WWE Smackdown Live

Notes From SmackDown 4/09: Who Was and Wasn’t Backstage?

While the Superstar Shake-up isn’t until next week, we saw several RAW stars invade the blue brand on Tuesday night’s show. Braun Strowman made his presence felt against Samoa Joe and Drew McIntyre teamed with The Bar to take on The New Day. While this could be seen as teasing possible matchups for after the draft, this was done for another reason.

Via PWInsider, several prominent members of the SmackDown roster were out of New York following a busy WrestleMania weekend. Daniel Bryan left NYC on Monday, and The Miz was out of town as well. AJ Styles and Rey Mysterio took more than the normal amount of abuse during the festivities, so they’re out healing their wounds. With those four missing, it only makes sense that WWE would need some help filling out the card and keeping things exciting.

In other backstage news from yesterday’s show, Kairi Sane was backstage for the taping. Could this mean that she and Io could be making the jump for NXT with Paige as their manager? It certainly seems like a possibility at this point.

Beth Phoenix was also backstage, and there’s some talk of her competing more for the company after her return on Sunday. It’s assumed she would continue her Divas of Doom revival with Natalya, competing in the newly populating Women’s Tag Team division.

RELATED: Paige to Debut New Women’s Tag Team Next Week

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