As soon as the brand split happened, people were grading both Raw and Smackdown and had compared the two shows. Even though the first shows of both brands were pretty different as Raw was amazing and Smackdown was a letdown, that didn’t continue. Now, eight months later, we can safely say that Smackdown Live was a much better show than Monday Night Raw. Did that happen this week as well?
Yes, it did. In fact, Smackdown usually wins because Raw is bad. But, this week, Raw was tolerable and had some decent moments. Smackdown Live was just great from start to finish, and it was a much better show.
Raw started off hot with Samoa Joe in the ring, signing his Raw contract. Roman Reigns interfered, and the main event was set. Samoa Joe and Roman Reigns faced off in the main event, and it was a decent thing to watch.
Besides that, nothing else overly interesting happened, and in case you didn’t see this part of the show that would be the only thing you missed. Goldberg and Owens will fight at Fastline, and we already knew that they will have a showdown in four weeks.
On the other hand, the Smackdown show was pretty good with the opening segment, the fatal-four-way match, women’s contract signing and a good main event with Luke Harper showing up and the crowd really reacting well. They told the story pretty well while they did a good job building for their Elimination Chamber PPV.
This two-hour format helps Smackdown tremendously as it’s paced really well and it’s much easier to watch. Smackdown Live failed to give us a good show last week, but they bounced back with one of the best shows in the past couple of weeks.
Winner: Smackdown Live.
