6 Ups & 2 Downs From WWE SmackDown (15 Aug - Results & Review)
Downs...
2. Why Sami Zayn’s Switch Feels Hollow
Like Gene Snitsky punting babies, this isn't Sami Zayn's fault.
The popular babyface announced on Friday that he's jumped to the SmackDown roster from Raw. Sorry, but big whoop. When Sami told Solo Sikoa that he’s able to challenge for the United States Title because he’s now officially part of the blue roster, people cheered before realising that Zayn has been on SmackDown anyway. In short, he wrestled on the show last week, and then MFT showed up on Raw to attack him during his match vs. Rusev.
WWE needs to know that they don’t get to make a big song and dance over brand switches when wrestlers just float around between shows all year round anyway. Boston popped for Sami because it’s Sami, and it will be nice to see him on Fridays more often, but he didn’t need to make the brand jump to challenge.
Not many will have a problem with Zayn getting a US Title shot, but the way WWE pretends on and off that brand stuff matters is maddening. It's like they forget every other week, then somebody suddenly remembers during creative meetings and "brand loyalty" is an important thing again. For 5 minutes. Then, it isn't.
If the promotion want to make announcements like this mean something/anything, then they've really got to honour the roster split more often. At least Sami didn't cut some speech about 'being a loyal Raw guy who is now on team blue', or something else like that. Still, his brand jump feels hollow.
There are good matches coming to soften the blow though.