WWE SmackDown 1000 and Recent Wrestling Trends Review

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.ie. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the podcast

arena. Coming to the ring at this time... First,

representing this week again, and from hearts

unknown, he is Mike the Birdman. I got four words

for you. Check out my ass. And from the Great

White Horse, here is your special guest referee.

Hello and welcome to Mayhem Mikes, this is episode

48, I am of course TFG1 Mike, joining me is Ryan

the Unevenflow Marklee, hello sir. Hello. Hello.

So Smackdown had its 1000th episode. Yay, Smackdown.

Woo. Yeah, 1000 episodes for Smackdown, pretty

cool, I mean just... You know, as much as Raw,

SmackDown's, I think they're approaching their

20th anniversary or something like that. Or other,

I don't know. I like SmackDown 1000. It was more

interesting to look back on SmackDown than to

see what currently is going on. SmackDown's been

the better show though, and it's been really

good lately. But again, a lot of that is. Lot

of that's been Lynch and what they've been doing

with her. Yeah as opposed to Ra has pretty much

everybody injured or So I guess we should bring

up a couple of the bigger notes to just in wrestling

in general Yep, we of course had the revelation

that Roman Reigns is Fighting leukemia again.

Yeah, very very sad Yeah, there's There's no

good I honestly believe he will Be back and I

think he will be a fantastic story When he does

I really do think he'll be alright He stands

a better chance than an awful lot of people I

mean obviously is in phenomenal Physical condition

and he's definitely a fighter. So Yeah, that

was I Had said after they had done that or after

he revealed that I had said to you and Mike and

Alex and the man Mike's group on Facebook I'm

like this better not be storyline because if

it is I will never ever Watch WWE and they're

not that dumb. Although I don't I wasn't Wasn't

all that comfortable with the fact that they

did the Ambrose heel turn that night and coming

out of that they have They haven't used it, but

they've referenced it which I don't know not

a big fan of it mm -hmm Yeah Mean we saw it this

year like yeah, I was People listen to some of

the previous episodes the podcast. I was so happy.

Yay. The shield is back together again They're

going to be the you know unstoppable force in

in WWE whether it's raw whether it's smackdown,

whatever it is the shield is gonna dominate again

and Then once they did the The Strowman Ziegler

McIntyre triple threat thing six man tag, whatever

the hell and Drew started getting Drew and Ziegler

started getting into Dean's head and all this

and all that and everything else you kind of

saw the change in Dean I wish he hadn't done

it that night, but I understand why it was done

that night So they needed yeah, they needed to

do something to Change up the storylines, but

yeah, just Yeah It was uh It was a mess like

I kind of wish that Dean and Seth would have

had just a lit like maybe a month longer Run

as the tag champs and then AOP come in and kill

them because I figure they had yet they The original

idea was to probably stretch things out a little

longer, but everything got moved up. And then

we have... Then we have Brock coming back and

signing a contract. By the way, the company seems

to be having a lot of trouble with contracts

lately. AJ Styles currently not appearing and...

