5 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE SmackDown (Aug 13)
Sasha Banks takes a huge risk; WWE crowns a new champ; SmackDown is Cena.
'King' and new Intercontinental Champ.
Shinsuke Nakamura's latest push might be his best yet as a babyface (at least outside the cosy confines of NXT). Spare a thought for the man he replaced though - Apollo Crews is in real trouble as a heel, and it's very worrying that WWE has given up on him so easily.
This was a good episode of Friday night fare though. Major stars like John Cena and Roman Reigns killed it on the mic, the company actually put on some solid matches (unlike last week), new feuds kicked off, and WWE managed to avoid an all-too-familiar booking trope in the tag-team division.
Sadly, the same writing staff couldn't hurdle another trope elsewhere in the women's scene. Was it terminal? Well, no, because Sasha Banks challenging Bianca Belair for the SmackDown Women's Title at SummerSlam will still work bell-to-bell. However, the booking here was stupid, and it did nothing to make anyone else vying for gold look like they have a hope in hell.
Here are all the 'Ups' and the 'Downs' from WWE's penultimate SmackDown before next week's pay-per-view...