WWE Smackdown Live Hits and Misses 2.19.19 w/ The Chairman

HIT: Kofi Gets His One on One WWE Championship Match

Shane McMahon made the announcement on Smackdown Live that Kofi Kingston would get a WWE Championship match against Daniel Bryan at Fast Lane. Kofi had quite the memorable week and had even this wrestling fan on the edge of his seat during the Elimination Chamber on his pursuit of the ultimate prize. Even though many fans were hoping Kofi would get his big match at Wrestlemania, we still have several weeks to go before we get there. It’ll be interesting to see how this story gets built with the next two Smackdown Live episodes, but it should be a good ride. It’s also crazy to think that if Mustafa Ali didn’t have his unfortunate injury, Kofi Kingston probably wouldn’t even had this chance.

 

MISS: Rematch Clause Return

When it was announced WWE was doing away with rematch clauses, I guess that only pertains to certain individuals. To kickoff Smackdown Live, Miz interrupted Shane McMahon and of course went on his big sad sob story on losing the WWE Smackdown Live Tag Team Championship. The Usos then came out and absolutely slammed the Miz which made Shane snap and grant themselves the rematch at Fast Lane. While it’s nice Smackdown Live has their storylines planned out already putting two matches on the Fast Lane card to Raw’s ZERO, this is probably a match many fans aren’t interested in. However I guess it’ll take one more big loss before we finally see the Miz betray Shane O Mac to setup their Wrestlemania match that everyone is expecting.

 
HIT: NXT Arrivals to Smackdown Live

Last night on Raw Aleister Black, Johnny Gargano, Tommaso Ciampa, and Ricochet all competed. It was definitely random seeing four of the top superstars in NXT wrestling, but kind of figured a struggling Raw show needed a shot in the arm. Turns out the foursome returned to Smackdown Live and the matches were great. We seen Aleister Black face Andrade in the same New Orleans arena where they faced off at NXT Takeover last year for the NXT Championship. Ciampa and Gargano joined forces to take on the Bar and Ricochet took on Eric Young. These four are definitely something special and bring alot more to the table than the random batch of NXT call ups we seen a few weeks ago. However I’m not so sure these four will be sticking around for the long haul or not? Black is definitely ready for the jump being he has nothing left to prove in NXT. Ricochet is definitely talented enough to make the jump as well, just a matter if the powers to be allow it or not. Ciampa and Gargano are more complex cases being they’re both holding the NXT Championship and NXT North American Championship respectively. Granted Gargano could lose his title tomorrow night on NXT possibly in his title defense against Velveteen Dream so there is that. Guess it remains to be seen where these four end up.

 

MISS: Asuka Returns and Loses

Asuka has been completely lost in the shuffle since defeating Becky Lynch at the Royal Rumble. She’s been off television since until tonight. With the majority of the Smackdown Live women either interested in chasing the Raw Women’s Championship instead or the Women Tag Team Championship, nobody was in fact ready for Asuka. This all changed tonight though with Mandy Rose stepping up to the plate and scoring a victory over the champion. This is definitely not the way to book your champion. Mandy could’ve easily won a number one contender match to set up the match against Asuka. However it appears this is the route were going to go and you can pretty much assume we’ll be seeing Asuka vs Mandy Rose for the Smackdown Live Women’s Championship at Fast Lane.

 

This pretty much summarizes up Smackdown Live. As always thanks for reading and following @ChairmanSV for my latest thoughts.