This week on WWE Friday Night SmackDown, we saw Gran Metalik have a great match with AJ Styles for the Intercontinental Championship. This marks the second straight week that Metalik has been featured on TV and he’s being portrayed as being more than just an undercard wrestler.
Vince McMahon has never seen much in Gran Metalik or any of the members of Lucha House Party but we will be seeing more of them on TV because of Daniel Bryan.
Bryan is said to be the person who pushed for the Gran Metalik vs. Lince Dorado vs. Shorty G vs. Drew Gulak number 1 contenders match that led to this week’s Metalik vs. AJ Styles match for the Intercontinental Championship.
Bryan is said to be a big fan of the work of all of the names mentioned above and, as previously noted here on WrestlingNews.co, Gulak’s storyline with Bryan that kicked off earlier this year was done at Bryan’s request and he has gained much more influence behind the scenes. This is also why Gulak was booked to wrestle Styles on SmackDown a few weeks ago.
Here is what a WWE source told us back in February about Daniel Bryan: “Bryan pitches a lot of his own ideas,” a WWE source said. “Sometimes Vince [McMahon] and Bruce [Prichard] will turn down an idea but a lot of the things he has pitched have been used on TV.”
Another WWE source told WrestlingNews.co that fans should expect to see more underused talent on shows in the coming weeks. There has also been talk of having Chad Gable drop the “Shorty G” gimmick. The same source says that McMahon has been more open to out-of-the-box ideas as of late as he looks for fresh ideas that could help boost the TV ratings.
Metalik and Dorado will be featured in the coming weeks in a feud with Cesaro and Shinsuke Nakamura over the SmackDown Tag Team Championship.
