Welcome to the Opening Bell, where we round up what’s been announced for WWE (Raw and SmackDown) and AEW (Dynamite and Rampage) programming for the week we’ve just begun.
WWE Raw preview – Monday, Sept. 26, Rogers Place, Edmonton
Matt Riddle, you may have bitten off more than you can chew.
Just about everyone who has tangled with The Judgment Day has come to regret it, though arguably none more than Rey Mysterio since he lost his son to the group. Nevertheless, Riddle has gotten tangled up with Judgment Day business during his own ongoing vendetta against Seth Rollins, and will try to make the best of it Monday night by defeating Damian Priest.
The trick, of course, is dealing with the rest of the group. He may not even have Rey to back him up since the elder Mysterio has his own match with Rollins to worry about.
Also on tap for this week’s show in Edmonton:
- Johnny Gargano and Kevin Owens join forces in what should be an extremely popular pairing when they go up against Alpha Academy.
- AJ Styles takes his social media beef with new Honorary Uce Sami Zayn to the ring.
- Bianca Belair tests her mettle against IYO SKY of Damage CTRL.
AEW Dynamite preview – Wednesday, Sept. 28, The Liacouras Center, Philadelphia
The Forbidden Door isn’t closed. No sir, as Jon Moxley is about to find out this week on Dynamite, it still is open a crack every now and then, and you never know who might walk through it.
In this case, it’s NJPW’s Juice Robinson, showing up in Philly for an AEW World Championship Eliminator. And while we don’t usually like these “beat the champ to get a shot at the champ’s title” bouts, we’ll make an exception for Rock Hard in this case.
AEW is also promoting these segments for Dynamite:
- Saraya will speak, following her dramatic debut at Grand Slam.
- The Jericho Appreciation Society will hold a championship celebration after the seemingly unlikely Chris Jericho ROH World Championship victory … and maybe say something about fellow ROH champ Daniel Garcia too.
- MJF will be on the show to stir the pot again, probably.
WWE SmackDown preview – Friday, Sept. 30, Canada Life Centre, Winnipeg
WWE continues its tour of the North by hitting Winnipeg for SmackDown on Friday night. If you watched any college or NFL football this past weekend, you no doubt heard Michael Cole’s voice on promos advertising a few matches already set for this show.
Most notably, new BFFs Solo Sikoa and Sami Zayn will team to face Madcap Moss and Ricochet. The latter duo was only trying to warn Sami about his inevitable heartbreaking betrayal by the Bloodline, but Solo wasn’t trying to hear that talk and gave them a good thrashing.
Two other matches have also already been revealed for SmackDown in Winnipeg:
- Shotzi, perhaps finally driving her cool tank again, will nonetheless be the underdog when she faces Bayley.
- After being publicly disrespected by Los Lotharios during their watch party last week, Hit Row will get a chance at some payback.
AEW Rampage preview – Friday, Sept. 30, The Liacouras Center, Philadelphia (recorded on Sept. 28)
AEW has actually been doing a nice job of teasing some Rampage matches a week in advance, but that wasn’t the case this time out thanks to Grand Slam being a bigger than normal deal in its own right (and expanding to two hours just for last week).
So surprise! We may know more as we get closer, and certainly by the time Dynamite is on some matches will be revealed before they are taped later Wednesday night, but this show is a question mark for the time being.