SmackDown In A Nutshell: Kicking Off A Brand New Season

We end our wrestling week as we always do, with SmackDown In A Nutshell. This week, we are kicking off a brand new season, as it’s officially the premiere of season 2 on FOX.

Don’t worry, I am right there with you on the notion of either RAW or SmackDown having seasons, but I digress.

So yes, we are kicking off a brand new season, and the big attraction this week is Braun Strowman challenging Roman Reigns for the Universal Championship.

Outside of that, how else can the blue brand kick off their brand new season on FOX? Well, I’d say the other big item is welcoming all the new roster members, freshly drafted off of RAW to SmackDown.

And there are quite a few notables, as you’d expect. SmackDown now has Seth Rollins and Rey Mysterio, as well as new tag champions the Street Profits.

So there is a lot of new…plus a lot of familiar. And, put it all together and it means plenty to be excited about as we kick off a brand new season,

Are you ready to kick off that brand new season?

Let’s crack open this Nutshell and find out!

Best Match of the night:

Lots of things happened tonight, but not many matches.

With that said…I enjoyed the six man match which gave us the New Day farewell.

Reigns and Strowman wasn’t bad either.

Worst match of the night:

Street Profits versus Roode and Ziggler…if only because it was a DQ finish and a short match.

Star of the Night

Hard to pick one this time. I did like getting Bryan back though.

Spot of the Night:

Maybe it wasn’t like, some super amazing spot…but this was nice to see…

Jobber of the Night:

Plenty to choose from here.

You could go with guys like Kalisto or Chad Gable, because they got tossed around by Lars Sullivan.

Or, we could go with Sheamus or Braun Strowan. Both are RAW Superstars now, making appearances on SmackDown. There wasn’t a reason for them to win, so they did not.

Upset of the Night:

Nothing to see here.

Holy Sh** Moment of the Night:

I guess we could go with the beating given to Braun Strowman?

Or, the beating that Reigns also administered to his cousin…

WWE let him take a ton of abuse, all things considered, and I’d guess they are banking on fans having a short memory when it comes to RAW next week.

Noteworthy Moment:

We got both Hunter AND Stephanie on television tonight. Stephanie, of course, was at the podium for the draft as well.

I could do without her, to be honest.

In other news, there were celebrities in ThunderDome. Well, legends for sure.

We saw Ric Flair, Jeff Jarret and Bill Goldberg, among others.

Overall lowlights:

Lots going on, sometimes it felt a bit crazy.

Also, see above…the less Stephanie we hear, the better.

Also, when the draft was getting started, plenty of us hoped Seth would go one way, the Mysterios another, and that did not happen.

Overall highlights:

Just getting to see some of the new faces was good, though it’s still early.

Was really happy to see Daniel Bryan once again.

Nice going away party, or whatever you’d call it, for New Day.

After the final bell:

A lot was happening in this show, and busy can be a good thing. Plenty of new faces on SmackDown, plus plenty of familiar ones.

Some RAW feuds carried over, for better or worse.

All in all, seemed to be a solid kickoff for a brand new season.