SmackDown Preview – Does Ellsworth Have a Fighting Chance?

“Any man with two hands has a fighting chance,” or so James Ellsworth said on his WWE debut, moments before being soundly crushed by Braun Strowman. But last week on SmackDown, Ellsworth managed to defeat WWE World Champion AJ Styles–though admittedly he had a bit of help from special referee Dean Ambrose.

Tonight, Ellsworth reaps the rewards of that victory, having earned a world title match against Styles. It seems doubtful that the Face That Runs the Place will be caught with his guard down now that the biggest prize in pro wrestling is on the line, but hey, stranger things have–wait, no. No they haven’t. AJ Styles holds on to the title tonight and the only question is how bad the beatdown to Ellsworth afterwards will be.

We’ve got two real championship question marks tonight, however. Becky Lynch is scheduled to defend the Women’s Championship on November 8th against Alexa Bliss, but the challenger suffered a disappointing defeat against Naomi at No Mercy. If the latter wrestler feels the glow once again, she might find her way into that match, either as part of a triple threat or replacing Bliss altogether.

Then there’s the tag division, where Heath Slater and Rhyno now stand at the top of the heap. Who’s next to challenge for those titles? I have no idea, and my last prediction was an “obvious” victory for the Usos at No Mercy, so clearly my tag championship picks are way out of line. I’d like to see American Alpha–who had an amazing run in NXT–pick up the titles, but in any case we should see the future of the division start to take shape tonight.

Meanwhile, Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt will continue their mind games, and way further down the card, Jack Swagger and Baron Corbin look to settle unfinished business from No Mercy.

It all goes down from the Pepsi Center in Denver, Colorado, broadcast live on USA Network tonight at 8PM Eastern/7PM Central. Don’t miss our Wrestling Warm-Up roundtable, or our live coverage of the show!