Before the draft I dreaded Smackdown, now its must see TV.

Here comes Triple H or Ortons latest beat down ...is becoming the equivalence of

"The NWO is attacking the ring we are out of time"

I for one was not a fan of the style of the show. It hurt my eyes to watch and I hope they switch back. Other than that, Smackdown was awesome yet again!

Nice blog as usual, Mr. Eck.

"Speaking of Jericho, he just might be the real MVP in WWE. He consistently has good-to-great matches, cuts fantastic promos and is a big enough star that losses help his opponent but don’t hurt him. …"

I actually disagree here. I thought Jericho (his finishing moves at least, if not his character) was made to look really weak. He applied the Walls of Jericho, hit the Lionsault and hit the Codebreaker, and Punk survived all of those. Then Punk hits one GTS and Jericho is done for? Well, admittedly, I dislike Punk, but seriously...

"It may have been my imagination, but it seemed as if Punk wasn’t the only tweener on the show. I would swear that Jim Ross at times was making subtle heel comments."

Definitely not your imagination. I think it was during the Ziggler-Khali match that JR was praising Ziggler and sort of putting Khali down. He also seemed to go out of his way to support the tweener Punk and make it seem as if Hardy was at fault throughout the show.

Punk had great chemistry with Edge on the mic, and with Jericho in the ring. It was also great when he reminded Hardy that Hardy was the one who chose the ladder stipulation at Extreme Rules. The Straight-Edge Superstar looks like main-event material to me.

I totally agree about the contast with the HHH-Orton-Batista storyline. I pity those of you who limit your WWE watching to Monday nights.

I thought it was a good show overall. The Diva's tag match wasn't all that good. But watching Melina, it was all worth it. Maybe Punk will end up a tweener the way Austin and the Rock was in there day. Jericho never seizes to amaze me. His promos are all good and his wrestling is probably the top in WWE, His matches as of late have been good and he seems to have been putting over everybody. I hope John Morrison will be elevated so he can go for the I-C title. I hope they will let him do some in ring promos. The only thing Smackdown was missing is Rey Mysterio. I know he was taking some time off due to his sore knees.

"The program appeared as if it was filmed rather than videotaped. Not sure what that’s all about, but I thought it looked pretty cool. …"

I spent the first half hour trying to figure out if something was wrong with my affiliate, my provider, or my recording. I think WWE screwed up their compression or something.

It makes sense for CM Punk to have a transitional phase before becoming heel because he has been so over as a babyface. I don't really care either way for him, he's OK nothing special to me.

I was very disappointed in the use of Dolph Ziggler this week. His matches with Khali are getting old. I get it, he will find a way to weasel his way out of the match. He has a lot more potential to me than this.

I also picked up on the JR stuff. I really wasn't a fan of it. It almost seems like his frustration with being stuck with Grisham is showing through in hsis commentary.

And I was not a fan of the filming format.

Smackdown was really good Punk looks really good as champ and love that he is doing the tween thing jsut hope it leads into a long title reign or at the very least that he has a nice long program with the title because i think Edge has proven that he is bigger than the Title and does not need it to get over I almost would wish that they would keep him as a face let him face edge for the World title and start hardy off on a new program with jericho for the IC title. R-Truth was great on the Mic i just hope he is in line for a push as far as the telecast went I couldn't watch it in HD it gave me a headache so I watched it in regular digital. didn't like the Dolph/Khali match especially the ending.

Good comments. I also noticed the change in film style. I think I liked it. Let's see if they continue to use it. I also noticed the slight change in Ross's style. I don't like it. John Morrison looked great. I'm still not diggin the fame turn yet. They need to give him some time on the stick. Jericho is THE MAN!

I watched in HD and didn't think to change it to digital. Was the look the same in digital? If it was, could it be because of the change to digital? Also, did Edge really call Punk a pretty boy? Punk?

I think it's premature to contrast Punk's current push with last year's. I don't remember the details specifically, but didn't he cut a couple of high-profile promos and win clean matches after his last cash-in, as well? I hope you're right that this won't be pushed as a fluke, but I think it's early to say.

...GO PUNK!!!

...Jericho is rapidly approaching Shawn Michael’s status

...Ziggler should eventually go over Kahli. He is doing a great job!

I wonder if the film change had anything to do with the switch from analog to digital.. maybe some stations quality just didnt come across clear

Being reading your blogs as of late, and they're the reason why I'm still watching wrestling. Don't watch TNA though, but I'm a huge Smackdown fan and lately it's becoming the true "A" show of WWE.

I'm beginning to think that Rey could be gunning for a heel turn, just like he did in WCW. Which doesn't make sense - aren't we missing some top faces lately?

And the "filming" format was just some problem in the TV station. I can watch SD down here in Puerto Rico on Saturdays and it was running 60 frames per second (i.e. videotaped), meaning that we won't see film effect again. Oh well.

Keep up the good work.

what happend to mike konx and kane?

Hey Eck,

First time watching smackdown in a long time as I live in Japan. Honestly JR's style was fresh and I liked it...but his announce partner is horrible. He must have repeated himself a dozen times talking about how sore Hardy was/is. I can understand JR turning heel...anybody would having to listen/work with that guy.

