Rhyno Returns At WWE SmackDown & American Alpha Debut Confirmed

The new era surprises keep on coming.

by John Bills
Rhyno Heath Slater

More than 12 years after his last appearance on the blue brand, Rhyno made his return to SmackDown Live last night. The former ECW Champion returned with a bang, hitting Heath Slater with a Gore as the One Man Band was cutting a promo attempting to convince Shane McMahon to sign him.

Slater played up his 'hottest free agent' schtick, which led to Shane using that moniker to refer to the Man Beast. Rhyno has been featured on NXT on and off for the last 18 months or so, and his return to the main roster comes as no surprise as a result. Whether he is used mostly as an enhancement performer remains to be seen.

It was also announced last night that Chad Gable and Jason Jordan, collectively known as American Alpha, will make their SmackDown Live in-ring debuts next week on the show. No opponents were announced for the former NXT Tag Team Champions, but the safe assumption would be on 'local competitors' being up first.

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One of six NXT picks in the recent WWE Draft, the main roster debut of American Alpha has been heavily anticipated for quite some time. This finally happens next week.

Contributor
Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.