Backlash 2016 Preview

Let’s see: college football, first weekend of the NFL, see how the Cleveland Indians manager to screw up the division lead this year. Yeah it’s kind of a bor……Backlash? That’s this weekend? Apparently it is despite feeling like it’s lacking another two or three weeks worth of building. It probably doesn’t help that we’re only three weeks removed from the marathon that was Summerslam weekend and there’s barely enough material for a pay per view.

There’s no pre-show match announced yet so let’s start with the precursor to the Tag Team Title match as the Usos are facing the Hype Bros in what you could kind of call the third semifinal match. American Alpha had advanced to the finals to face Heath Slater/Rhyno for the titles but the Usos turned heel and then did so again after the match to injure Chad Gable’s knee, leaving us with only one team for the tournament final. Therefore we’ll be seeing the two teams that lost in the semifinals fight each other with the winners going to the title match.

Save for an American Alpha run-in, I see no reason for the Usos to not win here and go on to face Slater/Rhyno. There isn’t much else to say on this one as Slater/Rhyno already beat the Hype Bros earlier this week (making it even clearer that this match is filler) so the Usos are the only real option. So yeah, the Usos go on as is the only real option here.

That leaves us with the Usos vs. Slater/Rhyno for the titles and I’m really not sure where you go here. There’s a very easy case for the Usos getting the belts to give them credibility (the announcers have made sure to mention that the Usos are the only team in the tournament to ever hold titles in WWE) and of course to set up the rematch with American Alpha, who beat them clean in less than a minute.

On the other hand I’m not sure how long they can string out the “Heath wants a job” angle until they have to give him something. Slater/Rhyno as the first champions would be just fine as American Alpha and the Usos can have a #1 contenders feud and then win the belts while the first champs do comedy. All that being said, the Usos are the logical pick here and I’ll go with them, despite it being stupid to have heels wrestle twice in one night to win a title.

We’ll stick with the title matches as it’s off to Miz defending the Intercontinental Title against Dolph Ziggler. If you’ve been reading my stuff lately, you know I’m really not a fan of this feud and that hasn’t changed. The story here works: they’ve built up Miz as a pretty good champion (if he holds the title another two weeks it’s the longest reign in five years) who is enough of a veteran that he can be a bigger player on Smackdown, especially with what they were teasing with Bryan. Ziggler needs a big win (though remember: it’s DEFENDING the title that matters, not actually winning it) and this is suddenly a big enough deal.

That brings us to the problem: it’s Dolph Ziggler vs. the Miz. These guys have fought a ton of times (four times on TV this year alone) and none of them have been exactly what you would call thrilling. The match will be fine but the buildup to it with both guys wanting to move up the ladder into serious contention should be calling for something special, not something we’ve seen several times before and said “eh not bad” much more often than not. I’ll take Miz to retain the title here but Ziggler going over really wouldn’t shock me as they’re obsessed with pushing him for reasons I really don’t buy.

We’ll get to one of the bigger matches now with Randy Orton vs. Bray Wyatt and again I’m worried about what they’re going to do here. Orton really, really needs a win after that debacle against Lesnar last month but Bray really needs a win…….well always because he hardly ever wins anything important.

The problem here is there’s only a limited story aside from Wyatt’s traditional “I choose to haunt you” idea which ran out of gas a long time ago. I’m sure it’s going to be entertaining but this feels like a lot of going through the motions instead of giving us something that should be good. I’ll go with Orton here but a no contest or countout/DQ ending would be the better option.

Next up is the Six Pack Challenge for the inaugural Smackdown Women’s Title and I’ll spare you the time by saying this should be Nikki Bella’s to lose. Naomi is the athletic woman who probably won’t win, Alexa Bliss and Carmella are miles away from being ready and Natalya has less charisma than even your average Canadian wrestler. That leaves Nikki and Becky Lynch as the only real options and you know full well that we need a good Bella comeback story after the neck injury that we all sat up crying over because we might never get to hear her call herself fearless again. So yeah, Nikki wins because it’s all about the Bellas.

That leaves us with the main event and as is the case with almost anything else on the card, I really don’t care. Dean Ambrose is defending the Smackdown World Title against AJ Styles and that’s about the extent of their issue. They’ve tried to force in the idea that Dean isn’t taking this seriously and AJ is the uncrowned champion after pinning Cena and…..yeah that’s about it. Aside from a rematch, I really don’t see a reason for AJ to not get the title here. He’s the best on Smackdown and can hold the title for a few months until hopefully someone switches shows to mix things up a bit and give him a fresh challenger.

So that’s Backlash and I’m lucky that I stayed awake while I wrote this up. No matter how you slice it, this show really isn’t interesting and doesn’t need to be a pay per view. The biggest thing here though is this doesn’t feel like a three hour pay per view. We haven’t seen a single brand show yet so maybe they’ll speed things up a bit.

Let’s say the main event and Orton vs. Wyatt eat up an hour combined (that’s probably a big stretch even when you include entrances). A Six Pack Challenge, two tag matches and Miz vs. Ziggler isn’t enough to fill in two hours. I’d be really surprised if this show runs three hours unless they add in some nothing matches like Baron Corbin vs. Kalisto (Is that still a thing?) or Kane squashing Breezango for reasons of general stupidity.

Length issues aside, I’m really not interested in this show and I haven’t seen many who are. Smackdown has been the better of the two shows but they’re a long way away from being able to pull off a three hour pay per view with just the stuff they have. Just let the show run a little shorter and people will be a lot happier. I don’t think the Network subscriptions are going to plummet if one of the seven bonus pay per views a year is a little shorter than average.

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up my new book, KB’s WWE Grab Bag at Amazon for just $3.99 at:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IH7O904

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6

PDFPrint