{"id":68927,"date":"2020-05-21T13:00:30","date_gmt":"2020-05-21T17:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonprowrestling.com\/?p=68927"},"modified":"2020-05-21T13:00:30","modified_gmt":"2020-05-21T17:00:30","slug":"preview-friday-night-smackdown-5-22-20","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2020\/05\/21\/preview-friday-night-smackdown-5-22-20\/","title":{"rendered":"Preview: Friday Night SmackDown (5\/22\/20)"},"content":{"rendered":"

WWE<\/strong>‘s weekly episodic Friday Night SmackDown<\/strong> is fast approaching. With the Intercontinental Championship Tournament and a Champion versus Champion match scheduled, expect a good show.\u00a0 Wait, what’s this? A new Intercontinental Championship tournament? You may remember that Sami Zayn<\/strong> was stripped<\/a> of his Intercontinental Championship just last week.\u00a0 Therefore, a tournament was announced to crown a new champion.\u00a0 With all that being said, let’s dive into the preview.<\/p>\n

Intercontinental Championship Tournament: Jeff Hardy vs Sheamus<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The first match in this Intercontinental tournament is Jeff Hardy<\/strong> versus Sheamus<\/strong>.\u00a0 With these two being veterans of the game, you might be surprised to hear this will be their first singles match.\u00a0 Though having wrestled in countless tag matches against each other over the years, never have they fought one-versus-one.\u00a0 Jeff is a four-time Intercontinental Champion.\u00a0 Sheamus has won everything besides the Intercontinental Championship.\u00a0 This will no doubt be Sheamus’ driving narrative in this tournament and, therefore, you can expect a victory for the renewed Celtic Warrior.<\/p>\n

Intercontinental Championship Tournament: AJ Styles vs Shinsuke Nakamura<\/b><\/h3>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

There was a time when this match would be the most eagerly-anticipated in the tournament.\u00a0 We are four years removed from W<\/strong>restle Kingdom 10<\/strong><\/em> and this feud has long-since passed.\u00a0 Without the heightened expectations of their WrestleMania<\/strong><\/em> match, can Shinsuke Nakamura<\/strong> and AJ Styles<\/strong> steal the show one more time? Nakamura is a one-time Intercontinental Champion.\u00a0 Styles has never won Intercontinental gold.\u00a0 However, with Styles seemingly distracted by Deadman shenanigans, will he bring his a-game? This one is closer to call.\u00a0 Expect anything from a good-to-excellent match.<\/p>\n

Mixed Tag Team Match: Otis & Mandy Rose vs Dolph Ziggler & Sonya Deville\"Friday<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Otis<\/strong> shocked the world when he captured the Money in the Bank briefcase at Money in the Bank 2020<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 Now armed with the famous green briefcase, and linked in arms with Mandy Rose<\/strong>, Otis is winning at life.\u00a0 This week, wrestling’s power couple comes face-to-face with the duo who tried to break them: Sonya Deville<\/strong> and Dolph Ziggler<\/strong>.\u00a0 In a modern-day retelling of the iconic Macho Man<\/strong> and Miss Elizabeth WrestleMania VII<\/em> <\/strong>moment, Mandy aided Otis in his victory over Ziggler at WrestleMania XXXVI<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 The two duos meet in the ring this week for what might be the final time.\u00a0 What happens next? Stay tuned.<\/p>\n

NXT Champion vs SmackDown Champion: Charlotte Flair vs Bayley<\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"Friday<\/p>\n

The currently-billed main event sees Charlotte Flair<\/strong> take on Bayley<\/strong> in a Champion vs. Champion bout.\u00a0 Two members of the distinctive Four Horsewomen<\/strong>, these two are incapable of a bad match with each other.\u00a0 This is noticeably a heel vs. heel match, which makes the match a little unpredictable.\u00a0 Bayley will no doubt be accompanied by fellow Horsewoman, Sasha Banks<\/strong>, at ringside.\u00a0 This will no doubt tip the odds in the SmackDown Women’s Champion’s favor.\u00a0 Additionally, there are a certain two NXT<\/strong> superstars who might not be best pleased with Charlotte once again taking the title away from NXT.\u00a0 Io Shirai<\/strong> and Rhea Ripley<\/strong> are the joint-number one contenders for Charlotte’s NXT gold.\u00a0 Might we expect some kind of interference here? It is possible.\u00a0 Tune into Friday Night SmackDown this Friday on FOX<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned to the\u00a0Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a>\u00a0for more on this and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world.\u00a0<\/em>WWE fan? You can check out an almost unlimited array of WWE content on the\u00a0WWE Network<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WWE‘s weekly episodic Friday Night SmackDown is fast approaching. With the Intercontinental Championship Tournament and a Champion versus Champion match scheduled, expect a good show.\u00a0 Wait, what’s this? A new Intercontinental Championship tournament? You may remember that Sami Zayn was stripped of his Intercontinental Championship just last week.\u00a0 Therefore, a tournament was announced to crown […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2482,"featured_media":68928,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4,3],"tags":[145,160,403,167,6434,124,1752,5380,106,399,118,52,739,47],"class_list":["post-68927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-wwe","category-wwe-universe","tag-aj-styles","tag-bayley","tag-charlotte-flair","tag-dolph-ziggler","tag-friday-night-smacdown","tag-jeff-hardy","tag-mandy-rose","tag-otis","tag-sami-zayn","tag-sheamus","tag-shinsuke-nakamura","tag-smackdown","tag-sonya-deville","tag-wwe"],"modified_by":"Niklas George","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2482"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68927\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}