Why Smackdown is going to have a hard time beating Raw.

[AegonTargaryen]

I'd like to begin with a disclaimer- I thoroughly enjoyed the last few episodes of Smackdown, well over Raw (until Summerslam ). But I didn't quite enjoy last week's episode, and I'm not sure about what they're going to put on tonight. Nonetheless, with how consistently brilliant Raw has been over the last few weeks, and will be, for many many months to come, here are a few reasons why I think Smackdown is gonna have a hard time:-

1)Lack of Drama.

Alright alright, I get it. Smackdown Live is all about change and wrestling and whatever. I'm also aware of the Miz rant from Talking Smack, which was sheer drama.

But other than that, where's the drama?

Raw last night was so amazing that it made me realize why Vince Mcmahon succeeds and TNA or any other company doesn't, or at any rate sustain that success, if they ever reach it to begin with. Wrestling has always been about the combination of Drama, Athleticism and Spectacle, and aways will be. WCW had the most amazing wrestlers in the world, even in the early 90s, was a great product, but what put WCW on the map was Eric Bischoff's arrival and the subsequent NWO angle and drama, and by 1997 WCW was putting better in-ring product overall than WWF/E had put in that entire decade combined.

What transpired on Raw, and the layers of complexity contained therein, is so good that I actually wondered- Is this the greatest time to be a pro wrestling fan?

I'm talking about Stephanie Mcmahon's character, Seth Rollins impeaching her, Kevin Owens' heel champion mode, Seth Rollins' face turn, The stoical Roman Reigns, Sami Zayn's backstage segments as brilliant as ever, and Chris Jericho. Has it ever been this good!?

Compared to that, SD Live has got The Miz ranting against Daniel Bryan, a retired wrestler. Dolph Ziggler's resurgence as a passionate wrestler trying to redeem himself has been somewhat entertaining, but where's the payoff?

2)A boring maineventer and really lacklustre buildups.
I won't really elaborate on this one much. Kindly refer to the "Has Dean Ambrose flopped as a maineventer" thread created by kpgreece.

When Finn Balor debuted on Raw, the next 3 weeks were boring as fuck. Lesson being- Finn Balor is boring. Seth Rollins as a result was stuck with this freshie. And Kevin Owens was wasting his talent on Enzo and Cass.

4 weeks later, the entire landscape has changed. This is how it should be and should have been, and this is why Raw will be untouchable for months to come.

Compared to that, you've got Dean Ambrose and AJ Styles in what has been a very very boring buildup so far. (And I blame Dean Ambrose for that, AJ Styles has been entertaining me like no one else, consistently).

I enjoyed the first Dean Ambrose-Dolph Ziggler promo, but most of his mainevent run has been lacklustre, and the buildups utterly dreary, including the Ambrose-Styles buildup so far.

3)Lack of solid midcard talent.

SD Live has a nice tag division and a nice women's division. But where's the midcard talent? The Cesaro-SamiZayn-Sheamus to your show?

Randy Orton is feuding with Bray Wyatt.
AJ Styles with Dean Ambrose.
That leaves us with The Miz as champion and Dolph Ziggler.

If that wasn't bad enough, Alberto del rio was suspended and in all likelihood, won't wrestle in a WWE ring again.

 

[Psykohurricane55]

Since the draft started, I actually love watching smackdown a lot more then raw 9 times out of 10. Smackdown as been a solid show every weeks and rarely had a bad segment. All the talents have gotten a chance to shine on smackdown and not having a lot of top talent actually help a lot of those midcard guys climb the ladder to the main event and upper card level.

raw had more bad episode then good ones. Last night episode was the perfect exemple of a bad raw episode. The third hour alone was the worst hour that raw produce in a long while. Do we really care about the shining stars vs enzo and cass, sin cara vs braun strauman, nia jax vs alicia fox and titus o'neil vs darren young, this are all feuds that are feature on raw right now while guys like sami zayn, neville and many other talented guys have been lost in the shuffle. It's been the same old stuff on raw since the draft, owens was made to look like a midcard champion in the spend of a week. They could have run with it andjust make him look like a superstars based n the win but he was an afterthought after the opening segment because they made the point of reminding us over and over again that hhh was the reason for owens win.

Smackdown got a great shot of beating raw because they have less talent on the roster and it's only 2 hours so less time to kill.

 

[Deoxyribonucleic A.C.I.D.]

You know, Smackdown has been beating RAW every week, except the night after Battleground and last week. Although I get your points, I think SD is doing fine against RAW. They use their full roster, the actually try to give you storylines in every division.

What has RAW going on except their "main event", Charlotte and the New Day vs Club feud, which has been so incredibly boring? Nothing really.

