and everywhere.
He needs more.
I am not making anywhere near the dollar that Cody Rhodes is making. So yeah, just having one suit seems a bit a bit lax on his part.
But yeah, the show closes with Rhodes and KO basically kicking out and kicking each other's asses.
And yeah, I mean, I did get down that we had both Mark Henry and Michelle McCool at this Smackdown taping.
I call back to earlier on.
I didn't get Michelle McCool. But then I think by the end of the episode, my ADHD might have kicked in and my concentration span dropped a little bit.
If you look at my notes at the start of the episode, my notes are thick, they're healthy, they're chunky, they're further towards the end of the episode, I get the smaller my notes.
They're enough. But yeah, I mean, I already alluded the six woman tag match was my match of the was my match of the night.
Rich, what about you?
I think for me, it was between the LA night tower Tonga match and the six women tag match.
I'm not going to choose between the two. I think they're equally just as good. So I'm going to have joint matches at the night this for this episode.
Fair enough. As it stands, I mean, let us know in the comments who you are, whether you had a match of the night for this particular episode.
We'd love to hear about it.
And the next time you'll be hearing from us is all about Saturday night's main event, which takes a rich takes place at the Frostbank Stadium in San Antonio, Texas.
But yeah, I think until then, I've been Adam, I've been rich.
And we'll catch you soon to catch some more action.
See you soon. Bye.
Bye.