LOLWWE History

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It was bound to happen, but this is a history of the ***funny or dumb things*** the WWE has done that relate to storyline or business.

**Please do not include miscellaneous information here or use the page as your personal review of specific shows. The object of the page is to record events in the WWE which were either dumb or silly moves, ie talk about entire angles that went bad, not specific matches. If something was simply mediocre and/or forgettable, it's not worth mentioning**

## The '80s

* On March 31st, 1985, the WWF held it's first Wrestlemania in Madison Square Garden.

## The '90s

* The WWF originally scheduled *WrestleMania VII* for the LA Memorial Coliseum in an attempt to break a 100,000 attendance record. They later moved to the much smaller LA Memorial Sports Arena across the street, citing concerns that someone might try to bomb the arena due to Sgt. Slaughter's Iraqi sympathizer gimmick. The real reason for the move was the WWF realizing they wouldn't come close to selling out the 100,000 seats at the Coliseum.
	+ Additionally, WWF couldn't even sell out the Sports Arena. They had to give away tickets days before the show.
	+ The main reason for these problems with the attendance was the major angle for this Wrestlemania: Hulk Hogan's feud against Sgt. Slaughter was playing off of Operation Desert Storm. It should be noted that the angle was planned before the war, but once the war actually started, WWF decided to keep going with this angle.
* WWF recorded a taping in Austria with the commentary dubbed over by Jim Ross and Jim Cornette. The show was panned by critics for being one of the worst shows put on television at the time. As a result, Vince went on a head-chopping mission. Meanwhile, Vince Russo, who has been brought in for creative consulting, pitched ideas based around movie storylines at a booking meeting. McMahon promoted Russo to work directly with Cornette booking future shows - at this point in his career, Russo had never attended a wrestling event before.
* At *Survivor Series* 1990, after months of anticipation, the Gobbledy Gooker debuted and danced in the ring with Mean Gene Okerlund. The segment was so negatively received that the audience booed them both out of the building.
* At *SummerSlam* 1994, Undertaker faced off against an impostor Undertaker, who debuted at WrestleMania X during the real Undertaker's hiatus after his loss to Yokozuna at the *Royal Rumble*. Despite an over-produced pre-match ceremony of the resurrection of the Undertaker and Vince's best attempts to put it over for the pay-per-view audience, the live audience would have none of this match until the end when the real Undertaker won.
* During the Intercontinental Title Ladder rematch at *Summerslam* 1995, the belt was raised almost twenty-feet high. HBK was visibly upset and could be heard telling Vince to *"bring that back down!"* while Razor just pointed up and looked and the refs stood there not knowing what to do.
* In mid-1996, Razor Ramon and Diesel jumped to WCW from WWF to start what would be become the game-changing nWo angle alongside Hulk Hogan. Caught with their pants down and their dicks in their hands, WWF fired back... with Fake Razor and Fake Diesel. Basically, WWF figured because they owned the Razor and Diesel characters, they could just slap them on some other guys. The audience didn't buy into the replacements for a moment and both men were quietly dropped over time.
	+ Funnily enough, this did lead to a financial blunder on WCW's part. WCW was very worried that "Ramon" and "Diesel" really were Hall and Nash, and that they were still under contract with the WWF. At the time, The Outsiders were working for WCW under "memo deals", which meant they worked for a set amount of dates for a set amount of money, but at anytime, they could opt-out of their deal with no consequences. With paranoia setting in, WCW management immediately had them sign to written contracts, with huge signing bonuses as incentive (Nash stated once that the bonus was $400,000 each). With unnecessary spending like that, it's no wonder that WCW ended up going out of business
* Marc Mero was signed by the WWF after Vince watched a WCW show with Mero playing Johnny B. Badd. Badd was an over-the-top face character to the point where all of his matches were the same to work a crowd up at the beginning of shows. When Mero came in, he had no clue how to work a match as he had only been taught how to wrestle as Johnny B. Badd (do stock moves, get pops, pin and leave). Nevertheless, WWF tried to put together a program with him and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. In the run-up to this feud, WWF decided it would be a great idea to have Sable (Mero's then-wife) powerbomb and pin him on television. Austin immediately called Vince and asked how they could expect him to take a beat down from Mero the next week on RAW when the guy just got beaten by his wife.
* At *WrestleMania XII*, as part of the Hollywood Backlot Brawl, WWF used stock footage of the O.J Simpson car chase to simulate an on-going car chase between Roddy Piper and Goldust.
* The day after Brian Pillman was found dead in a hotel room, Vince McMahon interviewed his widow Melanie on a live edition of *RAW is WAR*, with Vince asking Melanie *"how she planned to provide for her family now that her husband was dead."* Melanie also broke down in tears and begged wrestlers to stop using drugs.

### The Lex Express

* Lex Luger was brought into WWF as a replacement for Hulk Hogan. He was being pushed to the moon as an American hero who slammed Yokozuna and was chasing the WWF Championship.
	+ Before he could wrestle, there was quite a brain fart from Vince McMahon that he had to deal with. Since Luger had a no-compete clause, Vince figured he could bring Luger in to promote the World Bodybuilding Federation. No one really cared, and Vince McMahon reportedly lost 15 million dollars on that company.
* At *SummerSlam* 1993, Luger won against Yokozuna... *by count-out*. So, he didn't win the belt, but for some reason the babyfaces came out to celebrate Luger's win like he won the title!
	+ Other wrestlers were pissed about Luger's treatment. Not because he didn't win the title, but because he was comfortable in his air-conditioned tour bus while everyone else had to pay for their own hotels or even slept in their cars. Financially, it was the worst of the dark ages for WWF at this time, with ticket prices dropping as far as $5 for kids' seats at Summerslam.
* After a rematch at *Wrestlemania X*, his WWF career was going downhill and thus, Luger left the company and went back to WCW as soon as his contract expired.