don't know what's going on with him and he's

the champion i know it's not dangerous anymore

and daniel one survivor series to know brian

did you know daniel did not win a survivor series

daniel one on smackdown last week which was really

really good by the way and the stuff they've

done with him has been terrific and yeah the

stuff on smackdown again They haven't suffered

the injuries, although, of course, most notably

Lynch got injured right before the Survivor Series,

which, uh, oof. Nia Jax is getting drilled online

for it, partially, kind of deservedly so, just

because this isn't the first time she's done

something. Injured people. Yeah. Um, it makes

them feel bad for her. The way I look at it is,

okay, yeah, you need to be safe, and you also

need to sell it and whatever, and maybe she was

a little bit unsafe in this, obviously, because

Becky got her face broken, literally. Yeah, but

I mean, she had the botched backbreaker on Asuka,

which, oof, looked horrific. And that's another

thing, like, poor Asuka. Yeah, they don't know

what they're doing with her. It's not even that

they had her at the highest high and then they

just drag her down and like nothing Yeah, they

don't seem to know what to do with her the only

thing honestly the only division and people that

have been consistently entertaining in the last

little while I've been the smackdown I was gonna

say have been the smackdown women Yeah, the stuff

even last night with Rousey and flair Was the

best most interesting part of the show? Yeah,

although holy cow Rousey is getting annihilated

on online and on Twitter By Lynch lately, which

has been oof if you follow one Twitter account

All Becky Lynch. Yeah her annihilating rousy

over and over again Today she got her for liking

her own tweets, which is pretty strong Yeah That's

been good, but yeah, they I don't know and now

to be fair Brian's Stuff has been good. Yeah

recently and I could watch him and styles go

at it Oh, absolutely a million times and both

of them are really good and But yeah, they don't

know what to do with a whole bunch of people

and then they don't have And then they don't

have Anything to do with Joe he loses in 35 seconds

at the Survivor series, even though he's been

quite good. Yeah, that's sad. Like did I like

the Joe AJ thing? Not so much at the end because

it got kind of really creepy like I love that

they did that I think it was I think it was a

good idea that they do that it was an interesting

storyline, but I like Joe and AJ Individually,

I like Joe a little bit more than AJ. It's kind

of like my thing when anyone goes up against

John I'm probably not gonna root against John

Cena most of the time But yeah, I want Joe to

have more to do like I want Joe to have like

Did Joe and Brock ever fight? I think they did

but I don't okay So maybe a rematch for that

or something. I know Joe's on smackdown, but

I would have not brought so I just would have

not brought Brock back and then I know you could

add Joe fill that role you could add They slowly

seem to be positioning Drew McIntyre for something,

but they could have had him fill that role. They

have choices if they're not fully behind Stroman.

They could have brought back Hornswoggle and

had him fill the role. Anybody's better than

Brock Lesnar. Look, Brock's a monster. I don't

want to take Braun's name away from him. But

Brock is a beast. He's this, he's that. But Brock

is not good for WWE, as much as it seems that

WWE is good for Brock. Because, as we said last

time a couple of times ago, Oh yay, finally.

Roman has the belt. That means a actual champion

that will actually defend it more than twice

a year. It had been the first time it was defended

on Ron about a year. Yeah, exactly. When he had

had it briefly, and yeah, now that's gone. Not

to mention last night during the match with Brian,

you heard the fans chanting, quote, same old

shit at one point. so people in general I think

are pretty pretty over or done with bronze or

sorry Brock's appearances and yeah they need

to do something I was done with Brock after that

last Undertaker battle like with them like with

the two of them getting out into the locker room

and one of them screaming I'm gonna kill you

I'm gonna this I'm gonna you know Like, I was

done with Brock Lesnar after the Undertaker thing.

Not because he beat The Streak or anything like

that, I was just done with him by then, because

I had seen too much of him. Uh, I thought the

Goldberg stuff worked. Yeah, that did. And that

was a good way to end that, and not to mention

give Goldberg a much better and more proper send

-off than the absolute garbage that was his WWE

run. Originally, but after that, yeah, there

was no, I really wonder what the upside is of

having Brock around versus not. Like, is he moving

the gates and the ratings that much? I mean,

SmackDown's been rated, or SmackDown, Brock's

been rated at some of its lowest levels ever.