By the way I noticed on your other thread about the death of Misawa Mitsuharu. He was quite famous here in Japan. He was on the TV talent shows a lot doing skits with comedians and what not. One of my favorite skits was he "wrestled" a comedian in a first to fall over in oil match and lost. The comedian couldnt have weighed more than 100 lbs and knocked him over with a kiss.

As big a Shelton mark as I am, I am starting to loose hope for him as a main eventer. Possibly the best wrestler on the roster and he's a jobber now. What waste of such a great talent. I do think it is 70% WWE's fault and 30% his.

I definitely did not like the new style. When I watch wrestling matches, I want to keep the illusion that I am watching alive sporting event rather than a movie. It definitely was jarring to the eyes and made for choppy continuity. I hope this experiment lasts as long as Jeff Hardy's most recent championship run.

I think WWE creative may be onto something here - have R-Truth say something degrading, true, and maybe edgy, about his heel opponent before the match...then say "And that's the..." before holding the mic up so the fans can finish, saying "truth!" He did something like that with the MC Hammer/Vanilla Ice comment about Shelton/Haas and it worked well.

Grisham and JR just don't work as an announce team, and I'm surprised the WWE hasn't split them up yet. Striker would work much, much better on Smackdown, and on ECW, you wouldn't notice the lack of a heel announcer as much with a Grisham-Matthews booth.

There definitely seems to be tension between Grisham and JR at times, but I wonder if there is a split between the older announcer (King, Cole, JR) and the newer ones (Grisham, Striker and Matthews). The few times they've all been together, it seems like the vets have been snippy at the others, even though they are consistently better prepared and rely less on catchphrases.

Might want to listen to the last few weeks of Ross doing commentary on Smackdown & Superstars--he's been dropping small "heelish" comments here and there. And I don't know what was up with the visual appearance of Smackdown this week but I wasn't fond of it.

Once again Smackdown was awesome. Chris Jericho is my favourite wrestler at the moment, great wrestler, superb on the mic and John Morrison's finisher is something else. My only question is how can Smackdown be so good an Raw so terrible that I had to stop watching it?.

Only one question Kevin:

Why are you so sold on R-Truth?

RESPONSE FROM KE: In my opinion, he has "it."

As much as I hated Punk cashing in the briefcase on Hardy, I must admit that the Punk-Edge-Hardy dynamic is fresh and exciting. I can barely tolerate Raw as of late but I'll be tuning in to see these three. This is definitely a PPV-worthy match.

JR's comments rubbed me the wrong way. Especially since he has always been in Hardy's corner and coined the phrase "Hardy Party"...now he's telling Punk that it was a smart decision to cash in the MITB briefcase?! WWE needs to just let JR be JR. Grisham was particularly bad on commentary...I wonder if some of that is an act to try to build this "JR heel" angle.

"And the "filming" format was just some problem in the TV station. I can watch SD down here in Puerto Rico on Saturdays and it was running 60 frames per second (i.e. videotaped), meaning that we won't see film effect again. Oh well."

JETZexc, most videotape runs 30 frames/second, and film runs at 24 frames/second. Now, the WWE may have been using some sort of filter on the lens of their cameras to give it the look of being filmed. Or, since "Smackdown" is recorded and not broadcast live, a filter could have been put in during editing before broadcast on Friday night.

Batista needs to take a lesson or ten from Chris Jericho. Not only did Jericho make Punk look strong and solidify that Punk belongs in the main event scene, but Jericho did all of that while maintaining his own credibility.

I am thrilled that Punk is where he is, doing what he is doing, and I prefer Punk over Hardy as champion any day. And twice on Sundays.

Smackdown is most certainly my favorite show of the three right now.

One of the things that made me realize that the WWE wasn't behind CM Punk during his first title reign was the fact that he never did what Cena, HHH, and all the others always do when they are champ...start the show with a twenty minute promo. It was nice to see Punk start the show, and hopefully we'll see him headline a PPV or two. (No, I'm 90% sure he didn't have any meaningful promos during his first reign.)

Grisham isn't bad. He and J.R. may not have the best chemistry though...not sure what to say.

Good episode overall. Just like last week, the main events keep delivering.

I think it's premature to contrast Punk's current push with last year's. I don't remember the details specifically, but didn't he cut a couple of high-profile promos and win clean matches after his last cash-in, as well? I hope you're right that this won't be pushed as a fluke, but I think it's early to say.

Posted by: Stephen | June 13, 2009 5:59 PM
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The biggest "clean" victories Punk had were all over JBL, who was no longer viewed by anyone as a possible world champ. While being the IC champ, Jericho is still very much a viable world champ, and only Orton and Edge are higher up on the totem pole as heels than he is. This is the first time Punk was presented as a legit main eventer. But then again, that's the big difference between RAW and SmackDown, the SmackDown writers seem to actually care about details and depth.

During his first title reign, the WWE did everything short of making him wear a t-shirt with fluke champion written on it. From never beating a legit top guy to Michael Cole constantly saying Punk survived or escape, everything about his reign screamed fluke transitional champion. But that's what happens when you hotshot an angle. Punk was losing cleanly to guys like the Miz (who was probably a low midcarder at that point), so logically he couldn't possibly beat someone like Batista cleanly two months later. Just a complete utter lack of planning, again, the difference between RAW and SmackDown.