WWE SmackDown Live Review - September 25, 2018

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

The Miz def. R-Truth

Miz and Truth will be facing off on Mixed Match Challenge after SmackDown Live, hence Truth's heavy involvement at the start of the show and his match with Miz. Truth TV was a chaotic mess (largely because of Truth and Carmella), but I actually enjoyed it because of the strong verbal exchange between Daniel Bryan and Miz. The subsequent match was fine for what it was and gave Miz his win back over Truth from two weeks ago.

Sheamus def. SmackDown Tag Team Champion Big E

You had to know Sheamus was winning here to allow The Bar to continue building momentum ahead of Super Show-Down, where he and Cesaro will vie for The New Day's SmackDown Tag Team Championship. Mind you, they did nothing to earn the opportunity, so they need as many victories as possible prior to the event. As for this match, it was well-wrestled and fun while it lasted.

Rusev Called Out Aiden English

As everyone expected, English turned on Rusev for all of the obvious reasons, but I appreciated them taking a trip down memory lane and recalling their last year together. What I didn't expect, however, was English insinuating that he and Lana had an affair. I didn't have much faith in their feud before, and I'm not optimistic it will be any better after this, but I'm willing to give it a chance and see where it goes.

Asuka and Naomi def. Sonya Deville and Mandy Rose

Deville and Rose impress during every opportunity they get, but they're nothing more than background players at this point, and the same can be said about The IIconics. This was a decent little match to establish that Asuka and Naomi are on the same page ahead of their clash with The IIconics at Super Show-Down. It was better than Asuka squashing Peyton Royce, though I assume we'll get that next week.

Tye Dillinger def. United States Champion Shinsuke Nakamura by Disqualification (Non-title)

Dillinger and Nakamur have had strong chemistry in the past and could have had another entertaining encounter here if given the time. However, this was more of an angle than anything else with Randy Orton crashing the contest and targeting Dillinger. The Perfect 10 shtick hasn't been over in ages, so I hope Orton vs. Dillinger isn't a full-fledged feud but rather a one-off match where Orton can win with ease.

SmackDown Women's Champion Becky Lynch def. Lana (Non-title)

This bout was set up backstage earlier in the evening when Lynch got involved in Lana's business and demanded they go one-on-one. Lana still isn't very skilled in the ring and it was weird for her to score even a remote amount of offense before losing, but on the bright side, it was smart to keep this on the shorter side and give Lynch her first dominant win as champion. For those wondering, Charlotte Flair was nowhere to be seen after being attacked backstage before the show by Lynch.

Samoa Joe Invaded WWE Champion AJ Styles' Home

Contract signings in wrestling almost always end the same, so while this one was bound to be no different, I was looking forward to it because the brawls between these two never cease to excite me. Well, what we got instead was equally intriguing with Joe journeying to the Styles compound. He rang the doorbell and then the show abruptly ended, which was a nice hook for next week. The intensity in this program has been top-notch,

Overall Show

SmackDown is fully focused on Super Show-Down at the moment and thus the build to the event on this show was well done. There wasn't a ton else going on to be honest (at least anything worth going out of your way to see), but the Joe and Styles stuff was solid, the first half hour was enjoyable, and the angle with Rusev, Lana and English held my attention throughout the night.