Although the roster Smackdown seems weak now, it's RAW the one that will suffer in 2 months from now.
Smackdown created a solid women's division and a somewhat solid tag team division out of thin air. Done.
The midcard scene has Miz, Ziggler, Rowan, Crews, Corbin, Kalisto and with a couple more additions from NXT it will be complete. Done.
The main event scene has Ambrose, Styles, Wyatt, Orton and Cena. More than enough and they can mix it up with their midcard as well, since AJ is so much fresh air.

What does RAW have really?
They have 4 tag teams and the 3 of them have already feuded and the 4th one are jobbers. They need at least 2 more tag teams to make the division on RAW work.
Where are the women? All I see is Charlotte, her dog, Bayley and Banks. Nia Jax is just squashing nobodies. They need more additions here as well.
Midcard. Rusev, Cesaro, Zayn, Sheamus, Neville. Again, they need more! You can't have a division with 5 people, when you have booked the 2 of them against each other for 2-3 straight months and Neville isn't really a threat. Plus Zayn has been floating around for 2 months now.
Main Event. Reigns, Rollins, Owens, Y2J.
That's it. That's RAW.

Why does everyone think that RAW got the better roster? They might have gotten the better wrestlers, but all the great names are on Smackdown. Smackdown has had great writing and everyone looks important.
RAW only cares for the main event scene. A scene consisting of 4 guys. You see, Smackdown can sell you Ambrose vs Ziggler or Ambrose vs Miz now if they want as a main event feud. I don't think RAW can do the same with Rollins vs Zayn for example.

Smackdown has been laying the Smackdown on RAW ever since the draft and that won't change until RAW steps up ther writing, because they really lack the name value in their talents to carry the flagship show.

 

[L@RISANO]

Disagree completely.

RAW was really really bad last night overall aside from an opening segment that gave us a babyface Seth Rollins. Kevin Owens, the new Universal Champion was treated like an afterthought in his own title celebration.
Roman Reigns, who had as much, if not more gripe at being screwed out of a title win, only showed up at the end and unlike Rollins, has to earn his title shot for some reason(tho no one bats an eyelid because it is Reigns).
Oh, and the ME scene has been a strong point for RAW which has generally been all over the place in terms of building up Superstars and Storylines, you know, the two things that drive the show.

At this point, RAW could be named Stephanie, Mick and their kids, lMO.

Also, HHH didn't even show up last night after hikacking the title match the week before for some unknown reason.



SmackDown on the other hand, is doing what RAW continuously fails at, and that is creating some captivating storylines for each and every superstar and that makes each and every segment much more enjoyable.
Everything about it feels fresh and different in comparison to RAW and it is seemingly working as well, even the TV ratings have been steady and increasing in the past couple of weeks even without John Cena appearing on the show.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

For the most part, I think SmackDown Live is a better structured show in terms of overall quality. Truth be told, I honestly expected SmackDown Live to be the "better show" more often than not while Raw would be the show where many of the bigger things happened and those bigger things would result in Raw being the "better show" every so often.

Raw has the advantage of being the first show. It's been around longer than SmackDown Live and it's almost always been treated like the more important show. As a result, there's still this strong perception of Raw being the more important show; as I mentioned, a lot of the bigger things tend to have happened on Raw but, then again, SmackDown Live has only very, very recently been put anywhere close to an equal footing with Raw. It'll take time for that perception to dim and for SmackDown Live to be viewed in an overall equal light.

However, SmackDown Live looks to be a brand that's ultimately "building" itself. Generally speaking, aside from Orton & Cena, there aren't any top tier names on the blue brand or, at least, guys who haven't been top tier for years the way they have. Ambrose, Styles, Cena, Orton, Wyatt are the main event or near main event talent at this point, though it's possible for someone to be built up as time goes on. I think the blue brand has an overall solid mid-card scene with Miz, Kalisto, Ziggler, Crews, Corbin, Rowan, Kane & guys like Rawley, Rhyno, & Slater could be brought in. Del Rio is gone from WWE, which is what everyone was expecting anyway. He could've been a useful hand in the mid-card scene but it's not a crippling blow or anything. The women's division is also off to a solid start; there's work to be done still but, like the mid-card & tag team division, it's getting there. Speaking of the tag team division, if the blue brand was to see the inclusion of possibly the Revival and maybe a reunited Blake & Murphy brought up from NXT to go along with AA & the Usos, they'd have the foundation for a really strong tag team scene. Breezango is a team that has potential as they've delivered some brief, but very good, matches against the Usos.

In the grand scheme of things, I don't think WWE cares if Raw or SmackDown Live wins the ratings war, just so long as the numbers increase, and they have been overall. For Raw, I think a lot of problems would be solved if they simply went back to 2 hours; with the fall TV schedule ready to hit, including Monday Night Football, the 3rd hour almost always drags the overall numbers of the show down anyway. For me personally, I thought the first 2 hours of Raw this past Monday were really good, but the 40 minutes or so of the third hour featured a horrendous segment featuring New Day and Gallows & Anderson and one squash match after another; it just sucked the energy right out of the show. As for SmackDown Live, it's generally been drawing about 2.9 million viewers when it hasn't had to go up against the Olympics, which is some 600,000 to 800,000 viewers more than it was doing before the brand split.

