Solo Sikoa wasn’t expected to deliver the best match of his WWE career on Monday Night Raw. He wasn’t supposed to walk into his semifinal bout of the "Last Time Is Now" tournament and go strike-for-strike with Gunther, one of the best talents in the wrestling ecosystem today.
Few anticipated that he would look completely at home under the bright lights and remind the entire wrestling world that there might be a real performer buried somewhere beneath the version of Solo we see every Friday on SmackDown.
But that’s exactly what happened Monday night, and it forced a lot of people — myself included — to reexamine who Sikoa actually is when he’s not suffocating under what I’ve come to call the SmackDown Tax.
For months (honestly, years), Sikoa has been treated as an easy punchline. He's been the weakest part of a sinking weekly show, a presentation so flat and joyless that it actively repels viewers.
His MFT stable hasn’t helped. It’s a creatively bankrupt act built on vague menace and interchangeable goons, and it’s dragged Sikoa down harder than anyone seems willing to admit.
Yet on Raw, freed from that dead weight and asked to simply wrestle one of the best performers in the world today, Sikoa looked revitalized. He looked confident and engaged. He looked like someone who actually belongs as a featured act on a top program.
But the real revelation isn’t necessarily just that Sikoa can go. Instead, it’s what this match further exposed about the environment he’s been trapped in.
Solo Sikoa has suffered from WWE's 'SmackDown Tax'
What Monday really highlighted is just how destructive the SmackDown Tax has become. WWE SmackDown is a fully operational creative sinkhole.
Nearly everyone who spends meaningful time on that show comes out worse. Drew McIntyre’s momentum evaporated there. Jacob Fatu had his momentum completely halted as well. Even Cody Rhodes, the reigning WWE Champion, hasn’t been immune to the dulling effect of a program that strips performers of personality and distinctness.
The SmackDown Tax doesn’t discriminate. It slowly eats away at everyone.
Quietly, Sikoa may hold a claim to being one of its biggest casualties. His run on Friday nights has been defined by a presentation that actively works against his strengths. He's been pigeonholed in the stoic, blank-faced enforcer role, while saddled with endless MFT stare-downs and soulless promo material.
The MFT stable itself is a problem. It’s packed with interchangeable lackies who, in many ways, feel like relics from a different era. Someone like Talla Tonga may have blended in fine in 2008, but he sticks out in the worst possible way in present-day WWE. He is not a 2025 WWE-caliber performer, and the same could probably be said for a couple of others in the group.
They’re not menacing, they’re not allowed to be charismatic, and they’re certainly not elevating Sikoa. If anything, they’ve turned him into background noise, as the centerpiece of a faction nobody takes seriously.
But on Raw, Sikoa's presentation was a bit different. Solo wasn’t carrying a dead act on his back. He wasn’t pretending to be something he’s not. He was allowed to be a bruiser — a big, physical, throwback wrestler who can surprise you with his intensity and flashes of personality.
The Glendale crowd rewarded him and Gunther because there was finally something worth rewarding. Wrestling can be that simple sometimes.
You can almost understand Sikoa’s situation better through sports analogies. SmackDown is basically the wrestling equivalent of a bad NFL offense — the kind where it’s impossible to evaluate the quarterback because everything around him is broken.
Sikoa feels a lot like Cam Ward on the Tennessee Titans right now. He's a talented young performer thrown into a situation that actively works against him, which, in turn, leaves everyone unsure whether the flaws are his or his environment's.
He’s that bruising eighth-man power forward off the bench who thrives in a limited, clearly defined role, but looks completely miscast when a team suddenly asks him to be its starting point guard (h/t Ibou, of Self Made for the analogy).
Monday was the rare night WWE finally put Sikoa back in his proper position, with a format that accentuated his strengths instead of exposing his weaknesses. And just like that, he looked like a totally different performer.
Sometimes, a change of scenery is all it takes, especially when that change of scenery involves escaping from the SmackDown wasteland.
Unfortunately, WWE seems committed to the MFT experiment, even as the SmackDown Tax continues to erode every performer tied to it. Pulling Sikoa out of the group would expose how little value the other four members bring, and WWE rarely abandons a program so quickly that they invested this much in.
So while Monday showed what Solo could be, there’s no guarantee the company lets him be that version of himself again. That, in and of itself, is the tragedy of the SmackDown Tax.
However, Sikoa's Monday night banger against Gunther showed that he can be more than what WWE has allowed him to be. Now, he's probably never going to be a WrestleMania main event-caliber performer. He doesn't belong at the top of the card, and it's hard to see him reaching that point on merit alone.
But he can and should have a role on the roster. You need performers like Solo Sikoa to round out your team. He can be an entertaining part of WWE's weekly programming. The company just has to let him do what he does best.