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WWE Friday Night Smackdown returns to your screens tonight with a new episode coming live from the American Bank Center in Corpus Christi, TX.
Tonight will be a really important episode of Smackdown as we sit just eight days out from the Backlash pay-per-view in Puerto Rico. Tonight will mark Night 1 of the WWE Draft and we’ll get a highly anticipated Wrestlemania 39 rematch in the main event.
How to watch Friday Night Smackdown
Date: Friday, April 28
Time: 8 p.m. ET
Location: American Bank Center, Corpus Christi, TX
Network: Fox
Live stream: Fox Live or Fox Now App
What to watch for on Friday Night Smackdown
As mentioned before, the 2023 WWE Draft will begin tonight as superstars from both brands will be assigned their designated shows for the foreseeable future. The roster has been divvied up into two pools, with one pool finding out where they’ve been drafted tonight and the other finding out this Monday on Raw. Tonight’s pool will include stars like Bianca Belair, Becky Lynch, Cody Rhodes, Imperium, and the Bloodline, among several others. We should also see a select few stars from NXT get drafted to their first main roster brands. There hasn’t been a draft since October of 2021, so this an opportunity for the company to freshen things up and do a hard reset with its roster.
The main event of tonight’s show will feature Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens defending the undisputed WWE Tag Team Championships against the Usos in a rematch of their epic encounter at Wrestlemania 39. The two teams have continued warring against each other in the month since that match, with Solo Sikoa notably pulling more weight for the Bloodline. The Usos went as far as to dedicate this match to Roman Reigns and the underlying tension here is what the “Tribal Chief” will do if his cousins fall short yet again. We’ll see how this rematch plays out.
Also on the show, Zelina Vega will go one-on-one with Sonya Deville tonight ahead of her showdown with Smackdown Women’s Champion Rhea Ripley at Backlash. Speaking of the Judgement Day, we’ll probably hear more from them after Bad Bunny officially challenged Damian Priest to a street fight at the pay-per-view.