Yeah. the last few weeks So I don't think he's

he's obviously not moving the needle that much

but I Know like I said before though I will give

them at least a little bit of a pass because

they've had an awful lot of Plans changed in

the last little bit like I mentioned it before

Ros lost Zane Owens and then Roman in short amount

of time and Roman is obviously They were building

everything around him and they were rock was

gone and It was good. Yeah, it looked like we

were entering a really a time where things were

we're looking up and they were finally ready

to move on and do some stuff, but Then it all

kind of fell apart and I think it goes without

saying that both of us wish Roman the best, but

I fully believe yeah, he can he's gonna beat

it. Yeah, he's gonna beat it and You want to

talk about a heartbreaking moment regardless

of what Dean did later that night The final you

know three fist bump thing on the on the ramp

like wow watching Rollins Tearing up at the same

time exactly. Yeah, cuz yeah, these guys are

you know, we've mentioned it before these guys

are friends in real life Travel together that

sort of thing and just you know Yeah, it's just

awful and Yeah, it is I Mean again, hopefully

this I'm Just yeah, I just want to see him back

Now I mean there's a huge difference. Yeah, I

do too I I hope that whatever time it does take

Roman to beat it that he does beat it not just

in remission that he is cancer free kind of a

thing There's a huge difference folks in someone

who's a part -timer and someone who is a part

-time champion And I'm sorry, Brock Lesnar is

the worst part -time champion ever. I would rather

have John come back once every three months in

a year, or hell, at least once a year to wrestle

something, to at least see John do something,

and I know John's getting up there in age and

yada yada yada and everything else, but look

at Undertaker, look at, you know, Goldberg, look

at... Whomever else that's that's come back to

do stuff. Hell look at Triple H and Shawn Michaels.

I mean, you know Kane to a slightly lesser extent,

you know, they've all come back and done stuff

but because Brock the way is the way that he

is I Don't see the Universal Championship being

Challenged all that much in the next year. No,

and then you've got on the other show where they

should have focused on styles more because he

was always defending the title and he's absolutely

brilliant hopefully with Brian they will focus

on the title more and hopefully it's not just

you know this week on the Miz and Brian show

like don't get me wrong I love the Miz Daniel

Bryan stuff I absolutely do but like I said with

Brian turning With Brian turning, that's not

going to happen at least for a while. Yeah, I

think inevitably they'll probably there'll be

a fight with the roles reversed. Brian is the

bad guy, Miz is the good guy, but that's a ways

off. Yeah, because I don't think Miz has ever

been the good guy. No, they'll need to. Yeah,

they'll turn him. Well, I mean, when he was in

a tag team with John Morrison, but. Other than

that. So anyway, uh, Smackdown 1000. Yeah, I

thought it was a fun show I liked seeing all

the cameos even the one or two little excuse

me's I love seeing Teddy Long back. I just love

that guy. He was one of the better Smackdown

GM's It was a good show overall. He was obviously

always having fun. Absolutely. Yeah I still can't

believe they did the whole Vicky Edge marriage.

That was weird. That was like one of the weirdest

times in Smackdown history in my mind. It's weird

that for a time, Smackdown has always been considered

the B show by WWE. think is wrong because for

a time it was much better than raw and right

now I'd argue it's much better than raw absolutely

but the Paul Heyman days when he was doing the

writing and edge was one of the focus characters

and it's really good and I was happy that they

had they found a way for edge to be on yeah His

interview with Lynch was fairly well done and

I liked I liked where they went with it with

edge telling Lynch that they had similarities

and that edge told her that She's gonna end up

alone like he did You know if she keeps on her

path, it was well done and that was well done

I'm not always the biggest fan of when you get

bunch of either part -timers or guys who were

retired together but the evolution interview

that was cool yeah I thought it was well done

and I liked that they found a way to have Orton

continue to be a heel when he makes yeah dig

at Batista and it was well done overall and Batista

by the way was terrific so good I miss that guy

That's that's something we should do on the show

at some point do a spotlight on Batista cuz man

did I? See yeah, he's underrated and people seem

to have forgotten that as a big man He had quite

a few really good matches. He was actually pretty

good in ring performer and because to be honest

a lot of the Big men are not very good entering

performers No, he was he was one back in the

day like I said somewhere between 98 and 2007

or whatever it was but like in that era like

I Remember and I've said this before on the show

in the last three years when I started like I'm

on my 11th year of watching WWE full -time again.

