5 Ups & 4 Downs From Last Night's WWE SmackDown (Dec 26)

Downs...

4. Middle Men

Shane McMahon Sami Zayn
WWE

In what surely has to go down as one of the biggest consistent disappointments of 2017, AJ Styles and Kevin Owens were yet again unable to craft the sort of quality contest most fans seem absolutely desperate for them to achieve.

And once more, a storyline involving Shane McMahon had a big hand in ensuring their reverse sweep continued.

'Shane-O-Mac' and Daniel Bryan's authority figure turmoil has an awful lot going for it (more on that later), but the angle sucked all the drama out of what should still have been a blockbuster main event. Worse still, the finish reeked of writing staff taking a Christmas break even if the talent weren't permitted to.

McMahon's mishandling of Sami Zayn's ringside meddling resulted in the referee missing Styles rolling up Owens, and 'KO' grabbing a handful of trunks to claim his own dirt cheap win.

The victory suggested that perhaps the 'Prizefighter' is in line for a Royal Rumble crack at 'The Phenomenal One', but has this latest clunker murdered any anticipation for that before it's even been announced?

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Contributor

Michael is a writer, editor, podcaster and presenter for WhatCulture Wrestling, and has been with the organisation over 7 years. He primarily produces written, audio and video content on WWE and AEW, but also provides knowledge and insights on all aspects of the wrestling industry thanks to a passion for it dating back over 30 years. As one third of "The Dadley Boyz", Michael has contributed to the huge rise in popularity of the WhatCulture Wrestling Podcast, earning it top spot in the UK's wrestling podcast charts with well over 50,000,000 total downloads. He has been featured as a wrestling analyst for the Tampa Bay Times and Sports Guys Talking Wrestling, and has covered milestone events in New York, Dallas, Las Vegas, London and Cardiff. Michael's background in media stretches beyond wrestling coverage, with a degree in Journalism from the University Of Sunderland (2:1) and a series of published articles in sports, music and culture magazines The Crack, A Love Supreme and Pilot. When not offering his voice up for daily wrestling podcasts, he can be found losing it singing far too loud watching his favourite bands play live. Follow him on X/Twitter - @MichaelHamflett