WWE SmackDown Live: Examining The Best and The Worst of the Brand for 2017

Best Promo: Usos Destroy New Day in a Rap Battle, July 4

The first time I watched this – when it aired live – honestly I thought it was kind of dumb. I’ve never been much of a rap guy (heavy metal for life, yo), and WWE “rap battles” are usually guys with no rhythm trying to recite the lousy poetry an intern wrote for them. So I went into this with pretty low expectations, and really only half listened.

But then a ton of people were raving about the promo, so I went back and watched it again. Having done that, and devoting more attention to it the second time around, I realized that this wasn’t the typical WWE rap battle. This was actually good.

I don’t care what the decision was – Wale played favorites for sure – the Usos smoked this. Absolutely knocked it out of the park. 2017 was a banner year for Jimmy and Jey, both in ring and on mic. While New Day tried to play this one for laughs, the Usos went for the jugular. It was brutal.

These two teams had some great matches in 2017 – SummerSlam kickoff, Hell in a Cell among them – but this rap battle was possibly better than all of them.

Honorable Mention: Pride of Bulgaria Celebration, Sept. 26

Plovdiv’s favorite son was given a key to the city, and this was the first day to officially be known as “Rusev Day.” How can that not be among the best promos of the year? Aiden English got to sing, Rusev was happy as a mida, and if Randy Orton didn’t ruin it all with an RKO from outta nowhere it may have topped the whole year.