Boys Becoming Men, Men Becoming Wolves – A Very Smackdown Halloween – 10/31/2017

Norfolk, Virginia, don’t you dare be sour.  Clap for your favorite wrestling recap, and feel the Powah!!!!!!!!!

#UnderSiege

Shane O kicks off our Halloween edition.  I chose this giphy specifically, because I’ve got a feeling we’re going to see something wild at Survivor Series.  Kurt Angle has been announced as the captain of the Raw men’s team, so as you could imagine, that means we’re getting General Manager vs Commissioner at SS, as Shane is here to let us know he’s going to put together a team of his own, and he’s going to be at the helm.  So as it stands as of this paragraph, our teams are Kurt Angle, Braun Strowman & 3 to be named and Shane McMahon, Randy Orton & let’s find out at least two of our other competitors, shall we?

The Nougat, I could eat a whole bowl of nougat

• 2 out of 3 Falls – Dolph Ziggler vs Bobby Roode:  The Show-Off and The Glorious One will do battle again to determine which one will join Shane and The Viper on the Smackdown team.  I think these two would make fantastic tag team partners, honestly.  Anyway, another well crafted match from both, nothing too over the top, just technically sound.  Ziggler would get the first pinfall, but Roode would land a Sunset Flip for a pinfall of his own and a Glorious DDT for the victory and he will join the Smackdown team at Survivor Series.
• Baron Corbin had another match with Sin Cara.  Is it simply because we don’t really care what he does between now and Survivor Series?  I don’t know.  I’m bored with this.  Baron Corbin is apparently their new Ryback.  Nobody wins.  This one was probably a double count out.  I think.  I’m not sure.  Sin Cara was beating Corbin on the announce table, they never really announced anything.  Whatever.  We lost too because this ate up a potentially meaningful segment.
• Jinder ran off at the mouth, AJ squashed whatever the other Singh brother’s name is, then he got jumped by Jinder and both Singhs to “send a message to the Beast Incarnate”.  Whatever.  Get ready for Suplex City Bitch.
• Rusev defeated Big E with a kick to the back.  The New Day and Aiden English all ended up involved.  It was a mess but just an excuse for the only group willing to dress up for Halloween to be on the program.  Xavier’s Jimmy Hart was on point.
• Strangerer Things:  I was a pretty big advocate for these segments, but they’re approaching the point where it’s just going on way too long with no payoffs.  This was better than last week’s, but we’ve got to get to a point where something actually happens soon.
• Shinsuke Nakamura def. Kevin Owens to become the 4th man on Team Smackdown.  He had the match won early, but Sami came to create a distraction.  Didn’t help so much, as Randy Orton later came out to even things up, sneaking in from behind and back body dropping Sami Zayn into the announce table.  Following the Orton distraction, Owens ate a spin kick and a Kinshasa and took the pinfall.  The Owens and Zayn friendship has not been beneficial for either of them beyond Hell in a Cell, so it won’t last much longer.

Final Observations:

I’m alright with this episode.  Raw felt a little overcrowded last night, Smackdown felt a little underbooked because skipping commercials I swear I got through it in less than an hour.  That’s an exciting set of four already, I’m curious to see who they’ll add to balance the Braun Strowman of Raw’s team.