{"id":37789,"date":"2017-01-19T21:57:22","date_gmt":"2017-01-20T03:57:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/?p=37789"},"modified":"2017-01-19T21:57:22","modified_gmt":"2017-01-20T03:57:22","slug":"smackdown-hits-misses-wwe-trying-get-fans-like-smackdown-better-raw-change-mind-plus-mickie-lawler-ziggler-bliss-lynch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/01\/19\/smackdown-hits-misses-wwe-trying-get-fans-like-smackdown-better-raw-change-mind-plus-mickie-lawler-ziggler-bliss-lynch\/","title":{"rendered":"SMACKDOWN HITS &#038; MISSES: Was WWE trying to get fans who like Smackdown better than Raw to change their mind? Plus Mickie, Lawler-Ziggler, Bliss-Lynch"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"pwtor-4150272178\" 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><b><u>SMACKDOWN HITS<\/u><\/b><\/h3>\n<p><b>Miz vs. Styles:<\/b>\u00a0 While I did not like the set up for this match during the poor opening segment (more later), the match itself was good.\u00a0 It went nearly 11 minutes and featured good wrestling action.\u00a0 It isn&#8217;t great to have a heel vs. heel match, but AJ Styles was getting more of a babyface reaction so it worked ok in this case as there was clearly one wrestler to get behind.\u00a0 He and The Miz worked well together and put on a good match before the expected non ending with John Cena getting involved.<\/p>\n<p><b>Nikki and Natalya:<\/b>\u00a0 I feel like this is maybe a guilty pleasure for me.\u00a0 But, maybe it should just be a pleasure and there isn&#8217;t anything guilty about it.\u00a0 Nikki Bella and Natalya are playing their parts well.\u00a0 The fans are responding positively to their feud.\u00a0 It was very cartoonish this week which is why it starts to move into that guilty pleasure zone, but I enjoyed it.\u00a0 It was fun how Natalya destroyed the merchandise booth.\u00a0 It is interesting how she is incorporating anger towards her family, particularly her uncle Bret Hart into this storyline.\u00a0 The brawl that ended the segment was well done.\u00a0 This has been good.<\/p>\n<p><b>Bliss vs. Lynch:<\/b>\u00a0 This was a pretty good steel cage match for the Women&#8217;s Title between Alexa Bliss and Becky Lynch.\u00a0 There were a few off spots early on which unfortunately tend to happen in Bliss&#8217; matches.\u00a0 But for the most past, the match was well executed.\u00a0 It was well booked in the typical WWE steel cage match way to have the heel try to escape through the door right away while the babyface is actually trying to fight to win the match.\u00a0 I would be happy if WWE did away with the escape the cage gimmick.\u00a0 At the very least, they should get rid of the door and make the wrestlers climb out of the cage.\u00a0 But given the established rules, this was well booked and fun to watch.\u00a0 But the ending left a lot to be desired considering the cage gimmick was set up to specifically keep La Luchadora from interfering and yet because of the stupid door, she was able to block Lynch from leaving and then easily gain access to the ring to kick her in the head.\u00a0 So, WWE is killing the gimmick by contradicting the point of the gimmick.<\/p>\n<h3><b><u>SMACKDOWN MISSES<\/u><\/b><\/h3>\n<p><b>Opening Segment:<\/b>\u00a0 Sometimes, it felt like WWE was trying to take all the bad things about Raw which they eliminated on that show this week, and apply them to Smackdown in order to make the fans who say Smackdown is the better show change their mind.\u00a0 That was the case with this overly long talking segment which kicked off the show.\u00a0 I was happy that we didn&#8217;t see an authority figure on Raw, but Smackdown started off with Shane McMahon.\u00a0 I know he gets a nice pop in the arenas, but that doesn&#8217;t mean I have to like it.\u00a0 I&#8217;m not a fan of bringing back the Elimination Chamber between the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania.\u00a0 I advocate for no PPVs between Royal Rumble and WM, but I know that&#8217;s not going to happen.