By Matthew Klink (@klinkmatt on Twitter)

3/13/2018

Tonight’s SmackDown should be awesome! We’re gonna know what the plans are for AJ Styles and Nakamura (for week to week booking purposes), Shane McMahon’s plans for Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, Asuka’s first appearance, and the first steps in setting up the Bludgeon Brothers for WrestleMania.

While every week can be considered a fun watch, I truly believe we are on the cusp of some of the best programming that Sports Entertainment has to offer. The Blue Brand has tough competition, with the storylines of Roman Reigns, Alexa Bliss, and the Intercontinental Championship starting to heat up, but I think SmackDown will be better.

To start, AJ Styles and Nakamura need a story going into Mania. I don’t think they could do any better than communicate their strong respect for each other. This of course, opposed to having them feud as heels and faces. This is where I see ‘Rusev Day’ (or if it’s not the name of the tag team, then Rusev and Aiden English) getting involved and forcing Styles and Nakamura to pair up and work together. These two aren’t very strong on the mic, so I can’t see a solution that is pure talk to boost this match. If it isn’t a respect/tag team solution, I’ll be very hopeful that they keep the microphones away from both of them.

The next big match for SmackDown is going to involve Shane McMahon. In what has become a yearly occurrence, Shane will fight someone that he would have no business competing with in the ring. I’m guessing that this will be Shane setting up something different tonight that will only lead to him battling KO and Sami. I don’t think he’d announce that as a match, but will more than likely be forced into it. Again, if that isn’t what happens, I’ll just be hopeful that its more than a special guest referee spot for KO vs Sami.

Finally, we might get a good promo from the Bludgeon Brothers. After almost committing murder on Sunday, this team has skyrocketed to the top of SmackDown Live’s Tag Team division. I’ll be happy to see them start squashing some real opponents, that I predict will happen tonight and lead them into what I hope could be years of feuding with the New Day and the Usos.

SmackDown seems to be the place where wrestling and new characters’ reign supreme, while Raw gets to rest on the bigger names. The writers know they’ll have an audience just hoping to witness certain individuals stand in the ring (like Brock and Ronda). SmackDown’s challenge has made them look like a better show. The drama is high, the wrestling is at a peak, and (barring injuries) their WrestleMania matches look to be way more exciting.

If we only get half of this tonight, it’s still going to be huge! With still four weeks before WrestleMania, there is a lot of work to be done, but the rest of the groundwork should be completed tonight.

Let me know in the comments what you think! Is there a better way to book AJ and Nakamura? Is RAW easily better than SmackDown? And how is Shane going to be booked for Mania?

Matthew Klink (@klinkmatt on Twitter)

@BODPodcast for Twitter and Facebook