WWE Wrap-Up
This week in WWE: Post-WrestleMania shows were a breath of fresh air
Apr 11, 2018, 4:43 pm
Paige had an interesting week as she retired on Monday and became the GM of SmackDown on Tuesday. Photo by WWE.com
Raw
Stephanie McMahon opened the show with a sling on her arm after sustaining an injury from her match with Ronda Rousey. She then brought out Ronda to congratulate her and tried to recruit and put her in her corner. Ronda responded by putting her in an Arm Bar on the same arm she injured at WrestleMania. “You deserve it” chants welcomed Nia Jax. Bliss and James antagonized Jax explaining she has a bad attitude which explained why she did not have a partner for their tag match. Jax proved she was wrong though, revealing her partner was NXT call up, Ember Moon. The two would win after Moon hit Bliss with her captivating finisher, The Eclipse. Braun and Nicholas, the 10-year old, relinquished their tag titles. The Bar asked for their titles back. Kurt explained they’ll get a shot at the title against which ever tag team came out of his “Tag Team Eliminator.” The Revival defeated Gallows and Anderson in the first match of said tournament.
Seth Rollins celebrated winning the IC and becoming a Grand Slam Champion. Finn Balor congratulated him, but explained that he wanted a chance to challenge him for his IC title. Rollins accepted, much to Miz’s distain. The former champ raced down to the ring explaining he will get his title back at Backlash, but the two of them can face him and the Mizterouge then, if they were still in the mood to fight. Jeff Hardy made his triumphant return to back up Rollins and Balor. Mandy Rose defeated Sasha Banks with a monstrous knee to the face. Bayley was in Sasha’s corner and accidentally struck her. Paige, the leader of Absolution, then, announced her retirement from in ring competition. Elias performed a new song for New Orleans. Bobby Lashley made his return to WWE. For the first time in a decade, Lashley stepped into a WWE ring and destroyed Elias. The Authors of Pain defeated Slater and Rhyno after the two made the mistake of calling out any tag team in the back.
Samoa Joe made his return from injury verbally assaulting Roman Reigns, who was out there giving Brock Lesnar the business about his part-time contract. Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt defeated Titus Worldwide in the Tag Team Eliminator. Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens face off after Angle promised a job to the winner of a match between the two on Raw. The match ended in a double count out leaving neither men with a job. The team of Finn Balor, Jeff Hardy, and Seth Rollins defeated Miz and The Mizterouge to close out the Raw after ‘ Mania.
SmackDown Live
Shane opened the show giving fans some updates. Daniel Bryan will be stepping down as the GM in order to become a full time wrestler. In his place, Paige will be the new GM of SmackDown Live. As her first order of business, she issued Daniel Bryan vs AJ Styles as the main event of the night. The Usos defeated The New Day to win a shot to challenge The Bludgeon Brothers for their newly acquired Tag Titles. Naomi defeated Natalya in an electric match of two underrated wrestlers.
Charlotte thanked Asuka for the magic they made at WrestleMania before wondering who she will be making magic with next. This prompted the debut of The Iconic, Peyton Royce and Bilie Kay. The two brutally assaulted the champion, and opened the door for Carmella to cash in her MITB contract to finally win the Women’s Championship. Randy Orton defeated Bobby Roode and Rusev to win a shot to challenge Jinder Mahal for the United States Championship at Backlash. A dream match in Daniel Bryan vs AJ Styles closed the show. Nakamura would eventually crash the party, though, hitting Bryan with a knee before focusing his attack entirely on AJ Styles.
Boy, were the post ‘Mania shows a breath of fresh air.
Raw needed improvement in their tag division, so they add one of the most dominant teams from NXT in the Authors of Pain. The SmackDown roster needed new faces in the women's division, and, boy, did The Iconics deliver on their first night. Returns like that of Jeff Hardy, Bobby Lashley, and a full time Daniel Bryan add so much to the table.
It has been a long time since I have said this, but SmackDown felt like it was above and beyond what Raw did this week. It was quick, it was surprising, and, frankly, every segment felt like it mattered. Having Bryan as a full-time wrestler will do wonders for the show. Not to mention, turning Nakamura heel was perhaps the best decision to come out of WrestleMania. It has given him the edge he has so desperately needed on the main roster.
Of course, all this considered, things could look drastically different a month from now. Next week, The Super Star Shakeup will take place on both shows. Stephanie and Kurt will do their best to one up SmackDown Live, as Shane and Paige try to do the same. I have been an advocate for another shake up for a while now, I just hope it does not disturb what appears to be a newly acquired balance on SmackDown Live.
