BRM Reviews the 11/7/2014 Smackdown

[Big Red Machine]

STEEL CAGE MATCH FOR THE WWE TAG TEAM TITLES: Goldust & Stardust(c) vs. The Usos- 6.25/10
Well, we have a cage match in a situation where it makes no sense in which two guys who just recently lost cleanly to the tag champs are getting a title shot for no reason... so we might as well make it the opener to, because this match means completely nothing.
It's a steel cage match, but they're still following standard tag team rules. Why? Because this isn't a blood feud, so even though there are no DQ's they're going to follow those rules anyway because of... let's say a gentleman's agreement. But again, if this is just a regular tag team match that happens to be in a cage, WHY IS IT IN A STEEL CAGE?!
The match itself was fine, but the whole situation made it hard for me to care. And the finish, which seems like the sort of thing you would do to continue a feud, also makes no sense here. A cage match is supposed to be a blow-off, and there is already another team that has a victory over the champs. Why would this feud need to continue?
Oh. And what was this finish, you ask? The Usos hit a superplex then a big splash on Goldust, but Cody quickly cradled the Uso making the pin and picked up the victory. Again: why did this have to happen in a steel cage?


Orton has a kayfabe concussion and will be out of action for an undetermined amount of time.

KANE PROMO- an awesome "you're either with us or against us" promo.
Also, we finally got the answer to why there "needed" to be a steel cage match in the opener of tonight's show: so Kane could punish Dolph for turning the Authority down by booking himself vs. Dolph in a steel cage tonight. Um... WHY COULDN'T HE JUST DO THAT, ANYWAY?! Why couldn't they just announce BEFORE THE SHOW (you know, when it might get you some extra viewers), that Kane would face Dolph Ziggler in a steel cage tonight! They're the Authority! They can book cage matches whenever they feel like it!
In fact, didn't Kane beat Dolph last week on Smackdown? So why not announce in advance that you are doing Kane vs. Ziggler for the IC Title in a steel cage. That should get some extra viewers. Then you can play it up as the Authority abusing their power by doing whatever they can to punish Dolph for rejecting them and to serve as a warning for anyone else who might be thinking about joining Team Cena.
In fact, you could do a lot with that match to push the Survivor Series match. For example, why not have Kane order the referee to open the door, and ask for anyone who wants to prove his loyalty to the Authority to come out and help kick the sh*t out of Dolph. With some many people clamoring to get a shot in on Dolph, you could have them start to brawl with each other (or, alternatively, have some babyfaces try to protect Dolph), and allow Dolph to escape the cage during the schmoz and thus circumvent the Authority's cheating and retain his title. You could then use this to lead to a mini-story within the great story where the Authority tries to get the title off of Dolph, but he manages to outsmart them or out-wrestle them and retain the title, so Dolph actually looks important going into Survivor Series, and setting up some big spot with him and Kane during the Survivor Series match. That seems to tell a much better story and make a lot more sense than randomly booking one cage match just so you can book a second one with no hype. Just saying.

Kane then calls out someone the Authority wants to recruit for their team. Cesaro comes out, but he wasn't the guy Kane was referring to. Cesaro cut a good promo, so Kane books him against the guy he was trying to recruit: Ryback.

CESARO vs. RYBACK- 4.5/10
Cesaro worked over Ryback's head with both sleeper holds and strikes to try to get some sort of knockout win, but Ryback still won. Kane wanted to talk to Ryback, but Ryback left ringside before Kane could talk to him.

R-TRUTH vs. ADAM ROSE (w/the Exotic Express)- no rating, bad segment.
Rose stole Kenny Omega's stop sign gimmick. Truth danced, which caused the bunny to decide to dance in a similar fashion. he even jumped up on the apron to do it. What an attention whore. Rose went over to yell at the Bunny, but while this was happening, Truth rolled him up. That wasn't very nice of Truth, but Rose should know to keep his eyes on his opponent at all times. In other words, no one came out of this looking good in any way.
Rose then shoved the Bunny down. Everyone was shocked and reacted by booking loudly... aside from JBL, whose reaction was to shout "KICK THE BUNNY IN THE HEAD!" The Rosebuds then all started to cheer. The Bunny still wanted to hang out with them, but Rose yelled at him. Of course, now that he is a heel, Rose's shelf-life on the main roster as anything but a jobber is going to be exactly as long as this feud with the Bunny lasts. And I'm okay with that (assuming, of course, that this feud with the Bunny lasts no more than a week or two).
In Rose's defense, the bunny really was acting like a jackass.

THE PEEP SHOW WITH SPECIAL GUEST DEAN AMBROSE- bad. Christian plugged the PPV. Ambrose cut a promo... then Bray came out, did his magical appearing, cut a promo about Dean Ambrose having daddy issues because his father doesn't send him postcards from prison, and then offered Ambrose a spot in the Wyatt Family. When Dean charged at him, he did more magic, disappearing a few times, and also taking over the TV screens, which Dean couldn't possibly see, so it makes you wonder why Bray did it. As I'm sure I've said before, these writer have no idea what to do with Bray, so they just have him do the same magic crap every week. Bray Wyatt is the sort of character who NEEDS long-term planning (indeed, he has been responsible for many delays in my fantasy booking), and I'll bet anything that WWE didn't put effort into anything of the sort for him once the Cena feud was over.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS AJ- great segment.
AJ cut a promo saying that she understands that Brie only slapped her because Nikki ordered her to. brie apologized for this... but then Nikki jumped AJ from behind. Despite the fact that her plan worked to perfection, Nikki still shoved Brie and ordered her to "be more sincere next time." GREAT heel stuff.

TYSON KIDD & RAE-COOL BACKSTAGE- Tyson was bragging about his win over Sheamus. Nattie came up and was unhappy that Tyson hadn't returned some texts. Layla and Summer got catty. It was dumb.

NATALYA (w/Tyson Kidd) vs. SUMMER RAE (w/Layla)- no rating. Good segment.
Tyson was being great on commentary, so Cole yelled at him to go support Nattie instead, so he tried to give her advice in the middle of the match, which distracted her and resulted in her getting rolled up.

Ryback vs. Cena has been announced for Raw. Yeah... that's going to a double DQ because of a run-in.

RENEE YOUNG INTERVIEWS DOLPH ZIGGLER- Triple H showed up and said that Orton and Cena aren't here to save Dolph from Kane tonight, and offered Dolph another chance to join Team Authority.

STEEL CAGE MATCH: Dolph Ziggler vs. Kane- 6.25/10
The story of this match was that Kane, the heel, would beat the crap out of Dolph, then Dolph, the babyface, would hit one counter and attempt to run away like a coward. The finish was cool, but this was just such a pointless match. And if Dolph was going to win, why not make it an IC Title match so that Kane's win over Dolph last week actually had some consequence.

A mixed episode of Smackdown. There was some good stuff on here, but it was a major logical fail.