WWE Smackdown Live results and observations (1/24/17): The phenomenal guy from Atlanta

Smackdown Live had a lot to live up to Tuesday with Raw leaving fans with the final visual of Brock Lesnar, Goldberg and The Undertaker standing in the same ring the night before.

The blue brand didn't try to match its counterpart in star power. Instead, it opted to stay the course and put a bow on its build to the Royal Rumble in San Antonio this weekend.

The course Smackdown Live has built up until this point has been consistently good, so I don't blame them for remaining on it.

At the end of the day, it made for a solid installment of Smackdown Live. The show was bookended with a pair of pretty good matches and featured a very good talking segment in the middle.

The rest of the program was rather pedestrian.

With that said, here are the full match results from the Huntington Center in Toledo, Ohio:

- Randy Orton def. Luke Harper

- Mojo Rawley wins Over the Top Rope Challenge

- Dolph Ziggler def. Kalisto

- WWE Intercontinental championship (Lumberjack match) – Dean Ambrose def. The Miz

Royal Rumble mayhem

While we got three icons standing in the ring at the end of Raw, Smackdown Live was the place where the annual rumble before the Rumble occurred.

Unlike most years where it happens for no real reason, Smackdown Live took a smart approach by booking Ambrose against The Miz in a lumberjack match for the Intercontinental title.

That way, it would at least explain why the entire roster would be in the ring tearing each other a part.

The match went exactly how most would have expected. Ambrose and Miz tossed each other out of the ring and were beaten up by their foes.

Things eventually broke down and all of the lumberjacks jumped into the ring and a melee ensued. After the melee traveled from inside the ring to the backstage area, Ambrose hit The Miz with dirty deeds to retain his championship.

At the end of the day, I appreciate WWE providing something different for each of the brands. It would have been easy to have both shows feature some sort of brawl.

But WWE opted to keep it to one brand and provide a pretty cool moment for fans on the other.

John Cena brought the heat

Once every blue moon, Cena ditches his happy-go-lucky attitude and gets serious.

When he does this no one is safe, not event the man that pinned him three times in 2016.

That man is WWE champion AJ Styles and he called out Cena Tuesday night to have one final conversation with the 15-time world champion before their title match at the Royal Rumble.

Styles said he felt disrespected by Cena's appearance on the Today Show, when he was referred to as "the guy from Atlanta." He also felt disrespected by his placement on the Royal Rumble promotional poster, which has been a hot-button issue on social media amongst the fans.

Styles then said that a guy like Cena wouldn't have made it on the independent scene like he did.

Cena eventually came out sporting a new shirt and said that Styles isn't the guy from Atlanta, but is rather just a guy — a guy that has been WWE champion only because he allowed it to happen.

Cena then said that he wasn't made to make it on the independent scene. Instead, he was made to make it in WWE.

He also said that at the Royal Rumble, Styles will find out why Cena has been the top man in WWE for more than a decade before leaving the ring.

Cena's comments toward Styles and the independent scene may ruffle some fans' feathers, but I'll take that over some of the robotic speeches we tend to get from other various superstars in WWE.

At the very least, Cena comes across as a real person and the reason why people may have frowned upon some of the things he said was because they believed he actually felt that way.

The same goes for Styles, who probably really was offended by being referred as merely "the guy from Atlanta" on national television and by being tucked way in the back of the Royal Rumble poster despite being WWE champion.

At the end of the day, it only made people want to see this match more, which was the purpose of this segment. The match is going to be fantastic regardless. Both Cena and Styles have had phenomenal (pardon the pun) matches in the past and will look to top those at the Rumble.

Bray Wyatt gives Harper sister Abigail

In an interesting development, Wyatt gave Harper the sister Abigail after Harper lost to Orton Tuesday night.

What did it mean? Probably nothing.

It didn't seem like Wyatt was booting Harper out of the family. That's not the story the announcers conveyed, anyway.

The story they told was one of confusion. They wondered if that was Wyatt's way of showing Harper tough love, which could very well be the case.

Regardless, it was pretty interesting to see and I am definitely intrigued to see how this will play into the Wyatt Family's time in the Royal Rumble.

Rawley earns spot in the Royal Rumble

Joining the Wyatt Family in the Royal Rumble will be Rawley after he earned his spot by winning an Over the Top Rope Challenge Tuesday.

Rawley said on Talking Smack a couple of weeks ago that he was ready to embark on a journey as a singles competitor being as though his fellow Hype Bro, Zack Ryder, will miss a lengthy period of time due to a knee injury.

The first stop on that journey began Tuesday with Rawley earning a spot in the Royal Rumble.

Women's division getting quite intriguing

After the shocking return of Mickie James last week, Smackdown Live was tasked with capitalizing on the division's newfound momentum.

I believe it did this week by setting up two new feuds and continuing another.

Let's start with James who was attacked by Lynch during an in-ring interview with Renee Young. James attempted to escape through the crowd, which prompted Lynch to chase after her.

Lynch did not get far, however, as Smackdown Live Women's champion Alexa Bliss cut her off. Bliss and James double-teamed Lynch and left lying in a heap in the ring.

Later in the show, Natalya was scheduled to go against the returning Naomi. However, the match never happened, as Nikki Bella attacked Natalya backstage, which was in retaliation to Natalya's attack on Bella in the parking lot before the show.

The Bella-Natalya brawl left Naomi without an opponent, but she wasn't willing to settle for that. Instead she challenged anyone to come out and fight. That brought out Bliss, who wondered where Naomi had been for the last three months.

We've all been wondering the same thing, Bliss.

Naomi was game to fight Bliss, but the champion backed off.

I'm very intrigued by a championship feud between Naomi and Bliss even with the former being missing in action for the last few months. The same goes for James and Lynch.

I also liked the continuation of the story between Natalya and Bella, who apparently want to fight each other on sight. I like that type of tension between two superstars.

All of this set up a six-woman tag team match at the Royal Rumble with Naomi teaming with Bella and Lynch to take on Bliss, James and Natalya.