Last night’s Smackdown saw good matches and angles to hype the Rey Mysterio–Cody Rhodes and Edge-Alberto Del Rio bouts at Wrestlemania. We also had Wade Barrett picking up the Intercontinental Title from Kofi Kingston in a solid match. Everything else on the show was short, and in some cases uninspired, but had a Wrestlemania connection. After a dull Raw, and whatever you want to call TNA, it was nice to watch Smackdown. While not their best effort, the three highpoints of the show made it worth watching and it certainly came out ahead of the other two “major” weekly shows.
Here’s my thoughts on the show, as it happened:
So, Edge and Alberto Del Rio are not allowed to have contact prior to Wrestlemania. Might have made sense to make that ruling a little earlier.
CM Punk and Rey Mysterio had a good match, pretty much picking up where they left off with their excellent series of bouts from last year. Quick pace, and some nice spots, with then going back and forth early, then Punk dropping Rey on the security wall to set up Punk going on offense. Rey came back with the big dropkick, then Cody Rhodes, some would say predictably came out and attacked Rey, giving us a DQ finish. Couldn’t realistically expect either man to lose clean this close to Mania. Rhodes used his protective mask to headbutt Rey, then revealed a knee brace to crush Rey’s face. Perfectly fine segment to build up Rhodes-Mysterio, but it would have been nice if the announcers pointed out that when Rey injured Cody’s face, it was Cody who had pulled the padding off Mysterio’s brace, exposing it, instead of just saying “that was an accident” repeatedly to counter Michael Cole’s “eye for an eye” yapping.
Edge vs. Drew McIntyre was a short, solid match that established two things for Wrestlemania. One, that Edge will be going into the match with an injured arm, which should favor Alberto Del Rio. Two, Edge can beat you one armed, as he did McIntyre with his Cloverleaf variation. The spear afterwards was the icing on the cake. Good segment, unless you are a fan of McIntyre, in which case hearing how McIntyre is “good, but not as good as Alberto Del Rio” had to sting.
LayCool coming out and mocking Snooki was worth a chuckle. Kelly Kelly was KO’d by Michelle McCool kicking her with the protective boot, and Rosa was finished off with a Layla neckbreaker faster than I could type this sentence. Total squash. This might be why no one cares about the Divas division anymore. Quick LayCool promo and we’re done.
I suggest watching Wade Barrett vs. Kofi Kingston with the volume off. The Cole-Booker arguing is just painful early in the bout. Wade Barrett came off like a monster for much of the match, throwing Kofi all over the place, before missing an elbow drop off the ropes, followed by Kofi floating out of a slam and hitting a pendulum kick and top rope bodypress. The Corre caused a distraction, giving Barrett time to recover and we had the cool finish of Barrett blocking the Trouble In Paradise kick and turning it into Wasteland. New Intercontinental Champion. Not a bad bout, and post-match Gabriel gives Kingston a 450 splash. I really wonder what the future holds for Kofi right now, especially if he doesn’t end up somehow joining with Big Show & Kane to battle Corre at Wrestlemania. He hasn’t exactly been booked strong over the past few months with losses to Alberto Del Rio, Sheamus and now dropping the belt to Barrett. We’ll have to wait and see.
Theodore R. Long lays down the law to Alberto Del Rio, and I like when WWE presents Long as a strong authority figure, because he should be. I always hated when they had Vickie Guerrero reversing his decisions and negating his rulings.
Okay promo from the Undertaker to set up this Monday’s face-to-face with Triple H on Raw, but to be honest, I’m tired of the talking. Because there is no backstory between them here (all their past matches, even Mania 17, are being ignored in the storyline), it is all just “I’m going to stop the streak” and “You’re not going to stop the streak” so once you’ve established that, what else is there to say?
Well, R-Truth did get in a little offense during his match with Jack Swagger, but this was essentially another squash win by Swagger. Hard to believe R-Truth was in a main event match at the last PPV, because he seems a million miles from being on the Wrestlemania card. Honestly, noting here we haven’t seen before. A Swagger squash and a lot of Cole ranting. I did like Josh Mathews pleading to Jerry Lawler to shut Cole up at Wrestlemania.
Rather strange to see two men in a regular match one week after having seen them battle in a steel cage, but that is what we got with Alberto Del Rio vs. Christian. Big dive off the top rope to the floor by Christian early in the match. Shortly after the break, Alberto took over and worked on Christian’s arm until Christian came back with the rana off the ropes. Nice back and forth with Alberto avoiding the bodypress and Christian avoiding the enzugiri. Great false finish with Alberto hitting the enzugiri after Brodus Clay had laid Edge out on the floor, only for Christian to kick out. The actual finish, with Alberto hesitating on his armbreaker to look at Edge, who had killed Clay with the chair, and Christian getting the pin was really well done. Also, a bit shocking, as Christian has now beaten Alberto two weeks in a row. Sort of strange for a Mania main eventer to lose two weeks in a row against someone who isn’t even on the card. I loved the post-match, with Christian keeping Edge from touching Alberto, protecting him from getting in trouble with Teddy Long, while hitting the chairshot for him. That’s what friends are for! Unique bit of booking there.
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