7 Problems Plaguing WWE SmackDown Right Now
This is just some of what's keeping the blue brand from being the "A" show.
It’s close to the one-year anniversary of the new brand split. In the time since, both RAW and SmackDown have competed for ratings supremacy as well as creative superiority. From the time after the draft until WrestleMania, most fans would tell you SmackDown was the clear winner in the latter category.
Despite supposedly having a weaker roster than a stacked RAW, SmackDown lived up to the promise of the brand split by elevating new talent, and having logical week-to-week storylines that made it appointment television in what is otherwise a creative dead zone for WWE (as evidenced by RAW’s parallel doldrums).
However, sometime after WrestleMania, the show started to take a dip in quality. Not to say it’s unwatchable now, or that in its initial run, it was perfect, but when comparing RAW and SmackDown these days, the gulf in quality has narrowed significantly, with SmackDown taking a hit.
There are a number of potential reasons why this has happened. They aren't all exclusive to SmackDown, but they are problems nonetheless that could stand to be corrected to make the blue brand the A-show again.
7. The Women’s Division
Simply put: the women’s division on SmackDown is one of the most creatively bankrupt divisions in WWE at the moment. How many multi-man or tags have they had on PPV? There are no feuds or storylines in the women’s division on SmackDown. The division itself is the storyline. The individuals have no motivation other than, "I should be champion/I should be #1 contender".
In theory, this is the right mentality. After all, why would they wrestle other than for a desire to be champion? However, when everyone is fighting for the title at once, and with a division so small, it comes off as repetitive and redundant. One month, it’s a six-woman tag, the next month, five-way, next month, tag match, next month, five-woman ladder match, next month... rinse and repeat.
It’s understandable that they want to have the women featured and to give as many superstars a spotlight as they can, but when every woman is on every PPV in matches with high stakes, it makes it feel like everything they do on weekly TV is completely meaningless. In a division with such talented wrestlers such as Charlotte and Becky Lynch or dynamic personalities such as Carmella, it is shameful that SmackDown makes it feel so boring and cyclical.