Friday Night SmackDown Review - July 17, 2026

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Cody Rhodes Attacked Gunther

Adam Pearce informed Gunther during this segment that Gunther and Sami Zayn will be added to the Undisputed WWE Championship match at SummerSlam if they can beat Rhodes and CM Punk at Saturday Night's Main Event. That's an excellent stipulation to make the star-studded match even more meaningful. The rest of this segment with Rhodes attacking Gunther was effective in setting up their main event for later in the night.

Finn Balor def. Talla Tonga

Balor beating Tama Tonga last week wasn't too surprising, but I was pleasantly surprised that Balor beat Talla Tonga clean here considering how protected he's been since debuting last year. It was a nice match for as long as it lasted. It's worth noting that Balor has been pretty over the last two weeks, so hopefully they can capitalize on the momentum he has at the moment.

Women's United States Champion Tiffany Stratton def. Jacy Jane to Qualify for the Interim WWE Women's Championship 5-Way Ladder Match at SummerSlam (Non-Title)

It was revealed in a vignette earlier in the night that Rhea Ripley is out injured indefinitely and that an interim champion will be crowned in her absence. Yeah, that's an awful idea. It's dumb whenever AEW has done it in the past and it's just as dumb in WWE. At that point, just strip Ripley of the title. A six-way Ladder match is a lazy way to determine a champ, too. Stratton and Jane had a quality contest, but Jane losing clean after such a hot start on SmackDown a few months ago is baffling booking.

Jade Cargill def. Nia Jax to Qualify for the Interim WWE Women's Championship 5-Way Ladder Match at SummerSlam

Wow, this was terrible. Cargill and Jax feuded for several months in 2025, so I'm sure they could've had a fine match with more time, but both are heels, so they kept it extremely brief. Not only that, but it also barley got underway before Charlotte Flair attacked Cargill, resulting in Cargill winning by disqualification. This also means it won't be Cargill vs. Flair one-on-one at SummerSlam, which is disappointing.

AAA World Tag Team Champions The War Raiders def. Fraxiom (Non-Title)

You could hear a pin drop when War Raiders made their entrance and it's hard to blame them considering they haven't wrestled on WWE TV in many months. That said, they managed to get the crowd into the action down the stretch. This turned out to be a lot of fun. It was a much-needed victory for War Raiders ahead of their looming title for title match with Damian Priest and R-Truth.

Cody Rhodes def. Gunther by Disqualification

We've now seen this match a handful of times at this point, so it didn't feel like as big of a deal as it should have, but what we got was good. It wasn't long before Zayn and Punk showed up at ringside and all hell broke loose. Apparently Gunther is incapable of beating Rhodes, even by disqualification. Anyway, this was a hot angle to close the show with going into the tag team matchup at Saturday Night's Main Event.

Overall Show

I enjoyed the last two editions of SmackDown more than this one. The situation with Ripley isn't ideal and it's resulted in qualifiers that I personally don't care about. The tag team division is dire, but War Raiders vs. Fraxiom was a treat. The best parts of this show were in the last half hour or so, but it certainly wasn't a strong effort on the whole, regardless of the runtime.

SEE MORE: SmackDown Reviews