SmackDown airs tonight (Apr. 10) with a live show emanating from SAP Center in San Jose, California. This is the sixth episode of SmackDown during the seven week build to WrestleMania 42, which takes place on the weekend of April 18 and 19.
WWE tries to save the main event of WrestleMania with a big surprise
WWE tried its best to ruin the main of WrestleMania 42 last week with the return of Pat McAfee, who shit all over WWE’s current business metrics and said Randy Orton is the only one who can save the industry. McAfee called back to the glory days of the Attitude
Era as part of his argument.
The negative backlash online to McAfee’s heel turn was swift and severe, and we know WWE pays close attention to that sort of thing. McAfee now says he has a MASSIVE SURPRISE on tonight’s show. Hopefully that means Triple H’s creative team has made some adjustments to turn this mess around and save WrestleMania’s main event angle between Orton and WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. Then again, it could also mean that WWE plans to double down on celebrity or outside involvement, and only make things worse from here. For some fans, this is like staring at that car wreck on the side of the road while driving down the highway.
In addition to Pat’s huge surprise, WWE’s preview for SmackDown also indicates that Rhodes will “strike back” after McAfee and Orton kicked him in the dick and beat him up with a steel chair last week. Cody says he is starting to hear the voices in his head, so we’ll probably get an idea of what they’re telling him when we see what level of violence he’s willing to unleash tonight on MAGAfee and The Viper. Unless it’s just Jelly Roll’s voice that Cody is now hearing, which would be kind of lame.
Will Pat McAfee’s MASSIVE SURPRISE live up to the all-caps hype? Tune into SmackDown tonight to find out.
The rest of the card
At this time last week, there were zero matches announced for SmackDown. There’s kinda, sorta one match announced for this week’s show. WWE says Royce Keys is debuting tonight, which I’m pretty sure means he’s in a match. Will he run through some lower card guy en route to potentially winning the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal next week (assuming it returns)? Will he do something higher up on the card to play off his AEW history with Cody Rhodes? Is WWE’s babyface hype video for Royce setting up fans for a swerve? Will Kit Wilson accuse him of being toxic because his name sounds like a set of car keys?
WWE says United States Champion Sami Zayn is “out for payback” tonight after he was laid out by Trick Williams and Lil Yachty at the end of last week’s show. Is Carmelo Hayes also out for payback after Zayn took advantage of his leg injury to win their rematch last week? Actually, when it’s worded like that, it sounds like Hayes just wasn’t good enough to get the job done and deserves to be out of the US title mix at WrestleMania 42.
Drew McIntyre “promises to expose the real Jacob Fatu” on tonight’s show. I assume this is related to Fatu’s criminal record. I’m a little worried about a super cringe and/or racist sketch coming our way related to this, but maybe that’s because I’ve seen too much of Vince McMahon’s creative vision on WWE programming over the years. Drew and Jacob have delivered strong performances throughout this feud, so they have earned plenty of goodwill to keep it going here as they build up more hype for their unsanctioned match at WrestleMania.
Other stuff to keep an eye on
– Tiffany Stratton and Women’s United States Champion Giulia didn’t make the cut for WrestleMania 42. However, next week’s SmackDown on the eve of WrestleMania does need some matches booked, so perhaps WWE will set up a title match between them on that show. Is there any chance Chelsea Green is recovered in time from her foot injury to also be a factor?
– Speaking of injuries, how much longer is WWE willing to wait before making a call on clearing Nikki Bella for the WWE women’s tag team championship match at WrestleMania? Is this really what’s holding up a decision on officially announcing Asuka vs. IYO SKY for WWE’s biggest show of the year?
– Tama Tonga was sick of that stupid Wyatt lantern and finally gave it back to Uncle Howdy last week. Solo said he’s on board with Tama’s idea for the MFTs to refocus on winning all the championships on SmackDown, but first they have to finish off the Wyatts. What kind of feud-ending match does he have in mind, and will it take place next week on WrestleMania SmackDown?
– Damian Priest and R-Truth successfully defended their WWE tag team championship for the first time last week with a win over Kit Wilson and The Miz, after Danhausen’s curse stopped the ref from counting to three for the heels. Will Miz and Kit respond by coming up with a plan for Danhausen to take his first bump in WWE?
– Aleister Black beat that jabroni Matt Cardona last week in a singles match. Are Aleister and Zelina Vega still interested in convincing Matt to turn heel, or will they move on to targeting a different jabroni on the roster? Also, why the hell is WWE allowing Matt Cardona to wrestle with a kayfabe broken wrist?
– WWE Women’s Champion Jade Cargill has reformed The Baddies in WWE, and they forced Rhea Ripley to watch Jade put a whooping on IYO SKY with a kendo stick earlier this week on Raw. Who will Rhea eradicate tonight as she looks for revenge?
– Where the f*** are the Street Profits?
What will you be looking for on SmackDown?
