The biggest winners and losers of last night's SmackDown (June 25)
In the latest WWE NEWS, with the exception of an excellent main event, SmackDown capped off a lackluster week in WWE. Even Raw managed to outperform this show, as tired booking tropes and retreads of rivalries we've just seen asserted themselves all over the show. The months between WrestleMania and the build to SummerSlam are notorious on the WWE calendar for staging filler, but this year has seen it totally undisguised, almost as if the company is telling us that nothing we see on screen matters.
It's a questionable philosophy they should try to fix, pronto.
Did anyone manage to take anything away from last night's show?
Losers: Daniel Bryan and Rowan
Aside from WWE throwing a monkey wrench into the biggest tag team match they could have booked for SummerSlam and giving this away too early, an overused booking trope reared its ugly head. For the second time this week, champions lost cleanly in a non-title match.
And then the company wonders why it feels like nothing matters.
Afterward, we got a trainwreck of a four team tag match that saw some dissension between Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn, but we've gone down this road so many times before that we shouldn't take anything out of that.
Loser: The Miz
Once again, The Miz falls prey to Shane McMahon: Super Villain. Shane McMahon prevented his victory in the match by creating distractions, and orchestrating a beatdown before the the deciding fall could take place. Elias then took advantage of a battered Miz to register the win. Shane proceeded to hit Coast-to-Coast on The Miz to addd insult to injury.
Of course, Miz won't get back at Shane McMahon. Why is this feud still continuing? It almost feels like Miz is being punished.
Remember a few years ago when fans used to complain about Stephanie McMahon degrading everyone, and it was made worse because the wrestlers had no chance of retaliation?
That's where we're at with Shane McMahon. He's taken up his sister's torch.
See WWE Smackdown Results, Highlights of event, & more on WWE Smackdown Results page