WWE SmackDown 1/10/2025: 3 Things We Hated And 3 Things We Loved

Welcome to Wrestling Inc.'s weekly review of "WWE SmackDown," the show where Cody Rhodes continues to fight Kevin Owens literally any time he sees him! This week marked the second three-hour presentation from the blue brand, and while the WINC staff still don't love it, we can't single it out to bash on every week. Who are we, Cody Rhodes when Kevin Owens shows up? Fortunately, there are many other things for us to discuss from this episode, from the show-opening Paul Heyman promo to the United States title picture; from the new queen of the women's division and her latest challenger to something still vaguely resembling The Bloodline.

As always, you can check out our Friday night results page for anything details you missed, especially from things we're not covering here (sorry, Chelsea Green vs. Michin — we love Piper Niven's look, though). To read about what gave us the strongest feels, both positive and negative, here are three things we hated and three things we loved from the 1/10/2025 episode of "WWE SmackDown."

I really struggled with a lot of this episode of "SmackDown," but with nothing more than the A-story, which was set up by a Paul Heyman promo in the opening segment. Now there's nothing wrong with a Paul Heyman promo, but for one thing, Heyman was alone — no Roman Reigns on this episode. Not only did the once-and-future "Tribal Chief" not show up with the ula fala back around his neck asking everyone to acknowledge him, but we seemed to already be moving past that entire thing, since Heyman was here to announce Roman is entering the Rumble. It felt strange that such a huge story beat wasn't allowed to breathe even a little before it's time to start gunning for the world title again, especially because it certainly wasn't allowed to breathe on the three-hour WWE commercial that was "Raw's" Netflix debut.

Beyond that announcement, the entire A-story felt like a placeholder. Not only was there no Roman, there was no Solo, no Jey, no Sami, no Drew. Tama Tonga and Jacob Fatu coming after Heyman makes sense, but the choice to have Heyman be defended by Jimmy Uso alongside Cody Rhodes struck me as ill-conceived. Cody has a whole thing still going on with Kevin Owens that's been among the hottest angles in the company in recent weeks; while Owens got to say a little bit more of his piece this week, that storyline has really felt shunted aside lately in favor of Cody's relationship with various Samoans. And as it happens, teaming up with Jimmy to fight Tonga and Fatu gives even more credence to the stuff Owens, ostensibly a delusional heel, has been saying. On Monday, Cody directly helped Reigns become "Tribal Chief" again; on Friday, he teamed with Roman's cousin against Romans enemies. He appears to be actively ushering back in the very reign of terror he himself ended not even a year ago — teaming with Reigns at Bad Blood was one thing; lately Cody has been directly enabling his former nemesis. If I had any faith this was leading to a Cody heel turn or anything similarly interesting, I could give it the benefit of the doubt, but it really just feels like we're supposed to forget all that ever happened. Except for Owens, who keeps reminding us, and we're apparently expected to boo him for it.

Written by Miles Schneiderman

What can I say, I just want better things for poor ol' Shinsuke Nakamura, including better feuds and a better, more memorable reign for him as Intercontinental Champion. This week, he faced former champion LA Knight once again, and I believe I've said it before, but it's getting very, very old. WWE even put up a graphic as the men made their way to the ring that said Nakamura's last three matches were against Knight and Andrade, both of whom have been stuck in the IC title vortex, against each other, for months. To me, it just feels like we've added a new champion, but things within the division are still very much the same old story.

What made it even worse was the fact the new (or maybe the old?) Bloodline interfered, because Knight made the dumb decision to throw Jacob Fatu out of a door in the back after the "Samoan Werewolf" Jacob Fatu got too worked up during the opening segment and started taking out officials. WWE may decide to redo the match between Nakamura and Knight, as it was officially ruled a no contest, or they could even go as far as doing something even worse, like pitting Nakamura and Knight together in a tag team match to take on Fatu and Tama Tonga. I'm crossing my fingers that won't happen, since it seems like the new Bloodline is still feuding with the original Bloodline, in some sense, as we saw in the main event.

