If you are drafting guys from NXT, you have to start the list with Nakamura and Samoa Joe, but I have no belief that that's what they'll do. I;ll say Balor, American Alpha, Bayley, Nia Jax, The Revival and Mojo.

Oh I agree but it seems like with Joe as the champ and Nakamura the challenger, neither of them will get the call yet. I wonder if they want Nakamura to work on his English a bit before calling him up.

Balor & Bayley seem like the two most obvious.
Vince being Vince, I figure Nia gets an undeserved call. I then expect at least American Alpha (yawn) with another tag team as a possibility.

From there Joe & Nakamura are the most deserving but that's pretty much why I'd be surprised by it. Honestly, I'll also be surprised if it's Aries either.

Could they count Bobby Roode as "an NXT guy"? I could see that happening just as an easy controversy angle to work with.

What about Carmella, could that be one of the callups? (I've wondered if they're going to use the teams are 1 pick UNLESS a GM only specificallys ask to draft 1 of the pair rule in order to split Enzo & Cass). Either her or the tiny blonde former gymnast chick.

I know this sounds weird, but how can you be having a draft for the best people but leave Joe, the Revival and Asuka all out of the draft. Oh yeah, Kayfabe.

That being said. American Alpha, Dillinger, Balor, Bayley, Jax and I think a haha because the WWE does stupid shit, Corey Graves as an announcer. (didn't JR get traded back in the "random" drafts?)

What about Alexa Bliss? Didn't they have her break away from that tag team she was managing?

I don't think Roode has enough of a name yet among the WWE audience. I'd wager Aries before him and then let Roode take the role of veteran wrestler in NXT who can put on good matches with anyone.

Also I think 2 women and a tag team have to get called up. Aren't they planning to have 2 women's titles and 2 tag team titles now?

Was the ending a botch or really bad writing?

Yeah, that's the "tiny former gymnast" I was talking about.

Alexa was actually impressive at the house show I went to last week. Impressive and hot. She was against Asuka, but Asuka was unimpressive.

Just from what I saw at the house show Balor for sure would be gone. Roode did some nice work with Balor, but it was AA and Nakamura, along with Joe and The Revival that did the best work. In fact, that was the only match that really felt like both sides were really at another level skill wise.

Baley really played to the crowd, spent most of the time interacting, which makes me think she'll go up just on popularity alone.

Tony Schiavone thinks this is the way the show is suppose to end every week. That's all the time we have see ya next week!

I'm assuming it means Dean and Seth end up on different shows and both GMs claim that their guy won last night and give them a title to start each show next week.

Yeah my guess is now Stephanie has a clear #1 overall pick in Seth Rollins, him being the World Champion and all.

I truly believe that Asuka has the potential -- if her health holds up & assuming no injuries -- to be the best female wrestler there in at least 30 years or so.

Her eyes, or that look, just scream heel to me. I can't think of any woman in the States that has had the charisma, the skill set, AND the opportunity all come this close to converging in a very long time.

Instead, we'll likely get to watch Nia lumbering around the ring indefinitely.
X-Pac Heat with me.

Agree and I think she almost wrestles in a "Lawler" style (what I've seen) that can give her a long career in the WWE. Just kicks, punches and her chicken wing or arm bar submission. While others seem to worry about perfecting leaping moves she seems to just focus on her strengths and says screw the rest.

Then again, I don't watch NXT all the time and seem to be the only person who doesn't think Sasha is just a botchfest about 30% of the time she wrestles.

I didn't think much of Alexa when she debuted in NXT but her as a heel is insanely hot. I'm not a fan of Nia but she can be a monster heel. She is so much bigger than most of the women on the roster. When was the last time the women's division had a true monster heel?

Sasha seemed better in NXT where she could work on the same kind of match with the same person every single night to perfect it. Now that she's at the main level, she is in something new each night and doesn't look comfortable.

The last couple days Nakamura has been re-tweeting kids doing his intro. It's kind of neat. He has so much potential when he eventually gets called up.

Shinsuke Nakamura (@ShinsukeN) | Twitter

I almost have this fear of too much "strong style" wrestling on Smackdown. It fits it's GM but I'm not sure if they can have a smackdown show full of Nakamura, Styles, the Club, Jericho and others who spent a good amount of time in Japan.

Looks like Bayley is coming up. I was actually thinking they might save her for Sunday and have her be Sasha's mystery partner.

