I really like the idea of promoting William Smithers to the main cast and having made Jeremy Wendell a heavily featured character who would be go "toe to toe" with JR. He would in essence, have been taking the spot in the show that had been reserved for Cliff. My thinking on that is that they have Wendell buy Cliff's company and because of that Cliff demands the stipulation that he gets to be on Westar's board of directors. Wendell doesn't think highly of Cliff's abilities but he agrees to it because he wants those vast reserves of oil that Cliff has in Gold Canyon 340, so Jeremy says OK.
That sets up a situation where JR's primary adversary would be Jeremy because that adds something fresh to the show so that it doesn't become repetitive. Now JR has a rival who not only wants to put Ewing Oil out of business, but is far more capable and powerful than Cliff ever was. Wendell is the ultimate threat to the Ewings because he can convince the audience that Wendell is "that guy" - the one who not only wants to put them out of business but can.
To make things exciting, my philosophy is you put the best against the best - Jeremy Wendell against JR Ewing. JR did things to Jeremy that as far as we know, nobody was ever able to do, such as getting him to sign over all the property that he got when the government took from Ewing Oil, all in exchange for ownership of the land he needs to use to get the natural gas he bought from Cliff to the pipeline.
Like JR, Jeremy Wendell eats, sleeps and breathes the oil business. Unlike Cliff, Jeremy doesn't make decisions based on emotion. Jeremy is a shrewd, calculating man who runs a company significantly larger than Ewing Oil. We saw skirmishes between JR and Wendell, but since William Smithers was never in the main cast, he was never featured as extensively as he now would be. He had been underutilized. William Smithers is a new kind of opponent for JR, a careful calculating man in very good control of his emotions. He doesn't make stupid mistakes. Now for the first time, the Ewings are the underdogs. They're up against a bigger, stronger opponent. JR and Bobby are going to have to learn to work together to have any chance of winning this. Meanwhile, Wendell has a liability on his hands in the form of Cliff Barnes on his board of directors. There is potential there for some very entertaining scenes where an exasperated Wendell is trying to explain why they have to do things a certain way, but Cliff just doesn't get it- Cliff wants to do things his way. Cliff becomes the one chink in the armor of Westar that JR and Bobby can exploit to their advantage. Wendell finds himself fighting with Cliff when he should be carefully calculating his next move against the Ewings.