5 reasons why Smackdown Live was better than Monday Night Raw in 2017

Stephanie McMahon, Shane McMahon,
Shane and Stephanie McMahon exchanging words before the brand split

#2 More focused on building future stars

Shinsuke Nakamura,
Shinsuke Nakamura speaking to the WWE Universe

One thing that makes Monday Night Raw so hard to watch nowadays is its constant use of the same talent in the same storyline situations. Raw has managed to build up Braun Strowman as the company's next big man, but Smackdown Live has gone above and beyond to turn Sami Zayn, Kevin Owens, Jinder Mahal, and Shinsuke Nakamura into top stars.

Another problem with Raw is that they sometimes have similar main event matches week after week with the same people involved. Yes, Smackdown Live can be accused of doing that as well, but they actually progress the story forward in the process and leave fans with a much better feeling than Raw does.

Take the December 12th episode of Smackdown Live for example, where Daniel Bryan stepped in as special guest referee and seemingly helped Kevin Owens get back into his match against Shinsuke Nakamura.

If nothing else, this proves that Smackdown Live is willing to push the boundaries to the limit and create the stars that Monday Night Raw is unwilling to. In fact, underutilised talent like Bray Wyatt, Finn Balor, The Miz, and Bayley would be so much better off if they were drafted to Smackdown Live in the near future.

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Edited by Nishant Jayaram
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