WWE TLC 2016: 10 Awesome Moments

SmackDown might be WWE's apparent "B-show," but anyone who's paid close attention to WWE's post-Draft programming knows that the blue brand has made huge improvements through the Brand Split. The weekly show regularly trumps Raw's repetitive product for quality, and on pay-per-view, SmackDown's Backlash and No Mercy have continued the theme.

The latter stands as one of 2016's best PPVs, and when the dust settles, Tables, Ladders & Chairs will likely join it. There wasn't an objectively bad match to be found on last night's card, and while clashes like Kalisto vs. Baron Corbin and Nikki Bella vs. Carmella didn't look great on-paper, they over-delivered. TLC was a tremendous night of action from start to finish, and SmackDown has much to be proud of.

There were a few disappointments, of course. The Tag Team Title match between Heather Slater & Rhyno and Randy Orton & Bray Wyatt could've been longer, and if you hate James Ellsworth, you probably hated the main event's outcome. There's no such thing as a flawless show, however, and on the whole, these low-points were eclipsed by TLC's bright spots.

TLC won't sent the internet ablaze like Survivor Series did (Ellsworth is no Goldberg, after all), but it was a night of huge spots, hard-hitting action, and a visceral main event that harked back to TLC's glory days.

Here are 10 awesome moments from WWE TLC 2016.

Chad Gable and Jason Jordan are a fantastic team who are immensely skilled between between the ropes, and whose enthusiastic personalities make them inherently likeable. In the long run, American Alpha are SmackDown’s most promising young tag team, and as soon as they find their footing in the title hunt, they’ll take-off.

Sadly, they haven’t had much luck since arriving on the main roster yet. They continually fall short in their attempts at advancing up the ladder, and without a story as strong as their formation tale in NXT, they’re not as popular as they should be. They were able to worm their way onto last night’s PPV card as part of a ten-man tag match, and while it was good to see them on the card, such matches only emphasis their bit part player status in the division.

On the plus side, American Alpha took those lemons and made lemonade. It was a crowded match and they weren’t allowed much time to shine, but when they did, they looked like stars. Gable played the face in peril for much of the match before Jordan tagged in and started throwing guys around with reckless abandon, and in the end, the duo nailed Simon Gotch with an inch-perfect Grand Amplitude for the 1, 2, 3.

It’d be nice to see Alpha featured more prominently, but they came-off as the opening match’s biggest stars last night. It offered glimpses of the megastars they can eventually become, and they’d make ideal opponents for Bray Wyatt & Randy Orton in the near future.