WWE Heat

WWE Heat was a professional wrestling show made by the World Wrestling Entertainment.

During its televised history in the United States it was shown on the USA Network, MTV and Spike TV.

From 2005 to 2008 it was streamed on WWE.com on Fridays for North American viewers. However it was still televised in internationally. The final episode was streamed on May 30, 2008.

Internationally it was replaced by WWE Vintage Collection a program which featured matches from past WWE events and hosted by WWE 2006 Hall of Fame inductee "Mean" Gene Okerlund.

History

1998
The show made its debut on August 2, 1998 on the USA Network as WWF Sunday Night Heat. It began as the second most important show in WWF Programming second to WWF Monday Night Raw. Heat would feature backstage interview segments and in-ring action. Main event stars such as The Rock, Mankind and Triple H would appear often to help further the storylines which occurred on Monday Night Raw. Heat itself lead to a big ratings draw for the USA Network.

1999-2002
When SmackDown! was created in 1999, Heat's importance lowered as well as ratings. With the debut of SmackDown! it lead to Heat being taped before SmackDown!. When  SmackDown! debuted in August 1999 it briefly became a recap show, with exclusive interviews and feuds from the past of WWF Programming being made into music videos. This only lasted a couple of weeks as it returned to airing exclusive matches.

The WWF also aired two Halftime HEAT television specials which aired during Super Bowl XXXIII on the USA Network. During this period the show moved to MTV as part of a deal between Viacom and the WWE. When the show moved to MTV it began broadcasting live from WWF New York.

2002-2005
In 2002 the show reverted to its previous format of taping the matches before Raw. Since the brand extension in 2002  Heat became exclusive to the Raw brand, the only exception to this was pay-per-view nights which were broadcast live from the PPV venues and could involve wrestlers from the SmackDown! brand.

In 2002 SmackDown! branched off its own secondary show called Velocity which mirrored the same format as Heat.

2005-2008
Heat and Velocity were not picked up by the USA Network, when WWE moved Raw back to the USA Network in October 2005. This left Americans no way of watching the weekend programmes on Television. WWE then made a decision to begin streaming these programmes on WWE.com exclusively for the United States audience. Sunday Night Heat soon was renamed WWE Heat as it no longer aired on Sundays.

Heat was still broadcast internationally due to previous programme commitments. For a short time a special 30 minute live edition of Heat began airing in place of the traditional pre-taped Free For All PPV pre-show. This lasted from No Mercy 2005 to Backlash 2006.

When WWE began airing in high definition Heat began using the same set as Raw, SmackDown! and ECW.

The final episode was streamed on WWE.com on May 30, 2008, and was replaced internationally by WWE Vintage Collection.

Commentator history

Related pages
WWE Raw

World Wrestling Entertainment television programs
1998 American television series debuts
2008 American television series endings