BRM Reviews the 7/19/2013 Smackdown
Posted: Jul 21st, '13, 20:28
OPENING SEGMENT- Complete and total crap, but at least it was newsworthy. Teddy says that Vince will be here tonight to give him a job evaluation.
Teddy says that he doesn't know much about Brad Maddox's qualifications for his job as the GM of Raw, but he is certain that "they've got to be better than Vickie Guerrero's." This really pissed me off for a few reasons.
1) Vickie has been a GM of either Raw or Smackdown for the better part of the past six years, while Brad Maddox is a former referee who wasn't even good a being a referee with no real experience at running anything at all. Saying this just makes Teddy look like an idiot. Not something you want to do when you have a job evaluation coming up that night.
2) Even if Vickie didn't have credentials that blew Maddox's out of the water, Teddy's job evaluation is being performed by Vince McMahon, who, if you'll remember, was the one who was in favor of keeping Vickie on as the GM.
3) Clearly Teddy did not understand anything in the segment where Vickie got fired. Vince strongly implied that he hired Maddox to punish the WWE Universe for wanting Vickie fired because he thought Maddox would do a horrible job and everyone would see how good Vickie was in comparison. If the whole thing is based around the fact that Maddox's credentials are not even close to Vickie's why (from a non-kayfabe point of view) would you have Teddy try to say the opposite?
GRRRR!!!!
Anyway, Booker T returns to Smackdown, and got a HUGE pop. Then Vince came out and said that only one person be in charge of Smackdown. And only one person is in charge of Smackdown! It's Booker T. He is the GM and Teddy is his "Senior Advisor." They both have booking power, but Booker can overrule Teddy if he wants to. If the issue is having two different people with booking power, then why did no one deal with it when it first became an issue ALMOST A YEAR AGO?
Vince then asks them what matches they would make for tonight if they were the GM of Smackdown. Both men take a moment to think, and then Teddy books Jericho vs. Axel for the IC Title while Booker books Orton vs. Del Rio. I have a bigger question, though: Why do either of these men deserve to be the GM of Smackdown IF THE DON'T HAVE THE F*CKING CARD BOOKED BEFORE THE START OF THE SHOW?!
Brad Maddox then shows up and says that Vince should make him the GM of Smackdown, too. We then got a face-palmingly stupid drum-roll before Vince announced that the permanent GM of Smackdown will be... VICKIE GUERRERO!... and me, of all people, who loves the babyfaces and hates the heels... actually popped huge for this, because of how idiotic and semi-competent this segment had Booker T and especially Teddy Long looking.
I have to ask, though, why is it just Vince here? Where are Steph and/or Hunter? Do they just not care about Smackdown? And can Vince really hire someone to an important position like GM of Smackdown without Steph and/or Hunter's consent? Come to think of it, why did Vince alone get to hire Maddox? Shouldn't Steph & Hunter have had a say, too? And now that I think about it, that segment showed us that the combination of Steph and Hunter can overrule Vince, and Steph and Hunter just fired Vickie for being an incompetent GM... so what is to stop them from just firing Vickie again?
Vickie then cut a short promo about hating the fans that came just short of being mediocre. Meanwhile, in the background, Teddy, Maddox and Booker all stood around angrily, though only Booker did a good job of it. Maddox wasn't bad, but Teddy was just horrible.
Not that I am complaining, because Swagger and Ziggler have more than proven their ability to put on great matches for us multiple times this spring, but... that's just it... we've seen this tons of times already in the fast three months. Why not give us Dolph vs. Cesaro to change it up a little?
DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. JACK SWAGGER (w/Antonio Cesaro & Zeb Coulter)- 3/10
Remember what I said about these guys giving us great matches? Well not even they could do much with four minutes. After the match, Ziggler cut a promo saying that he is sorry that he didn't dump AJ sooner... but he said it in the most heelish way possible, which seems counter-productive. Then we saw AJ freaking out backstage... and she and Big E. almost kissed. If they had, I would have thrown a f*cking brick, because that would make SIX different love interests for AJ in FIFTEEN MONTHS! WWE has done a lot of things that have pissed me off over the years, but I will never forgive WWE for taking the best character they had and turning her into a psycho slut for no reason. Props to AJ and Big E. for their acting here, though. They did a perfect job.
SETH ROLLINS & ROMAN REIGNS vs. THE USOS- no rating. Good segment.
The match never gets started because they are brawling too much. Ambrose then comes out and helps his Shield compatriots beat down the Usos until Mark Henry comes out and makes the save, officially become a babyface. This turn was a stupid idea.
FROM THE VAULT MATCH- whoever came up with the idea of wasting time that could be spent building new stars by showing random matches from the 80's should be flogged, fired, and then shot.
