Surprising Reason Why SmackDown Debut Was Delayed

It took some time. One of the most exciting things you can see in wrestling is the debut of a new wrestler. It means that you are going to be getting to see some fresh matches with the new star meeting the established veterans, along with some kind of a new story. However, sometimes it does not exactly go as well as it should have, and that seems to be the case again for a WWE star.

This week’s SmackDown featured the in-ring debut with Xia Li, who defeated Natalya with a kick to the face. Li had appeared on SmackDown multiple times while being billed as The Protector, but had not actually wrestled despite being drafted to SmackDown from NXT in the 2021 WWE Draft back in October. According to Fightful Select, Li did not have any creative plans for her debut, despite several animated vignettes airing hyping her move to SmackDown. Li was never injured and was simply waiting on something from WWE.

Opinion: That really is one of the most WWE things I have heard in a long time, as the company came up with a bunch of vignettes about someone’s debut but then did not actually have a plan for Li. If that is the case, why bother making up the vignettes in the first place? Or why not use the Draft pick on someone WWE had something planned for at all? It seems like WWE does not think these things through and that is not exactly good thing to see, despite it happening over and over.

What did you think of Li’s debut? What should she do on SmackDown? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 60,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 6,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his- Amazon author page with 30 wrestling books

Keep up with the LATEST WRESTLING RUMORS! Click here to sign up for the exclusive Wrestling Rumors daily newsletter, delivered right to your inbox.