WWE SummerSlam 2017 Results: Biggest Missed Opportunities with Show's Booking

SummerSlam 2017 was a night of highs and lows filled with title changes and long in-ring battles. It was not a perfect show, but it was certainly an exciting one, and it didn't even feel too lengthy despite its six-hour duration.

Still, there were many decisions along the way that felt wrong, taking away from the performances of the talent. From WWE going title-change crazy to the choices to make multiple wrestlers look like jokes, the booking could certainly have been better.

In fact, there were several booking decisions that were just objective misses and that could have been improved with simple changes in direction.

These are the four most egregious missed booking opportunities at SummerSlam, all of which kept the Biggest Party of the Summer from being as great as it could have been.

Not Putting The New Day vs. The Usos on the Main Card

This should have been obvious from the moment these tag teams stole the show at WWE Battleground. The New Day and The Usos have located their chemistry so keenly that they cannot have anything less than an excellent match. Once more, they stole the show with a bout that outshone all but the main event of the SummerSlam main card.

The Kickoff matches are supposed to be the least built on the card precisely because the arena will not be at full capacity by the time the wrestlers are competing. It's a shame that SmackDown's top tag teams put on a spectacle in front of an incomplete crowd.

Giving the SmackDown Live Women's Championship to the Wrong Wrestler

Natalya is a solid wrestler who has more than paid her dues, but SummerSlam was not the right moment to put the SmackDown Women's Championship on her. Most of the reactions to the moment came off as confusion; Natalya has done very little in the past half year beyond the victory last month at Battleground that won her this opportunity.

If there were plans to move the championship at SummerSlam, one woman was perfectly positioned for the moment: Carmella. Carmella has been the center of controversy, adding more attention to the SmackDown women's division than ever before, and she was clearly a crowd favorite in Brooklyn, not too far from her Staten Island home.

While Naomi could also have done well retaining the championship, only Carmella made sense to dethrone her. It would have been the perfect environment for Carmella, who instead was only briefly shown watching the match backstage.

Failing to Get Enzo His Heat Back

It is becoming more and more clear that Enzo Amore is not well-liked in WWE. His booking has killed his popularity step by step, with his appearance at SummerSlam his worst to date. He talked too long before the match and then prattled on from the shark cage as Big Show and Big Cass did their best in the ring.

Finally, he escaped the shark cage only to jump down and take an immediate big boot. This could have been the moment that Enzo got some heat back on Cass, jumping down onto him after the match and taking out Cass.

It would have added a strong exclamation mark to a weak match and been a way for Enzo to get some retribution without going over Cass in the ring, avoiding the awkward street fight we got the next night. Instead, his whole appearance at SummerSlam was a waste.

Credit: WWE.com

Once More Not Allowing Rusev to Wrestle at SummerSlam

Last year, one of the biggest matches going into SummerSlam was the WWE United States Championship match between Rusev and Roman Reigns. A brawl broke out before the contest, and the bout was cancelled. This year, Rusev technically started his match, but he ran right into an RKO the moment the bell rang.

There have only been a few matches in SummerSlam's history that were shorter than the 10-second bout Randy Orton had with Rusev, including a very similar finish in 2009 when Christian defeated William Regal for the ECW Championship. This type of surprise sudden finish has never been great for anyone.

Rusev vs. Orton could have been a quality back-and-forth contest between two of the better performers in WWE. Instead, it seemed there was no reason the two should ever have been booked on the card. For two pay-per-views in a row Rusev has walked into a match with a top guy in WWE and then been squashed, killing his attempt to build himself back up as a top threat on SmackDown.