FanPost

Observations from Attending a SmackDown Taping (No Spoilers)

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Last night my buddy texted me saying he had an extra ticket to the SmackDown taping in Tampa. It was a no-brainer to say yes, and the fact we ended up in a suite for free was new for me. Let me start by saying this: suites are cool, but for a WWE event I wouldn’t suggest it. It was super cool, but somewhat took away from the atmosphere.

As for the night, it looked like the building was at least 80% full which was a great sign, but I was in the middle level on the hard camera side so if the non-televised side was empty it's news to me. The crowd wasn’t extremely live or anything but they were solid for the entirety of the taping. As for the show itself, I did notice some things that were kind of surprising and also made me kind of understand why WWE booking has been the way it has been lately. Not excusing them from their many atrocities, but being there live brought to light a few things that made me understand some of where they’re coming from.

I’ll start by saying one thing: Roman Reigns is extremely over. Albeit the majority of the noise for him was very Cena-esque in its high pitchness, he still gets an overwhelmingly positive reaction. When he gears up for the superman punch, the crowd really does eat it up, and everyone was standing when his music hit.

Now that that’s out of the way, I’ll get to something that made me really comprehend some questionable booking logic as of late. Chris Jericho is still wildly over. Like, it’s a bit crazy how over he is. The crowd loved him and he got the crowd going like crazy and by far the most fan chants. After seeing so much hate online for him and wondering why WWE still stuck with him despite it, hearing the reactions he still gets made it come together for me more.

Also getting a great pop, one I would say was top 3 of the night, was Big Show, explaining why he is still used so frequently. His pop was bigger than Dean Ambrose’s, who was extremely good at getting the crowd behind him despite the natural pop for his entrance being less than what I expected. Another bigger pop was for Dolph Ziggler.

Oh and I figured I’d mention one of the guys I went there with was your typical younger WWE fan type of guy. As in he doesn’t look at the product like a smark or anything but genuinely watches the product and follows storyline and kayfabe. It made me miss those days to be honest, and I didn’t have it in me to tell him how ridiculous he sounded when he said Ambrose would main event WrestleMania this year. His reasoning made sense, though, as he thought it was crazy Reigns would get in because he gets booed so much while Ambrose gets cheered. Arguing that point probably would’ve made me sound incredibly stupid.

Just a few other tidbits: that loud blast noise heard when Ryback does his entrance and when Rusev’s flag drops is deafening. My god, I thought it was just a sound effect but nope it’s a legit pyro blast from behind the titantron. And being perpendicular with the stage (so perpendicular we couldn’t see the screen) made all of it sound so much louder and that thing left my ears ringing. The "Lucha" arms are a big hit and I’d say well over half the crowd was doing it with Kalisto. AJ Styles entrance song is even better live, the Uso’s get great in-ring crowd reactions, and the New Day are far and beyond the most entertaining part of WWE programming today; it’s not even close. They’re seriously great. Oh and Ryback vs. Rusev on Main Event was legit a 20 minute match, easily longest of night, they went seemingly forever and it wasn’t bad.

My only real knock was an advertised Reigns/Ambrose vs. Sheamus/Owens dark match not coming to fruition (and no Owens on the show in general), but besides that it was a great time. SmackDown being 2 hours made it enjoyable and not exhausting and I’d suggest attending if you get the chance.

Anyone out there to dispute my claims based of a taping of a show they attended?

The FanPosts are solely the subjective opinions of Cageside Seats readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cageside Seats editors or staff.