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After finishing up with the Guardians the Astros have a rather important series for early May with the Seattle Mariners heading to town for the weekend. While it’s still too early to be an absolute must-win series for the Astros, losing the series to drop seven or eight games off the division lead would make successfully defending their American League West title that much more unlikely.
Since their own stumble out of the gate to a 6-10 record the Mariners have been racking up series wins, including one this week over the Atlanta Braves. The M’s offense is largely Mmm Mmm Bad, but their pitching is sensational. In 18 games after the 6-10 start, the Mariners gave up five runs in a game once. In the other 17 games they only gave up four runs once. Over the 18 games their starting pitchers gave up 18 earned runs total with a 1.44 earned run average. That’s absurd. Coming into the season Seattle’s starting rotation was clearly better on paper than those of the Astros and Texas Rangers, and it has crystal clearly played out as such into the second month of the schedule.
While it’s natural to focus on and fret over one’s own team's woes when they are plentiful as they have been for the Astros, a reminder that not all grass is greener elsewhere. Alex Bregman has been awful so far. So has young Mariners’ superstar Julio Rodriguez. A meager four extra base hits over his first 30 games were all Julio produced down at the ballyard. That the Mariners are well ahead of the Astros with J-Rod significantly underperforming is good news for Seattle.
Caratini comes through!
So it turns out the Astros are allowed to have a Puerto Rican-born catcher who can hit a little bit. Victor Caratini’s pedigree is not that of a quality offensive player, but he has swung the bat well thus far in his limited playing time and provided the most exciting moment of the Astros’ season with his two-out two-run 10th inning game winning home run Tuesday night. I grant that one could certainly say “Hey! Ronel Blanco finishing off his no-hitter has been the most exciting moment.” I opt for the suddenness of Caratini’s blow turning near defeat into instant victory for a team that has been lousy overall to this point. Frittering away a game the Astros had led 8-3 would have been another blow. Instead, to the Victor belong the spoils.
Pudge Rodriguez is the greatest native Puerto Rican catcher, but he was no longer a good hitter when with the Astros for the majority of the 2009 season. Then there’s Martin Maldonado.
Maldonado’s hitting stats with the Astros look Mike Piazza-ian compared to what Jose Abreu was doing this season. Finally, mercifully for all, Abreu is off the roster as he accepts a stint at rookie-level ball in Florida to see if he can perform baseball-CPR on his swing and career. Until or unless he proves otherwise, Abreu is washed up and at some point the Astros will have to accept it and swallow whatever is left on his contract that runs through next season. For now Abreu makes over $120,000 per game to not be on the roster. At his level of performance, that’s a better deal than paying him that money to be on the roster.
Abreu’s seven hits in 71 at bats for an .099 batting average with a .269 OPS is a humiliating stat line. In 2018 George Springer went to sleep the night of June 13 batting .293 after going hitless in his last four at bats in a 13-5 Astros’ win over Oakland. At the time no one could have ever envisioned that Springer had started a deep, deep funk which would have him endure a nightmarish six for 78 stretch at the plate (.077 batting average). Springer then hit .293 the rest of the season.
Abreu’s exile opened the door for Joey Loperfido to begin his Major League career. Very cool for Loperfido to smack a two-run single in his first game. He also struck out twice. Loperfido will amass whiffs by the bushel, he had 37 strikeouts in 101 at bats at AAA Sugar Land. Still, if he can hit .225 with some walks mixed in (he drew 16 with the Space Cowboys) and deliver some of his obvious power (13 homers in 25 games for the ex-Skeeters) that’s an upgrade over Abreu/Jon Singleton, as well as over Jake Meyers and the awful showing Chas McCormick has posted so far. Frankly, it seems unwise that the Astros only had Loperfido play seven games at first base in the minors this year. If McCormick doesn’t pick it up soon and with Meyers displaying limited offensive upside, the next guy worth a call-up is outfielder Pedro Leon. In January 2021 the Astros gave Leon four million dollars to sign out of Cuba and called him a “rapid mover to the Major Leagues.” Well…
Over his first three minor league seasons Leon flashed tools but definitely underwhelmed. He has been substantially better so far this year. He turns 26 May 28. Just maybe the Astros offense could be the cause of fewer Ls with Loperfido at first and Leon in center field.
Catch our weekly Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast. Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and I discuss varied Astros topics. The first post for the week generally goes up Monday afternoon (second part released Tuesday) via YouTube: stone cold stros - YouTube with the complete audio available via Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.