### Billionaire Ted

* In 1996, when the Monday Night War was on and WWF were getting their ass kicked by WCW every week, Vince McMahon decided to take a jab at the competition. WWF filmed a number of skits titled *Billionaire Ted's Wrasslin' War Room*, with Billionaire Ted, an obvious parody of Ted Turner, WCW and Time Warner owner, with a southern accent, discussing the possibility to steal ideas from WWF and incorporate them into their own programming with the "Huckster", the "Nacho Man" and "Scheme Gene" (no introduction needed, you already know their real names).
* Things quickly went off the rails in further skits, when Vince decided to change focus from WCW to Ted Turner directly, and WWF commercials mocking the competition became pretty much every personal and professional insult aimed at Ted Turner Vince could think of.
	+ For example, one of the TV spots showed Billionaire Ted participating on a *Jeopardy*-like game show. The host asked which famous person said *"King Henry VIII didn't get divorced, he just had his wives' heads chopped off! Now, that's a good way to get rid of a woman - alimony"* (the actual quote from Ted Turner), and Billionaire Ted answered *"Why that was my buddy, O.J!"* before revealing it was Ted.
* By the time they went completely overboard, none other than the president of the USA Network told Vince to keep Ted away from his network. While he probably was fine with making fun of WCW (they actually were the first ones who fired shots with their *Where the Big Boys Play* segments), he obviously didn't want to broadcast clear defamation of the owner of Time Warner, one of the biggest cable providers in USA. The characters were thus killed off in the last skit broadcast during *WrestleMania XII*'s pre-show.
* As a bonus for their actions, for the first time ever, USA Network demanded to see advance scripts of *Raw* and have their representative at creative meetings. While the Ted skits was the first reason, the ratings suffering from *Nitro* competition was the second one. Billionaire Ted didn't help them too much, and *Raw* ratings were as low as they were for the first episodes.

## The Attitude Era

* In 1999, Jeff Jarrett, on his way out to WCW because the WWF didn't see any potential in him, started a feud with Chyna. The feud was originally planned to conclude with a Intercontinental Championship match at the *WWF Rebellion* PPV with Chyna winning the title from Jarrett. Vince Russo, also preparing to leave for WCW in a few days, convinced McMahon to postpone the match until the *WWF No Mercy* PPV later that month because of the popularity of the storyline. McMahon agreed, but nobody in the WWF office noticed that Jarrett's contract with WWF expired one day before *No Mercy*. Jarrett brought this up hours before the match and, according to Chyna, demanded and received $300.000 from McMahon to perform without a contract.
	+ Jarrett denied this in interviews and claimed he left WWF on good terms. Strangely, during the last *WCW Monday Nitro* after McMahon purchased WCW, Jarrett was the only person who was legitimately fired on-air with McMahon mocking his taunt by saying he would now be known as *"Capital-G, Double-O, Double-N, Double-E - **GOONNEE(?)**"*. Good terms, indeed.
* The *Brawl for All*: A legitimate "Tough Guy" contest that was born from Vince Russo's mind, according to JBL. The idea was to have "Dr. Death" Steve Williams win it all and use this to hype him up in a feud with "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. There were numerous problems with this tournament:
	+ You were expected to believe that this is real, even though WWF shows are centered on scripted events. In terms of stupidity, this is up there with WCW promoting a PPV by saying Goldberg didn't follow the script.
	+ **The wrestlers were not told that the plan was to have Steve Williams win the tournament.** You read that right, the people planning this thought Dr. Death was going to easily win the whole thing, namely Jim Ross, who was constantly putting him over backstage.
	+ This wouldn't be such a problem if not for the fact that Dr. Death was **already paid the $100,000 prize money before his second round loss to Bart Gunn.**
	+ In the end, Bart Gunn won the whole tournament, but instead of giving him the push that Dr. Death was going to get, Gunn got nothing for a while. That is, until he was put up against Butterbean, a real boxer, in a fight at *WrestleMania XV* which only lasted 27 seconds before Gunn was knocked out (proving he was a better booker then Russo, Butterbean came into this angle thinking it'd be a work, and happy to put Gunn over for a paycheck). Gunn was fired **as soon as he returned to the locker room.**
	+ As a bonus, throughout the *Brawl For All* matches, fans chanted *"Boring!"* and *"We want wrestling!"*
* Undertaker and Big Boss Man had one of the worst Hell in a Cell matches at *WrestleMania XV*. A nine-minute match that featured spots such as Big Boss Man handcuffing the Undertaker to the cell, only for it to break after Boss Man hit him once with his nightstick, and the post-match spot of Undertaker ***hanging the Big Boss Man from the cell.*** Granted, it looked silly as it was obviously that Boss Man's vest was wired up since it was pulled up a good six inches off of him.
	+ The next night, Boss Man, despite **being hanged**, came out only wearing a neck brace
* Mae Young began a relationship with "Sexual Chocolate" Mark Henry that resulted in Young becoming "pregnant". She would later give birth live on *RAW is WAR* to a plastic hand sextoy. Surprisingly, the hand made a cameo on the 1000th episode of Raw as an actual person in a costume.
* Mae Young went topless at the 2000 *Royal Rumble*, revealing a pair of horrible-looking fake breasts. This (along with the heavy amount of bloodshed in the Cactus Jack vs. Triple H street fight) almost killed the WWF's UK TV contract with Channel 4, and happened only a few weeks into said contract.
* Darren "Puke" Drozdov joined the Legion of Doom.
* The WWF tried to work Road Warrior Hawk's legitimate drinking problems into a storyline, which resulted in a segment where a "drunk" Hawk jumped off the Titantron in an act of attempted suicide. The Road Warriors were so insulted by this angle that they would leave the WWF not long afterwards.
* Kai En Tai attempted to cut off Val Venis' penis as punishment for sleeping with Yamaguchi-San's wife. The segment is best remembered for the line *"I choppy-choppy your pee-pee!"*. The storyline itself was Shane McMahon's very first attempt at booking.
* Miss Kitty lost the WWF Women's title in a "Lumberjill Snowbunny" match to a mystery opponent named "Hervina" in two-and-a-half minutes. A "Lumberjill Snowbunny" match is basically mud wrestling with a snow-like substance, and Miss Kitty dressed as a Playboy Bunny. The other women there took the "snow" and threw it at each other. "Hervina" was revealed to be Harvey Wippleman (a long-forgotten manager from the late-Hulkamania Era) in obvious drag. Wippleman, in a obvious take from the famous Andy Kaufman angle, claimed no woman could beat him. He was proven decisively wrong as Jacqueline kicked the shit out of him and won the title the very next night. The angle was never mentioned again.
* The Higher Power Angle.

## 2001

* A Tuesday night taping of *SmackDown!* scheduled for September 11, 2001, was moved to air live the following Thursday after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The show was heavily promoted by a lot of media, as it was the first public assembly of its size since that date. It went off like most tribute shows did, good matches and some heartfelt speeches... including Stephanie McMahon, who decided, in her infinite wisdom, to compare 9/11 to her father's 1994 steroids trial.

