Smark Out Moment

Welcome to another edition of Triple Threat from Smark Out Moment, where three of us get together to discuss three questions based on one big topic going down in the week of professional wrestling.

This week, Robert DeFelice, Jordan Chaffiotte, and Ben Guest will be giving their thoughts on what may happen at this Sunday's Survivor Series.

It's the Thanksgiving week tradition. Teams of five strive to survive and the brands have bragging rights on the line. What will happen? Let's discuss…


GUEST: It’s kind of hard to argue against Becky Lynch, she has been perhaps the best part of WWE for a while now and this heel turn has completely rejuvenated her. I think AJ Styles is going to give us another good Brock Lesnar match, but I can’t really see anyone beating Becky to MVP. Unless they start another pointless Asuka push.

NEVERMIND, Raw and SmackDown happened. It would be nice to see Daniel Bryan put in a match worthy of his name in a WWE ring, and if he could maybe… beat, Brock? Eh, as long as it lasts longer than 5 minutes and Bryan gets some sort of offense in, I’ll probably be happy. I also think Charlotte and Asuka could dominate their respective matches (from a performance perspective) and be good shouts for MVP.

For Raw, I think it’s between Seth Rollins and Drew McIntyre. Seth is always an amazing performer and putting him in the ring with Shinsuke Nakamura can be nothing but positive. And I think McIntyre is next in line to Braun Strowman to get a shot at Lesnar. If I had to pick, I’d say, Rollins, hey, maybe he even wins despite the inevitable Dean Ambrose interference.

CHAFFIOTTE: Becky Lynch is already the SmackDown MVP as far as I'm concerned. I really don't even care that she's not performing, she's still the MVP She threw the first punch by confronting Ronda Rousey at Evolution and lead the charge into Monday Night Raw. It's really exciting to me that the women are the ones at the helm of Survivor Series this year since Brock Lesnar is nowhere to be found. Becky is doing some of the best work of her career, and directing it to Ronda and her hot trash of an angle is something I am very here for. Of course, it's disappointing not to see her on the show,

On Raw, it seems like Braun Strowman is in line for that spot. I'd like to say it'll be Finn Balor and his craftiness will be what helps team Raw pick up the win. Let's be real though, they're never going to pull the trigger with him. It wouldn't surprise me if Braun was a sole survivor or something of the sort.

DeFELICE: Since SmackDown’s real MVP, Becky Lynch is on the shelf, and AJ Styles is no longer Champion or on this pay-per-view, my pick for SmackDown MVP is The Miz. Nobody has consistently delivered for this brand more than him and it seems like he's going to be heavily featured going into WrestleMania. If anybody has a chance of surviving for SmackDown it's Miz.

On the Raw end of things, it seems like the obvious pick is Braun Strowman. He is the top babyface considering that Roman Reigns had to go down due to leukemia and Seth Rollins is still the midcard champion preoccupied with Dean Ambrose. Look for Braun to have an amazing showing this Sunday.


DeFELICE: The hot shot, out of nowhere match of Daniel Bryan vs Brock Lesnar is easily the one I'm looking forward to the most even though I don't think it will have a proper finish. I was looking forward to Becky Lynch vs Ronda Rousey but that's obviously not happening now. Seth vs Nakamura should be good but it looks like it will just lead to Dean Ambrose interference so I'm not really holding out much hope for that.

GUEST: I’m also pretty sure it will be Rollins vs Nakamura, but for the sake of being different, Daniel Bryan vs Brock Lesnar is a dream match for a lot of people and I think that despite the weird heel/face dynamic going on, this could still be a lot of fun. Charlotte Flair vs Ronda Rousey is another dream match, so much so that it should be happening at WrestleMania, but I’m not so sure we get the full story here and I think this will be little more than a taster.

CHAFFIOTTE: Nakamura vs. Rollins is going to be so good. Despite being a midcard champion, Rollins has been carrying Raw for the past couple of weeks, if not months. This is a good use for him, giving him a chance to shine in a one-on-one match. It doesn't feel like Nakamura has been doing much over on SDL, but that might just be a matter of perspective. He's never been my favorite but I can appreciate that he's one of the best in the world. I love that we get a fresh matchup and it'll be a technical clinic. Here's hoping it encourages them to expand their booking if I have to watch Bobby Lashley fight Finn Balor one more time I'm going to scream. A great match that we haven't seen before will go a long way.


CHAFIOTTE: (Editor's Note: This answer was not revised following SmackDown's events) On the women's side it's got to be SmackDown. Lynch is amazing for reasons we've already covered. The women's team, while missing Charlotte Flair for the moment, is it a better position to have a united front. Alexa Bliss might be great in her role but she's probably not going to have a lot of luck uniting the women's 5-on-5 team. But on the men's side, I think it's going to be Raw. Daniel Bryan and the Miz are clearly going to implode, which I'm looking forward to. Brock will probably crush AJ Styles because god forbid he shows any weakness. WWE has a strange habit when it comes to Survivor Series. They book all of these inter-brand matches and then claim whoever wins the men's 5-on-5 is the winner of the whole night regardless of what happens in those other matches. That's pretty telling of their mindset, don't you think?

DeFELICE: I think Raw has the advantage because smackdown's hottest stars aren't even going to be on the show and when push comes to shove you got to give the advantage to the number one brand.

GUEST: When comparing the people in each of the matches, I would say it’s fairly even, but somehow looking at the card overall, Raw seems to be the much stronger brand. I would be very surprised if Raw didn’t win the night overall, but I think the shows are relatively close in terms of personnel.

Okay, so I wrote that first paragraph before Becky Lynch was confirmed out and Daniel Bryan won the title. But considering that SmackDown can easily replace their two biggest names, with the next two biggest names, SmackDown has the advantage from a roster perspective, but on the night, Raw still takes the edge. But if SmackDown had Becky Lynch and AJ Styles also on the card… very different story.