Brock Lesnar is scheduled to appear on the show tonight, while Shinsuke Nakamura and Ludwig Kaiser will face each other in a rematch. Also on the show, Morgan and Rousey will face each other, with Lacey Evans going up against Raquel Rodriguez. Welcome to the anonymous reviewer on PWNews!
Stephanie McMahon opens SmackDown tonight and welcomes viewers and announces the departure of Vince McMahon. She says her father has made the decision to retire and Vince wanted to thank the fans and all the staff. She says they are eternally grateful to everyone and gets the fans to run the “Thank you Vince” chant.
The music theme of The Street Profit plays in the arena. Ford and Dawkins enter the ring through the audience, grab the microphone and say they have some information. They say they’ll be the new undisputed WWE Tag Team Champions at Summerslam. Chiori interrupts their conversation. He says no one cares about the SummerSlam tag team titles because everyone will be too busy watching him sell his suitcase at Summerslam and become the undisputed champion of the universe. He says he will win the US title from Bobby Lashley and then take two world titles in the show’s main event.
The Usos then enter the ring and tell Tiori that he will not make it to SummerSlam. Everyone starts laughing with Tiori, and he furiously tells Ford that he and his wife will walk away untitled after SummerSlam. After that, a big fight starts. Tiori and The Usos start working together, but Madcap Moss runs out to the Street Profits to help. He helps kick The Usos and Chiori out of the ring while celebrating their segment victory.
Shinsuke Nakamura Ave. Ludwig Kaiser
Kaiser charged to win. He immediately goes on the attack and pins Nakamura near the ropes. Shinsuke misses a series of blows to the head and kicks to the body. Ludwig still makes a mistake and gives Nakamura the opportunity to impose his pace of the match. Kaiser responds with a suplex, and then knees in the face, pushing off the ropes. Kaiser again suplexes and launches Shinsuke into the ropes, but gets a hard kick to the head. Nakamura throws him out of the ring, but Kaiser grabs Shinsuke’s leg and throws him into the steel steps. Gunther stands in the ringside and advises Ludwig as the match progresses. Kaiser returns to the ring, but Shinsuke reverses his attack again and shows why he is called the king of strongstyle. Nakamura hits the knee from the second rope, and then gives a few more punches. Nakamura was getting ready for the finisher, but Gunther got out on the apron of the ring and started shouting something to him. Nakamura turned to look at Gunther as Kaiser pushed him into the ropes. Gunther discreetly punched Nakamura in the face, and Kaiser got him his finisher and held him to three. After the match on the ramp, Gunther again punished Ludwig Kaiser with a powerful chop right on the ramp.
WinnerStory by: Ludwig Kaiser
Kayla Braxton backstage introduces Liv Morgan and Ronda Rousey. Braxton asks how their rematch will be different from what we saw on Money in the Bank, and Rose asks Kayla to leave. Rosie states that she respects Morgan and doesn’t hold a grudge against her because she just took her chance. Rosie is confident that she will beat her at SummerSlam and hopes Morgan will shake hands with her after she takes the title from her. Morgan replies that she needs this victory more, she loves wrestling more and she will do everything to take the victory. However, Morgan can’t say for sure if she will retain her title against Rousey, but when she wins, she will definitely shake hands with her. Rosie replies that Morgan has more passion than anyone else in the dressing room except her, before leaving.
We are shown Pat McAfee and Michael Cole at the commentary panel. Unexpectedly, Corbin attacks McAfee. He starts beating him, after which he goes backstage. McAfee quickly gets up and runs backstage. Pat finds Corbin close to backstage and begins to beat him with powerful punches until the backstage workers stop them.
After a commercial break, Pat McAfee returns to the ring. He enters the ring, grabs the mic, and says he has something to say to Corbin before returning to the commentators’ table. He sends him a threat and promises to take the victory at SummerSlam.
Viking Raiders Shanki Ave. and Jinder Mahal
Eric starts the duel against Jinder Mahal. After an exchange of blows, Aivar enters the ring. As you might guess, the match turned out to be of a very mediocre quality. More precisely, it was in principle not a match, but something incomprehensible. Ivar threw Mahal at Kingston and Woods, who were sitting at the commentary table, and the referee declared victory by countout.
Winners: Viking Raiders by countout
Backstage, Adam Pierce is on the phone. Sonya Deville approaches him and reproaches that the quality of his work has become much worse after she was fined and suspended for several months. Pierce replies that he’s actually pretty good at doing show announcements on his own, and here’s one of them: Sonia will be fighting Raquel Rodriguez tonight.
Seamus, Butch and Holland enter the ring. Seamus takes the microphone and says they’ll be making history tonight. Initially, he thought he’d take Drew McIntyre’s head off tonight and get a world title match at Clash of Castle, but he wouldn’t fight him until he got the condition that McIntyre was banned from the match with his sword. He calls McIntyre crazy for trying to cut off his head and says that his sword has no place in the ring.
Drew McIntyre’s theme music plays in the arena. The former WWE champion comes out with a sword in his hands and moves to the ring. Butch is very angry, but Holland takes him out of the ring, and McIntyre takes the microphone and asks what happened to Seamus? Why did he become such an asshole? Where is the shy guy he’s known for twenty years? McIntyre wants to finally have a match for the challenge and offers to do it right here and now.
