Matt Hardy is currently testing out his brand new “Woken” gimmick in WWE. So far, the character has been extremely similar to the “Broken” character that he previously portrayed. Several elements of the old character have shown up again in Matt’s new “Woken” gimmick, and he has now ditched his old Hardy Boyz entrance theme music. During a recent Madison Square Garden live event, Hardy came down to the ring to face Bray Wyatt with the ‘Moonlight Sonata’ theme that he used as “Broken” Matt Hardy in Impact Wrestling playing on his way down. Matt Hardy has yet to debut his new entrance theme on WWE television, but he will likely be doing so soon.
Matt has his piano theme and it’s amazing to see this persona in the garden #WWEMSG pic.twitter.com/flNJtm7OTO
— be Meepy, be Moopy, be Merry (@VincentMichaels) December 27, 2017
They actually gave matt the piano sick!! #WWEMSG @MATTHARDYBRAND pic.twitter.com/rYhMjY09qi
— Miles Struble (@miles_struble) December 27, 2017
On last week’s episode of Smackdown, Dolph Ziggler laid down the United States Championship in the ring before exiting the building without much explanation. It was later confirmed that Ziggler will be taking some time off. As a result, Daniel Bryan made the announcement on Smackdown this week that Ziggler has relinquished the title. Bryan then confirmed that there will be a tournament to crown the next United States Champion. Very few details about the tournament were shared, but Bobby Roode defeated Baron Corbin to qualify for the second round, and Jinder Mahal defeated “The Perfect 10” Tye Dillinger in a first round tournament match as well.
The Royal Rumble is beginning to take shape as WWE heads into the new year. “The Drifter” Elias officially declared himself the first entrant in the Royal Rumble match a few weeks ago. Since then, two more wrestlers have announced their intentions to enter the match on this past Tuesday’s Smackdown show. Randy Orton promised to enter the match, then Shinsuke Nakamura announced that he would be joining the Royal Rumble match not long after that. Orton and Nakamura are the first two Smackdown talents to announced their participation in the match. The Royal Rumble will be taking place at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on January 28th, 2018.