### The *InVasion*

* WWF wanted to introduce the WCW wrestlers by having them attack WWF superstars on *RAW is WAR* and *SmackDown!*. These attacks ended up being forgettable, with Lance Storm being the first guy to strike and Hugh Morrus the second. These attacks were not performed on big stars, either, but rather midcarders like Bradshaw and Goldust. The first major WWF wrestler to be attacked was Kurt Angle, but the attacking was done by Shane McMahon. In short, the *InVasion* was made to be focused on the McMahons.
	+ This angle seemed to be moving towards its own salvation when an ECW faction was formed, with Rob Van Dam and Tommy Dreamer being joined by other past ECW wrestlers who were already on the WWF roster. Paul Heyman gave a great promo setting up the alliance of WCW and ECW to take on the WWF. All was well and good, until the last two minutes of this *RAW is WAR* episode, where the new owner of ECW was announced to be... **Stephanie McMahon**. This not only alienated fans of ECW, but also annoyed WWF fans who were tired of the McMahon family's constant in-fighting.
* Diamond Dallas Page was desperate to get back on the road and continue competing. He openly offered to take a 50% paycut in order to compete. How did the WWF reward this act? By putting him in a storyline where he stalked the Undertaker's wife, Sara, and was eventually pinned by her in a singles match.
	+ The Brothers of Destruction during the *InVasion* in general were a bit ridiculous. The two of them spent the entire months-long angle squashing WCW and ECW guys and no-selling everything they did to them. The low point of their run would be their horrible tag match against KroniK at *Unforgiven* 2001. Apparently, after being told that they'd be fed to Kane and 'Taker, KroniK decided to completely phone the match in, resulting in one of the worst PPV matches of the entire angle.
* WWF tested the waters for making WCW a separate brand by putting matches with former WCW guys on *RAW is WAR*. One such match was planned out to be Booker T vs. Lance Storm. They had previously feuded in WCW and were said to have good chemistry together. Somehow, Buff Bagwell convinced everyone that he should replace Storm in the match. What followed was an absolute disaster of a match that killed off the idea of WCW as a brand. Bagwell was fired not long afterward, mainly for annoying the hell out of the front office by having his mom call them all the time.
	+ Other memorable moments of Bagwell's short-lived WWF career included antagonizing Shane Helms into chucking a frozen water bottle at his head. It's safe to say that nobody liked him.
* WWF hosted the *InVasion* pay-per-view, and given that the WWF now had ~100% of the wrestling audience, this PPV did a huge number of buys. Hyped as a huge face-off between the WCW/ECW Alliance and WWF, most of the buys came from people buying the replay of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin backstabbing the WWF and revealing himself to be the leader of the WCW/ECW Alliance. In total, *InVasion* did 775,000 buys and, by this time, McMahon had enough money to pay for the contracts of Kevin Nash, Scott Hall, Hollywood Hulk Hogan, Sting, Bill Goldberg and Scott Steiner. Did Vince buy any of them? **No!**
	+ What was even worse than this? All of the guys listed above were brought in anyway, but only **after** the *InVasion* storyline ended. Hell, Ric Flair showed up **the night after it died!**
* With both "Stone Cold" Steve Austin and Kurt Angle turning heel and leading the crusade to destroy the WWF, the spotlight was almost completely filled with WWF talent, while the new talent from WCW and ECW were relegated to being filler to the angle. Within twelve weeks of the *InVasion* PPV, *RAW is WAR* viewership dropped by 30%.
* In an attempt to hype up *Survivor Series*, the Alliance and WWF had four title matches in the go-home *RAW is WAR*... and the Alliance lost all their belts to WWF guys.
* At *Survivor Series*, the final match was billed as a "Winner-Take-All" final battle, where the loser would go out of business forever. Despite this billed stipulation, Booker T and Rob Van Dam were the only members of the Alliance team that were actually from either WCW or ECW, with the rest of the team consisting of Kurt Angle (who had never worked a match with either promotion, and actively threatened to sue Paul Heyman if the little footage of him in ECW doing commentary was released), Stone Cold Steve Austin (who had already been in WWF for years at that point) and Shane McMahon, son of the WWF's owner.
* With the end of *Survivor Series*, the potential angle was completely pissed away as WWF won the final showdown against the Alliance. From here on, the major WCW stars that were missing before were signed over time merely to fight the downward trend in the ratings.

## 2002

### nWo 2002: Putting the Band Back Together (Again)

* In an attempt to reverse the trend of falling ratings and attendance, the WWF signed Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash shortly after the Royal Rumble. In a series of ridiculous backstage segments, Vince McMahon announced he was bringing the group in as a "lethal dose of poison" to kill the WWF so he wouldn't have to share half of his creation with Ric Flair, who'd bought out Shane and Stephanie's shares when the WCW/ECW Alliance crumbled.
	+ Hogan, Hall and Nash were signed to very large contracts, which upset most of the locker room.
* The nWo debuted at *No Way Out* 2002, cutting a promo where they said they weren't actually bad guys and were happy to be back in the WWF. The Rock later embarrassed the group backstage in a promo where he referenced Hall and Nash's old gimmicks. The group ended the night by costing "Stone Cold" Steve Austin his Undisputed Title match against Chris Jericho.
* The following night on *RAW*, Hulk Hogan cut a promo on the fans, blaming them for booing him in 1993 and forcing him to jump ship to WCW. The Rock came out to set Hogan straight, and challenged Hogan to a match at *WrestleMania X8*. As The Rock was leaving, he was attacked by Hall and Nash, who held The Rock down and allowed Hogan to hit The Rock in the head with a hammer. This was a fine way to write The Rock off of TV for a few weeks so he could reshoot scenes for the upcoming *Scorpion King* movie... but the WWF ran another lengthy segment where the nWo hijacked The Rock's ambulance and rammed a semi-truck into it. The Rock returned two weeks later with only some tape covering his ribs.
* Rocky convinced Hogan to leave the nWo after *WrestleMania X8*, so Hall and Nash replaced him with the returning X-Pac. Things went downhill very quickly for the nWo after this, as they were feuding with Ric Flair, Kane, Bradshaw(?!) and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin for multiple reasons and basically became a parody of the parody they were originally parodying. When Hall was fired for drunkeness in May, he was replaced by Big Show and Booker T. Shawn Michaels returned from his four-year back injury as the new leader of the nWo in June and literally kicked Booker out of the group. Michaels announced that the nWo was going to recruit Triple H into the group at the *Vengeance* PPV in July, but Kevin Nash tore his quad while **walking across the ring**, X-Pac went MIA (and his release was eventually announced by Jim Ross at *SummerSlam*), and Vince McMahon finally said *"fuck it!"* and announced on *RAW* that the nWo was dead and buried.