Yes !!!!! @wwe #SmackDownLIVE pic.twitter.com/MQkJ7pghVR

— Joe Cronin SHOW (@JoeCroninSHOW) July 19, 2016

Looks like we're mostly getting the same tired/tiring matchups out of the draft.

Disappointing really.

Too much dead weight / dull / Raw-junior workers going to Smackdown for it to be more than so-so unless we go back to the squash match era just to get the talent on screen.

The one thing I appear to have gotten somewhat right was using the draft to split teams/stables.

So it looks like Reigns will be the Raw top guy and Cena will be the Smackdown top guy. Worst case scenario.

Also the NXT people they picked are disappointing. Nia Jax, Alexa Bliss, Carmella, and Eva Marie over Bayley?

The Women's division of Smackdown is really bad too. Are they even going to bother having a title on the show?

Nobody drafted Heath Slater. Lol.

Smackdown roster has a few great guys and then is just terrible.

If they wanted to make Smackdown appear like an equal show to Raw, they failed after about 5 minutes. That said, I will probably make more of an effort to watch SD with AJ and American Alpha as exclusive wrestlers, then I did since they stopped having exclusive rosters in 2011. I would have liked to see them put one of Zayn, Owens, Cesaro and Balor on Smackdown.

From an NXT perspective, the most head scratching results possible.

To me, the callups scream of someone that walked into the dressing room, shook a few hands, and decided who would move up based on that.

Bayley is plain looking. Samoa Joe is fat. Nakamura doesn't even speak English.

Look at Mojo Rawley! That guy has CHARISMA! Alexa Bliss is HOT! Nia Jax is HUGE!

To me, the callup list is almost the list of people that I would have released if I were in charge of NXT. (minus Finn Balor who is awesome and American Alpha who should have moved up months ago)

For some reason I hope they form miz, zig and Ryder into a heel cliq.

Unfortunately there just aren't that many faces on smackdown. Out of the first 8 rounds, ziggler might be the #3 or #4 top face.

I'd actually be about as interested in watching paint dry as seeing American Alpha. They make Malenko look like the 2nd coming of Flair to me.

{shrug}

The fact that even as of yesterday afternoon they were still changing who the NXT draftees were gonna be, and didn't know what they were gonna do about the tag team and womens divisions (and may still not know), tells you just about everything you need to know.

People thinking that Smackdown is going to somehow be this fresh, new, different type of show are in for a big letdown. It's going to be Raw Jr.

WWE.com either having fun with that, or it's part of an interesting angle. Probably the former.

After not being drafted, what’s next for Heath Slater?

New announce teams for both shows - Michael Cole, Corey Graves and Byron Saxton on RAW and Mauro Ranallo, John Bradshaw Layfield and David Otunga on Smackdown. I think that improves both shows.
Lawler bumped to pre-show panels.

I get that they wanted Samoa Joe and Nakamura to carry NXT through the summer, but I wish there was some kayfabe reason they weren't picked. Like maybe that Regal got to "protect" champions and top challengers or something.

And I think the Smackdown/RAW split is fine, it definitely creates opportunities for a bunch of guys, but I hope they bring in more guys because they're going to burn through matchups and feuds very quickly if they stick to their low-roster-turnover model. RAW was already dragging and resorting to 15+ minute TV matches, and now their roster is reduced by 1/3rd.

How hard would it have been to say that Regal gets to pick 2 guys before each round to protect? Could have done Nak/Joe and then Bayley/Asuka and it all would have made perfect sense and Balor and Alpha could have been picked in the exact same spots. But, when you don't have any sort of plan...

Edit: Shit, now that I think of it, after making those announcements he could have announced, on USA, in front of millions more people than see NXT, that the next takeover show will in fact, be headlined by Joe Vs Nak and Asuka Vs Bayley. This is not rocket surgery for the love of Pete.

I'm sitting in the kitchen having a smoke, fantasy booking in my head, and I come up with this in the course of one USA Gold Menthol.

Show opens with Vince at a podium in the center of the stage. Bryan and Foley at tables to the left and right of him. All the wrestlers in a room backstage along with Shane & Steph (This is just a personal thing, to make them less of the focus, but I get that they'd likely be at their respective tables).

