John Cena opened “WWE SmackDown,” following which Sami Zayn interrupted him and challenged him to a match, before Brock Lesnar attacked both of them. This was followed by a match between Damian Priest and Aleister Black, and Giulia vs. Michin for the WWE Women’s United States Championship, both of which Bully Ray felt were overshadowed by the aforementioned moments. Ray thinks that the audience in the Allstate Arena in Chicago was uninterested in the Priest-Black and Giulia-Michin bouts.

“I can make a great argument for why you would do that [put the Cena-Zayn-Lesnar and AJ Lee return back-to-back] because there’s nobody that can follow — and nobody did follow Cena, Sami, and Brock. It’s those two matches in between … go back and listen to the people. The people were uninterested. They could have cared less. It’s almost like those matches are set up for failure. Not deliberately. But what are they supposed to do?” he asked. “I just saw Cena and Sami have a great match. I just got Brock. What the f**k are Aleister and Damian, Giulia and Mia supposed to do?”

AJ Lee’s big return took place right after the WWE Women’s United States Championship match, where Giulia successfully retained her title. When co-host Dave LaGreca asked if he would have put the two big segments on different shows, he rejected the idea, saying he would have placed both at the end of the show and given the rest of the stars an “opportunity to succeed.”