Before the no contest, however, I was thinking that I'm tired of Nakamura not looking super strong. While I didn't want this to be a squash match, necessarily, but Knight got in quite a bit of offensive, a large portion of it toward the end of the match. There were also too many near falls with Knight covering Nakamura, which can be exciting, but I just wasn't feeling them this week. Ultimately, Knight hit a BFT, but couldn't cover Nakamura quick enough, and that's when Fatu and Tonga appeared. I think overall, my main issue is that I just want some new, credible challengers for Nakamura. Heck, even Fatu or Tonga would something new and refreshing, and would add an interesting new aspect to the Bloodline with Sikoa no longer Tribal Chief. There are plenty of other worthy candidates on the roster for WWE to throw together one of its beloved tournaments, or even a fatal four-way match or two, to determine a new number one contender. It would great to see Nakamura and a fresher face in a big feud, to go and compete for the championship at a premium live event. That might be hopeful thinking, and I guess I should at least be happy Nakamura is on television and holding gold.

Written by Daisy Ruth

WWE has done a very good job recently of replenishing the "SmackDown" tag team division. If this is what they do with it, though, I'm not sure what the point was. We have a lot of tag teams who want title shots, so Nick Aldis naturally puts them in some tag team matches. Only they're not explicitly ... for anything. It kind of feels like a No. 1 contender's tournament — Los Garza beat Pretty Deadly Friday night while Motor City Machine Guns beat A-Town Down Under, so now it's Los Garza vs. MCMG next week — but it's not officially that, and the vagueness makes the whole thing harder to grab on to.

Granted, if it were explicitly a tournament, I would probably be annoyed with that, too, because we've done so many tournaments lately. Would it kill anyone here to base a tag team storyline around personal issues and character history? I thought that's what we were getting when Johnny Gargano betrayed Alex Shelley, but it's become more of a division-wide DIY chase than a focused, character-driven narrative. The only thing that even come close is whatever is happening with Gargano conning Pretty Deadly into thinking they're friends (which, we just did this with Nia Jax and Tiffany Stratton; hell, Pretty Deadly were even briefly part of that story) and Apollo Crews running around backstage snitching on every tag team he can find because his character is now The Instigator, I guess? The lesson here: Don't happened to have been teamed up with a guy who's about to get fired for no reason.

It's also weird because there are just so many heel tag teams in the mix, which would be fine if the champions weren't also a heel tag team. Los Garza literally beat Pretty Deadly this week by being better at cheating; I shouldn't have to explain to people why heel vs. heel matches are mostly a bad idea. We need the Street Profits back in the absolute worst way, and we need some creative types actually devoting time and effort to this division, because whatever they're doing now just feels completely uninspired.

Written by Miles Schneiderman

Last Friday, Tiffany Stratton completed one of the best MITB cash-ins ever. On Friday, she addressed the fans as champion and knocked it out of the park. She looks and sounds like a star. She expertly sidestepped "what?!" chants and told the fans to put respect on her name.

Stratton explained how she gained Nia Jax's trust and friendship to set her up for a cash-in. She wasn't the "dumb blonde" her "mentor" thought she was. Of course, Jax is mad that she got played, yet still thinks Stratton is too dumb to have carried out such a ruse. Jax threatened Stratton to return her title, but the champ was "saved by the Bayley" as Wade Barrett put it. The women's tag team champions wanted their shot at the title too, which is a waste of time when they have their own titles to defend. Nevertheless, it set up an excellent women's four way following the segment.

The segment proved that it is, in fact, Tiffy Time. She is ready to hold the gold and be the face of the "SmackDown" women's division. She is compelling on the mic and clearly a talented star. The segment also successfully set up a No. 1 contender's match. Bayley is (obviously) a very formidable first challenger for Stratton and will quickly put her title on the line just two weeks after winning it.