I started watching full -time again in 2007 and

His whole runs back then 2007 2009 that kind

of thing. I loved everything the guy did Didn't

hurt that saliva at the time was his theme song

The band saliva had his theme song with Yep,

yeah, I walk alone. That's it. Yeah yeah so love

that um i just love what the guy did because

he was another one of those guys where he wasn't

healed but he wasn't faced either he was more

of kind of like what dean did after the first

shield breakup uh where you know he's basically

this in your face kind of against authority kind

of figure but he's not like a full -on bad he's

like straddling the line of good and bad guy

he's not good but he's not bad kind of thing

and batista was doing that for a while I wish

he would have gotten his WWE championship thing

a couple of years ago. That pissed me off to

no end that they didn't let him do that. Maybe

it's cuz he was going back to the movies or whatever.

I mean, a lot of it was part timer fatigue. They

debuted him really poorly by having him just

win the rumble when everybody and their brother

was behind Bryan. They just sort of had him leapfrog

everybody yeah, I think it was just More WWE

not they didn't understand the what the fans

Were looking for and they didn't know how to

Write around it really Surprise surprise they

seem to still have problems with that, but yeah,

yeah the other The other positive from SmackDown

that I enjoyed was Rey Mysterio and Shinsuke.

Yeah, that was pretty cool. I wish it had been

a little longer, but man, Rey Mysterio still

looks really good. Like, he's still got it. And

actually now I'm just gonna get into the negatives.

The Rusev mismatch being about three seconds.

Yeah Again, what are they doing with Rusev? What

are they do it? Like they don't know he's out

again outside of Daniel Bryan becoming a heel

What is the next thing for Miz? What is the next

thing for Rusev? Cuz they don't know what the

hell to do with that guy and miss I feel like

he's only showing up to promote marine six seven

eight nine ten eleven twelve Yeah, I don't know

I don't know either next negative and I hate

to put this one in there, but the scene of promo

Why couldn't they just have them there? Exactly

Or have them on live Something the taped promo

did not work. Why was what what I? Don't understand

the decision there That was baffling to me and

then my biggest negative The finale the undertaker

coming out and Doing the rest in peace and Talking

about crown jewel, which I absolutely don't care

about So I said it before and I'll say it again

crown jewel will not be covered on this podcast

whatsoever if people want to hear talk of that

pay -per -view the only thing i'll say is i fast

forwarded through most of it and it was uneventful

crown jewel it was a bad event it was a bad idea

to have it and it was terrible yeah crown jewel

was worse than um What's the first one the first

Saudi Arabia match they had what the hell was

it called? Yeah, I know anyway, but yeah, it

was the very first year I Don't know it's gonna

be one of the worst It's gonna be one of the

worst paper. I can't remember. Yeah, it's easily

the worst paper view of the year Crown jewel

because of the situation or surrounding it with

the reporter and all this and all that and everything

else Not only was it a bad pay -per -view it

had absolutely zero Consequence on what's currently

going on on either bra or smackdown like it was

also Poorly timed in that yeah, they had evolution

just right before it. Yeah an evolution So evolution

first of all was great Fantastic and then second

of all it just they didn't promote it at all

which Ticked me off and was absolute garbage

They did nothing to get it hyped and it might

be As of right now, I would say it's their best

pay -per -view of the year. Yeah evolution is

most actually really good and a sign of how far

they've come and Then they took a gigantic step

backwards the next week and it was terrible And

I don't know if this is Vince, I don't know if

this is the board, I mean Vince essentially is

the board, but whatever. I don't know if it's

that, I don't know if it's creative, I don't

know what it is. And as we all know, women in

WWE specifically have had a long, hard road to

get to where they are now. Like going from just,

you know, round girls to broad panty matches,

to divas, to this, to that, whatever. It's been

a long, hard fought road for the women in WWE

and they deserved every bit of it. In my mind.

it goes evolution and then survivor series there

is no such fucking thing as a crown jewel because

this whole thing of oh we need saudi money we

need this we need that we're so so not doing

so well so we need all the white men you know

survivor series uh not terrific either i have

not watched it as a misrecord there was a there's

a great There were parts of it that were fantastic,

although it's the women again Well, mostly just

two of them and then but I saw a great quote

about it today Where somebody just said what

was the point? And that's that's how it felt

there was it just Whatever anyway back to the

smackdown Supposedly supposedly there's gonna

be a No more brand split, there's gonna be this

one whole WWE again, I don't know. Yeah, SmackDown

1000 was really, really cool. I thought it was

a good show. It was fun and looking back, trying

to remember some of my favorite moments or things

I really enjoyed. Edge's heel run. Yeah. was

delightful with the whole rated R superstar.

