EA’s Weekly SmackDown Live YouTube Report (10/9/18)

As we all know, social media and other outlets have become a huge means of drawing in interaction and viewers for WWE. Most people will point to television ratings like they did during the Monday Night Wars in the late 1990’s, however that can be skewed with so many various means of watching today that do not include cable television.

As you’ve become accustomed to, here is this week’s SmackDown Live YouTube Report (2:30 PM EST, 10/11/18):

1. Big Show vs. Randy Orton – 1.2 million views
2. Aiden English’s plan is foiled by Rusev & Lana – 931k views
3. The Miz stirs the pot between AJ Styles & Daniel Bryan – 694k views
4. Becky Lynch defends her title against Charlotte Flair – 612k views
5. Relive Randy Orton’s career – 599k views
6. Jeff Hardy vs. Samoa Joe – 536k views
7. AJ Styles vs. Shelton Benjamin – 333k views

When you bring back a legendary Superstar, it always leads to great things on YouTube and that’s what we get this week for SmackDown Live. A lot of fans like to rag on the guy, but Big Show is indeed a legend and his first match back in over a year, plus the appeal of Randy Orton who has been on a roll and a World Cup spot on the line leads them to be the only clip to reach a million views. Plus…how good has Orton been lately? ‘The Viper’ is red hot, so much so that a career highlight video is good enough to land him on our list a second time at number five.

Number two was the continuation of the one night in Milwaukee reveal, which hasn’t gone how I hoped. Many fans still wanted to know the payoff and despite my feeling that it has all been a bit of a let down, Rusev and Lana having it blow up in Aiden’s face was a nice and entertaining touch. I just don’t see much coming of this route unfortunately.

Sliding into the third spot is the build to AJ Styles’ next WWE Championship defense against Daniel Bryan at Crown Jewel. There’s nobody better to be the one trying to stir the pot between them than The Miz and was a great way to kick this off, but you have to wonder why this clip didn’t draw more. Is this not the type of match smart fans clamor to see? Seems like this is the quintessential dream match and there would be more excitement for it.

The fiery feud over the SmackDown Women’s Title comes into number four this week with a rematch from Super Show-Down that opened the broadcast. Becky and Charlotte got a large chunk of SmackDown Live’s airtime and produced another quality match, but again the draw feels lower than you’d expect. My best theory would be perhaps it just seemed inevitable we were going to see it again at Evolution and maybe people expected a finish that wasn’t clean.

Lastly, SmackDown Live’s second World Cup Qualifier takes home fifth as Jeff Hardy advanced over Samoa Joe to earn his spot at Crown Jewel. It was Hardy’s return after being off television since Hell In A Cell, but the match left a lot to be desired and ended abruptly via referee stoppage with Joe still selling his damaged knee from Super Show-Down. The important part is that Hardy return however, which is good enough to carry it away from the bottom of the SmackDown Live barrel this week.

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