{"id":104662,"date":"2020-09-18T09:08:02","date_gmt":"2020-09-18T14:08:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/?p=104662"},"modified":"2020-09-18T09:08:02","modified_gmt":"2020-09-18T14:08:02","slug":"wwe-friday-night-smackdown-primer-9-18-samoan-street-fight-sasha-to-speak-a-j-vs-sami-a-moment-of-bliss-for-nikki","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2020\/09\/18\/wwe-friday-night-smackdown-primer-9-18-samoan-street-fight-sasha-to-speak-a-j-vs-sami-a-moment-of-bliss-for-nikki\/","title":{"rendered":"WWE FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN PRIMER 9\/18:  Samoan Street Fight, Sasha to Speak, A.J. vs. Sami, A Moment of Bliss for Nikki"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"pwtor-3444719238\" class=\"pwtor-before-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><hr \/><b>SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)... <\/b>\r\n\r\n<iframe src=\"https:\/\/widget.spreaker.com\/player?show_id=3076978&theme=light&playlist=false&playlist-continuous=false&autoplay=false&live-autoplay=false&chapters-image=true&episode_image_position=right&hide-logo=false&hide-likes=false&hide-comments=false&hide-sharing=false&hide-download=true\" width=\"100%\" height=\"140px\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\r\n<hr \/><\/div><h3>WWE FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN PRIMER<br \/>\nSEPTEMBER 18, 2020<br \/>\nORLANDO, FL. AT THE THUNDERDOME IN THE AMWAY CENTER<br \/>\nAIRS ON FOX NETWORK, 8:00 p.m. EST<br \/>\nBY FRANK PETEANI (@FrankPeteani), PWTORCH.COM SPECIALIST<\/h3>\n<p><em>Announcers: Michael Cole and Corey Graves<\/em><\/p>\n<h4>Top Three Developments from Last Week<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Bayley explained why she betrayed her best friend Sasha Banks following their ill-fated attempt to regain the WWE Women\u2019s Tag Team Championship.<\/li>\n<li>Alexa Bliss gave her best friend Nikki Cross a Sister Abigail and then walked out on in the middle of a Fatal Four-Way to determine the next challenger to Bayley for the Smackdown Women\u2019s Championship.<\/li>\n<li>Jey Uso and his cousin Roman Reigns, the current Universal Champion, defeated Sheamus &amp; King Corbin. Roman did not appear until late in the match and scored the pin following his tagging himself in the match and hitting Sheamus with a spear. Roman and Jey stared at each other intensely while raising each other\u2019s hand to celebrate the victory.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Items Advertised by WWE<\/h4>\n<p>The top three developments lead to the advertised items for tonight, as we are a little over a week away from Clash of Champions. Here\u2019s what\u2019s on tap thus far:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Roman Reigns &amp; Jey Uso to face Sheamus &amp; King Corbin in Samoan Street Fight<\/li>\n<li>Sasha Banks to respond to Bayley for first time since devastating attack<\/li>\n<li>Alexa Bliss welcomes Nikki Cross as special guest on \u201cA Moment of Bliss\u201d<\/li>\n<li>A.J. Styles to battle Sami Zayn as Intercontinental Title argument heats up<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Samoan Street Fight: Universal Champion Roman Reigns &amp; Jey Uso vs. King Corbin &amp; Sheamus<\/h4>\n<p>Roman Reigns will defend the Universal Championship against his cousin Jey Uso at Clash of Champions. These days Roman is flanked by Paul Heyman, a former rival from his days feuding with Brock Lesnar. Last week, all three men were in the ring discussing their upcoming match. Roman told Jey he was doing the family proud but reminded him that he kicked his ass as a kid and will do so at the Clash. King Corbin showed up and expressed his frustration at the \u201cnepotism\u201d that was going on and hated watching people abuse their power (look in the mirror, dork). Sheamus came out and agreed with Corbin, and said it was unfair because they had no time to prepare for Jey. (didn\u2019t Sheamus and Corbin have a beef a few weeks ago?) Jey offered to team with Roman against Corbin and Sheamus later in the show, and then went at it with them while Roman looked on.<\/p>\n<p>In the top three developments I talked about what happened in that match. Tonight, a rematch has been made only it will be a Samoan Street Fight.<\/p>\n<p><em>Frank\u2019s Analysis: I can\u2019t imagine the difference between a Samoan Street Fight and any other street fight or no-DQ match. I get the sense Roman\u2019s character is reluctant to act the way he\u2019s been acting, and Jey senses he\u2019s being pulled to the \u201cdark side\u201d with Paul Heyman. He knows his own family and is more forgiving as I suggested to Wade Keller on the post show last week. I also sense there will be issues with Jey and Roman tonight seeing as they won last week, but Roman showed up late. Why the referee started that match without Roman present is still annoying, regardless of the story WWE is trying to tell.<\/em><\/p>\n<h4>Sasha Banks Responds to Bayley<\/h4>\n<p>We found prior to Raw this week that Sasha Banks would return to Smackdown tonight to address Bayley\u2019s attack on her a few weeks ago. Last week, Bayley explained herself. She claimed that Sasha was following her for a while, going back to when Bayley first won the Raw Women\u2019s Championship. She claimed she did so to keep her close but also needed to become Two Belts Banks seeing the success Bayley was having as Smackdown Women\u2019s Champion. She said while Sasha was using her, she was doing the same and never cared about their friendship. Sasha is of no use to her.