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Welcome to this week's edition of things WWE subtly told us on SmackDown! It was an interesting episode to follow up after Survivor Series and the build to TLC began in a big way.
As always, SmackDown was centered around The Tribal Chief and Universal Champion Roman Reigns. Let's get right into it:
#5 Roman Reigns' reign of terror has led to two major title contenders emerging on SmackDown
Former WWE writer buries Judgment Day HERE
We're not sure why, but Roman Reigns seemed to have a slight change of heart on SmackDown. While he embraced Jey Uso at Survivor Series for helping him beat Drew McIntyre, he berated his cousin for doing the same just a few days later on SmackDown.
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Roman Reigns berated Jey Uso to kick off SmackDown and made it clear that everyone needs to respect him. The only way to get that respect? Fear. Jey Uso assaulted Otis with a steel chair, seemingly transferring his anger towards the former Money in the Bank holder.
This also resulted in the cancelation of King Corbin vs Otis. While the latter was replaced by Murphy, the central storyline on SmackDown was the terror caused by Roman Reigns and Jey Uso doing all his bidding.
Dave Meltzer initially reported that Daniel Bryan is penciled in to be Roman Reigns' Royal Rumble opponent. Given that Bryan was seemingly behind the Intercontinental title on SmackDown, we wondered how it would play out.
Given the way it did, Daniel Bryan has been set up as a future contender for the Universal title - but we'll get back to that later. One name who also emerged is Kevin Owens - who stopped Jey Uso from attacking Daniel Bryan and would face him in the main event of SmackDown.
Kevin Owens only won by disqualification, but he got the last laugh on the night and looked straight at the camera - directing a message towards Universal Champion Roman Reigns. It's clear that Kevin Owens will be Roman Reigns' immediate title challenger, presumably for TLC.
It'll be an interesting feud to see play out on SmackDown. We've seen them have a rivalry with the roles entirely reversed in 2016 (and early 2017) - with Roman Reigns as the babyface challenger and Kevin Owens as the Universal Champion.
Kevin Owens came out on top on that occasion, but we don't expect the same to happen this time around.
#4 Bayley's first non-title feud since losing the SmackDown Women's Championship
It's still odd to see Bayley outside the SmackDown Women's title picture. We often forget that while Bayley's title reign lasted over a year, the reality is that she was the Champion from June 2019 until October 2020 - with only a small and forgettable reign by Charlotte Flair being one to disrupt it.
Either way, she lost to Sasha Banks at Hell in a Cell and that turned out to be the right call. With Sasha Banks having a new feud as the SmackDown Women's Champion, Bayley is officially out of the title picture.
Bayley was also ringside for the Natalya vs Bianca Belair match on SmackDown. As you may know, WWE has been pushing Bianca Belair and given all the showings she's had so far, it's clear that the goal in mind is for her to eventually become a multi-time Women's Champion on SmackDown and eventually RAW.
Belair defeated Natalya, but it wasn't before she had a standoff with Bayley where she accidentally struck her (intending to attack Natalya, who ducked). It was a good way to set up Bayley's first non-title feud in over a year and a half. It will do wonders for Bianca Belair, who is still relatively new to the roster and is getting a major push anyway.
#3 The Street Profits have new SmackDown Tag Team title contenders
The Street Profits have essentially had the tag team division centered around them for all of 2020, whether it was RAW or SmackDown. They won the RAW Tag Team Titles in February and they never lost them - defeating mostly Andrade and Angel Garza during the pandemic era.
They held the gold all the way to the second night of the WWE Draft, where they simply exchanged titles with The New Day - who had just won the SmackDown Tag Team Titles before being drafted to RAW.
On SmackDown, their first major feud as Tag Team Champions are Dolph Ziggler and Robert Roode. They faced the duo this week in the first half of the show and in typical WWE style, the Champions were pinned in a non-title match.
This is either going to lead to a title match next week on SmackDown or a match at TLC. We would imagine that a stipulation match at TLC would be more suited to bring out the best in all four men.
#2 Sasha Banks and Carmella are in full swing for the SmackDown Women's Championship
It's good and bad that WWE had Carmella inserted into the SmackDown Women's title picture instantly. One argument would be that Bayley was pushed out too fast, but the other side of the argument is that the SmackDown Women's title picture needed some fresh faces.
Carmella was away for most of 2020 and she returned to SmackDown with a seemingly new character altogether. It was a necessary change and she went right after SmackDown Women's Champion Sasha Banks - setting up a title feud in the process.
This week, it was Carmella who was on the receiving end of a beatdown. While cutting a promo, she was blindsided and Sasha Banks got the better of her this week. It was a simple and effective way of getting the feud ahead and we presume that Carmella will make her in-ring return at TLC.
She has yet to wrestle since returning to SmackDown, but we wouldn't be surprised to see her compete first at TLC.
#1 Sami Zayn's busy night on SmackDown and the fallout of it all
Sami Zayn started his night by facing Daniel Bryan on SmackDown in what was a WrestleMania 36 rematch. Sami Zayn won again, but it was via countout. While he rushed in, it was revealed that Daniel Bryan was attacked by Jey Uso - instantly setting him up for a future feud with Roman Reigns (which we assume will happen in a month).
However, Sami Zayn had quite a few people behind him and when talking to Apollo Crews and Big E backstage at SmackDown, it was the latter who told Crews to step aside and stood up to Sami Zayn himself.
While Sami Zayn insisted that Big E should be grateful to him, the former Tag Team Champion paid no heed to what he said and the confrontation seemingly set up an Intercontinental title feud between the two.
While Sami Zayn has been doing great as the Intercontinental Champion, a solid TLC match could be the perfect way to transition the title to Big E.
