RammerJammer
#RollTide #TSC #RiseUp #BullsNation #RIPKobe
Ahh, SmackDown Live, the show that took WWE by storm in 2016. The show that featured established stars such as AJ Styles, Randy Orton, John Cena, The Usos, Dean Ambrose, Becky Lynch, Nikki Bella and The Miz. The show that was home of rising stars such as Baron Corbin, American Alpha, Alexa Bliss, and Apollo Crews. The show the featured a very popular worked shoot post show known as Talking Smack. Remember that SmackDown?
Almost two years later the show has been relegated to Authority Figures bytching like children, out of the blue Fatal Five Way matches, boring champions, and an absolutely horrible Women's Division so aside from bushing Road Dogg I'll try to list some ways to fix SmackDown Live.
1. Utilize The Roster
It seems as if Road Dogg/Vince is content on using the same group of wrestlers every week but there have been some glaring omissions from the ring. Tye Dillinger was #10 on the SDL rankings last week yet, what has he done? Look, I know what some of you are thinking, no I'm not advocating for Tye to be WWE Champion but he's a popular wrestler and should at least be in some storylines. The Fashion Police and Mike Kanellis are also wrestlers that haven't really been utilized as much as the should, something to think about. They also shouldn't be afraid to use some of the tag team wrestlers in the the single title picture, guys such as Kofi, Big E, Xavier, Chad Gable, Shelton, Luke Harper should absolutely be in the WWE and US Title pictures. As for the Women, and this goes for both show, stop grouping all of them together, sure Absolution is ok but The Riott Squad is a god awful group that should've never gotten called up, Charlotte, Naomi, and Becky should be in individual feuds but they're stuck in this slop.
2. Star Power
Besides AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura, who's the next big star on SmackDown? Randy Orton who hasn't been all that popular since 2011? Keep in mind, John Cena and The Miz were on SmackDown last year. I know RAW is Vince's baby but from a business perspective it makes more sense for both RAW and SmackDown to be big time. For this year's draft, I believe it would be a good oppurtunity to move Seth Rollins, Balor, and Sasha Banks or Bayley to SmackDown. We could have a situation where there's a Seth/AJ feud or a AJ/Balor Club feud which basically writes itself. Asuka may be coming to SmackDown but even with her, Bayley or Sasha would be a great addition as they appear to be directionless on RAW and with Rousey now on RAW, she's probably gonna take up a lot of time.
With the men, as long as Roman Reigns, Braun Strowman, Samoa Joe, and the rumored Lashley are on RAW, they'll be straight, they do need to get the title off of Lesnar ASAP though.
3. Authority Figures
Get rid of em, or at least limit their influence. Now, I was originally on board with the whole Shane/DB storyline as I thought this would lead to something interesting for Bryan but, it's turned out to be absolute travesty and SmackDown would be much better without Shane hogging the spotlight. Authority Figures are played out in wrestling anyway unless your name is Dario Cueto, either find a way to use the Shane/DB to get a wrestler over or squash this entirely. What's the point of the SmackDown Top 10 list if DB/Shane are just gonna put whomever they want title matches anyway?
4. Women's Division
To be perfectly honest, both Women's Divisions in WWE are a joke, it's become a division with Divas Era booking masked as a Feminist movement, an utter embarrassment. As I said earlier, the Riott Squad are absolutely one of the worst stables I've ever seen in WWE featuring three wrestlers moved up too early. This can be fixed though by dropping them back down to NXT or maybe even keeping them but bring up the Iconic Duo and Nikki Cross, three wrestlers who are absolutely ready for the main rosters. Also, stop having the likes of Naomi and Becky Lynch used as Cheerleaders in a feud featuring the Champion, limit the amount of multi-woman matches period, it's messes up everything. Naomi and Becky could be aiming for Charlotte right now or even having a nice face vs face feud right now. Utilize the other women like Natalya and Lana as well.
5. UK Championship
As of right now, the UK Championship is being defended in small promotions across the indies, in what feels like a rushed attempt for WWE to compete with World of Sport, a year or so later, WWE finds itself without a UK show. Now I'm not advocating for the whole division to be on SmackDown Live but I feel like having UK Championship showcase every week or once in a while could help out the Championship and SmackDown Live.
These are not major fixes but something I feel that could improve the show.
I just want the show to get better
I agree with every point in this thread. 