WWE SmackDown: Results, Highlights and Grades for November 29th, 2019

New Day’s Open Challenge

The New Day come out to explain why Black Friday is a special day. Not just because Big E debuted on a Black Friday, but because it’s a day where dreams come true, so they are going to grant an open challenge to defend their SmackDown Tag Team Championships. But who will answer? Who? Who? Who? Whooooooo? Whoooooo?

Out comes Cesaro and Shinsuke Nakamura, led by Sami Zayn, who says New Day romanticizing “the imperialism of evil” that is Thanksgiving and a greedy Black Friday holiday just makes him sick. He says the Tag Titles need to be held by men who can see through the nonsense, which is why they are ready to beat New Day for their belts.

Kofi and Cesaro start. Cesaro has Kofi in a headlock only to get pushed to the ropes. Shoulder block by Cesaro for a one count. Kofi responds with a big uppercut for a one count. Cesaro drags Kofi to his corner to tag Nakamura. Once in, Nakamura knees Kofi in the gut before whipping him to the corner.

Monkey flip to Kofi, but Kofi lands on his feet and hits a dropkick for a two count. Back to his feet, Naka hits a series of strikes. Kofi tries to recover with a middle rope dive, but before he can, gets distracted by Cesaro. Naka pushes him off and the back of his head hits the turnbuckle before Naka knees Kofi in the gut.

Cesaro comes in and locks in a chinlock. Eventually, they make their way to the outside where Kofi gets his legs sweeped off the apron by Zayn, then uppercutted by Cesaro into the announce table to send us into a commercial break.

Back from break, Kofi hot tags to Big E just as Cesaro hot tags to Nakamura. Big E comes in like a house of fire for a tag comeback. Nakamura evades a big splash and hits a series of knees. Tosses him into the corner and runs into a Uranage for the two count.

Big E signals the Big Ending, but Naka wiggles out and responds with a roundhouse kick. One more kick after tagging to Cesaro, who hits a diving headbutt for a two count. He sets up a Neutralizer, but E hits a back body drop, but Cesaro lands on his feet and tags to Naka.

Kofi makes the tag for an assisted foot stomp. Cesaro breaks it up at two.

https://twitter.com/WWE/status/1200606178788511744

Kofi goes for an assisted tope, but dives into a mid-air uppercut from Cesaro before laying out E. Back in the ring, Naka goes for Kinshasa, but Kofi reverses with a rollup, only to get kicked, then (sorta) hit with a sliding knee before the pin attempt gets broken up.

After E gets disposed, Naka tags to Cesaro, who nails a series of uppercuts onto Kofi before the latter finally reverses. He goes for Trouble in Paradise, but gets caught by Cesaro and draped across the ropes. Zayn runs in to hit Kofi with a plate of pancakes, but the ref stops him and ejects the manager.

Distracted by Zayn’s exit, Kofi takes the opportunity to hit Trouble in Paradise on Cesaro for the win.

Winners: The New Day

Grade: B+

By far the best match of the night. I love me some tag team wrestling and there’s a lot to love when it comes to the chemistry between these four.

After the match, Daniel Bryan makes his way to the ring to address Bray Wyatt’s challenge. He understands the advice he received about how The Fiend could “change” him, but maybe, he needs to be changed. The same way he changed Finn Balor and Seth Rollins. He says by the end of their Survivor Series match, he wasn’t changed because of the Fiend, but he was changed by the fans’ energy and passion. It made him remember the person he should’ve been this whole time.

When it comes to accepting Wyatt’s challenge, he finally says it: YES! YES! YES!

Bray pops up onscreen share his enthusiasm and excitement for Bryan’s new energy. He says Miz is right. If he fights The Fiend again, he will be changed. Which is fair because in a way, Bryan helped Bray changed and built the Firefly Funhouse. He remembers, and so does “he.”

As a man of his word, Bray Wyatt brings up his promise to introduce a new face. Cue the lights cutting off.

Suddenly, the Fiend comes up from under the ring trying to pull Bryan into “Hell.” Bryan fights his way through it, but The Fiend tortures Bryan with the Mandible Claw until The Yes Man is finally pulled into the ring, showing he ripped Bryan’s hair out as well while underneath the ring.

He continues to pull pieces of hair out from under the ring until we go off the air.

Overall Grade: B-

Weaker than usual episode, but that’s to be expected for most holiday episodes. It was watchable at least and while most matches did not deliver, all the angles and segments were pretty stellar. The tag team championship match especially was stellar.