WWE SmackDown: How Can WWE Make It More Must-See Without Compromising Raw?

The WWE’s brand extension is over. Has been, if only unofficially, for quite some time now. 

Raw stars appear on SmackDown all the time now, and the opposite is also true. The WWE might as well just come out and say that there are no longer “Raw superstars” or “SmackDown superstars.” 

That being said, there’s still a definitive difference between the WWE’s top two shows. 

Generally speaking, Raw is a more entertainment-oriented show while SmackDown tends to focus more on actual wrestling and less on backstage segments or other forms of talking. 

That changes from time to time, but by and large, it remains true. 

Personally, I like that that Raw and SmackDown have two different styles. It makes things less monotonous and seems to help the quality of both shows in an odd way. 

The problem with SmackDown is not its format, which I think works pretty well. It’s the fact that it’s treated like the B-show. 

SmackDown should be considered to be “must-see” TV by those within the WWE like Raw tends to be, but for the most part, it isn’t. 

Raw is the show where most of the WWE’s major events occur, and it is the show that gets most of the publicity and the hype. 

That’s understandable, given that Raw is live and SmackDown is taped. In fact, I have no problem with it generally staying that way. 

But even though I tend to be more of a SmackDown guy, that doesn’t prevent me from admitting that Raw has the “bigger feel” to it and is deemed as more important. 

That’s all fine and dandy, but I think there are some fundamental changes that need to be made to SmackDown in order to make it seem more on par with Raw without compromising it. 

At the top of that list is one simple word: Marketing. 

Especially recently, the WWE seems to go all out in promoting Raw, especially if it’s a really big episode (like Raw 1000) or if a major legend from the past (like Shawn Michaels) is scheduled to appear. 

On the flip side, though, the company doesn’t seem to have this same all-out marketing for SmackDown that it does for Raw. 

Perhaps this has something to do with the networks they air on and/or their TV time slots—I don’t know. But SmackDown could seem like a bigger deal simply if the WWE promoted it better.

Take, for example, the occasional live Tuesday SmackDown specials. 

Those shows tend to do pretty bad in the ratings department because the WWE does such a lackluster job of promoting them, and this remains true for the standard Friday time slot. 

The problem extends to the SmackDown shows themselves, too. 

I mean, how many Raw replays do we see on an episode of SmackDown alone? Two, three, four, five? 

I can recall a recent SmackDown episode in which about one-fourth of the show consisted of Raw replays, which is absolutely ridiculous. Replays are fine, but they shouldn’t take up a significant portion of the show. 

SmackDown replays do not happen super often on Raw, and the ones that do aren’t four or five minutes long like the Raw ones that air on SmackDown are. 

By overloading SmackDown with Raw replays, the blue brand—even if inadvertently—automatically seems inferior to Raw. It’s like the WWE saying, “Hey, what happened on Raw is more important than anything new you’ll see on this show.” 

That’s perhaps my biggest gripe about SmackDown, which suffers in terms of both flow and quality because it focuses far too much on Raw. 

I hate it, and I also can’t stand that it seems to make SmackDown a place for Raw’s leftovers. 

In other words, if something can’t fit on Raw (which is absurd now that Raw’s three hours), the WWE’s approach is this: Let’s put it on SmackDown. 

“Oh, crap. We can’t fit Brodus Clay’s dancing segment and squash on Raw tonight? Just move it to SmackDown.” 

“Damn. Ryder’s segment won’t fit on Raw? Let’s put it on SmackDown instead.” 

You get the point—it’s like SmackDown has become an extension of Raw rather than its own unique show. 

This probably is a result of the informal end of the brand split, but that’s a bigger discussion that has been beaten to death at this point. 

Anyway, what I essentially think would make SmackDown more compelling is for it to stem away from Raw’s style even more so than it already does. 

SmackDown does some things very well in that it almost always features one or two great TV matches and that it provides a platform for up-and-coming stars to rise up the ranks of the WWE. 

But at times, it tends to become too Raw-like. It focuses on Raw stars, features far too many Raw replays and takes Raw’s castoffs to fill up its two-hour time slot. 

That’s not what SmackDown should be about. 

SmackDown is SmackDown, and Raw is Raw. They both succeed, but they both do things in much different ways. 

Let’s keep it that way, or we’re compromising the integrity of both shows. 

After all, the last thing we want is two Raws per week. Three hours of it every Monday is more than enough.

Drake Oz is a WWE Featured Columnist for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter and ask him any wrestling-related questions on Formspring.