The long-running joke among wrestling fans when Teddy Long was the WWE Smackdown GM was that he loved tag team matches and that every confrontation or disagreement would result in the main event of Smackdown being a tag team match. It turns out WWE was in on the joke because they had an article this past week interviewing Long about his favorite tag team matches of all time. So with last night’s episode of WWE Smackdown being the milestone 700th episode, what else but a tag team match would be the main event? And while the match was very good and entertaining and made sense given the storylines surrounding the World Heavyweight Championship right now, but the ending did not make any sense at all given the rules of a tag team match.
WWE Smackdown kicked off with a “Fiesta Del Rio,” a Mexican-themed party in the ring celebrating Alberto Del Rio winning the World Heavyweight Championship from Big Show last week on Smackdown in a Last Man Standing match. However, the party was quickly interrupted by Dolph Ziggler (along with Big E Langston and AJ Lee), who reminded Del Rio that as a former Money In The Bank winner himself, he knows all too well that Ziggler can cash in the briefcase anytime he wants and become the world champion. Ziggler threatened to have Langston take out Del Rio right then and there so Ziggler could cash in the briefcase and end Del Rio’s title reign,but before Ziggler could make good on his threat, Big Show came to the ring. The giant didn’t say a word but stared a hole in Del Rio, and when it looked like everyone in the ring was about to brawl, Sheamus made his way out with a few jokes and then the promise to join Del Rio in any fight. As I mentioned before, this then brought out Booker T, who booked a tag team match for the main event between Big Show & Ziggler and Del Rio & Sheamus. Booker T then sent the heels out of the ring while he, Sheamus and Del Rio celebrated with the mariachi band.
The first match of the night was between United States Champion Antonio Cesaro and Kofi Kingston. Just a month ago, Kingston was engaged in a battle with Wade Barrett for the Intercontinental Championship, a battle that Barrett eventually won. Since then, Kingston has been on the losing end of nearly every match he’s been in and last night was no exception as Cesaro impressively caught Kingston in mid-air after he had jumped off the top rope and ht him with the Neutralizer for the win.
The second match of the night had me wondering who I felt worse for – Natalya Neidhart for wasting her talent being teamed up with Great Khali in a valet/girlfriend role or me for having to watch Khali wrestle week after week. This week I decided it was myself, since not only did Khali wrestle but his opponent was Tensai, but then I decided it was Natalya because I just fast-forwarded through the entire match, which Khali won.
Damien Sandow and Cody Rhodes teamed up with Wade Barrett to take on the team of WWE Tag Team Champions Kane and Daniel Bryan with Randy Orton. Now, for the past few weeks, Orton has slowly been doing and saying things that I assumed would eventually lead to a heel turn, and I thought that would continue last night with him teaming up with fan favorites Kane and Bryan. Instead, after the match (which Kane, Bryan and Orton won after Orton his Sandow with an RKO), Bryan and Kane forced Orton into a group hug, after which Orton just shrugged it off and posed for the crowd. A more heelish move would have been for Orton to refuse the hug, or even get physical with either Superstar as he attempted it, so I’m not sure what the deal with Orton is now.
Earlier in the night, The Miz had been watching Cesaro defeat Kingston when Primo, Epico and Rosa Mendes approached him and made fun of his appearance on MizTV on Monday night with Ric Flair. Miz challenged either Superstar to a match and it ended up being Primo, who surprisingly held his own, got in a lot of offense and nearly defeated Miz. In the end, however, Epico tried to distract Miz but Primo ended up knocking into him on the ring apron instead, which led to Miz putting Primo in the Figure Four Leg Lock and forcing him to tap out for the win.
New Divas Champion Kaitlyn (looking hotter than ever) had her first match since winning the title against Aksana, a quick match that the champion won fairly quickly. It wasn’t the best Divas match I’ve seen, nor was it the worst, but with Eve Torres now gone from the company, the rest of the roster is going to have to really step it up to fill the void. Of course, there are also some Divas down in the minors on the NXT roster that would serve as great opponents for Kaitlyn and the other Divas….
The aforementioned tag team main event was the last match of the night and, as I said, it was good and fairly entertaining. All four Superstars got a chance to battle each other and show off their offense in a match that actually lasted a solid 15 minutes. Unfortunately, for me the match was ruined by the ending, which did not make any sense at all. First, Del Rio put Ziggler in the Cross Armbreaker, but as soon as Ziggler was about to tap out, Big Show broke up the pin. Sheamus then got in the ring and hit Big Show with White Noise, which caused Big Show to roll out of the ring. Del Rio then grabbed a bucket of water and splashed it all over Big Show, who was so irate that the stormed off backstage. Back in the ring, the referee counted to 10 and declared Del Rio & Sheamus the winners via countout. The reason this ending makes no sense is because Ziggler was the legal man, so if anyone was going to get counted out it should be him, but the referee was clearly looking at Big Show while making the count. There have been plenty of tag team matches where one partner leaves the match and the other is forced to fend for himself, but instead, the referee just gave the win to the other team. If anything, Big Show and Ziggler could have been disqualified, since Big Show left and Ziggler was nursing his injury from the Cross Armbreaker at ringside, but not counted out.
The other part of the show that bothered me was the recap from Raw this past Monday night which showed the segment with The Rock and CM Punk (including the “Rock Concert”) in its entirety. At over 15 minutes long, that time could have been devoted to a new match or as more time given to one of the matches already on the books. In reality, is there anyone who watches Smackdown that doesn’t either watch Raw or at least watch the highlights online?
My Squared Circle 