The WWE Smackdown Reaction for 1/17/20 by Kelly Dishnow
Welcome to The Smackdown Reaction, where I offer my take on this week’s show from Greensboro, NC. You can check out John’s full in-depth report here.
We start things off with the Smackdown intro and pyro before Kane makes his way to the ring. Kane cuts a decent promo on the upcoming Royal Rumble before being interrupted by The Firefly Fun House. Wyatt cuts a quick promo before the lights go out in the arena to signal The Fiend’s appearance. Kane was waiting for him and Daniel Bryan attacked The Fiend before he could retreat down the hole in the ring. Bryan pulled on Fiend and go some hair before he was able to escape. When we get back from break, Kane and Bryan are backstage with Kayla Braxton and Bryan issues a challenge for a Strap Match at the Rumble.
Our first match of the night has Big E taking on John Morrison in his first WWE match in eight years. We get a decent back and forth match while commentary fills in the background of Morrison for those who have not seen him before. Side note, I’m not sure what happened to Kofi’s head, but it wasn’t pretty. The finish was set up with Miz distracting Big E so Morrison could get the upper hand and land Starship Pain for the pinfall. We will likely see a tag title match coming soon between the two teams, likely after the Rumble.
We get a quick video package with the history for tonight’s table match and promo from Roman Reigns before heading into a break.
The Usos had their match against The Revival. The match was as good as expected for the little amount of time they were given. The Usos picked up the win in this short match.
Kayla caught up to The Revival about their match. The Revival started to cut a promo on tag team wrestling when the cameraman bailed to catch the fight down the hall between Lacey Evans, Sasha Banks, and Bayley. It is broken up quickly and Sasha is holding her ankle.
Quick recap on the Otis/Mandy Rose happens from last week before a quick promo from Fire and Desire with Sonya asking Mandy to have Otis come out for her match against Alexa Bliss later.
Back in the Trainer’s Room, we find Sasha icing her ankle down talking to Bayley about what Lacey just did. (Smackdown GM) Adam Pearce shows up and told Sasha that her match with Lacey was still on tonight, but Bayley was taking her place. The girls are upset and Pearce tells Bayley the match is not for the title but it is next. Can we just make him the Smackdown GM and use him like NXT does with Regal? Shows up only when needed to progress an angle. He’s done that several times in the past couple of weeks now.
Bayley is coming out by herself for her match with Lacey. The match was pretty good as the fans are buying the Lacey face turn. Bayley still seems to be struggling a bit with the heel turn. Lacey wins the competitive match after Big Showing Bayley with the Woman’s Right.
We go backstage and find out that Kayla Braxton has been cloned into Alyse Ashton (really?) to interview Shorty G about Sheamus. Gable cuts a quick promo and Sheamus shows up to make more short jokes, although the height difference is not that significant as compared to Corbin. A quick scrum between the two gets broken up to send us to break.
Back from break and the real Kayla Braxton is interviewing Braun Strowman about his desire for an Intercontinental title match anytime and anywhere.
Elias is in the ring for a song only to be interrupted by Sami Zayn, Shinsuke Nakamura, and Cesaro. Zayn addresses the Strowman challenge by saying no. Zayn and company go to leave Elias to do whatever and Elias starts to sing a song about the trio. Cesaro runs down to the ring to attack Elias before Nakamura and Zayn join in. Strowman comes to the ring to help out Elias. Zayn bails and Strowman tosses Nakamura and Cesaro out of the ring, Royal Rumble style. We can pencil in the tag match for next week.
A nice video tribute to The Rock’s father, Rocky Johnson, plays to honor his passing on Wednesday.
Sonya Deville was in the ring with Mandy Rose waiting for Alexa Bliss to come out with Nikki Cross. Heavy Machinery comes out after the match started and Otis would catch a falling Mandy to allow Alexa to roll up the distracted Sonya for the win in what felt like an angle more than a match.
Quick Royal Rumble preview leads us to the main event, Roman Reigns versus Robert Roode in a Tables Match. The winner gets to pick the Reigns/Corbin match stipulation for the Royal Rumble. Roman and Roode have a really good match before Corbin and Dolph Ziggler show up as expected. Roman gets triple-teamed before The Usos show up on the delay run-in. The Usos take out all three with superkicks before putting Ziggler through the announce desk with a double splash off the barricade. Corbin, like usual, had run away so Roman could spear Roode through the table for the win. After the match, Roman picks the stipulation of Falls Count Anywhere to close out the show.
Let’s look at tonight’s highs and lows:
The Highs
Outside of the Sonya/Bliss angle match, there was really decent in-ring action this week. The Table match and Big E/Morrison were pretty solid contests.
Effective use of Adam Pearce again as the “authorityish figure” to set up the Bayley/Lacey match. This should be a good role for him going forward, as long as they don’t overdo it like they usually do.
The Lows
The Usos/Revival match was just too short this week. It was a really good match for the time given, but it would have been better with some extra time.
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That’s all I’ve got this week, until next time.