WWE Superstar Shake-Up Recap And Future Predictions

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The two-night WWE event of the Superstar Shake-Up concluded at last night after both Raw and Smackdown, well, shook things up and made both brands feel fresh especially if you like the colour blue.

On a personal note; I got 13 of my 23 picks correct, so yay me!

Anyway, here’s a recap of the moves and debuts from Monday and Tuesday nights and predictions of what might happen moving forward.

Raw

When it comes to Raw, their post Mania NXT debuts were actually overall better than what they got during the Shake-up.

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A lot of the talent that moved over was low/mid talent, but you can see plenty of potential with some of these wrestlers.

Firstly, getting Jinder Mahal out of Smackdown and dropping the US title to Jeff Hardy was Paige and Shane McMahon’s smartest move and it looks like his next feud will be No Way Jose.

Although he will never bring the house down or that no one liked the idea of the Maharaja being WWE Champion but it’s nice that the last time he was on Raw was as a lower card jobber but now he’s a former world champion.

The next newbies to team red were the Riott Squad (something I predicted but also thought it would’ve been just Ruby Riott and Liv Morgan).

All three members weren’t used brilliantly on Smackdown but now they can battle Sasha Banks, Bayley and Ember Moon and become a stronger faction.

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Elsewhere, even though they battled to a no contest last week, Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn got fully reintroduced into Raw thanks to the help of GM Stephanie McMahon and with that Kurt Angle revealed The Miz will be heading to Smackdown.

The fact we will finally get Miz and Daniel Bryan match after the build from that Taking Smack promo the pay off is going to be amazing. It could be easily feud of the year and I’m hoping for two matches one at Summerslam and again at Wrestlemania 35 for the WWE Championship.

Dolph Ziggler and Drew McIntyre could become a dominant tag team and this could be the thing that refreshes Ziggler’s career and with McIntyre, it’s easy to predict they’ll be a Shawn Michaels/Diesel partnership. I just hope this alliance doesn’t last long because the Scot is and will become a bigger star than the Showoff.

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The next newest addition was Natalya and it looks like she’s going to be a face and be a mentor to Ronda Rousey. We’ve seen them train together and it’ll give Natalya a new dynamic and Rousey can learn a lot from the veteran.

Another great get for Raw is Breezango who will inject fun to Monday nights and after SD dropped the ball hopefully we’ll see the Fashion Files back with new superstars and mock storylines.

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The final superstar joining Raw is Bobby Roode and it’s a shame the Smackdown babyface run was so bland but let’s hope they readjust the character and turn him heel becoming the man we first met in NXT.

It’ll definitely be needed, especially with Miz moving, we need to have that cocky heel back.

Post-show it was revealed that The Ascension, Zack Ryder, Mojo Rawley, Mike Kanellis, Baron Corbin and Chad Gable are all now coming to Monday nights.

Smackdown

I won’t beat around the bush, Smackdown has won this year’s Superstar Shake-Up and they have the potential to becoming the 2018 version of what Paul Heyman did with the blue brand during 2003-2004 when they had the likes of Edge, Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit, Kurt Angle etc.

After Chad Gable’s move to Raw, Shelton Benjamin kept the heel heat by telling fans he’s better on his own and demanded big competition with Randy Orton stepping out and walking so slowly that Jeff Hardy was revealed to be the first superstar to leave Raw and bring back the US title and get the fans popping.

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For a lot of fans seeing these two superstars squaring up it felt like a 10-year flashback.

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The next major surprise wrestler coming to Tuesday nights had the hard task to face the threating Sin Cara, luckily Samoa Joe had enough to swash him.

Joe’s move is the biggest surprise at this year’s Superstar Shake-Up because a lot of us would’ve thought he’d be a Raw guy for a long time.

With Carmella as Women’s Champion and bring in The Iconic Duo has freshened up the blue brand’s women’s division and the Princess of Smackdown could hold the belt for a while but she’ll have to battle The Empress of Tomorrow as Asuka is officially a Smackdown superstar.

After Baron Corbin moved to Raw there was a gap of a monster heel and this is where we welcome back Big Cass to take over that role and before we see him lock up with Miz it looks like Bryan will be in a program with Cass and this could be brilliant for his development as a main eventer.

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Throughout the show, there was a number of promos of who’s going make SD their new home with another major signing in the form of The Bar.

Then you have Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville, followed up by The Club and finally, there were call-ups for former NXT Champion Andrade “Cien” Almas with his manager Zelina Vega and Sanity but weirdly without Nikki Cross.

Oh R-Truth is on the blue brand, but who gives a shit about R-Truth.

Verdict and Prediction

Overall, Smackdown obviously won the Superstar Shake-Up but both brands have an exciting year ahead.

Before The Bar and The Club left, I thought Raw’s tag team division was dead and buried by what happened with Braun Strowman. However, if you look at this list it looks exciting and fresh.

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Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt will be holding the belts before Authors of Pain dominate the division but they’ll have strong competition with The Revival, Breezango and Dolph Ziggler & Drew McIntyre and maybe Ryder and Hawkins partner up again.

Now there will be a question marks over American Alpha with Gable now joining Jason Jordan on the red brand or they’ll have their own feud and I’m hoping for the latter.

The Smackdown tag division looks as impressive with The Bar moving from dominating Raw they’ll have to match the likes of The New Day, The Usos and current champions The Bludgeon Brothers.

Now add The Club and Sanity the feuds could be brilliant and I have no doubt, Eric Young, Alexander Wolfe and Killian Dain first program will be against The New Day before they become the only team to dethrone the Bludgeon Brothers and I’d love to see what the Usos and Club do together.

Elsewhere, the US title scene has looks majorly competitive with Jeff Hardy bringing new life to the belt and with the likes of Orton, Benjamin and I’m sure Joe will get involved as will Almas and Big Cass.

However, Joe and Almas could both just enter the main event scene with AJ Styles, Shinsuke Nakamura and Bryan because Almas has a five-star match behind him and I’d love to see him battle the likes of AJ and for what he did with the IC title, Miz deserves to be a main eventer.

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Meanwhile, with so many women on both rosters there needs to be a tag team title because you have built in teams like Absolution, The Riott Squad, Iconic Duo and even build her and give her a belt Ronda Rousey and Natalya.

It looks like Kanellis has moved past his issues and he’ll be the wrestler fans were excited to see when he was first coming to Smackdown and let's hope he can get into that midcard/IC picture with the likes of Seth Rollins, Finn Balor and now probably Corbin and Roode.

It’s just a shame Brock Lesnar is still Universal Champion because wrestlers like Owens, Zayn, Balor, Rollins, Strowman and Reigns could have their own feuds battling for the belt, but I won’t be surprised if we’ll have to wait until Summerslam until Bobby Lashley beats Lesnar to give Raw a main event scene.