10 Things We Learned From WWE SmackDown (June 6)

3. Contender?

Naomi Shane McMahon Lana
WWE.com

Randy Orton was again reduced to interview fodder for the second consecutive week, despite the angle for his WWE Title rematch being built around 'The Viper's insistence that actions speak louder than words.

It's lucky for him that when it comes to his RKO, that rings true, because yet again he spoke at length and still managed to say nothing.

The gist was, he's going to get his title back from Jinder Mahal at Money In The Bank in front of his hometown St Louis crowd. Only, almost nobody believes him.

The Jinder Mahal experiment is still incredibly new, and whilst much of the novelty appears to have worn off based on how he's been booked on television since his victory, there's multiple strands of evidence that suggest he may be actually starting to get over that go beyond the aforementioned favourable crowd reactions that came during his match with Mojo Rawley.

Sadly for Randy, the programme is already dead meat. Rather than following the traditional WWE roadmap, the story only had steam with Jinder on the chase. With Mahal's unlikely ascent already complete, Orton is yesterday's news, and will need a wholesale reboot following what will most likely be yet another defeat in two weeks.

Contributor
Contributor

Michael is a writer, editor, podcaster and presenter for WhatCulture Wrestling, and has been with the organisation nearly 8 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 35 years. As one third of "The Dadley Boyz" Michael has contributed to the huge rise in popularity of the WhatCulture Wrestling Podcast and its accompanying YouTube channel, earning it top spot in the UK's wrestling podcast charts with well over 62,000,000 total downloads. He has been featured as a wrestling analyst for the Tampa Bay Times, GRAPPL, GCP, Poisonrana and Sports Guys Talking Wrestling, and has covered milestone events in New York, Dallas, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, 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