Smackdown was LIVE from Toronto, because it’s a big WWE weekend in Toronto, of all the places.
Cody! and Kevin! and Randy! arrive backstage. Well they’re walking. Orton’s eating a plate of food. That’s real natural-like, which is how it is in WWE now. Just real casual behavior. Walking around in your underwear and a t-shirt eating a plate of food at a public place. Like we all do.
oh GOD
it’s jey uso
why is he here? oh right money in the bank. GOD. Luckily he doesn’t talk too long before LA Knight arrives. Oh no. the yeet man and the yeah man. This is a time crunch weekend, I’m not watching this.
Oh it’s Carmelo Hayes and his terrible putdowns. And now it’s Chad Gable. Then Andrade, then Drew McIntyre. Long story short they all say a couple things, they all plan to win, they get in a fight, the yeet man and the yeah man stand tall.
Backstage, Bayley is with Jackie Redmond. THANK GOD Chelsea Green interrupts. She has a nice outfit. I mean actually it sucks but it’s wrestling so it is good. Piper Niven attacks Bayley and Chelsea makes clear that, when she wins MITB, she’ll be using Piper to take Bayley out and then cash in. She’s an architect. Seth Rollins no longer gets that nickname. “The Architect” Chelsea Green.
After break, Bayley emerges from Nick Aldis’ locker room and HERE IS NAOMI! “Sis!” These two have the worst verbal chemistry of any duo I’ve ever heard in wrestling and it is special, I hope it lasts forever. Anyway Bayley has a match with Piper later.
Pretty Deadly vs Street Profits
WCW Saturday Night Comparison: Blue Bloods vs American Males. “It’s not been a great year for the Street Profits.” I hear ya, man. B-Fab does actually get to accompany them all the way to the ring for this one so she’s earning the paycheck. Graves and Barrett plead with the audience to care what happens in wrestling matches.
Dawkins straight up one of my favorite WWE guys to watch at this point. Top five or so for sure. It turns out he is the team’s Bret but without the likely singles future. Montez is absolutely Jim Neidhart, just with flying instead of power. But I say that and then Ford has one of his best, most truly energetic showings in recent memory. Really solid tag match, not exceptional but nothing wrong with it. Dawkins’ swanton bomb isn’t Jeff Hardy-esque in its grace but it is latter stage Jeff Hardy-esque in that he lands it physically. Montez’s frog splash wins it. Welcome back, “Pretty Deadly”! ***
Backstage, Grayson Waller shadowboxes but doesn’t acknowledge that he’d have eaten a counter shot from his shadow opponent with that style. Austin Theory may have Johnny Gargano in his head. Waller thinks so. Theory disagrees. If my soul were being battled for by Grayson Waller and Johnny Gargano, I think I would conclude that my soul isn’t worth much.
Bianca Belair & Jade Cargill vs Indi Hartwell & Candice LeRae
President Paul’s obsession with Karrion Kross is one thing — and I have an admiration for his stubbornness, because I’m a stubborn fuck, too — but his insistence on continuing to have Indi Hartwell wrestle on television may be lapping the Kross fascination.
This is joined in progress, basically, so I can’t star rate it, and thus I am here only to see if Indi can bounce back into her historic form of mediocrity. The answer is not really! But I guess this is better than last week or whenever that was. She’s being done no favors working with Cargill, either, to be honest, but they do land a nicely-timed DOUBLE BOOT. Bianca and Jade win, putting them at 3-0 against this great tag team of Candice and Indi over the last six weeks or so.
Post-match, Bianca says “these past couple months have been really rough” for her and Jade. Here is the entirety of their run together:
Backstage, Cody! and Kevin! and Randy! walk, getting ready to talk.
Cody, Kevin, and Randy are here to talk
These guys cannot stand the Bloodline! Sick of it! Kevin gets the spotlight portion of the promo to relate a story that his mom was rushed to the hospital earlier in the week, but he’s here and he’ll be in the ring at Money in the Bank because his mom would want him to be. It’s too sincere and real to “review” in a “wrestling review.”
Piper Niven vs Bayley
Non-title, of course. Piper has Chelsea (different outfit now) with her and Bayley has Naomi in her corner. Sis! These two had a really good match at the Scotland “PLE” so sure this is a way to eat up some time.
Wait, actually, the real point of this is to have Zoey Stark and Lyra Valkyria watch in the crowd and eventually get around to Tiffany Stratton walking down to the ring, so everyone is here! And the chaos with the MITB competitors is the purpose here. What Bayley and Niven do is fine but it’s not about them. Bayley wins with a great-looking Rose Plant. Nia Jax attacks post-match and Michin and her kendo stick save Bayley, who is officially a Good Sister. Sis!
If I ever go to a professional wrestler’s stand-up comedy show just know that it’s truly over for me. I will have given the fuck up entirely.
WWE Tag Team Championship
Austin Theory & Grayson Waller (c) vs #DIY
I think they did a good job building this match up over the course of the show but the problem is, for me, that I don’t care about either of these teams, these belts, or anything that happens here. I am also amused by this idea that #DIY are Toronto heroes because of a match from eight years ago.
It’s a good match, especially if you like Evolve with all the edges sanded down. They’re moving toward a Theory vs Waller feud which is fascinating, neither of them a natural babyface at all, Waller the one with more “anti-hero” type potential but even then, what, lesser LA Knight? #DIY get their big win in Toronto where they’re mega-stars and everyone loves them, and they pay some tribute to their old rivals “The Revival” in doing so. ***
Look at this shit now. That necklace makes Solo the Tribal Chief. It’s not for him, it’s because his family needs him to step in because Roman Reigns is not man enough anymore. His target is Cody Rhodes, and if Roman wants some he can get some, basically. The trios at Money in the Bank is seen by Solo as his chance to legitimize himself, which is the way to play it.
GRADE: C
A lot of mediocrity at play, but it’s a day before a “PLE,” so it is what it is. This is a newly established WWE rhythm, “go-home show” is a dead concept here. If you’re a #DIY fan then you got their big moment as another act that HHH absolutely refuses to be realistic about, but at least unlike Kross or Hartwell they can hold their own in their matches and someone cares about anything they’re doing. They’re a fine tag team, I just see them more as a Killer Bees than a British Bulldogs, but that is neither here nor there.
Three Stars of the Show
Montez Ford: Again, thought that was as good and “up” as he’s looked in recent memory. I still have the theory that maybe Montez just isn’t looking to be The Guy or even take a real run at it, and that this is fine. If he’s OK just having a job, getting to travel with his wife, team with Dawkins forever, then that’s alright. I understand the personal aspect of recognizing the limits of your own professional desires. During one of the prison live albums, I forget which, Johnny Cash said, “They say ol’ Johnny Cash works well under pressure. Put the screws to me and I’m gonna screw right out from under you. Tired of all that shit.” Some people just truly do not want the pressure and the obligations that come with climbing the ladder past a certain point.
Solo Sikoa: I keep getting more into this dude. He’s really buying his own hype now that Jacob Fatu is part of the crew, feels invincible. Still think this all backfires on him and he winds up crawling back to Roman’s side after these mercenary lunatics give him the what’s-for, and setting it up as “the family needs me” can aid that, because if/when he fails, the family will need someone else.
Chelsea Green: She had TWO outfits!
Hahahaha she had two outfits
With Punk being back in the fold and Living Colour’s “Cult of Personality” getting played all the time on WWE programming, do you think they would give them a discount on “Glamour Boys” for Pretty Deadly?