DANIEL BRYAN vs. WADE BARRETT- 3.5/10
These two were reportedly supposed to get a lot of time on Raw, but the match got nixed because Punk and Heyman went too long. If WWE nixed the Raw match and gave it's remaining time (about eight minutes) to RVD vs. Jericho, rather than just shortening the match and doing it on Raw, you would assume that this was because it was important to WWE to give Dragon and Barrett a lot of time. Knowing about the cancelled match and the reason for it, I was very excited when this match started, thinking we were going to get a nice long wrestling match. Well... this went just over TWO MINUTES! And what's even more frustrating is that this took place right after they wasted almost ten minutes on the f*cking pointless "From the Vault" match! GRRRRRRR!!!!
VICKIE SLAPS MADDOX- well... he kind of deserved it for being a dick at Money in the Bank
MIZ TV WITH PAUL HEYMAN- Heyman was decent. Miz really seemed to serve no purpose at all here. I guess they just wanted to have him stare down Axel when Heyman brought Axel out to the ring. I'm not sure why, though, seeing as how Axel beat Miz completely cleanly at Money in the Bank.
WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE MATCH: Curtis Axel(c) (w/Paul Heyman) vs. Chris Jericho- 6.5/10
I understand that they want to have an exciting match, but is Jericho's last match for at least the next few months... did he really need to kick out of Axel's finisher? Aside from this, the match was very good, and Walls of Jericho spot was fantastic. If I hadn't known Jericho was headed out after this match, I would have been certain Axel was about to tap.
RYBACK ATTACKS JERICHO- Oh come on! I thought this crappy feud was over with! Please don't tell me we'll have to suffer through it again when Jericho comes back.
SANDOW & CODY SEGMENT- great.
ROB VAN DAM vs. DARREN YOUNG (w/Titus O'Neil)- 4/10
Yeah, Darren mostly got squashed here, but he showed a lot of personality, which was good.
VICKIE & TEDDY BACKSTAGE- Vickie decides to humiliate Teddy by having security escort him out of the building (as revenge for Teddy doing the same to her last week), but apparently she waited an hour and a half do so.
RANDY ORTON vs. ALBERTO DEL RIO- 7/10
A great match, but there is no reason for Orton to win here unless this is to set up him challenging Del Rio at Summer Slam (which shouldn't happen because he has the MITB briefcase for the WWE Title). Anything else you are doing with Randy at Summer Slam won't be hurt by him tapping out to Del Rio here.
Overall, I'm not going to call this episode of Smackdown bad because it hit all of the important points in a (mostly) effective way, but I was very disappointed that many of the matches got as little time as they did.
Teddy says that he doesn't know much about Brad Maddox's qualifications for his job as the GM of Raw, but he is certain that "they've got to be better than Vickie Guerrero's." This really pissed me off for a few reasons.
1) Vickie has been a GM of either Raw or Smackdown for the better part of the past six years, while Brad Maddox is a former referee who wasn't even good a being a referee with no real experience at running anything at all. Saying this just makes Teddy look like an idiot. Not something you want to do when you have a job evaluation coming up that night.
2) Even if Vickie didn't have credentials that blew Maddox's out of the water, Teddy's job evaluation is being performed by Vince McMahon, who, if you'll remember, was the one who was in favor of keeping Vickie on as the GM.
3) Clearly Teddy did not understand anything in the segment where Vickie got fired. Vince strongly implied that he hired Maddox to punish the WWE Universe for wanting Vickie fired because he thought Maddox would do a horrible job and everyone would see how good Vickie was in comparison. If the whole thing is based around the fact that Maddox's credentials are not even close to Vickie's why (from a non-kayfabe point of view) would you have Teddy try to say the opposite?
GRRRR!!!!
Anyway, Booker T returns to Smackdown, and got a HUGE pop. Then Vince came out and said that only one person be in charge of Smackdown. And only one person is in charge of Smackdown! It's Booker T. He is the GM and Teddy is his "Senior Advisor." They both have booking power, but Booker can overrule Teddy if he wants to. If the issue is having two different people with booking power, then why did no one deal with it when it first became an issue ALMOST A YEAR AGO?
Vince then asks them what matches they would make for tonight if they were the GM of Smackdown. Both men take a moment to think, and then Teddy books Jericho vs. Axel for the IC Title while Booker books Orton vs. Del Rio. I have a bigger question, though: Why do either of these men deserve to be the GM of Smackdown IF THE DON'T HAVE THE F*CKING CARD BOOKED BEFORE THE START OF THE SHOW?!
Brad Maddox then shows up and says that Vince should make him the GM of Smackdown, too. We then got a face-palmingly stupid drum-roll before Vince announced that the permanent GM of Smackdown will be... VICKIE GUERRERO!... and me, of all people, who loves the babyfaces and hates the heels... actually popped huge for this, because of how idiotic and semi-competent this segment had Booker T and especially Teddy Long looking.