Vince does an opening speech, explains the rules exactly as they were last night, no need to change anything. Says that each GM will hand him a card when it's their turn to pick. But first, they go to remote down at Full Sail, all the NXT wrestlers are in a room and William Regal is there too. Vince explains that before the first two rounds, Regal gets to protect 2 of the NXT Wrestlers. Regal says he's protecting Joe and Nakamura because they are headlining the next Takeover show in a match for the NXT title, have the two face off or cut short promos or something, whatevs, it doesn't have to be extensive, just get their faces out there.

Now it's time to draft. Foley says this pick may be controversial, but he has a plan in place, and drafts Roman Reigns. Stephanie is upset. Bryan says it's a no brainer to pick the WWE champion and takes Dean Ambrose. Foley says he's taking Seth Rollins and he now has a 2/3rd chance of walking out Battleground with the world champ, Steph is happy and now Shane looks concerned. Bryan takes the WWE World Tag Team champions The New Day, and now Shane is happy again while Steph is upset. Foley takes the United States Champion Rusev to end the first round. When each guy is picked they come out and cut a short promo, yadda yadda.

They do a match, just like they did last night.

Regal again, he protects Asuka & Bayley and announces them as the co main event for Takeover. Balor looks upset.

Foley takes The Wyatts with the idea that they'll win the titles at Battleground and Raw will have the belts. See how we're building interest in this show and promoting getting the network?

Bryan takes Cena, Foley takes Balor, Bryan takes Styles, Foley ends the round by taking The womens champion Charlotte.

Round 3, Foley takes Sasha Banks, Bryan takes American Alpha, Foley takes Enzo & Cass, Bryan takes Gallows & Anderson, Foley ends the round by taking Kevin Owens.

Round 4, Foley takes Zayne, Bryan takes Cesaro, Foley takes The Uso's, Bryan takes Miz, Foley takes Corbin. So after 4 rounds we have.

Raw
------
Reigns
Rollins
Rusev
Wyatts
Balor
Charlotte
Banks
Enzo & Cass
Owens
Zayne
The Uso's
Corbin

Smackdown
--------------
Ambrose
New Day
Cena
Styles
American Alpha
Gallows & Anderson
Cesaro
Miz


You keep Raw strong and stocked, you give Smackdown a good slate of guys. So much you can work with from here going forward. You could even have Bryan & Mick talk about doing trades that could lead to surprises showing up on the shows.

I know TL/DR but it was in my head and if I didn't get it out the voices would just get stronger. :rant:

Is there a list anywhere of how the brand splits ended? I was out of the country and really have only seen the reactions.

WWE Draft results: Full rosters, thoughts from Raw, SmackDown brand split - CBSSports.com

Raw Draft Results
1. Seth Rollins
3. Charlotte
5. Finn Balor
6. Roman Reigns
8. Brock Lesnar
10. The New Day
11. Sami Zayn
13. Sasha Banks
14. Chris Jericho
16. Rusev
18. Kevin Owens
20. Enzo Amore and Colin Cassady
21. Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson
23. Big Show
25. Nia Jax
26. Neville
28. Cesaro
30. Sheamus
31. The Golden Truth
33. Titus O'Neil
35. Paige
36. Darren Young
38. Sin Cara
40. Jack Swagger
42. The Dudley Boyz
44. Summer Rae
46. Mark Henry
48. Braun Strowman
50. Bo Dallas
52. The Shining Stars
54. Alicia Fox
56. Dana Brooke
58. Curtis Axel

SmackDown Draft Results
2. Dean Ambrose
4. AJ Styles
7. John Cena
9. Randy Orton
12. Bray Wyatt
14. Becky Lynch
16. The Miz
18. Baron Corbin
22. American Alpha
24. Dolph Ziggler
27. Natalya
29. Alberto Del Rio
32. The Usos
34. Kane
37. Kalisto
39. Naomi
41. The Ascension
43. Zack Ryder
45. Apollo Crews
47. Alexa Bliss
49. Breezango
51. Eva Marie
53. The Vaudevillains
55. Erick Rowan
57. Mojo Rawley
59. Carmella

I see what you're saying about the lack of heels on SD. Geez, Orton could carry the mantle as top heel, but he get too many cheers and has missed a lot of time hurt. Then maybe Bray gets the shot at it, he could certainly do it. After that it's the Miz and Del Rio? Seems like a big drop off. They would need to really be built up in that case.

It seems clear that NXT is holding the other stars out to finish the summer tour season. Plus, it does give the WWE some flexibility to move people around without proverbially blowing their wad right off at the beginning.

Tag matchups between AA, the Usos and the Ascension/Vaudevillians don't come off as tremendously entertaining.