\u00a0 But, now they are doing two &#8211; one for each brand which is ridiculous.\u00a0 And while I did like the job that Styles did on the mic, it still wasn&#8217;t a good segment.\u00a0 We got more interruptions from Miz and Cena.\u00a0 We got too much talking.\u00a0 Cena acting like a buffoon going back and forth between Miz and Styles to stir the pot was bad.\u00a0 That&#8217;s the type of performance that got fans to start chanting &#8220;Cena Sucks!&#8221; in the first place.\u00a0 It just didn&#8217;t work for me.<\/p>\n<p><b>Set Up For Ambrose vs. Orton:<\/b>\u00a0 I laughed when Dean Ambrose tried to get a new Intercontinental Championship belt from Shane because it smelled funny and was sticky.\u00a0 That was fine.\u00a0 But when he asked for a match against Randy Orton because of his problems with the Wyatt Family, I asked myself &#8220;what problems with the Wyatt Family?&#8221;\u00a0 I was trying to recall an encounter that they had last week or the week before, but I couldn&#8217;t.\u00a0 I honestly was confused as to what they were talking about.\u00a0 Then right before their match, they showed a video of them fighting like a month ago.\u00a0 Did Ambrose just wake up\u00a0Tuesday\u00a0morning and remember getting beat up a month ago and decide to ask for a match?\u00a0 This felt too random.\u00a0 It was like they needed an opponent for Orton to continue his tension with Luke Harper.\u00a0 They also needed something for Ambrose to do since they had something else going on with Miz, so they just stuck them in a match and then worked backwards to a month old incident.\u00a0 It was weak.<\/p>\n<p><b>Orton vs. Ambrose:<\/b>\u00a0 The match itself wasn&#8217;t much better.\u00a0 A match between Ambrose and Orton should feel more important than this.\u00a0 It wasn&#8217;t for the IC Title.\u00a0 It was more of a backdrop for the Orton vs. Harper tension than a match between two top wrestlers on the Smackdown brand.\u00a0 It was slow.\u00a0 It was boring at times.\u00a0 They failed in their performances to draw me into the match which I wasn&#8217;t interested in.\u00a0 They could have had a much better match where I would gain interest as it went based on their performance.\u00a0 That didn&#8217;t happen here.\u00a0 And then you end up getting a roll up victory for Ambrose after some lame distraction by Harper.<\/p>\n<p><b>King&#8217;s Court:<\/b>\u00a0 Based on Jerry &#8220;the King&#8221; Lawler&#8217;s performance on this King&#8217;s Court, I would say there is potential value to having these segments moving forward.\u00a0 He was very good here in trying to interview Dolph Ziggler.\u00a0 Ziggler was better than he has been lately in his more toned down presentation without all the yelling he&#8217;s been doing.\u00a0 But, the segment didn&#8217;t work.\u00a0 Bringing up Lawler&#8217;s heart attack was uncomfortable.\u00a0 I don&#8217;t like exploiting that real life very scary moment just to get over Ziggler&#8217;s new heel character.\u00a0 I know Lawler signed off on it, but still.\u00a0 It was forced.\u00a0 And this whole segment doesn&#8217;t lead to anything.\u00a0 We aren&#8217;t going to get a Lawler vs. Ziggler match (and thank God for that).\u00a0 This didn&#8217;t advance a possible feud between Ziggler and Apollo Crews.\u00a0 The only person to come to King&#8217;s aid was John Bradshaw Layfield who is a terrible bully with an inconsistent heel character which this played into.\u00a0 And, he isn&#8217;t going to wrestle Ziggler either.\u00a0 So, what did this accomplish?\u00a0 Not much.\u00a0 And on an aside, while David Otunga has been better lately, he should NOT have made fun of JBL tripping while trying to get out from behind the desk to get in the ring.\u00a0 They should have ignored that.<\/p>\n<p><b>Mickie James Reveal:<\/b>\u00a0 I will start by saying that I was happy to see Mickie James return to WWE at the last NXT Takeover special against Asuka.\u00a0 I was hoping it would lead to a bigger role on the main roster and it has.