And then he was rated RKO with Orton for a while

in a tag team. And they did just a bunch of things

with him. That was all terrific. They showed

it again. But that first time ever with the ring

collapse spot. Oh, yes. That's exciting. And

that was interesting. Seeing JR and King. Just

love seeing those two guys do do the announcing

hell. I don't think they showed this I don't

know if they have an issue with the guy or anything

else, but I remember watching Michael Cole and

Taz do to do smackdown Commentary yeah again

from the Heyman age and Taz was strong on those

actually those they were pretty good together

And yeah, I don't know if that was now why they

didn't have him back my It has been time to like

to be fair The to be fair. It would have been

nice if they had more time for Memories or for

some of the people you mentioned like Teddy Long

and some of the others. They just kind of showed

up for two seconds like I wasn't a huge fan of

John lorinitis and that time but it does kind

of suck that you know, his time Was constrained

to one second of him You know, being there as

the camera pans through the room. Yeah. I'd have

to say my favorite overall Smackdown moment.

Not only is it just anything with Stone Cold,

but it's the Stone Cold Booker stuff. Because

that was just... Yeah, that's true. That was

some of the best wrestling stuff I've ever seen.

That was fun. Cena's Rise was... Really strong

everything with Kurt angle as well during the

time frame. Yeah. Oh, yeah Yeah, yeah, let's

don't hold the booker. That's true. I don't know

how I forgot about that because he had everyone

remembers the the infamous shopping slash grocery

store Yeah Love it. Absolutely love it. Honestly,

anything with Stone Cold and Vince. I mean, because,

you know, that was a thing. And everything. We

had Vince and Ric Flair feuding whenever one

was in charge of Raw, the other was in charge

of SmackDown. You had probably the best moment.

A certain country's president is ever gonna have

when, you know, the Battle of the Billionaires

happened. Oh, Ashley. Why are you... Why are

you still here? Talking about guys they don't

seem to know what to do with. Yeah, exactly.

But yeah, SmackDown is more than just the B show.

It... It has had moments that... would rival

some of the best Raw moments. It's been really

good over the years, and Raw... Raw didn't start

out strong. No, it did not. Because of its era.

Yeah. They started out in the whole everybody's

gone in occupation era of WWE. Yeah, so over

on GeekCast Radio's Wars Tournament, Wrestling

Tournament thing, we're recording this before.

the final winner is announced kind of a thing

um... there was one episode where optimus solo

had to miss because of a previous engagement

so i came in as the repo man and uh... so i'm

like repo man i gotta look him up so i'm like

WWF best of repo man or whatever else and it

showed me this Monday Night Raw clip. He wasn't

on a whole lot might I add. Right, no no no right

obviously but I'm saying that you know I had

to they had referenced the repo man on the podcast

so I'm like okay I gotta look into this kind

of thing. I looked into it and I'm like, I'm

watching this moment and I'm like, oh my god,

will they turn that fucking siren off on Monday

night? Those early years of Raw, I would never

rewatch them because that siren pisses me off

to no end. That was the dumbest thing. Oh god.

See, smack them didn't have a siren. Exactly.