### The Extending of the Brand

* The WWF decided to execute a roster split after *WrestleMania X8*, where wrestlers would only appear on either *RAW* or *SmackDown!*. The plans for a roster split dated back to the purchase of WCW in 2001, where there was originally going to be a WCW "brand" with a TV show on Saturday nights, but those plans fell through due to the negative reputation WCW still carried. Another idea was to run a storyline where Linda McMahon received control over half of the WWF after divorcing Vince, but those plans also fell through after the disastrous Buff Bagwell vs. Booker T match.
* The storyline reason for the roster split was that co-owners Ric Flair and Vince McMahon couldn't get along, so the Board of Directors ruled that Ric Flair would take control of *RAW* and Vince McMahon would take control of *SmackDown!*. Linda McMahon announced the split the night after *WrestleMania*, but her robotic delivery, combined with the WWF using the phrase "brand extension" and not actually coming out and saying the roster was splitting, left many fans confused as to what was actually happening.
* The March 25 episode of *RAW*, the final under the combined roster, featured the first ever WWF Draft. McMahon and Flair stood on a podium and drafted 10 wrestlers throughout the show, and the rest of the draft picks would be announced on WWF.com. Many of the picks made no sense. For example, only a few main eventers were drafted, and picks were wasted on people such as Mark Henry, Rikishi, Lita and Maven. Almost every tag team was split up, most notably the APA and the Dudley Boyz (both teams were reunited less than six months later after disastrous singles pushes). All of the singles titles wound up on *RAW* (the Unified World Champion and Women's Champions could appear on both shows, but that would be quickly dropped) and the Tag Titles ended up on *SmackDown!*, a show with no tag teams. Also, instead of being drafted individually like everyone else, the nWo was drafted as a unit because *"lethal dose of poison!"*.
* Despite hyping that the brand extension would be a change from the Attitude Era-standard of long promos and short matches, nothing actually changed. Matches were still short and awful, promos were still long and heel authority figures still feuded with wrestlers. The co-owner storyline was dropped less than two months into the brand extension, and Vince took over like normal before bringing in Eric Bischoff and Stephanie McMahon as each brands' respecitve General Managers.
* Realizing that the original plan to treat the Intercontinental Championship, a long-standing but decidedly secondary title, as a the World Title for Raw wouldn't be taken seriously, they hatched a plan to introduce a second world title. After Undisputed WWE Champion Brock Lesnar was exclusively signed to *SmackDown!* (which outright violated the rules regarding the champion not belonging specifically to a brand while champion, though nobody did a thing about it), Triple H was awarded the World Heavyweight Championship, using the WCW title's Big Gold Belt. That didn't mean he was booked to win the title, it meant he literally had the belt handed to him by Eric Bischoff on *RAW*, without having to do anything to get it, and with Bischoff infamously saying "You deserve it, Champ!". (Though it's oft overlooked that Triple H did win a number 1 contender's match over the Undertaker the week before, and that technically Lesnar was refusing to defend the title against the duly designated mandatory challenger. It's mostly overlooked because nowhere in the segment where Triple H was awarded the title was any of that mentioned at all.)

### WWF vs. WWF: Getting the F Out!

* In 2000, the World-Wide Fund for Nature sued the World Wrestling Federation, claiming illegal use of the "WWF" initials, which the two had shared since 1979. The conservation organization claimed that the wrestling company had violated a 1994 agreement regarding international use of the WWF initials. A U.K. court ruled in favor of the World-Wide Fund for Nature and, on May 5, 2002, the World Wrestling Federation changed its web address from WWF.com to WWE.com, and replaced every "WWF" reference on the existing site with "WWE", as a prelude to changing the company's name to "World Wrestling Entertainment". Its stock ticker also switched from "WWF" to "WWE".
* Starting with the May 6 edition of *RAW* (the first under the WWE banner), a terrible ad campaign was launched in which fans were literally told to *"Get the F Out!"*. Vignettes aired featuring shrubs shaped like the WWF logo being trimmed to look like the new WWE logo, and a WWF mascot going to a barber shop and getting butchered into the WWE logo. This ad campaign aired at a time when ratings were dropping each week, and combined with the alienation of fans with the brand extension, many jokes were made about fans actually *"getting the F out"* of the entire product.
* One terrible result of the court ruling was that archival footage containing the spoken phrase "WWF" or the Attitude Era "scratch" logo had to be censored. As a result, home video releases featured commentators and wrestling talking about WW***[censored]*** titles, and Attitude Era footage (which featured logos everywhere) were blurred to the point that most matches and segments were unwatchable. With the expected launch of the WWE Network in 2012, WWE and WWF reached a deal so that WWE could broadcast archival footage unedited once again.

### Katie Vick: The Very Definition of "Sick and Wrong"

* Kane returned from injury the night after *SummerSlam* and received a big push, winning the Intercontinental and Tag Team titles (with Gregory "The Hurricane" Helms) in a short amount of time. He was also booked to wrestle Triple H for the World Heavyweight Championship at *No Mercy*. After Kane single-handedly defeated three other teams in a TLC match in the main event of the October 7 *RAW*, Triple H came to the stage and called Kane a *"mur-diddly-urderer!"* as the show went off the air.
* The following week, Kane was convinced by his good friend Terri Runnels to come clean. Kane came to the ring and explained that, in high school, he had a girlfriend named Katie Vick. Kane and Katie went to a party one night, had a little too much to drink and ended up in a car accident. Kane was only slightly injured, but Katie died. Triple H came out and insisted that not only was Kane a murderer, but he also violated Katie's corpse.
	+ None of this made any sense whatsoever, considering that Kane's entire backstory was him getting burned as a child and locked away in a closet by Paul Bearer for several decades. The idea that he was suddenly able to sneak out one night and become a super-popular high school student with a girlfriend was laughable, especially if you recall that Kane's first kayfabe girlfriend was Tori. To add to the ridiculousness, Kane and Terri had never interacted outside of backstage interviews, so nobody bought them as longtime good friends.
* The most infamous part of this feud came on October 21, where footage aired of Triple H, dressed up as Kane, sneaking into a funeral home and having sex with a mannequin in a casket. After having to watch a naked Triple H sniff panties and simulate sex, the segment ended with Triple H saying *"I did it! I screwed your brains out!"* and throwing some spaghetti at the camera.
	+ That same episode of *RAW* ended with Kane stuffing Triple H in the trunk of a car... with the camera catching Triple H climbing out just seconds later.
* October 28 saw the "fun" continue with Triple H "interviewing" the mannequin. Kane's tag team partner, The Hurricane, came out and showed a video of a guy in a Triple H mask on a surgical table having things removed from his colon, such as a sledgehammer, Mae Young's hand son and Triple H's own head. It was about as funny as it sounds. The angle died a merciful death later that night when Shawn Michaels returned to rekindle his feud with Triple H, dropping Kane back down to the mid-card.
* Vince McMahon and Kevin Dunn reportedly **LOVED** this storyline, and were flabbergasted when fans were turned off of the product and ratings dropped.
* Years later, Sick Boy of WCW fame claimed that the angle was supposed to set up his introduction as a WWE wrestler. See, Sick Boy's real name is Scott Vick, and the idea would be that Katie was his sister. The violently negative response to the angle caused these plans to be dropped, and Vick retired from wrestling shortly afterwards.
* The storyline won WrestleCrap's Gooker Award by a landslide. Years later, WWE auctioned off the Katie Vick outfit on their website. The winning (and probably only) bidders were none other than R.D. Reynolds and Blade Braxton.