I have to ask, though, why is it just Vince here? Where are Steph and/or Hunter? Do they just not care about Smackdown? And can Vince really hire someone to an important position like GM of Smackdown without Steph and/or Hunter's consent? Come to think of it, why did Vince alone get to hire Maddox? Shouldn't Steph & Hunter have had a say, too? And now that I think about it, that segment showed us that the combination of Steph and Hunter can overrule Vince, and Steph and Hunter just fired Vickie for being an incompetent GM... so what is to stop them from just firing Vickie again?
Vickie then cut a short promo about hating the fans that came just short of being mediocre. Meanwhile, in the background, Teddy, Maddox and Booker all stood around angrily, though only Booker did a good job of it. Maddox wasn't bad, but Teddy was just horrible.
Not that I am complaining, because Swagger and Ziggler have more than proven their ability to put on great matches for us multiple times this spring, but... that's just it... we've seen this tons of times already in the fast three months. Why not give us Dolph vs. Cesaro to change it up a little?
DOLPH ZIGGLER vs. JACK SWAGGER (w/Antonio Cesaro & Zeb Coulter)- 3/10
Remember what I said about these guys giving us great matches? Well not even they could do much with four minutes. After the match, Ziggler cut a promo saying that he is sorry that he didn't dump AJ sooner... but he said it in the most heelish way possible, which seems counter-productive. Then we saw AJ freaking out backstage... and she and Big E. almost kissed. If they had, I would have thrown a f*cking brick, because that would make SIX different love interests for AJ in FIFTEEN MONTHS! WWE has done a lot of things that have pissed me off over the years, but I will never forgive WWE for taking the best character they had and turning her into a psycho slut for no reason. Props to AJ and Big E. for their acting here, though. They did a perfect job.
SETH ROLLINS & ROMAN REIGNS vs. THE USOS- no rating. Good segment.
The match never gets started because they are brawling too much. Ambrose then comes out and helps his Shield compatriots beat down the Usos until Mark Henry comes out and makes the save, officially become a babyface. This turn was a stupid idea.
FROM THE VAULT MATCH- whoever came up with the idea of wasting time that could be spent building new stars by showing random matches from the 80's should be flogged, fired, and then shot.
DANIEL BRYAN vs. WADE BARRETT- 3.5/10
These two were reportedly supposed to get a lot of time on Raw, but the match got nixed because Punk and Heyman went too long. If WWE nixed the Raw match and gave it's remaining time (about eight minutes) to RVD vs. Jericho, rather than just shortening the match and doing it on Raw, you would assume that this was because it was important to WWE to give Dragon and Barrett a lot of time. Knowing about the cancelled match and the reason for it, I was very excited when this match started, thinking we were going to get a nice long wrestling match. Well... this went just over TWO MINUTES! And what's even more frustrating is that this took place right after they wasted almost ten minutes on the f*cking pointless "From the Vault" match! GRRRRRRR!!!!
VICKIE SLAPS MADDOX- well... he kind of deserved it for being a dick at Money in the Bank
MIZ TV WITH PAUL HEYMAN- Heyman was decent. Miz really seemed to serve no purpose at all here. I guess they just wanted to have him stare down Axel when Heyman brought Axel out to the ring. I'm not sure why, though, seeing as how Axel beat Miz completely cleanly at Money in the Bank.
WWE INTERCONTINENTAL TITLE MATCH: Curtis Axel(c) (w/Paul Heyman) vs. Chris Jericho- 6.5/10
I understand that they want to have an exciting match, but is Jericho's last match for at least the next few months... did he really need to kick out of Axel's finisher? Aside from this, the match was very good, and Walls of Jericho spot was fantastic. If I hadn't known Jericho was headed out after this match, I would have been certain Axel was about to tap.
RYBACK ATTACKS JERICHO- Oh come on! I thought this crappy feud was over with! Please don't tell me we'll have to suffer through it again when Jericho comes back.
SANDOW & CODY SEGMENT- great.
ROB VAN DAM vs. DARREN YOUNG (w/Titus O'Neil)- 4/10
Yeah, Darren mostly got squashed here, but he showed a lot of personality, which was good.
VICKIE & TEDDY BACKSTAGE- Vickie decides to humiliate Teddy by having security escort him out of the building (as revenge for Teddy doing the same to her last week), but apparently she waited an hour and a half do so.
RANDY ORTON vs. ALBERTO DEL RIO- 7/10
A great match, but there is no reason for Orton to win here unless this is to set up him challenging Del Rio at Summer Slam (which shouldn't happen because he has the MITB briefcase for the WWE Title). Anything else you are doing with Randy at Summer Slam won't be hurt by him tapping out to Del Rio here.
Overall, I'm not going to call this episode of Smackdown bad because it hit all of the important points in a (mostly) effective way, but I was very disappointed that many of the matches got as little time as they did.