WWE Friday Night Smackdown comes live from Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids, MI, and we’re moving closer to the Hell in a Cell pay-per-view in two weeks.
Whether it’s an extremely important episode or a completely throwaway show that will be forgotten about in two weeks, there’s always questions that surround each edition of Friday Night Smackdown. I’ll ask some pertaining to tonight’s episode.
What will come from the tag team title unification match?
Tonight we’ll finally get the tag team unification match as Raw Champions RK-Bro will face Smackdown Champions The Usos. This match was supposed to happen at Wrestlemania Backlash a few weeks ago before it was changed to the trios match that eventually main-evented.
So will we get an actual finish for this match?
This has the potential to be one of the best television matches of the year but it’s curious that it’s happening just 16 days before a ppv. It would make sense to stretch it out to the big show and an ongoing feud like this between two top teas would certainly warrant the Hell in a Cell stipulation. We’ll see if there’s shenanigans tonight that will set up that match.
How/will the Sasha Banks-Naomi walkout be addressed?
The news coming out of Monday Night Raw this week was WWE Women’s Tag Team Champions Sasha Banks and Naomi walking out of the show. Rumors and reporting have cited different reasons for the walkout and it’s been the talk of the wrestling world for the past four days.
The WWE already released a hastily made press release about the incident but it will be interesting to see if it’s mentioned on air tonight. Banks and Naomi are two of the top female superstars in the company and their absence will definitely be noticed.
Who’s next for Ronda Rousey?
Smackdown Champion Ronda Rousey is issuing an open challenge for her title and her first challenger was rookie Raquel Rodriguez last week. She successfully defended against the upstart and will most likely do it again.
So who’s next?
Rousey was reportedly supposed to face Sasha Banks at Hell in a Cell but those plans have been seemingly scrapped for obvious reasons. With Charlotte Flair taking time off, there’s currently no other top stars for her to face on Smackdown at the moment. Interestingly enough, they began an angle coming out of last week’s open challenge where Aliyah and Shotzi were arguing over who was supposed to come out for the open invitation. We’ll see if that leads to anywhere.