Yeah, so but smackdown didn't have that they

started out at a time when things were good and

They started out with being the beautiful people

because the Marilyn Manson song was the themes

It was the first smackdown theme song I can remember

off the top of my head. Yeah, but yeah for the

most part they were able to kind of hit the ground

running and That helped them a lot would have

been nice to have seen the rock on Smackdown

1000 more for talking about because you know,

he's synonymous with the term and Just I mean

He was Smackdown in the same way in the same

way that Cena was Smackdown It was nice. They

had Cena appear at least somewhat even though

like I said before it was really underwhelming

But they should have found a way to work The

full in somehow Yeah, the four hurt the in my

mind the four horsemen of Smackdown Stone Cold

the Undertaker the Rock and Cena I'm sure there

are others. I mean just in no points, but like

you think of It's tough though because to me

edge and angle are synonymous with absolutely.

Yeah, absolutely Cuz I mean for years edge carried

it. Yeah But a lot of what? Yeah, he was he and

the undertaker feuded for quite some time on

us as well. Yeah, yeah then They've had a lot

of good superstars Pass through there and hopefully,

you know years from now we do this or if somebody

else does this they can talk about Lynch being

synonymous with it too because she seems to be

at the start of a pretty amazing run hopefully

as long as Nia Jax stops hurting her Yeah, it's

it's crazy and smackdown has had a good run.

Hopefully it continues to have a good run Hopefully

it out does raw and like we said raw has suffered

some injuries and some setbacks and that's very

much sucks for the people that have you know

had that happen to them, but Right now I'm not

thrilled with any of it. Like I said earlier.

I have not as of this recording I have not even

watched Survivor series yet Enjoy watching the

stuff with the women right now, but there's not

a lot else, you know, I mentioned Brian and AJ

I could watch forever either against each other

or Generally what they do against other people

is entertaining as well But aside from that,

yeah, they just they don't know what they're

doing with half of their Characters or half the

people. Yeah, I mean Elias weekly gets some of

the loudest cheers, and they don't have a clue

what to do with the guy. Yeah. Like, I thought

they were gonna put him on this big heel turn.

Like, he got vicious recently. Like, it looked

like he was gonna go full -on villain kinda thing,

and then nothing happened with it. Well, they

turned him, uh, when the announcement with Roman

happened, they decided they needed more good

guys, so they turned him, and they turned Strowman.

Yeah, but They just haven't done anything with

Elias and then tonight, you know you Spoiler

alert, they still didn't do much with him. He

got involved in a six -man elimination and gets

beats and leaves like If he Yeah, this is why

I'm not sure what the hell is going to happen

next on Mayhem Mikes, folks. We might be going

on a hiatus for a while. We might just stick

to WWE comics from Boom Studios because I am

less than interested right now. And it's not

just because of Roman's news or anything like

that. The shield break up, the storyline's changing.

It's not just because of that. It's because the

overall product is just... If I am fast -forwarding

through a cut -down version of the show Just

to get through it to see if there's anything

I actually want to see then there has to be a

problem And we can do other older content and

things like that, but I just I don't know right

now Dad don't worry. I'll make him do something

So where can the people find you online sir at

night be on Twitter There you go. I'm at TFG

and Mike on Twitter You can follow at geek cast

radio and at this week in geek on Twitter as

well Go to geek cast radio comm and or this week

in geek net for the show Next time who knows

I I don't know what the hell is gonna happen.

So Could be an evolution could be a survivor

series It could be a minute by minute commentary

on transformers the movie who knows. I don't

know We should definitely do evolution just because

we shouldn't ignore it the way WWE tried to ignore

it, which was a load of shit. Yeah, I'll say

right now, not to necessarily give away my hand,

the only thing that I did not like about evolution,

and I know this is more because the NXT people

were promoting that than the main WWE people,

I'm not a big fan of the live music in the beginning

of the NXT events. I'm just not a fan of that,

I guess. Other than that, I absolutely love Evolution.

I like when they use it for the themes. I'm okay

with that if it's a slightly longer entrance

theme, but when they just decide to have music

for the sake of music, that's weird. Yeah, it's

very weird. Alright folks, we're gonna get the

heck out of here, and we will catch you next

time here on Mayhem Mice. You just made the list!

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