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SMACKDOWN HITS

Batista and Mark Henry: Batista’s solo promo was pretty bad, but things got better after he was interrupted by Mark Henry. Henry was strong on the mic, and Batista responded well. Batista really needs to feed off an opponent in interviews as opposed to just cutting a solo promo. He is much better interacting with other wrestlers than just talking. Henry is a good talker and their interchange was strong. All I could think though is that it is too bad that neither guy can really wrestle, or I would look forward to their match.

Yang vs. Noble: This was a solid, but short match with some nice action. Jimmy Wang Yang got a few chances to show off some of his nice high flying moves which are always fun to watch. Jamie Noble showed some of his in ring skills as well. The distraction by Shannon Moore was amusing and continued the feud that has been building up the last few weeks between him and Noble. With Hornswoggle being featured heavily with Vince McMahon for the time being, it makes sense to have Noble move on for a while to a feud with Moore, while reminding the audience that Noble’s real beef is with the Leprechaun.

MVP and Matt Hardy: Just as the Christian Coalition has been a highlight week in and week out on Impact, MVP and Matt Hardy have been the highlight week in and week out on Smackdown. They have great chemistry together, whether it be in scenes like their football throwing contest, or in the ring, whether it be when teaming up against Deuce & Domino, or facing each other (which will happen again eventually). Their match this week was solid in terms of wrestling action, but very good in terms of Sports Entertainment and advancing their storyline. Their team is the best reason to tune in to Smackdown right now.

Mysterio, JBL, and Finlay: When Michael Cole was interviewing Rey Mysterio, I kept waiting for someone to interrupt. I assumed it would be Finlay just because there are no other heels on the show. So I was pleasantly surprised when John Bradshaw Layfield interrupted from the announce table instead. I enjoyed his berating of Michael Cole for his softball questions to Mysterio. His interplay with Mysterio was good as well. Mysterio is similar to Batista in that he is much better playing off an opponent than giving a solo promo. Ultimately, I was right that it was Finlay who came out to attack Mysterio at the request of JBL. They could have done a much better job of explaining why Finlay come out, but I was intrigued enough by JBL’s involvement that I can wait and see if they explain in better next week. Finlay vs. Mysterio has a chance to be a good feud.

Wedding (the good): As with so many long drawn out non-wrestling segments in WWE there was both good and bad in the Kristal and Teddy Long wedding. We will start with the good. As with all WWE weddings, they did go all out to have it feel like a special moment, with the wrestlers from all three brands, the set, and Jagged Edge performing. I enjoyed seeing what various wrestlers were wearing. Hornswoggle as usual was hilarious, in his initial appearance, his squabbling with Coach, and his ultimate interruption of the ceremony. Jillian Hall was great as well. I always enjoy a Godfather sighting and his presence was amusing too. In fact, the whole scene had several very funny moments.

SMACKDOWN MISSES

Smackdown Hosts: I could have done without Maria and the Ying Yang Twins hosting Smackdown. The Twins were very annoying. Having wrestlers arrive to give it a special occasion feel was o.k., but none of it was particularly interesting or entertaining to watch. There was enough pomp and circumstance (not a Randy Savage reference) in the rest of the show that they could have done without these scenes. In fact, there were only three cuts to the hosts during the show. That is good as it kept the annoyance level down, but why even bother to have them for just three appearances?

Batista vs. Henry: As much as I enjoyed the interplay early on between Batista and Mark Henry, I certainly didn’t enjoy their match, which isn’t surprising. It was short and predictably interrupted by The Great Khali. The real problem here is that they are trying to build up Mark Henry as a top level heel. He already lost to the Undertaker at Unforgiven. He announced he has a rematch next week against the Dead Man, but Batista really dominated the match while it lasted. So why should I care about Henry vs. Undertaker? Henry just lost to him, and struggled against Batista. That is not the way to build interest in a big free t.v. match. Until Edge comes back from injury, it seems like Smackdown will be doomed to have nothing but big, slow and lumbering wrestlers in their top feuds.

Wedding (the bad): While the wedding did have plenty of humor, it wasn’t all good. For one thing, it just went on too long. I am not a fan of talking segments going on for that long. Plus, with the three appearances by the hosts mentioned above, and two backstage scenes in the bride and groom’s dressing rooms, the wedding was way too dominant on the show. While the humor worked, there was so much, they could have done with less. The biggest problem is that with the long history of disastrous WWE weddings, the fans have been waiting to see what would go wrong ever since Teddy Long proposed a few months back. When you know that something will go wrong, it just lacks a certain amount of unpredictability. Ultimately what went wrong was Teddy Long having a heart attack. That seemed like the cheesiest way out of this wedding. I guess it was less predictable than having someone interrupt, but where will this lead? At least an interruption would lead to a program of some sort. I have been worried for a long time that something would happen to cause Long to not be the General Manager any more, thus leaving Vickie Guerrero as the GM. It looks like they are going that direction, which I am not looking forward to. Plus, Long’s acting was terrible, but I guess I shouldn’t expect much.

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's Hitlist Specialist, providing his point of view in the Torch's hitlist format for Raw, Smackdown, ECW, and TNA Impact each week. Email him at jmezz-torch@sbcglobal.net.

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