Stratton is right; she is at the Tiffy Top of her game and the division is on notice.

Written by Samantha Schipman

"WWE SmackDown" had a zinger of a fatal four-way to follow an excellent segment addressing Tiffany Stratton's Women's title win, with each of the Women's Tag Team Champions, Bianca Belair and Naomi, facing off against former champions Nia Jax and Bayley. The bout itself was structured excellently and flowed so well, with each of the women involved getting their chance to shine in seamless action and coming off as compelling potential winners, and the three-to-one face/heel dynamic provided an anchor to the early goings; Naomi, Belair, and Bayley worked together until their alliance inevitably run its course, and that in itself gave way to an exciting climax. A fourth party interfering on the behalf of Jax, Candice Lerae, cut the deficit and proved essential to the great finish: Lerae held onto Belair's braid, which when yanked back slapped Naomi inadvertently, with Jax then pulling Belair out of the ring as Bayley hit the Rose Plant for the pin on Naomi.

Not only did the result add an entirely different direction to Stratton's title reign for the immediate future, with a veteran like the "Role Model" more than a worthy defense to establish the "Tiffy Time" era, but it also added another layer to the story between The Big Three. The seeds of dissent have been sown over the past few months, exacerbated by Jade Cargill's sidelining but then plastered over with Naomi standing as champion, all while Naomi remains a potential suspect in the attack on Cargill. Now for Belair to have, inadvertently or not, cost Naomi a title shot (while she herself has been suspected of shelving Cargill) is sure to add some more tension to the matter. Looking at the bigger picture, this was a good way to establish the immediate women's title picture leading into the Royal Rumble, with four very credible winners already making their intentions for Stratton clear; six, if you choose to count Cargill and Lerae among them. It's also just cool that alongside an intensely fun piece of wrestling, there were several subplots unfolding, leaving hooks for the future.

Written by Max Everett

Jacob Fatu is slowly becoming a main character of "WWE SmackDown," at least in my mind, after me not being familiar with him until he starting working for WWE. I think he stood out a lot more to me this week because Solo Sikoa wasn't on the blue brand to lament his "WWE Raw" Netflix debut loss of his Tribal Chief status to Roman Reigns. Reigns wasn't on the show either, so Fatu shined a bit more brightly. I know I complained about Fatu and Tama Tonga taking out LA Knight and causing a no contest in that match, but this is a overarching "I LOVE YOU, FATU!" (written in his voice) portion of this article. I think we got a very brief glimpse into what it could be like if he was leading the newer half of the Bloodline.

Of course, you can't have a Paul Heyman and Cody Rhodes segment without Bloodline interference, and it was Fatu who stood out more so than Tonga throughout the beatdown opener. Fatu was taking out officials and producers like it was nothing, and everyone else stood on the outside of the ring, shaking in their boots, too scared to get near him, which I thought was effective. Fatu is a scary "Samoan Werewolf," and he needs to be treated as such by those who aren't active wrestlers, especially.

Before their main event tag team match against Rhodes and Jimmy Uso, Fatu even got a bit of backstage mic time as they were heading to gorilla. He's so fierce, but still a great talker, I was hanging on every word he said. Which is a bit easier to do when he's not constantly expressing his love for Sikoa ever other sentence. The main event itself wasn't really anything to write home about, it was more so a glorified house show main event, but Fatu still looked good in the match. He hit an impaler DDT, followed by his absolutely beautiful moonsault to get the pin on Uso. Even though Owens came out and fought Rhodes to the back and commentary exclaimed how it was "two on one!" when it came to Uso, it really wasn't. Tonga really didn't do much, and it was Fatu who scored the victory for the team.

While there was no blatant takeover by Fatu of the new Bloodline or anything, and maybe I'm making up subtilties in my mind, it was refreshing to see him work without Sikoa. Next week will be extremely interested when Sikoa gets back. Will Fatu still love him, or are things up in the air now that he's no longer Tribal Chief?

Written by Daisy Ruth