THIS WEEK IN WRESTLING

October 17, 2018

This week in wrestling saw three major stories hit the headlines.  Smackdown racked up their 1000^th show since debuting in 1999; Johnny Impact became World Champion; and the WWE Crown Jewel event in Saudi Arabia was put into jeopardy due to external politics.

Smackdown celebrated their 1000^th anniversary with a show headlined by the returning Rey Mysterio facing Shinsuke Nakamura for a place in the World Cup tournament next month.  Mysterio, in his first bout on Smackdown in four years, defeated Nakamura, and will compete against the likes of John Cena, Randy Orton, Seth Rollins, The Miz, Dolph Ziggler, Kurt Angle, and Jeff Hardy.

Sheamus and Cesaro defeated the New Day to become tag team champions for the fifth time.  They achieved the result with the help of the Big Show, who turned heel yet again.  Other matches saw The Miz beat Rusev after interference from Aiden English, and the Usos defeat the team of AJ Styles and Daniel Bryan.

WWE brought out stars such as the McMahon family, Edge, The Undertaker, and Evolution during the show, while there were messages from The Rock and John Cena.  While there was reason to laud the achievement of their 1000^th show, Smackdown continued to build to the next major events, Evolution and Crown Jewel.

On Impact, Johnny Impact defeated Austin Aries in the main event of Bound For Glory to become World Champion of the promotion for the first time.  Impact, who may be best known for his work as John Morrison in the WWE, was previously ECW World Champion in the reinvented version of that promotion under the WWE banner; as well as a tag team champion alongside The Miz.

While the promotion for Crown Jewel continues, there is a chance that political pressure may be placed on the WWE to consider cancelling or postponing the event, following allegations the Saudi Arabia hierarchy were involved in the alleged murder of a Washington Post journalist in Turkey.  Investigations are still underway at time of writing, but Crown Jewel is just one factor in an event which continues Saudi Arabia’s intentions to open their country to modernism.  A business expo scheduled for November follows a similar event held earlier in the year, when WWE hosted The Greatest Royal Rumble.

If the event goes ahead, there are four matches already scheduled.  Shawn Michaels returns to the ring for the first time in over eight years to partner Triple H against The Undertaker and Kane; while AJ Styles battles Daniel Bryan for the World Championship.  The aforementioned World Cup tournament will take place at the event, as will a Universal Title triple threat match between Roman Reigns, Brock Lesnar, and Braun Strowman.

You can read more about all of the above wrestlers here and here.