### Miscellaneous Shenanigans: The Ruthless Aggression Edition!

* The flight back from the UK-exclusive *InsurreXtion* pay-per-view became known as "The Plane Ride from Hell" when all hell broke loose after most of the wrestlers on-board consumed a little too much alcohol during a long delay. Notable incidents included X-Pac cutting off Michael Hayes' ponytail (which was stapled to a wall backstage at the next *RAW*) after Hayes got into a fight with Bradshaw, Ric Flair walking around in nothing but his entrance robe and flashing flight attendants, Goldust taking over the plane's PA system to serenade his ex-wife Terri Runnels and Curt "Mr. Perfect" Hennig challenging Brock Lesnar to an amateur wrestling match near the plane's emergency exit. The incident resulted in WWF terminating the contracts of both Hennig and Scott Hall.
* The Undertaker and Hulk Hogan had a feud for the Undisputed WWE Championship that led to an embarrassing segment on *RAW*:
	+ Hulk Hogan was supposed to drive Undertaker's bike up the entrance ramp to make The Undertaker run away. However, Hogan was having a lot of trouble even getting the bike to move a few inches at a time. As if he was thinking *"fuck it!"*, Hogan got off the bike and ~~ran~~ hobbled after the Undertaker.
	+ Realizing that the next segment required him to be on the bike, Hogan came back out ages later while the commentary was stalling for time to finally get the bike up the ramp and into the backstage area.
* Eddie Guerrero and Rob Van Dam's ladder match on Raw was interrupted by a fan who ran in and pushed the ladder over. In Eddie's 2004 DVD, this was edited out by having the camera show Chris Benoit, who was sitting in a front-row seat.
* Molly Holly was given a heel gimmick that saw her enter a bikini contest dressed in a 1920s swimsuit and cap. Molly was later made fun of by other divas for having a big ass, and was also ridiculed when it was revealed that she was a virgin. This was apparently a rib on Molly's real-life religious beliefs, but the fans must have missed the part where they were supposed to laugh.
* *WWE Tough Enough 2* winner Jackie Gayda teamed with Christopher Nowinski to take on Trish Stratus and Bradshaw in what would become known as "That Jackie Gayda Match". The match saw Gayda commit numerous botches (including failing to sell Stratus's finisher properly) and was later named "Worst Match of 2002" by Dave Meltzer. Unsurprisingly, Gayda was quickly taken off TV in order to undergo further training.
* July 15 saw the announcement that Vince McMahon had hired two General Managers, one for *RAW* and one for *SmackDown!*. Raw's GM turned out to be Eric Bischoff, who came to the stage and ***HUGGED*** Vince McMahon.
* Billy Gunn and Chuck Palumbo became the first openly-gay tag team in the WWE. Throughout the year, they competed in swimsuit competitions against Torrie Wilson and Stacy Keibler, gave each other matching headbands for Valentine's Day and obtained a manager/stylist in Rico Constantino. Eventually, a wedding was set for a September episode of *SmackDown!*. The angle received lots of mainstream coverage, particularly from GLAAD, who gave the couple a gravy boat from Pottery Barn.
	+ The actual wedding featured Billy and Chuck admitting that the angle was a publicity stunt gone too far before being attacked by 3 Minute Warning and Eric Bischoff, who was disguised as the minister. GLAAD was told by WWE that the wedding went off without a hitch and were shocked to discover they had been lied to after the episode aired, apparently not knowing that wrestling isn't entirely on the up and up.
		- After the Billy and Chuck wedding, Rico defected to *RAW* to become Eric Bischoff's right-hand man. His first match on *RAW* was **a clean win over Ric Flair**. Following this huge victory, Rico proceeded to do absolutely nothing for the rest of his career.
* HLA, short for "Hot Lesbian Action", was yet another desperate stab at getting ratings. Eric Bischoff would bring out "lesbians", actually developmental workers, who'd make out a little in the ring then, after a few minutes, have 3 Minute Warning squash them. It eventually resulted in Stephanie McMahon making out with Rikishi in drag before Bischoff got stinkfaced. It was bad as it sounds and also pissed off both TNN and TSN in Canada.
* Scott Steiner's WWE debut was at *Survivor Series*. Just before picking up a microphone, he could be heard yelling *"Gimme a fuckin' mic!"*.
* Test won a year of immunity at the battle royal at *Survivor Series* 2001, meaning WWE wouldn't be able to fire him for a whole year, no matter what he did. Test never took advantage of this.

## 2003

### *RAW 10th Anniversary*

* WWE broadcast a 2-hour special from The World in January to celebrate the 10th anniversary of *RAW*. It was hyped for weeks as an unpredictable special where any current or former star, whether they were on good terms with WWE or not, could show up. Of course, the special ended up being anything but that.
* The awards were lame and the results obviously rigged, and by the end, the drunk crowd at The World completely turned on the show. For example, Trish Stratus, who had been with the company for 2 years and a wrestler for barely one, won "Diva of the Decade" over Sable, Sunny and Chyna. A TLC match from October 2002 (that also kicked off the infamous Katie Vick storyline) won "Match of the Decade". Mick Foley and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, who were both on the outs with WWE at the time, both won awards, with Vince McMahon accepting on behalf of Austin, claiming that Austin was not invited to the show. Why bother hyping his involvement for weeks, then?
	+ Triple H and Stephanie McMahon won "Couple of the Decade". They accepted the award with Triple H mooning Stephanie, who proceeded to spank Triple H's bare ass.
* A tribute video for all of the wrestlers that had appeared on *RAW* and passed away aired. This would have been fine, but only major names were mentioned. WWE even took a cheap shot at the late Bertha Faye before this video aired. WWE also ran countless commercials during the special hyping that week's episode of *SmackDown!*, where Al Wilson's funeral would take place.
* Throughout the night, WWE counted down the Top 10 moments in *RAW* history (for the very first time, for those of you reading in the future who see these moments on countless home video releases). *RAW is Owen* came in second place, with "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's Corporation Beer Bath winning "Moment of the Decade".
* The one good thing to come out of *RAW 10th Anniversary*? The crowd booed Rock's pre-taped acceptance speech, which was the basis for his "Hollywood Rock" heel turn the next month.