<\/p>\n<p>Sasha returns tonight to respond to Bayley. Both women have been on relatively quiet on social media, at least regarding each other. This isn\u2019t the first time Bayley has attacked Sasha. She did so two years ago on an episode of Raw, which led them to have to take anger management classes. Things are much different this time as Bayley is the Smackdown Women\u2019s Champion, and I\u2019m sure Sasha is targeting that title as well as vindication for the attack.<\/p>\n<p><em>Frank\u2019s Analysis: I said this on both the Wade Keller post show and with Greg Parks on Wrestling Night in America. I thought the turn was well-executed, but I didn\u2019t understand why Bayley picked that night. Did she feel like Sasha was dead weight because she couldn\u2019t retain the Raw Women\u2019s Championship and they lost the tag team titles? Sasha did get \u201churt\u201d in the match. She should have said so unless she was implying that in the \u201cyou\u2019re of no use to me.\u201d I don\u2019t know, but we\u2019ll see what Sasha has to say. We must see the whole thing play out. With Bayley set to defend against Nikki Cross and Hell in a Cell around the corner, I wonder if they pivot to Bayley vs. Sasha inside the cell.<\/em><\/p><div id=\"pwtor-4230064237\" class=\"pwtor-content pwtor-entity-placement\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x250\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<h4>A Moment of Bliss: Guest Nikki Cross<\/h4>\n<p>As I mentioned in the top three developments, the friendship between Nikki Cross and Alexa Bliss may have went south as Alexa gave Nikki Bray Wyatt\u2019s finisher Sister Abigail on the outside of the ring. This was during a fatal four-way match Nikki eventually won over Alexa, Lacey Evans, and Tamina to earn the right to challenge Bayley for the Smackdown Women\u2019s Championship at Clash of Champions.<\/p>\n<p>Things have been odd between Nikki and Alexa ever since Alexa was attacked by \u201cThe Fiend\u201d Bray Wyatt during his feud with Braun Strowman recently. Alexa admitted to being captivated by Bray and started wearing dreadlocks in her hair like that of which Bray wears. She smashed the mug she gave Nikki but apologized a week later. Then last week happened, and she walked out in a trance. Tonight, she welcomes Nikki into her occasional talk show A Moment of Bliss. Nikki wants to \u201csave\u201d Alexa, as she says here in a WWE exclusive:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Nikki Cross promises to save Alexa Bliss: SmackDown Exclusive, Sept. 11, 2020\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0tLkwPqsqBw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><em>Frank\u2019s Analysis: I\u2019m worried about Nikki losing another championship match to Bayley, because I think another loss hurts her. Maybe I\u2019m wrong, but I also understand Smackdown is in a weird spot because there are no other babyfaces worth putting in the title match. This may sound crazy, but instead of trading Mandy Rose to Raw you could almost have used her and let Nikki and Alexa build their feud on their own. It\u2019s a moot point now, but I thought of it, and had to get it out there. That said, it\u2019s clear they\u2019re going towards Alexa returning to her heel role and feuding with Nikki to start. There\u2019s an outside chance this is all a smokescreen and Nikki has been corroborating with the Fiend to mess with Alexa, which would be interesting, but I don\u2019t think they\u2019re going that way.<\/em><\/p>\n<h4>A.J. Styles vs. Sami Zayn<\/h4>\n<p>Sami Zayn has made some noise upon his return to Smackdown several weeks ago, as he has claimed to be the rightful Intercontinental Champion. He won the title before WrestleMania and defended it against Daniel Bryan, but shortly thereafter was unable to compete. A tournament was held to determine a new champion, which was won by A.J. Styles. He held the title until just before SummerSlam when he lost to Jeff Hardy.<\/p>\n<p>Last week, Jeff defended against A.J., but the match ended when Sami attacked A.J. He then attacked Jeff and held up his belt and yelled he was the real champion. Later, A.J. said he can beat Sami and Jeff in \u201cany match.\u201d Sami walked in on the trainer checking on Jeff, and they started brawling. Tonight, Sami goes one-on-one with A.J. It\u2019s not their first dance as they feuded over the WWE Championship back in late 2017-early 2018 when Sami aligned with Kevin Owens. Sami spoke in a WWE exclusive, making his case to still be Intercontinental Champion:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Sami Zayn continues stating his championship case: WWE Network Exclusive, Sept. 11, 2020\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/d7nYwocfPOI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><em>Frank\u2019s Analysis: I don\u2019t see where else they\u2019re going but a triple threat match at Clash of Champions. They could do a triple ladder match, as a caller suggested on the post show last week. They could hang both Sami\u2019s and Jeff\u2019s title belts the way they did it with Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon for their ladder match at WrestleMania 10. I love Sami\u2019s act, and the way everyone is playing their role in this story. I wouldn\u2019t hate it if the end point is Sami with the title.