5 Ups & 4 Downs From WWE SmackDown (22 May - Results & Review)

Ups...

5. Shin Does Everything To Make Talla Monstrous

Shinsuke Nakamura knows his role in WWE these days. His career with the company is largely petering out, but he’s still over with fans so comes in handy when making others look good. There was nice pacing to his bout vs. Talla Tonga on Friday. Personally, yours truly thought this was as good as Talla has looked in-ring since signing too. No, there was nothing earth shattering here, but it was rock solid.

Talla’s scoop power slam looked awesome before the chokeslam for the finish too, and that went a long way to selling him as the monster Joe Tess and Wade describe on commentary. Somewhat remarkably, especially when taking into account how crap the MFTs thing has been overall, this was a decent match, and it's the kind that's perfect for TV.

Credit to Tonga for listening to Shin out there. Neither man rushed through whatever spot was next, and they gave everything plenty of room to breathe from first bell to last. It does blow that WWE don't seem all that into the thought of paying off Naka's story with Tama Tonga, but hey - this is a match that'll stand the towering Talla in good stead going forwards, so at least Shinsuke's evening wasn't completely wasted.

Also, Talla needs to hit that massive elbow drop as much as possible. The big guy gets some impressive height on it, as pictured above, and he lands with a satisfying thump. Don't laugh, but that could easily become a finisher if he comes off the corner turnbuckles in the future.

Nice TV match.