6 Ups & 2 Downs From WWE SmackDown (Sept 2)
WWE owns Clash At The Castle build; Ronda Rousey is 'Stone Cold'; SmackDown delivers.
The object of any 'go-home' wrestling episode is to get you excited for some of the main matches on the coming pay-per-view. The object of most pre-taped wrestling episodes is to get through without an obvious lack of energy or any phoned-in segments. That's why this week's WWE SmackDown deserves praise.
Everyone brought it, and the last-minute Clash At The Castle hype was (mostly) ace.
Triple H still has some kinks to iron out on WWE programming, but he's been doing a bang-up job since replacing Vince McMahon as head of company creative. This, a pre-taped show, could've been his excuse to stretch back in that director's chair and present a skippable final blue brand chapter pre-Cardiff.
Instead, 'The Game' and his writers produced a solid two hours that made one yearn to see Drew McIntyre boot heads from shoulders and added new layers to some workers who aren't on the pay-per-view but WWE still wants to feature; Happy Corbin just got a legendary manager, in other words, and his TV persona could be much better for it.
Here's all the good and bad ahead of Saturday night's UK stadium show.