 

[nwocongo]

The lack of "drama" or backstage segments or angles can be explained by the fact that SD doesn't have that extra hour of time to burn. Smackdown has always been the wrestling show while Raw has been the storyline show, I personally have been enjoying Smackdown more than Raw because I like watching matches more than the angles. I will agree with you that the talent is a little skewed to the Raw side but if every episode of Raw still entails 15+ minutes of Stephanie talking to start the show, I will continue to favor SD over Raw. If Smackdown could get one more good main event guy and one mid card work horse type they'd be in great shape. That being said, a potential mid card work horse named Harper is due back soon and I think he is on the SD roster(?) please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[The Samoan Heritage]

If we are talking about ratings, Smackdown will always have a hard time beating Raw simply for the fact that Raw is older and has been seen as the flagship show for the past 17 years.
If we are talking about the quality of the show well then I have to disagree with you.

You say that Smackdown doesn't have drama and only gave one example of the drama Raw brings. Well Carmella/Nikki, Corbin/Kalisto, Bryan/Miz/Ziggler, and the Usos/AA from Smackdown says hello.

As for Smackdown's main event having lackluster build I would have to agree, BUT... Raw isn't much better. You even said so

When Finn Balor debuted on Raw, the next 3 weeks were boring as fuck.

Now Owens vs Rollins may be a better matchup than Ambrose vs AJ, but what build up did Owens vs Rollins get on Raw because to me it was more about Rollins/Mick/Steph(Triple H) than it was about the actual future main event match between Owens vs Rollins?

Now you do make a good and obvious point about Smackdown's mid-card, but you also have to remember that Ambrose, Wyatt, AJ, Cena, Orton, and Ziggler can not always be in the main event at the same time. What better way to make the IC championship prestigious than to have guys like Cena and Orton want to go after BOTH championships.

IMO, Smackdown is destroying Raw! Smackdown has given just about everyone on their roster relevancy, instead of just one of two people like Raw does. Smackdown is also constantly putting on the better overall show of the two (except for last week, I think it was).

 

[Un-Bo-Lievable Jeff]

You're acting as though they have completely split and are run as different companies. Both are still under the same umbrella as they always were.

This was a change to bring something new to WWE. It happened before, and I think they have done it better this time.

But acting as though they are being looked at completely separate is pushing it. Vince will still have his fingers in all the pies, but he basically can run his company two different ways now. Instead of having to choose one path, he can choose two.

A few comments acting as though the draft was real and absolutely no pre-planning was involved. Both rosters were created, not picked. Vince knows what he is doing with the two shows, none of this is random.

 

[kadroan]

Disagree completely.

RAW was really really bad last night overall aside from an opening segment that gave us a babyface Seth Rollins. Kevin Owens, the new Universal Champion was treated like an afterthought in his own title celebration.
Roman Reigns, who had as much, if not more gripe at being screwed out of a title win, only showed up at the end and unlike Rollins, has to earn his title shot for some reason(tho no one bats an eyelid because it is Reigns).
Oh, and the ME scene has been a strong point for RAW which has generally been all over the place in terms of building up Superstars and Storylines, you know, the two things that drive the show.

At this point, RAW could be named Stephanie, Mick and their kids, lMO.

Also, HHH didn't even show up last night after hikacking the title match the week before for some unknown reason.



SmackDown on the other hand, is doing what RAW continuously fails at, and that is creating some captivating storylines for each and every superstar and that makes each and every segment much more enjoyable.
Everything about it feels fresh and different in comparison to RAW and it is seemingly working as well, even the TV ratings have been steady and increasing in the past couple of weeks even without John Cena appearing on the show.

Yeah, I expected Reigns to show up in the beginning of the show just like Rollins did. It should have been a Rollins/Reigns vs. JeriKO match last week on RAW.

Yeah, it would have made sense for HHH to show up.

 

[ShinChan]

For me, Smackdown is already beating Raw.

SDL managed to make Slater a huge deal while he wasn't even a glorified jobber. SDL has much depth in tag and women division as compared to Raw. I must say that the midcard is weak on SDL, it would have been good if Cesaro/Zayn were on SDL.

On the other hand, we have to watch Titus-Darren Young confrontation, Nia and Braun squashing jobbers every week. There's no sign of midcard champion Rusev (I know he's on honeymoon break). Zayn is just lurking after his Battleground win over Owens. Not to mention multiple Cesaro/Sheamus matches.

I think that Reigns loses to Owens this week after Rusev returns. And we get Rollins Vs. Owens at Clash Of Champions where Triple H again screws Rollins thus giving us Rollins Vs. Triple H at Survivor Series.