Smackdown – April 10, 2012: Smackdown Goes Old School

And does better than Raw.Smackdown
Date: April 10, 2012
Location: Hampton Coliseum, Hampton, Virginia
Commentators: Michael Cole, Josh Matthews, Booker T

This is another special live show with a theme of Blast From The Past. That means that we have the legends coming out again for their semi-annual appearances which don’t mean much other than us getting to say “hey, I know you.” It still should be fun though as most of these shows are. Also we might even get some fallout from last week with Sheamus. Let’s get to it.

Do You Know Your Enemy? Mine is the Indians’ bullpen. How can it be this bad?

We get a quick clip of Bryan breaking up with AJ last week. Bryan is in Piper’s Pit tonight.

Here’s Mean Gene for an interview in the ring with Sheamus. Ok so by interview it means introducing him and standing in the corner. Sheamus talks about there being a code of honor as champion and he didn’t follow it last week. There was a Daniel Bryan chant as he started talking but it wasn’t a huge one. He publicly apologizes to all referees including Chad Patton. Everyone makes mistakes and he always learns the hard way from them.

Ace’s new trumpet music cuts him off. He shows us the clip of the ending of last week’s main event and the Brogue Kick after the match. Ace wants to know who Sheamus thinks he is and demands a public apology. Sheamus says he just did that and Ace says he didn’t hear it so do it again. He does it again and Ace wants an apology to all of the other referees and we get the same exchange with the same result. Now Ace wants an apology to the world which brings a smirk to Sheamus’ face.

Ace says apologize now which Sheamus does, almost laughing at the same time. That’s not good enough apparently and Sheamus is on permanent probation, meaning that if he touches a referee by accident or on purpose, he’s fired. Also he’s being fined $500,000. Also tonight it’s Del Rio/Bryan vs. Sheamus/Okerlund. As long as we don’t see him in trunks again I’m ok. This was an attempt at making us care about Sheamus and while it’s nothing new at all, it’s certainly better than nothing.

Bob Orton wishes his son good luck in his upcoming match.

Randy Orton vs. Mark Henry

Henry misses a charge and Orton pounds away with right hands. He tries to climb the corner to punch even harder but gets slammed out for two. Bob is watching in the back as we take a break, 80 seconds into the match. Back with Orton fighting out of a neck crank. We see a clip from the break of Orton avoiding a charging Henry to send him into the stairs. Back to the neck crank and then a slam sets up a splash for two. Orton gets his feet up to stop a charging Henry and hits him clotheslines which don’t work.

A low DDT like Miz uses gets two. RKO is countered with Henry throwing Orton to the floor. Orton comes back and rams him into the post twice and slides in when Kane’s pyro goes off. Kane pops up on the screen and says by beating him at Mania, he became a monster again. Last week Orton proved he can be just as evil as Kane is. Kane says it shouldn’t end now, so we pan back to see Bob Orton laid out in front of him. The match just stops at about 11:00.

Rating: C-. This was watchable but not much more. I have no idea why it was a no contest instead of the logical countout win for Henry. Henry has a world title match on Monday so you need to keep him strong, but at the same time you don’t want Orton to look weak. The perfect solution? Countout loss, but for some reason that’s not what we get because WWE has no idea what they’re doing for the most part with basic things like that anymore.

Randy runs to the back and finds his dad but Kane drills him with a pipe and says he’s a sucker for family reunions.

Back and we recap what we saw four minutes ago.

DiBiase and Atlas are watching from the back. Atlas says this is going to be a squash match.

Ryback vs. Benny Camer

Patterson and Hillbilly Jim are watching in the back as well. Ryback KILLS HIM with a clothesline right after the bell and then puts him in a torture rack position and falls backwards for the pin at 35 seconds. WAY better than both Lord Tensai matches so far as Ryback looked like a killer.

Heath Slater is trying to talk Tyson Kidd into teaming with him tonight. Slater even has a Hall of Fame manager for them that says Slater could be the next Honky Tonk Man. It’s Jimmy Hart, who looks exactly the same as he did 20 years ago. Take that for what you will.

Mick Foley comes out to do commentary.

Heath Slater/Tyson Kidd vs. Usos

Cole actually references Countdown to Lockdown (not by name) when talking about Foley’s commentary history. We get the Megaphone which never goes out of style. Jimmy starts with Tyson in this NXT special. They exchange cradles and Slater tags himself in. Off to a chinlock and Jimmy says that he’s had more tag champions than anyone in the history of the WWE. I think Captain Lou might have something to say about that. The Usos make the hot tag and clean house, hitting their toss into the Samoan Drop. Mick gets tired of Jimmy and chases him off with Socko, allowing the Superfly Splash to end this mess at 2:40.

Jimmy takes Socko post match. These legends bits aren’t working at all for the most part.

Time for the Pit with Bryan as the guest. He looks pretty good. Old but good. He’s not as big as a house if nothing else. Piper says he misses being here and says Bryan is the guest tonight, getting a somewhat mixed reaction. We see the breakup clip for the fourth time tonight and here’s Bryan. There’s a brief but solid YES chant but it dies quickly. Piper says Bryan looks happy for someone that lost the title in 18 seconds. Bryan says he’s been granted his rematch and the fans chant 18 seconds. The match is at Extreme Rules and it’s 2/3 falls. AJ will be nowhere to be found.

