6 Ups And 10 Downs From WWE Fastlane 2016

UPS

6. Ranallo On PPV (Sort Of)

WWE fans who never watch Smackdown probably had no idea who Mauro Ranallo is, but they got a glimpse of it Sunday during the Fastlane kickoff show. Ranallo teamed with JBL and Byron Saxton to call the Kalisto/Alberto Del Rio United States Championship match.

Fans got to hear the difference between Ranallo and longtime WWE announcer Michael Cole. Right away, Mauro showed why he came into WWE highly regarded, giving fans a history lesson about two-out-of-three falls matches, noting that the multi-fall bout is customary for title matches in Mexico and used to be the norm in America. That little bit of history probably was more context and knowledge than Cole has dropped on the audience all this year.

Ranallo has a bright future in WWE if he€™s allowed to continue to shine and the higher-ups (read: Vince McMahon) doesn€™t decide that he doesn€™t like his voice. Let€™s hope getting a spot calling the kickoff match on a PPV a month into the job is a good sign.

Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.