Sheamus replies that he is better than McIntyre and says that if he wants this fight, he will get it, but not tonight. Seamus states that he has spoken to management and the match will take place as early as next week and the sword will not be allowed in this match because it will be a special match under Irish club rules. Seamus removes the tablecloth from the table, revealing a collection of clubs. He challenges McIntyre to the first ever match under such rules. McIntyre takes over. Adam Pearce steps on the ramp and confirms that this match is officially scheduled. Seamus points his club at Adam Pierce as McIntyre pulls out his merch and breaks the club in two with his sword.
Backstage, Paul Heyman approaches the Usos, who discuss Tiori’s presence in their match. They don’t want to work with him, but Heyman says that they need to work with Tiori now, because otherwise they will cause themselves problems, because the opponents will have a handicap. Heyman says that the Usos can safely take out Chiori after they take the win.
Raquel Rodriguez vs. Sonya Deville
Raquel shows off her mighty back before the match, and then easily starts beating Sonya Deville right in the center of the ring. Deville responds with a series of punches and even imposes his own pace. She manages to knock out Raquel after a knee to the head, but Rodriguez gets up quickly enough. She holds a powerful slam, and then jumps on Deville from the ropes. Sonya tries to DDT, but Raquel easily stops her and throws her into the corner of the ring. Deville still does a DDT on the second attempt, but Raquel sends her to the shoulder blades with a powerful chouxlam and holds up to three.
WinnerStory by: Raquel Rodriguez
Lacey Evans comes out again for the match against Alia. Before the match, she reads again her motivational promo, while insulting the fans in the arena and the inhabitants of the city. Alia decided she couldn’t bear listening to Evans’ stories anymore. She grabbed Evans by the hand, but Lacey continued to speak, and then unexpectedly ordered her powerful punch to the jaw, putting out Alia with one blow.
Kayla Braxton backstage chatting with Jeff Jarrett. She asks why he thinks Adam Pearce chose him to be the special referee for the tag team title match. He says they just need someone who can get the job done and see it through, and he’s the right person for it.
Returning from a commercial break, we see Maxine Dupree backstage at SmackDown. This is Sophia Cromwell from NXT. She says she is now the new director of talent for MMA and will be unveiling a new 2022 swimwear collection next week.
The Usos & Theori Ave. Street Profits & Madcup Moss
Street Profits started the fight very confidently. They dominated the Usos, and Ford stole Tiori’s suitcase and started fooling around with him near the ropes. After the ad, the situation changed in favor of the healer team. An angry Tiori ran into the ring and managed to impose his pace on the match against Moss. The second part of the match is more dynamic. Moss took the plunge and came close to pinning Jimmy Uso for the win of the match. Uso miraculously escaped and responded with a superkick. He went to the corner of the ring to pass the tag to Tiori, but Mr. MitB pompously jumped off the apron of the ring and went his own way. Jay Uso unexpectedly met him from behind, prescribed a superkick and threw him back into the ring. There, Jimmy Uso also met him with a superkick, but the Street Profits quickly came to their senses and again took control of the match. Tiori and Moss got into a fight in the center of the ring. Tiori made some interesting combo of a neckbreaker and a backbreaker, but Moss pulled away. Tiori continued the match and just started to knead Moss with his contract under the audience “you suck” chants. The referee declared Moss and the Profits a DK victory, but an angry Tiori keeps boxing Moss until he is stopped by Brock Lesnar’s theme song.
Winners: Street Profits and Moss by DK
Beast Brock Lesnar smiles and moves towards the ring. He enters the ring, and Chiori is already standing up to hit him with a suitcase. Lesnar pompously knocks him out with a kick, and then F5 and begins to hammer his back with a suitcase. That didn’t seem enough for him, and Lesnar threw Tiori back on his shoulders for the F5.
Friday Night SmackDown Rating: 5/10 (author)
Like it or not, the main event leaves the main aftertaste after watching the show. Due to the constant absence of the world champion, we have to regularly watch team showdowns in the main event, which not only bothers us on a regular basis, but is generally perceived as a weaker level. Today’s SmackDown broadcast would have turned out many times better if we had been given a normal main event without the annoying Usos vs Street Profits matches, but as a result, a regular weekly was released, which was not remembered for something interesting, but was not an outright passer.
Wagner and Sikoa’s move rumors seem to be true as Sophia has already made her debut as the new leader of MMM. From her promo, one could conclude that Max Dupree was gone, but it would be right to wait until next week so as not to jump to conclusions.
And yet, for me personally, Viking Raiders is the worst that, in principle, is on the blue brand. Every week they get a timing and every week it’s terribly BORING. Boring Vikings, who were not originally WWE format, but they are constantly trying to push, give timing and keep them near the overcard of the team roster, but no interest is added. Each of their entry into the ring is just a guard, you want to turn it off right away, because you know that complete despondency awaits you next. The situation with Lacey Evans is also very interesting. Can we already consider her comeback a failure? What is the point of her regular appearances on SmackDown? Personally, I don’t know.
Well, about Vince McMahon. I do not believe that he is leaving the company and that this is a farewell to the legendary Vince. Most likely, the investigation really grabbed Vince by the balls, and he is forced to take such a step so that the further scandal does not affect the company in any way, they say I am already retired, I have no ties with WWE and I will bear any fair without sidelong glances and problems for WWE. I wouldn’t be surprised if he still appears on all the shows, has the unspoken lead voice in booking, and returns in a couple of years when the situation calms down.