EC3 locks in a headlock, Crews gets out of it ... events in the WWE Championship picture on SmackDown Live involving Kofi Kingston, Kevin Owens and WWE Champion Daniel Bryan.

Elsewhere on the card, The New Day will be competing for the NXT Tag Team Championships against Pretty Deadly, as Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston look ... continues. Crews then gets a clear bit ...

Kevin Owens battled Elias, and Apollo Crews squared off with Andrade in matches to determine which Superstars would advance to the next round of competition. Kofi Kingston avenged best friend ...

Who would emerge as the No. 1 contender to Kingston's gold ... Shinsuke Nakamura squared off with Apollo Crews in a non-title match to kick off the in-ring portion of this week's show.

A month-and-a-half ago on RAW, there were a few backstage segments where MVP teased Kofi Kingston joining The Hurt Business. It was similar to how the former tried to recruit Apollo Crews ...