LA Knight defeated Logan Paul to become the new WWE United States Champion at SummerSlam, and tonight’s SmackDown would decide Knight’s first opponent of his US Title reign. After Legado Del Fantasma’s Santos Escobar confronted Knight, Andrade would make his way to the ring for a Contender’s match with Escobar, and early on the two stars were neck and neck. Things took a turn though after Carmelo Hayes started interfering with the match, though his first attempt at costing Andrade failed. In this case, the second time was a charm, as he would pull Andrade out of the ring and send Andrade into the turnbuckle and the post, and that allowed Escobar to get the win and become Knight’s first challenger.
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Andrade came in and knocked Escobar down and then both superstars collided in the middle of the ring. Neither star had pulled ahead much to this point, but Andrade seemed poised for a shift in momentum. Escobar went to the outside but Andrade followed and hit a moonsault to knock Escobar to the floor. Andrade hit the crossbody from the top and went for the cover, but Escobar kicked out of the pin. Andrade hit two suplexes in a row and then hit the third, going for a cover after the Eddie Guerrero homage, but Escobar once again kicked out.
Andrade went up top once more, but Escobar rolled out of the way and went after Andrade. Andrade tried to hit a suplex but Escobar blocked it and climbed on the top rope and hit the poisonrana. Escobar went for the cover and almost got it, but Andrade kicked out at 2 and a half. The crowd was clearly in Andrade’s corner, but Andrade got rocked with a super kick. Andrade bounced back though with a dropkick to the face, and then Andrade went up top again and hit the moonsault, even pivoting in the middle of the move, but Escobar still kicked out.
Andrade set Escobar up for a finisher but Carmelo Hayes got up on the ring and distracted Andrade. Andrade was distracted but still regrouped and connected with a back elbow strike on Escobar. Andrade went for the big strike but Hayes pulled Escobar out of the way, sending Andrade into the ring post.
Escobar will now get a chance to bring Title gold to Legado Del Fantasma, though it’s not known if the match will happen on an upcoming episode of SmackDown or if it will be saved for an event like Bash in Berlin. At the moment there are already two Championship matches set for the card, including Gunther vs Randy Orton and Cody Rhodes vs Kevin Owens, and more will soon follow. We’ll have to wait and see what happens, but what is clear is that the feud between Andrade and Hayes is far from done.
What did you think of the match? You can talk all things wrestling with me on Threads and Twitter @mattaguilarcb!