### Dawn Marie and the Wilsons

* In late 2002, Torrie Wilson randomly began bringing her father, Al Wilson (played by Torrie's actual father), to WWE shows with her. Dawn Marie began to seduce Al, as a way to get back at Torrie for... well, the reason was never made clear, but it was bizarre because Dawn was probably 30 years younger than Al. One episode saw Torrie walk in on a fully-clothed Al in the shower with a butt-naked Dawn, made awesome when the camera panned down too low and exposed Dawn's bare butt on TV.
* Al eventually proposed to Dawn, despite Torrie's disapproval of their relationship. Dawn told Torrie that she would call the wedding off if Torrie met her at a hotel and performed some **VERY** softcore stripteases. Dawn played the footage for Al at *Armageddon*, with Al demanding that the footage stop playing (after he had watched the footage of his own daughter stripping for several minutes).
* The wedding went on, and took place on the first *SmackDown!* of 2003. The wedding featured everyone stripping down to their underthings. Yes, we had to see Al Wilson in his tighty whities. **It was not a pretty sight.**
* The next week, Dawn and Al were on their honeymoon, and Al eventually "died" when his heart gave out from the couple having so much sex. Torrie assaulted Dawn at the funeral, leading to wrestling's first-ever "Stepdaughter vs. Stepmother Match" at the *Royal Rumble*. Yes, it took several months before any actual wrestling came from this storyline. Al Wilson was never mentioned again after this match.
* The storyline won WrestleCrap's Gooker Award by a landslide.

### Scott Steiner in WWE: Big Poppa Flop

* Scott Steiner's feud with Triple H for the World Heavyweight title is where any chances of success for Big Poppa Pump faded away.
* First off, Steiner was famous for his heel run in WCW, and yet he was made a face for this rivalry. Second, to hype up their match, they had ridiculous test-of-strength contests on *RAW*, almost as if Vince McMahon was trying to revive his World Bodybuilding Federation idea through this feud.
* Steiner's performance in his match with Triple H at the 2003 *Royal Rumble* PPV was so bad that the crowd completely turned against him. Aside from botching a double-underhook suplex, Steiner did way too many belly-to-belly suplexes and got gassed easily, leading to numerous rest spots. Worst of all, it ended with a DQ finish to set up a rematch at *No Way Out*.
	+ Their chemistry did not improve at all in this rematch. At one point, Steiner fell on his ass after kicking Triple H's leg.
* After this feud, he was taken out of the World Title picture and had a cringeworthy debate with Chris Nowinski over the Iraq War, which Steiner opened with the immortal line *"Throughout my career, I've wrestled a lot of countries."*
* Over time, it was clear that Steiner needed to be a heel, as he was still delivering many lines which were not like what you'd hear out of a face wrestler, including:
	+ *"**I'M THE GREATEST SON OF A BITCH YOU EVER MET!**"* as he made Chris Nowinski tap out to the Steiner Recliner.
	+ *"What, you wanna suck my dick?"* to a diva interfering in a tag team match.
	+ *"No, your mother sucks! Your mother sucks!"* to a fan.
* Later, in a runaway contender for "Most Pointless Feud of 2003", Scott Steiner and Test fought over Stacy Keibler's managerial contract, which was contested twice on PPV and once on *RAW*. During one of these matches, Steiner fell off the apron and barely touched Test, who tried to save the botch by falling to one knee as if his leg was clipped.
* In the end, Steiner was released in 2004, making him a nasty addition to the list of WCW wrestlers who flopped in WWE.

### Goldberg's First Run in WWE

* Falling ratings, buy-rates and attendance caused WWE to finally begin negotiations to bring in one of WCW's biggest stars, Bill Goldberg. WWE ran a promo at *WrestleMania XIX* announcing that Goldberg was coming. He made his debut the following night on *RAW*, spearing The Rock. Yes, one of wrestling's biggest names received ***one night of hype for his debut***.
* The first few months of Goldberg's tenure were a disaster, as it was clear WWE had no interest in pushing another WCW star. In an effort to rid Goldberg of his "WCW stench", WWE gave Goldberg new music (a softer, less-intimidating version of his WCW theme) and new black/white MMA-style tights featuring his tattoo logo, completely changing Goldberg's look and aura. Some cities booed Goldberg heavily, as they had been trained that everything related to WCW was bad. Goldberg was also disliked backstage, either due to his contract (which paid him lots of money for limited dates) or his attitude (many ex-WCW wrestlers still held grudges against Goldberg, such as Chris Jericho, who ended up getting the best of Goldberg in a backstage squabble).
	+ One *RAW* segment featured Goldust placing his wig on Goldberg's head, with Goldberg calmly removing it and politely telling Goldust to get lost.
* In the summer, WWE finally started pushing Goldberg as a monster to build him up for a title run. However, at *SummerSlam*, an **injured** Triple H **squashed** Goldberg in an Elimination Chamber match after Goldberg had single-handedly eliminated Randy Orton, Shawn Michaels and Chris Jericho (receiving a massive crowd response in the process). Goldberg anticlimactically ended Triple H's Reign of Terror the following month, but the damage had already been done. Goldberg floundered about until his contract expired in 2004, and would not wrestle again until 2016.

### Kane Gets Unmasked (and Other Follies)

* After the "Katie Vick" debacle, Kane floundered around *RAW*'s midcard for months until WWE decided to make him the focal point of *RAW*'s big summer storyline. Kane got a World Title match against Triple H on *RAW* and lost, being forced to unmask as a result. Of all the possibilities that could have come from an unmasked Kane (including rumors that Mark Jindrak would dress up as Kane and join Evolution), WWE gave us the lamest one: Kane's long hair was revealed to be a wig, and he had a George Costanza-esque balding haircut with black paint smudged over his face.
	+ Since Kane's backstory was that he was burned as a child, WWE claimed his scars had healed and that Kane imagined he still had them... **because crazy!**
* After a few weeks of being portrayed as an unstoppable monster, Kane had an interview with Jim Ross that ended with Kane setting J.R. on fire. This was made unintentionally funny by repeatedly playing the same snippet of J.R. screaming whilst a stuntman slowly crawled around on the floor.
* The following week, Kane tombstoned Linda McMahon (made unintentionally funny when the wrong camera angle was used, showing that Linda's head was at least a foot above the stage when the impact was made), igniting a feud with Shane McMahon, who had been off of TV since the end of the *InVasion* angle. The two had what can only be described as the most over-the-top *"will not die"* hardcore matches and segments in the history of wrestling: this included testicular electrocution, superkicking Kane into a dumpster on fire, off-the-stage spots, being hit by cars and (of course) the Shane O'Mac classic: the *"jumping off something extremely high and almost dying as a result"*. The feud began in July (although the two made zero contact until September because WWE booked Shane against Eric Bischoff and Kane against RVD at *SummerSlam*, because reasons) and ended at *Survivor Series* in November.
	+ After all of the above wackiness, the go-home *RAW* for *Survivor Series* featured a series of segments where Kane met Shane at a fancy restaurant and the two casually discussed their hatred of each other.