<\/em><\/p>\n<h4>Other Match Results and Segments from Last Week<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Lucha House Party (Gran Metalik &amp; Kalisto) defeated Smackdown Tag Team Champions Cesaro &amp; Shinsuke Nakamura in a non-title match. During the match, Raw Tag Team Champions the Street Profits (Montez Ford &amp; Angelo Dawkins) were shown having a party in Cesaro &amp; Nakamura\u2019s \u201cchampionship lounge.\u201d Here\u2019s Lucha House Party in a WWE exclusive and Cesaro &amp; Nakamura:<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Lucha House Party carry celebration backstage: SmackDown Exclusive, Sept. 11, 2020\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/czAiEbNqiH4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Shinsuke Nakamura &amp; Cesaro survey \u201cChampions Lounge\u201d damage: SmackDown Exclusive, Sept. 11, 2020\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/cqaenGBuba0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Money in the Bank contract holder Otis defeated John Morrison. I\u2019m sorry but they\u2019ve made Morrison a no-good stiff and it\u2019s dumb that Otis has Money in the Bank. They did more goofiness with the briefcase that I don\u2019t care to recap in detail.<\/li>\n<li>Another vignette was shown with a \u201cmystery\u201d blond woman.<\/li>\n<li>Bray Wyatt was to introduce a new character on the Firefly Funhouse, Pasquali the Parrot, but it ended up being dead. The Vince McMahon character introduced Wobbly Walrus, which looked like Paul Heyman.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>Final Thoughts<\/h4>\n<p>I\u2019m overall interested to see how most stories play out on Smackdown. The Roman-Jey situation, the Intercontinental Championship picture, what\u2019s going on with Bayley and Sasha, as well as the deal with Nikki and Alexa are all cool stories to see unfold. With the lack of tag team depth, I don\u2019t understand why Heavy Machinery isn\u2019t more featured as a team. Otis having Money in the Bank is dumb. I don\u2019t know if they\u2019re foreshadowing a Bray vs. Roman match by introducing a Paul Heyman-type character in the Firefly Funhouse. Hell in a Cell is around the corner and I\u2019m afraid those two have that match written all over them.<\/p>\n<p><em>Follow Frank on Twitter @FrankPeteani. Questions and discussion are welcome. Thank you for reading!<\/em><\/p><div id=\"pwtor-2320835346\" class=\"pwtor-content-1 pwtor-entity-placement\"><!-- Tag ID: pwtorchcom_test_300x600 -->\r\n<div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280 __300x600\" id=\"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_test_300x600\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n<div class=\"pwtor-end-article-groups pwtor-entity-placement\" id=\"pwtor-4030144015\"><div id=\"pwtor-3709337407\"><div align=\"center\" data-freestar-ad=\"__336x280\" id=\"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\">\r\n  <script data-cfasync=\"false\" type=\"text\/javascript\">\r\n    freestar.config.enabled_slots.push({ placementName: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\", slotId: \"pwtorchcom_medrec_3\" });\r\n  <\/script>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\nTHANK YOU FOR VISITING<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>WWE FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN PRIMER SEPTEMBER 18, 2020 ORLANDO, FL. AT THE THUNDERDOME IN THE AMWAY CENTER AIRS ON FOX NETWORK, 8:00 p.m. EST BY FRANK PETEANI (@FrankPeteani), PWTORCH.COM SPECIALIST Announcers: Michael Cole and Corey <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2020\/09\/18\/wwe-friday-night-smackdown-primer-9-18-samoan-street-fight-sasha-to-speak-a-j-vs-sami-a-moment-of-bliss-for-nikki\/\" title=\"WWE FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN PRIMER 9\/18:  Samoan Street Fight, Sasha to Speak, A.J. vs. Sami, A Moment of Bliss for Nikki\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":104667,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,52,4403,27,5893,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-104662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-prowrestlingnews","category-opnionandanalysis","category-smackdown-primer","category-specialists","category-tvprimers","category-news_wwe"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/post\/2020\/09\/20200914_SD_romanjeysheamuscorbin_FC_tunein_fri-a732545b8840fd9a1c26c627918a88c9-2.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104662","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104662"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104662\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":104668,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104662\/revisions\/104668"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104662"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104662"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104662"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}