8/2 Smackdown Live News & Notes – Brock-Orton, Cena-Styles promo, Ziggler 2.0 re-build, American Alpha debuts, Contract Match next week, IC Title #1 contender, Women’s Division

WWE Smackdown News & Notes 8/2

– There were two big angles and one big promo exchange that anchored this week’s show.

The big promo exchange was A.J. Styles and John Cena setting up their singles re-match at Summerslam. Styles’s advertised “message” to Cena was that he wants him out of WWE. This set up Cena’s regular rah-rah WWE speech speaking to his audience, which drew mock applause from Styles, who vowed to humble Cena and make him admit that he (Styles) is better than Cena.

The two big angles included Randy Orton facing consequences for “crashing” Raw on Monday night. Smackdown authority figure Shane McMahon hired extra security to protect Orton, but Brock Lesnar “crashed” Smackdown to nail an F5 on Orton.

The other big angle was the WWE Title situation involving Dean Ambrose and Dolph Ziggler. WWE took a big step of rebuilding Ziggler by having Ambrose lay out all of the criticism of Ziggler in a promo, setting up Bray Wyatt to challenge Ziggler for his WWE Title spot at Summerslam.

Ziggler ended up beating Wyatt in the main event after showing some edge by using a turnbuckle pad to set up a superkick. This kept the WWE Title match as Ambrose vs. Ziggler.

– WWE announced one match and set up one more match for next week’s show. Officially announced for next week is Heath Slater vs. Rhyno for a Smackdown roster spot.

The other match is a potential tag match of Dean Ambrose & Dolph Ziggler vs. Bray Wyatt & Erick Rowan. After Ziggler beat Bray in the main event, Rowan sneak-attacked Ziggler, drawing in Ambrose, who also took a beating. The former Wyatts ended up standing tall to close Smackdown.

– On this week’s Smackdown, American Alpha (Jason Jordan & Chad Gable) made their main roster in-ring debut. Jordan & Gable soundly defeated The Vaudevillains in tag action.

– Apollo Crews beat Baron Corbin and Kalisto in a three-way match to get an Intercontinental Title shot against The Miz at Summerslam.

– In the Women’s division, WWE set up a new feud between Natalya and Carmella. Also, Eva Marie was scheduled to face Becky Lynch in singles action, but she sold injuring her leg before the match even started.