### *SmackDown!* 2003: McMahons. McMahons Everywhere.

* *SmackDown!* was well-received by fans in late 2002, thanks to the combination of head writer Paul Heyman and the tremendous matches put on by the "*SmackDown* Six" (Kurt Angle, Chris Benoit, Edge, Chavo Guerrero, Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio). The show was getting better ratings than *RAW* at one point, and was particularly popular in the younger, urban demographics. WWE decided to capitalize on this by making the Vince McMahon/Hulk Hogan feud the center of *SmackDown!* in the early parts of 2003.
* The feud went off the rails following *WrestleMania XIX* when Hulk Hogan was "fired" by Vince McMahon. The next week, it was revealed that GM Stephanie McMahon had signed an ironclad contract with a wrestler called "Mr. America", who she revealed that she had ***never actually met or even seen***. In reality, Mr. America was Hulk Hogan in a mask, which everybody knew, as he both talked and wrestled like Hogan. Vince decided to have a returning Roddy Piper do his dirty work, and **booked Hogan vs. Piper in a match at Judgment Day**.
* The Piper/Hogan match saw the introduction of one-legged wrestler Zach Gowen.
* After Hogan and Piper both left WWE, the entire feud turned into Vince vs. Stephanie.
* After the Stephanie feud concluded, Vince entered into a feud with The Undertaker, a feud which actually started during the Stephanie feud, while interjecting himself into the Angle/Lesnar feud mentioned below.
* You might be wondering why the "SmackDown Six" have not been mentioned at all, as they were all sent on completely different paths following the turn of the calendar.
	+ Edge injured his neck and was forced to take a year off for spinal fusion surgery.
	+ Kurt Angle was also slated for neck surgery following *WrestleMania XIX*, but wound up having an alternative version of the surgery done so he could come back earlier and feud with Brock Lesnar.
	+ Rey Mysterio was sent to the Cruiserweight Division, where he did a whole lot of nothing following an entertaining feud with Matt Hardy over the belt.
	+ Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero feuded against each other for the better part of the year over the re-introduced United States title.
	+ As for Chavo? He did fuck all for most of 2003 before eventually turning heel on Eddie and disbanding Los Guerreros.

### Johnny Ace takes over from J.R.

* As Head of Talent Relations, Jim Ross used to liaise with the booker of OVW (the developmental territory at the time), Jim Cornette. When John "Johnny Ace" Laurinaitis took over, those liaisons stopped completely, so much so that talent was being called up to television without Cornette's permission. Notable examples include:
	+ At one point, Randy Orton got booked for an OVW show while on the main roster. Ace never told Orton about it and Randy took a vacation at the time. Cornette found out Orton would be missing the show through Tommy Dreamer and Ace claimed he wasn't the one who was supposed to tell him.
	+ Ace also hired the wrong one-legged wrestler and was mocked on a *RAW* episode by Vince McMahon on the air years after the fact. The story goes back to when WWE was looking to sign Zach Gowen to a contract. Vince McMahon instructed John Laurinaitis to sign the then-nineteen-year-old Zach Gowen to a WWE deal. Unfortunately, Laurinaitis offered a contract to a different one-legged wrestler, who at the time was 37 years old. At the time, Tom Prichard was working for WWE, and had already sent a plane ticket and contract to Zach Gowen, and when he arrived to WWE Headquarters, John Laurinaitis had no idea who he was. McMahon then scolded him for offering the wrong one-legged wrestler in his late thirties a WWE contract.
	+ Doug Basham was the main champion of OVW at the time and had long messy hair. WWE Creative, obviously not familiar with how imagination works, told him to shave his head completely so they could see what he looked like bald. Again, Cornette wasn't informed and went ballistic. To quote Cornette, he came back looking like a *"forty-year-old truck driver"*.

### Miscellaneous Shenanigans

* Vince McMahon had an entire feud with a masked Hulk Hogan posing as Mr. America, despite everyone and their dog knowing he was Hogan. Vince couldn't fire him because he didn't have proof. Eventually, Vince fired Hogan when Mr. America unmasked to the crowd during a commercial break, neglecting to mention of course that Hogan did that spot **EVERY MATCH** on **TELEVISION** whilst doing the gimmick.
* Vince booked himself to go over Stephanie in a Father/Daughter "I Quit" Match. Stephanie refused to go through with the match and, after being forced to, refused to let Vince go to her wedding reception. Not her storyline one. Her real-life wedding to Paul "Triple H" Levesque in September 2003.
	+ Additional pitched storylines to take Steph off television included her being pregnant with Vince's child and a similar story but with Shane's child (because incest is **WIN**cest!).
* Zach Gowen had attracted backstage heat due to his ego getting inflated after being part of the Vince McMahon-Hulk Hogan angle, which eventually became a feud between Vince McMahon and Zach Gowen. This feud ended with Zach Gowen losing to Vince McMahon at *Vengeance*. On top of this, the fact that he was not getting the pops WWE staff expected lead to speculation that he would be released as soon as his contract expired.
	+ After this, the reports were basically confirmed as Zach Gowen just kept losing match after match. Eventually, Brock Lesnar threw him down a flight of stairs and that got him off TV for a month.
	+ Tajiri would later get Gowen knocked the fuck out by his duo known as "Kyo Dai". This was Zach's last appearance before getting released.
* Speaking of which, Kyo Dai was broken up because of Tajiri's request to the WWE creative team to do so. Why? He feared that real-life yakuza gangs would see this angle as an insult.
* In the summer of 2002, Raven was banished to *Sunday Night Heat*. He randomly appeared on a *RAW* in January wearing regular wrestling trunks, lost to Jeff Hardy in a *Royal Rumble* qualifying match and was fired the next week.
* Goldust was electrocuted by Evolution and developed Tourette's Syndrome, leading to "hilarious" segments and promos.
* The Rock had a mini-feud with The Hurricane, which featured several hilarious promos between the two. Hurricane even picked up a win over Rock in a *RAW* main event after a distraction from "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. WWE followed up on this by having Triple H squash their newest star *the next week*. Hurricane never sniffed the main event after this.
* The August 14 *SmackDown!* was main evented by Stephanie McMahon vs. A-Train. However, a major power failure caused a blackout in several states and Canadian provinces, leading to jokes that the power grid failed to prevent fans from having to watch such an atrocity.
* A feud between the Big Show and Eddie Guerrero revolved around fecal matter. **Seriously.** Episodes of *SmackDown!* featured Show eating burritos laced with laxatives and Eddie driving a raw sewage truck to the ring and spraying Big Show with liquid feces ala "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's Corporate Beer Bath.
* Jon Heidenreich debuted on *RAW* and, for a few weeks, was trying to get Divas to meet "Little Johnny". This double entendre for his penis was rumored to actually be a puppet or ventriloquist dummy, but Heidenreich was shipped back to OVW before anything could be exposed.
* Booker T found a letter in his locker that said *"I Still Remember"*. This was supposed to lead to a feud with his ex-tag team partner Goldust... but Goldust was fired in December, so WWE dropped the storyline and never mentioned it again.

