The Good
For Raw, the opening segment and match was entertaining. Baron Corbin was with Drew McIntyre and Bobby Lashley to open up the show and Corbin was emphasizing that when he becomes the permanent GM, you are either with him or against him. This brought out Elias, who made fun of everybody in the ring and said that anybody but Corbin would be a good fit for a GM. This then led to a match between Bobby Lashley and Elias, in where Lashley won because Corbin decided to make a last second adjustment in the match and make it a no DQ match, which led to the three guys all beating up Elias.
For Smackdown, they had a celebration for Jeff Hardy and his 20 years with WWE and Smackdown. They produced a great video and had the entire roster out to celebrate. But, then Samoa Joe came out and crashed the party. Joe went into Hardy’s past trouble with alcohol and drugs and already started this rivalry out on a personal note. That is what Samoa Joe does best with his rivals and this rivalry with Jeff Hardy is already out to a great start.
The Bad
For Raw, they hosted a Intercontinental Championship open with Seth Rollins and while these are enjoyable most of the time, this week didn’t work out. The main reason being is because Rollins defended his championship this week against Dolph Ziggler, which feels like the millionth time. For as many people that they have on the Raw roster, to not have other than Dolph Ziggler be the one to face off against Rollins is a total lack of creativity from WWE.
For Smackdown, they had a segment where the Big Show decided to end things with the Bar and it fell flat. The main reason is because they didn’t even make this a main point on the show. Instead they just showed a quick backstage segment that was filmed before the show even started where Cesaro was upset with Big Show for not helping last week, only to take a KO Punch. This could’ve been made a bigger deal considering the Big Show was the whole reason that the Bar was tag team champions, but for some reason WWE doesn’t want to give the tag team division proper attention.
The Final Verdict
Overall, Raw was very bad this week while Smackdown was very good. For being the “superior show” after winning at Survivor Series, you would think WWE would be able to have better plans laid out for Raw. Instead, we get repeat matches or filler matches and segments that just don’t feel intriguing. While Smackdown, on the other hand, has great build up for TLC and gives the proper time to each rivalry they are trying to push. With all that said, Smackdown won this week by a landslide and have all the momentum going forward right now.
