Shore's WWE Smackdown Hitlist: Lots of Hits including Christian vs. Alberto Del Rio, Randy Orton vs. RVD, Kofi Kingston vs. Fandango, Bray Wyatt, Brock Lesnar, and more

By Chris Shore

WWE Smackdown Hits

Christian vs. Alberto Del Rio: I went back and forth were to put this and finally decided on a Hit because the match was very good and entertaining. It’s still a potential miss because they gave away one of their PPV matches for free, and for absolutely no reason. I fail to understand the logic there, especially when it was such a long match--20 minutes--and served no apparent purpose. Still, as Jake Barnett and I said in audio, this is the match you want to see if you only have time for one match from Smackdown. Let's hope they can do even better on the PPV.

Randy Orton vs. RVD: Although the match was rather pointless, it is still a Hit for the same reason as Christian vs. Del Rio, it was very entertaining. Randy Orton gains nothing from the win, and I'm still surprised at all the jobs RVD is doing since his return. Not that I want to see Van Dam pushed to the moon, but he doesn't have any direction right now, and that's surprising given that almost everyone who debuts on TV now has at least some direction for their character.

Kofi Kingston vs. Fandango: Unlike the previous two matches, this gets a Hit both from work rate and storytelling. Kofi won on Monday, and Fandango won here, so I expect to have the rubber match at SummerSlam. I also thought Summer Rae's acting was a Hit too, not because she was all that impressive, but because she ends up drawing a lot of cheers from the male audience and they need to do more to make her heelish to keep from muddying the waters for Fandango.

Bray Wyatt promo: Bray Wyatt continues to be the best mic worker WWE has on the roster right now, and his big screen promo after Kane's win fits that mold as well. The promo was significantly creepy, and was a good response to Kane's from Monday. I really hope their match at SummerSlam comes off well. The Wyatt's are the single most intriguing thing on WWE right now, and I would hate for a bad match to derail that.

Brock Lesnar promo: Brock Lesnar is a terrible promo, unless you get him in a situation where you can have multiple takes and clean it in editing. In that situation, you get a big Hit of a promo. More than the presentation however, the content was a Hit. Most people do see this as a feud between Punk and Heyman, as Lesnar said, so it was smart to point out that Lesnar does have a personal grudge with Punk. Punk should play off of that on Monday and take this already wildly hot angle to an even hotter level.

WWE Smackdown Misses

Miz TV: Everything about this was a miss. The promo work from everyone involved was bland. Miz booking the match made no sense--since when does he have booking power? WWE has damaged Kaitlyn's character to the point where you don't want to see her anymore, and we've already seen Dolph vs. Big E enough times to feel like that feud has run its course. They have a week to make this feel important, and they better use all of that time because this desperately needs help.