6 Ups & 3 Downs From WWE SmackDown (June 23)

5. LA Knight Builds Some Steam

LA Knight Rey Mysterio
WWE.com

Yours truly really enjoyed this opening match.

WWE gave both LA Knight and Rey Mysterio plenty of time, and they made the most of it. It was neat that LA found himself overwhelmed by Rey's quick offensive flurries at first, but learned as the match rolled on to score a momentum-boosting win heading into Money In The Bank.

This was just really good stuff from start to finish, and a smart use of both guys. People online are already bitching that Vince McMahon (reportedly) changed a three-way pitting LA vs. Santos Escobar vs. Butch into this one-on-one. Eh? Since when was it a bad thing that WWE wanted to make Knight look strong?!

That sounds like bitching for the sake of it. If Vince did make this call, then it was the right one - not everything McMahon does is bad, people. Mysterio is a legacy star who can survive putting workers over clean, and LA rolls into MITB with the biggest win of his company career fresh in everyone's memory.

How is that a problem?

Advertisement
Contributor

Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.