Sami Zayn vs. Kevin Owens @ Battleground was one of the best matches I've seen this year. They had a long burn story line that was spread out over months. That final kick was full of emotion. Great storytelling.

That was solid - Owens vs Zayn - but for the life of me I don't understand putting them on the same brand going forward ... unless this leads to a tag team partnership.

I don't get it either.

Nice to see Bayley but apparently she's not getting called up full time for some reason.

About the only booking reason I can come up with is that she'll be used to facilitate an Asuka heel turn.

We live in a world where John Cena had to get a face rub from Enzo & Cass.

Now let's just think about that & let it sink in, hmm.

Solid show as far as in ring. Just right now the storylines are uninteresting IMO. Main Event was good.

... the Bayley stuff and the KO/Zayn matches were primo (KO/Zayn feud of the decade across all the different promotions), the Main Event was good too.

Enzo is trying to find out if he's truly immortal. (How you doin?)

That Brainbustah on the Apron. Holy shit.

And yeah, Roman is in the doghouse.

New Day was nice enough to mention they got the record last night. Wouldn't be shocked if they drop the belts tonight. Why not have them drop it to Zayn-Owens (transition tag team to Enzo and Cass @ Summer Slam).


You think they would address the free agency part of it by now with NXT. Unless Heath Slater will push this part on both shows for now making him the first FA and then the rules are set on others (NXT people try out on both shows and it becomes a "bidding war"). Maybe have one NXT FA a month and slowly bleed them onto the big roster instead of drafting 6 and having none of them on the PPV.


The storylines they seem to building off of are respect ones which take a while but at least they are trying to build things up(one can hope).

Think they dropped the ball by not having the Balor Club form last night just changing out the AJ/Balor part when AJ came in New Japan. Besides that you got Roman/Reigns now with each one saying they cost the title and probably setting up a RAW tourney for their own champ to be crowned at the next RAW only PPV.

I didn't really think about those absences last night tbh. I figure PPVs are mostly to end storylines, none of those folks really had one up in the air to deal with. But now that I think about it, Mojo Rowley got a cpl mins screen time cause I remember criticizing WWE for that specifically. (nope, not a fan, complete dead weight afaic)


Yep, another perfect opportunity wasted :/

edit

Re: KO/Zayn ... I wonder how much of that is just plain good, and how much of it is knowing/appreciating the length & depth of it? I thought my kid summed last night's match up pretty well when he said "it's like watching a PG version of the real thing ROH would have given us"

A bit of an aside - I now follow wrestling mostly from this thread, and one thing that always struck me was how mature and incisive Jon's kid is on the subject. Last week you posted your rough age, which has made me wonder, have I attributed all these comments to an amazingly intelligent 10-year old, when in fact he is a (still intelligent) 20-something? :D

He's 18, leaves for college in less than three weeks.

Though he'd seen bits & pieces on TV and some live shows locally, his wrestling background dates seriously to around 05-06 era TNA, which quickly grew to expand into following pretty closely (online & DVD) ROH, FIP, PWG among others.

He's been playing TEW for at least three (?) releases now, we've watched truly countless hours upon hours of video, we've had more discussions that ran until 2a or 3a about booking -- both historic & hypothetical -- more times than I can count. He's a product of growing up smark I guess, but with the ability to still "forget" at times & have some mark out moments along the way.

So do they end up with 2 "Clubs" now? (This worked so well for WCW with the NWO factions)

Balor Club logo for his entrance, Gallows and Anderson seem in line for New Day after the run in and finally Balor now gets his shot @ Summerslam against Rollins for the Universal Title. (Because someone had already called dibs on the Solar System Title). Leaves AJ out to dry unless he adds a team (maybe the Revival closer to SS).

Thought it was a pretty decent RAW last night but we know ratings will determine if they stick with that direction.

I wouldn't be shocked if they did a double turn at SS between Rollins & Balor. Either that or pray to Jesus they finally turn Reigns and we can get Reigns/Rollins/??? Vs Balor/Gallows/Anderson. Joe would be A perfect fit for that role.

The other option could be the long slow burn. Survivor Series is in November and just let AJ fly solo until then and go AJ/Club/Balor versus Shield+1 (would need AJ taking belt off Ambrose and the Club constantly jumping Seth and Roman but I've seen worse paths)

Only thing with that is I don't think we're going to see a lot of cross show booking. And quite frankly I'm fine with that. I really prefer the brands stay completely separate.