\u00a0 And I don&#8217;t mind her being La Luchadora although it wouldn&#8217;t have been my first choice for reintroducing her to the WWE Universe.\u00a0 But this particular reveal wasn&#8217;t good.\u00a0 Part of it is that La Luchadora hasn&#8217;t been around on long enough.\u00a0 It would have worked better with more appearances from her and more failed attempts by Lynch to unmask her.\u00a0 Drag it out a little while longer.\u00a0 Also, James has been gone from WWE for a long time.\u00a0 There are newer fans who don&#8217;t know her.\u00a0 And even long time fans need a bit of a reminder about her to get excited about her return.\u00a0 I&#8217;m not sure this gimmick is a great way to go for any returning or debuting wrestler as opposed to having someone on the main roster already.<\/p><div id=\"pwtor-1425918280\" 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<p><strong>NOW CHECK OUT LAST WEEK&#8217;S ARTICLE:\u00a0<\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/01\/18\/smackdown-hits-misses-110-ambrose-asylum-jbl-tearing-lunde-corbin-loses-natalya-nikki-kalisto-ziggler-crews-tag-title-match\/\">SMACKDOWN HITS &amp; MISSES 1\/10: Ambrose Asylum, JBL tearing into Lunde, Corbin loses, Natalya-Nikki, Kalisto-Ziggler-Crews, Tag Title match<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>OR CHECK OUT JASON POWELL\u2019S HITLIST ARTICLES<\/strong>\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/prowrestling.net\/site\/category\/viewpoints\/jasonpowell\/\">HERE<\/a>.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<article id=\"post-30600\" class=\"post-30600 post type-post status-publish format-standard has-post-thumbnail hentry category-hitsandmisses category-opinionandanalysis category-specialists category-spotlightarticles\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<p><i>Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com\u2019s WWE Hits &amp; Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw and Smackdown each week. Email him at jmezz_torch@yahoo.com.\u00a0<\/i><em>Act now and become my 68th Twitter follower<a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/jonmezzera\">@JonMezzera<\/a>\u00a0(pretty clever handle right?). Just be aware that I don\u2019t live tweet Raw, I don\u2019t tweet much about wrestling, and I don\u2019t tweet much at all.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"pwtor-end-article-groups pwtor-entity-placement\" id=\"pwtor-3501432107\"><div id=\"pwtor-3547489587\"><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>SMACKDOWN HITS Miz vs. Styles:\u00a0 While I did not like the set up for this match during the poor opening segment (more later), the match itself was good.\u00a0 It went nearly 11 minutes and featured <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/2017\/01\/19\/smackdown-hits-misses-wwe-trying-get-fans-like-smackdown-better-raw-change-mind-plus-mickie-lawler-ziggler-bliss-lynch\/\" title=\"SMACKDOWN HITS &#038; MISSES: Was WWE trying to get fans who like Smackdown better than Raw to change their mind? Plus Mickie, Lawler-Ziggler, Bliss-Lynch\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5548,"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":[46,52,28,27],"tags":[90,1008,652,257,242,376,116,4480,420,73,72],"class_list":["post-37789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spotlightarticles","category-opnionandanalysis","category-specialists_hitsandmisses","category-specialists","tag-aj-styles","tag-alexa-bliss","tag-becky-lynch","tag-dean-ambrose","tag-dolph-ziggler","tag-jerry-lawler","tag-john-cena","tag-la-luchadora","tag-mickie-james","tag-randy-orton","tag-smackdown"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/ZigglerDolphGG_3x2_600.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37789","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37790,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37789\/revisions\/37790"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pwtorch.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}