Piper isn’t sure about that but he does know that AJ is here tonight. He likes AJ and since this is his show, AJ, COME ON DOWN! AJ comes out and is very excited to be in the Pit. She says hi to Daniel and Piper is surprised. AJ defends Bryan and says that deep down, he’s a good person. Piper says in the Pit you don’t have to be politically correct. AJ insists it was her fault and begs forgiveness. She wants to talk to Bryan and Piper tries to talk her out of it. Bryan cuts them off and says if AJ loves him, she’ll leave right now. Piper says she doesn’t need to listen to Bryan but AJ leaves anyway, getting a reaction out of it too.

Bryan goes to leave but Piper goes into Hot Rod mode and talks about Bryan’s YES YES YES shirt. Piper says he has a lot of children including four girls, four ladies. Piper says you don’t tell a lady to shut up. That’s a No. You don’t yell at a lady. That’s a No. You don’t use a lady as a human shield, because that’s a coward, and that’s Bryan, also a No. Piper says he’s looking forward to seeing Sheamus kick Bryan’s head off twice. Bryan slaps Piper and runs away. Piper was on here and it worked well.

Drew McIntyre/Bella Twins vs. Great Khali/Natalya/Beth Phoenix

Men vs. men and women vs. women. The men start but Drew gets chopped and tags out. He says he doesn’t need this and walks out. Alicia hits a northern lights suples on Brie for the pin at 56 seconds. What was the point in this match existing?

Mae Young comes out and kisses Khali. I guess that’s why the match existed.

Damien Sandow explains how sophisticated he is. He doesn’t like social media because it furthers the moral decay of society. Preach it brother.

Another clip of Kane and the Ortons earlier.

Raw ReBound.

Gene thinks Sheamus has a plan for tonight. Sheamus says they’re probably going to lose tonight but he’s not going to let Ace have the satisfaction of seeing Sheamus sweat. If they survive, the first pint is on Sheamus. They’ll either drink to remember or drink to forget.

Jim Duggan vs. Hunico

Duggan knocks him to the floor where Camacho is waiting. Duggan calls out Sarge and I think we have a tag match on our hands. Well it is Smackdown after all. Or maybe Sarge throws Duggan the 2×4 and it’s a DQ at 1:00. Hunico takes the Cobra Clutch post match.

Here’s Cody to complain about life in general. He’s looking forward to a future where he’s the champion again and where these legends don’t hog the spotlight. This brings out Dusty for what could be interesting. Dusty says that he’d do anything for his son, but he doesn’t quite get what Cody has been doing lately. Cody has been poking a grizzly bear lately in Big Show. Dusty gets cut off as Cody says Dusty is embarrassing him and they can talk in the back.

Cody goes to leave but here’s Big Show. He does the required Dusty impression and says he’ll show the real Cody Rhodes. It’s one of the Dashing Tips videos, this one being him putting on lip gloss. Cody looks stunned and Dusty looks…..uh…….I think the right word is disappointed. Show says that was embarrassing and leaves. Dusty doesn’t say anything but does get to dance to his music. I still stand by my theory that Dusty’s kids are the biggest ribs in the history of pro wrestling.

Alberto Del Rio/Daniel Bryan vs. Sheamus/Gene Okerlund

The Fink does Gene/Sheamus’ entrance, making it instantly better. Sheamus starts with Del Rio but the heels double team him down quickly. Gene is in a Sheamus t-shirt and pants thankfully. Del Rio puts on a facelock but gets backdropped quickly. Sheamus throws both of them around but the Brogue Kick misses. Bryan dropkicks him to the floor and Del Rio kicks his head off.

Gene gets in for some reason and is surrounded. Ricardo is in there too. The Legends Army comes out to distract Bryan, allowing Sheamus to kick his head off for the pin at 3:23. I’m not going to rate it as most of that was Gene getting trapped and the Legends coming in, but the match was nothing at all of note anyway.

The legends all beat up Ricardo and celebrate to end the show. We’re not done yet though as Cole gets in the ring and says he knows they have to get back to the retirement home so let’s get a quick photo. They surround him and Patterson gives him a weak right hand to knock him to the floor. Atlas has some GUNS on him.

Overall Rating: C+. This is a hard one to grade. First of all, if you’re looking for the Smackdown version of Old School Raw, you didn’t get it here. This was more like a regular episode of Smackdown with some legends thrown in rather than the other way around. Now that being said it still worked okish, with the Pit being a highlight. The Sheamus vs. Ace stuff is decent as it gives Sheamus what he needs more than anything else: something people can relate to.

Since he turned face back in August, all he’s really done is beat people up and tell the occasional funny Irish story. That’s only going to get him so far and I think we reached that back in January. This is something a little different and while it’s something we’ve seen before, I liked how Sheamus handled it. It’s something I want to see continue and that’s a really good sign. This was a good show overall, but it’s not a great one.

Results
Randy Orton vs. Mark Henry went to a no contest
Ryback b. Benny Camer – Torture Rack Drop
Usos b. Tyson Kidd/Heath Slater – Superfly Splash to Slater
Great Khali/Natalya/Alicia Fox b. Bella Twins/Drew McIntyre – Northern lights suplex to Brie
Hunico b. Jim Duggan via DQ when Duggan hit Hunico with the 2×4
Sheamus/Gene Okerlund b. Alberto Del Rio/Daniel Bryan – Brogue Kick to Bryan

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