Friday Night SmackDown Review - March 7, 2014

Batista calls Daniel Bryan unworthy of being champ.

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Daniel Bryan Interrupted Batista

As much as I hate Batista's fashion sense, his stupid skinny jeans fit (no pun intended) his heel persona perfectly. He seems much more comfortable as a hated heel and this promo was pure proof of that. The live crowd was hot for Bryan, who had an enjoyable exchange with Batista on the mic. Both of their promos made sense and hinted at a potential rivalry between the two sooner rather than later. Kane helping Batista beat down Bryan and Big Show (who the crowd was surprisingly hot for) making the save help set up the tag team match for later in the night.


Christian def. Dolph Ziggler

I had higher hopes for this matchup, as it had the potential to be great on paper. These two have sparingly faced off in one-on-one action in recent years, so it felt fresh, but there was no heat on the match at all, sadly. As soon as they started to take it up a notch, it abruptly ended when Alberto Del Rio distracted Ziggler and allowed Ziggler to pick up the victory. It was a nice win for Christian seeing how he hasn't won many matches in recent weeks, and Ziggler was protected via the distraction. Sheamus coming out and brawling with Christian furthered that feud as well.

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Alberto Del Rio costs Dolph Ziggler his match.

WWE Tag Team Champions The Usos def. Curtis Axel and Ryback (Non-title)

Axel and Ryback have zero credibility as a tag team, so this was a glorified squash match from the get-go, but it was fine for what it was. The Usos are a hot act coming out of their tag team title win on Raw and this only furthered their strong momentum. Axel and Ryback can take a loss, and the match thankfully wasn't dragged out longer than it needed to be.


Natalya and Eva Marie def. Divas Champion AJ Lee and Tamina Snuka

I still have no idea why Eva Marie is portraying a face on television, and don't tell me it's because she's on Total Divas since she's hated on that show, too. I found it hysterical when Michael Cole acknowledged the chant for her from the first few fans in the front row. It was your typical Divas match for the most part, but it was mind boggling why Eva spent more time in the ring than Natalya. I have no problem with AJ tapping out to Natalya as long as it leads to Natalya getting a shot at the Divas Championship.


United States Champion Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns Called Out Seth Rollins

This was one segment I was looking forward to on this show after the controversial actions of Rollins on Raw, and it didn't disappoint. I didn't expect The Shield to go their separate ways here, but rather continue to plant the seeds for it. Ambrose and Rollins hitting one another relentlessly was a bit odd, but each man was excellent on the mic and played their roles well. The Shield split has been very well done thus far and I can't wait to see it reach its climax at some point in the next few weeks.


Sheamus def. Alberto Del Rio

The crowd was silent early on in the match, which was understandable given how neither character is all that interesting at the moment. However, as the action intensified down the stretch, the crowd was more receptive to the bout. Del Rio and Sheamus have very good chemistry together, there's no doubt about that, it's just their lack of character development that takes away from their encounters. It was a predictable win for Sheamus, but at least Christian didn't interfere to avenge the attack from Sheamus from earlier in the evening.


Daniel Bryan and Big Show def. Batista and Kane

The match was well-wrestled and everyone was able to hit their signature spots, but it felt formulaic more than anything else. As solid as the match was, it felt randomly thrown together since most of the competitors in this match aren't facing each other at WrestleMania nor do they have any real history together. I enjoyed the action, don't get me wrong, but what does the win for Show and Bryan mean in the long scheme of things? I will also be extremely sad if we end up getting Show vs. Kane for the umpteenth time at 'Mania.


Overall Show

Nothing was going to top the entertaining episode of Raw that we got earlier this week, so this show of course paled in comparison. There was nothing about it that was bad by any means, but none of the segments or matches featured stood out, either. If anything, The Shield segment was worth watching, but it's nothing that probably won't be replayed on next week's Raw anyway.

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