SmackDown: 3 things that went right on the Oct. 15 episode

This week’s episode of WWE SmackDown served as more than just the final stop for the brand before heading over to Saudi Arabia for another propaganda show. With the show moving to FS1 to accommodate the American League Championship Series in Major League Baseball, WWE saw an opportunity to flex its muscle against All Elite Wrestling’s secondary show, Rampage.

As such, the company dug into its bag of tactics to make this “supersized” SmackDown live up to that billing. It took advantage of its temporary move to the less-restrictive FS1 by extending the show a half-hour and making that period commercial-free. It booked Brock Lesnar for an appearance. It gave us Becky Lynch vs. Sasha Banks. It even blessed us with another edition of Happy T…….okay, that was a bit too far, but you get the picture.

We won’t know until later whether WWE’s strategy worked opposite matches like Bryan Danielson vs. Minoru Suzuki and CM Punk vs. Matt Sydal (It probably did, but at least this WWE/AEW battle produced some fun content this week). For this show, though, there is something we can do…

These are three of the things that went right on the Oct. 15 episode of SmackDown.

Setting aside time for some quality wrestling

It seems silly for praising a wrestling company for, you know, putting good wrestling matches on its show, but given how promo, recap, and skit-heavy SmackDown has been over the last few weeks, it was nice to see them give the talent some time to do what they do best.

(Plus, with that extra 30 minutes tacked on, WWE didn’t have any excuse not to.)

This manifested itself in three matches: SmackDown Women’s Champion Becky Lynch vs. Sasha Banks, Finn Balor vs. Sami Zayn in a King of the Ring semifinals match, and The Street Profits vs. The Usos in a Street Fight for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship.

All three bouts lived up to their high expectations. Balor and Zayn put together a match so smooth, you would’ve thought they had worked several weeks of house show matches against each other beforehand (they didn’t, to be clear). The Profits and Usos turned in an intense effort that almost made you forget how forgone the conclusion of the match was.

And Banks and Lynch once again showed why WWE is right to turn to these two in big moments. Raphael Garcia went more in-depth on how Banks has basically become the Mariano Rivera of WWE (maybe she should come out to Metallica’s Enter Sandman, too), and even with a lame distraction finish, Banks met that standard in the show’s final match.

Goes to show that wrestling booking is more of an Occam’s Razor situation than WWE makes it out to be.

Edge’s show-opening promo

WWE starting all of their main roster shows with a long-winded, exposition-heavy promo (usually preceded by a video recap of everything the wrestler goes on to talk about) has become an exhausting trope over the years. Every once in a while, though, a wrestler like Edge will come through and turn something rote into something remarkable.

While this promo hyping up his Hell in a Cell match against Seth Rollins won’t go down as an all-time great soliloquy, the Hall of Famer delivery and lines putting over how dangerous the structure is and how much Rollins crossed the line by invading his home (not “house”) succeeded in making the bout at the propaganda show feel like the heated grudge match that it is.

Could’ve done without the “Seth is the only wrestler on the roster as passionate about wrestling as I am” stuff, as that defangs the rest of the roster more than it boosts Rollins. It was too reminiscent of Triple H’s “Undertaker and I are the last outlaws” promo from 2010.

Naomi vs. Sonya Deville…and Shayna Baszler

This one tentatively makes the cut because, for as disappointing as it is to see WWE go back to the heel authority figure trope, this succeeded in getting heat on Sonya Deville and cranking up the fans’ desire to see her get beat up by Naomi.

Now there are concerns, and they’re the usual ones that come with dusting this storyline off. For one, there’s a good chance WWE books Deville to get heat on Naomi for weeks on end before Deville gets her comeuppance, and that’s assuming they don’t give Deville her heat back right afterward. That would hurt Naomi’s babyface credibility more than it would help.

Plus, using Baszler — who WWE just started repairing after a year of questionable booking choices with her — as Deville’s henchman risks undercutting the work WWE has done fixing what they broke in the first place (after all, Naomi’s going to need to beat someone en route to facing Deville one on one).

In short, there are a number of ways WWE could mess this up, but they deserve some credit for getting it mostly right on Friday.