The WWE Smackdown Reaction for 1/21/22

Welcome to the WWE Smackdown Reaction, where I offer my take on this week’s show in Nashville, TN.

As always, you can check out John’s full in-depth report here. Before we get started, check out my column from Thursday about some bold moves I think WWE should do this year.

We open up the show with Promo Time with The Usos. The Usos are celebrating Roman Reigns’ Universal Championship record of 508 days as of Friday. Reigns comes out and asks Nashville to “Acknowledge Me.” A very well put together video package showed highlights of Roman’s title run. After the video package ended, Seth “Freakin’” Rollins showed up. Rollins put over the greatness of the video package and brought up their time in The Shield. Rollins tried to celebrate The Uso’s record-setting title run, but it didn’t go very far. Rollins proposed a tag match between him and a partner of his choosing, which would turn out to be Kevin Owens, to take on the Usos. Winning team stipulation; Rollins/KO would ban The Usos from the Royal Rumble title match, Usos would force Rollins to forfeit the title match at the Royal Rumble. Gee, thanks for telling us how the main event will go.

Kofi Kingston kicks off in-ring action by taking on Madcap Moss. Kingston had Big E accompany him to the ring. The match was okay, but the scent of 50/50 Booking was strong in this one. Kingston picked up the win after Trouble in Paradise. After the match, Big E took out Moss with a Big Ending just because.

Nashville’s own(?), Summer Rae, was shown in the crowd and announced as a WWE Legend and participating in the 30 Woman Royal Rumble. Calling her a legend might be a stretch at this point.

Natalya is out next to find a different way to lose to Aliyah. She picked the “let’s ignore the referee’s five count in the corner” option. It worked out about as well as her farting gimmick. We then get to the point of all of this with Xia Li coming down to do the “run-in face save” spot and knocking Natalya out of the ring for beating Aliyah up after the match.

Speaking of beating people up, here come the Viking Raiders to beat up Los Lotharios to build up for their Smackdown Tag Team Championship match. It’s sad to see how much Los Lotharios has fallen in such a short time. I wonder how much longer it’ll be until they are trying to hawk timeshares in Cancun?

Naomi takes on Charlotte Flair in a Championship Contenders match next. Oh look, Sonya Deville wants to be the referee and I immediately lost interest in the match. Deville screws Naomi yet again to continue this pointless feud that is way past its expiration date.

Sami Zayn hosts another episode of In Zayn next. It wasn’t as terrible as last week’s, but it was still awful. Zayn was claiming to be zapping himself with a cattle prod, complete with fake zapping noises. Johnny Knoxville shows up and turns the prod on and zaps Zayn to poorly timed zapping noises. Zayn sells it like death and Knoxville pitches Zayn over the top rope, a la Royal Rumble.

Adam Pearce is backstage with Eric Bischoff, which is kinda random, when Deville walks in. Pearce tells Deville he is going to recommend a match between her and Naomi next week because her godawful feud much conclude. Thank you, Adam. Even Bischoff agreed.

Smackdown is Rematch continues this time with Sheamus beating up Ricochet again. Ridge Holland was finally back in Sheamus’s corner this week. Ricochet has had great matches with Sheamus in the past, this just wasn’t going to be one of them. It was mostly one-sided for Sheamus and can we get Ricochet something better to do after the Rumble?

Main event time with The Usos taking on Seth “Freakin” Rollins and Kevin Owens. The match was really good. Match of the night for sure. The story was solid as was the action in the ring. The ending left a little to be desired. Rollins had Jimmy set up for a Stomp but Reigns hit Rollins with a Superman Punch for the DQ. It would have been better if they did the clean finish and then have Reigns attack. This way just made Reigns look stupid for costing The Usos the match.

Let’s take a look at tonight’s highs and lows.

The Highs

The main event between The Usos and Rollins/Owens was really good. The finish could have been a bit better but that’s what we got. If you missed the match, check it out. You won’t be disappointed.

The Lows

Tonight was mostly Rematch Palooza with lots of people getting beat up. Although, the segments devoted to the main event took up almost half of the show. It’s hard to do much more when the show is devoted to one thing.

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That’s all I’ve got, until next time.