WWE FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN PRIMER 10/8: Season Premiere, King of the Ring and Queen’s Crown Tournaments Begin, Contract Signing
SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)…
WWE FRIDAY NIGHT SMACKDOWN PRIMER
OCTOBER 8, 2021
SAN JOSE, CA. AT THE SAP CENTER
AIRS ON FOX NETWORK, 8:00 p.m. EDT
BY FRANK PETEANI (@FrankPeteani), PWTORCH.COM CONTRIBUTOR
Announcers: Michael Cole and Pat McAfee
Match Results, Key Segments and Exclusives from Last Week
- Night one of the Draft took place. See the Raw primer for results. Night two listed below.
- Universal Champion Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar had a face to face after round one of the Draft was announced. A brawl ensued with Smackdown Tag Team Champions the Usos getting involved.
- Happy Corbin (w/Madcap Moss) defeated Kevin Owens. Owens was drafted to Raw on night two.
- New Smackdown draftee Drew McIntyre said his goal is to go after the Universal Championship.
- New Raw draftee Edge appeared, answering Seth Rollins from a week before. Rollins appeared on the Titan Tron and revealed he was at Edge’s house. He made himself at home while Edge ran to the back in a panic and called his wife, Beth Phoenix. Rollins himself is now on Raw.
- Carmella vs. Liv Morgan never got started. Carmella wore an ugly mask. Who cares? Both women are now on Raw.
- New Smackdown draftees New Day (Kofi Kingston & Xavier Woods) and the Street Profits (Montez Ford & Angelo Dawkins) defeated Dolph Ziggler & Robert Roode and the Alpha Academy (Otis & Chad Gable). All three other teams are now on Raw.
- Sasha Banks defeated Bianca Belair. New Smackdown draftee and Raw Women’s Champion (how stupid is that) Charlotte Flair attacked both women after the match. Bianca is now on Raw.
Draft Night Two Results
New to Smackdown:
Sheamus
Shayna Baszler
Xia Li (from NXT)
The Viking Raiders (Erik & Ivar)
Ricochet
Humberto Carrillo & Angel Garza
Ridge Holland (from NXT)
Jinder Mahal & Shanky
New to Raw
Smackdown Women’s Champion Becky Lynch
Seth Rollins
Kevin Owens
The Street Profits (Montez Ford & Angelo Dawkins)
Finn Balor
Carmella
Gable Steveson (Olympic Gold Medalist and recent signing)
Dolph Ziggler & Robert Roode
Liv Morgan
Mia Yim
Tamina
Tegan Nox
Arena
WWE returns to the SAP Center in San Jose, CA. for the first time since February of 2020. The arena opened its doors in 1993 and is hope to the NHL’s San Jose Sharks, who played their first season that year. WWE has been running events here since 1998 beginning with that year’s Royal Rumble, and in terms of PPVs most recently ran the December 2018 TLC event.
Tonight’s episode of Smackdown is being billed as the “season premiere,” however the new rosters don’t take effect until October 22, one day after Crown Jewel.
Advertised Matches & Segments
Rey Mysterio vs. Sami Zayn in a King of the Ring Match
Rey Mysterio will go one-on-one in the first match of the King of the Ring tournament. The tournament, which goes all the way back to the late 1980s and became a PPV in 1993, was announced on Smackdown last week. Happy Corbin who went by Baron Corbin at the time, won the last tournament that took place in 2019 and held the crown until losing it to Shinsuke Nakamura, who is now the Intercontinental Champion and goes by King Nakamura.
Rey and his son Dominik have been involved with Sami Zayn recently with Dominik losing multiple matches. Sami has tried to get in the ear of Dominik recently saying he should listen to himself and not his father as much. Rey and Dominik are on their way to Raw, with Sami remaining on Smackdown.
No other matches have been announced for the tournament as of the posting of this article.
Frank’s Analysis: Call me old fashioned, but if a tournament is coming up, I would like to know the participants and brackets. Yeah, yeah, I know, tournaments don’t bode well for ratings. Well then don’t do a damn tournament then. You have a “new” king in Nakamura. What’s the point … oh right, Crown Jewel is on October 21. Never mind.
Carmella vs. Liv Morgan in a Queens Crown Tournament Match
Raw-bound Carmella and Liv Morgan will go one-on-one in a Queens Crown match. They were to have a match last week, but Carmella attacked Liv and wore a mask to protect her face. The match never started. WWE didn’t explain why, but, what’s the point. Liv holds a few wins over Carmella around the time of Money in the Bank and she recently paired with Toni Storm to defeat Carmella & Zelina Vega. Toni is remaining on Smackdown.
Again, no other participants have been announced nor is there a bracket.
Frank’s Analysis: I’d like to be into this, and maybe once it gets started, I’ll be pleasantly surprised, but I’ve seen these women wrestle (it feels like) 100 times and again why can’t they announce the participants and brackets? What’s the mystery? I don’t get it.
Contract Signing: Becky Lynch, Bianca Belair, and Sasha Banks sign for Smackdown Women’s Championship Match at Crown Jewel
Raw-bound Smackdown Women’s Champion Becky Lynch, Bianca Belair (also Raw-bound), and Sasha Banks will make it official and sign the contract for their triple threat match for the title at Crown Jewel. In the short history of going to Saudi Arabia, this will be the third women’s match (maybe it’s the fourth but who really gives a crap) to take place at these shows.
Chaos has ruled the land with these women in the past week. Smackdown-bound Raw Women’s Champion Charlotte Flair attacked both Sasha and Bianca after their match last week with Becky on guest commentary. On Raw, Becky attacked Bianca in her match with Charlotte causing a DQ. Sasha made an appearance on Raw and attacked Becky to close out the show.
Frank’s Analysis: We can only expect chaos tonight folks, what is going to happen? (Eye roll). I’ve previewed these WWE shows for three and a half years and I think they do like one contract signing per month. I’ve probably previewed approximately 30-40 of these things. I get why they like to do them, but when you do them so often, they lose their value. I remember Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant signing the contract for their match at WrestleMania 3, and that felt like a big deal. They did them sporadically through the years and it was cool because you knew something was going to happen and you don’t see it often. Now I legit feel like they do it to fill TV time and create this idea of excitement and unpredictability. When you do it so often, the fans become desensitized because it doesn’t feel special anymore and they know either a table is going to get flipped, there’ll be a slap and a brawl, etc. etc. etc. Maybe it’ll be cool, and the elements are there, but I can’t say I’m waiting with bated breath.
Follow Frank on Twitter @FrankPeteani. Thank you for reading!
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