## 2004

### *WrestleMania XX*

* *WrestleMania XX* was hyped for an entire year as the show *"Where It All Begins Again"*. The show was held in Madison Square Garden and lasted just under 5 hours long. While the top matches certainly delivered, much of the show was filler, with several matches taking place solely to get as many people on the card as possible.
* **BACKSTAGE SEGMENTS GALORE**: One segment featured The Fabulous Moolah and Mae Young making out with "Mean" Gene Okerlund and Bobby "The Brain" Heenan in a closet. Another featured Jesse Ventura hinting at a US Presidential campaign in 2008.
* Ultimo Dragon signed with WWE in order to realize two of his lifelong dreams: wrestle in Madison Square Garden and compete at *WrestleMania*. In realizing both of these dreams, Dragon slipped on the stage during his entrance, and slipped *again* while running to the ring.
* **Brock Lesnar vs. Goldberg**. WWE built this feud by having Goldberg make zero appearances on TV because his contract was expiring after the show, so it was a foregone conclusion that Lesnar would win. However, the week before the show, Brock decided to quit WWE. As a result, the MSG crowd completely turned on the match booing both wrestlers during their entrances and chanting "You sold out!!!" during the match. Goldberg and Lesnar proceeded to put on the absolute worst performance possible which upset the crowd even more. The match lasted *14 minutes* in a hostile environment, and ended with guest referee "Stone Cold" Steve Austin wishing Lesnar and Goldberg well in their future endeavors by hitting Stone Cold Stunners on them both, which should have happened the second the match started.
	+ At one point, the fans and even the announcers were paying more attention to a mock altercation between a fan dressed as Hulk Hogan and a fan dressed as Randy Savage than they were to the actual match.
* Kane helped Vince McMahon defeat The Undertaker at *Survivor Series* 2003 in a Buried Alive match. Undertaker disappeared from TV and returned at this show with his old Deadman gimmick... which was basically a hodge-podge of all of Undertaker's previous gimmicks.
* The show ended with new WWE Champion Eddie Guerrero celebrating in the middle of the ring with new World Heavyweight Champion Chris Benoit. Eddie passed away in 2005 and Chris Benoit murdered his wife and son before hanging himself in 2007. Because of this, the show has pretty much been erased from WWE history. Fans did not approve of this, as seen in this "*WrestleMania* in 60 Seconds" video.

### *SmackDown!*: The Post-Lesnar Era

* The week before *WrestleMania XX*, news broke that Brock Lesnar would leave WWE after the PPV to try out for the NFL. Brock was sick of the WWE's travel schedule, among other things, and the last straw was when Brock was informed that he would be jobbing to The Undertaker in Undertaker's first feud back with the Deadman character.
	+ WWE wrote Brock off of TV saying he was betrayed by the *SmackDown!* roster on the last episode before *WrestleMania* when "Stone Cold" Steve Austin invaded the show to take back his ATV, which Brock had stolen. Instead of preventing Austin from coming to the ring, the entire roster moved away from the stage and allowed Austin to beat the hell out of Paul Heyman and Brock Lesnar.
* Lesnar's departure left *SmackDown!* with only a handful of stars, so WWE's solution was to hold a Draft Lottery on *RAW* the week after *WrestleMania*. Six wrestlers were drafted from *RAW* to *SmackDown!*, and vice versa. *RAW* came out the clear victor in the draft, with many up-and-comers being sent over to the red brand. *SmackDown!*'s roster was absolutely destroyed, especially after Triple H (who was originally drafted to *SmackDown!* to fill the void left by Lesnar) decided he didn't want to work Tuesdays, and remained as the top heel on *RAW*. In return, *SmackDown!* received the beyond-stale group of the Dudley Boyz, Booker T and Rob Van Dam.
* Kurt Angle was injured, so WWE made him the General Manager of *SmackDown!* after Heyman quit on-air. An angle was booked where Kurt was thrown off of a balcony by the Big Show. When cameras found Kurt, his body was twisted, he had a pool of blood under his head and looked like a days-old corpse. Angle returned the following week with just a broken leg.
	+ This was also an excuse to write Big Show off of TV to heal various nagging injuries.
	+ Heyman quitting was originally supposed to set up WWE creating a third brand based on ECW, with Heyman in control of that show. This idea ended up being delayed and was finally realized in 2006 (see below).
* With no top heel on the show, WWE decided to give Bradshaw a singles run. His APA tag partner Faarooq was future endeavored, and Bradshaw was reinvented as an evil financial analyst under his real name, John Layfield. John "Bradshaw" Layfield, or JBL, was quickly pushed into a WWE Title feud with champion Eddie Guerrero, eventually taking the title from Eddie in June (see below) and holding it until *WrestleMania 21*, during which time WWE saw some of its lowest PPV buy-rates in company history.
	+ To be fair, Bradshaw had written a book about the stock market the year before, had a gig on CNBC and was married to a financial analyst, so in reality, the gimmick was Bradshaw's true personality *"turned up to 11"*.
	+ JBL's match with Eddie Guerrero at *Judgment Day* is mostly remembered for a gruesome chair shot to Eddie that busted him wide open. Eddie lost so much blood that he reportedly fainted backstage after the match ended.
		- The match was built up with segments featuring JBL hunting illegal immigrants at the US-Mexico border and causing Eddie's mom to suffer a heart attack at a house show in Eddie's hometown.
	+ JBL was the center of controversy in June when, at a house show in Germany, he made the decision to get cheap heat by goose-stepping and doing a Nazi salute during a match. JBL lost his CNBC gig as a result, but not his push.
* WWE signed Japanese wrestler Kenzo Suzuki in the spring. The original plan for Suzuki was to debut him as "Hirohito", a descendant of the late Japanese emperor of the same name who was out to get revenge on America after World War II. The Hirohito character was set to receive a main event push and feud with Chris Benoit for the World Heavyweight Championship. A single vignette aired on an episode of *RAW* before Suzuki's wife, Hiroko, told Vince McMahon that the whole thing might be a tad bit offensive. A few weeks later, Suzuki debuted on *SmackDown!* under his real name with a generic foreign royalty gimmick.
	+ Allegedly, the Japanese imperial family also got wind of the gimmick and contacted WWE, threatening to sue if they didn't immediately cease using it. Neither Vince nor the writer responsible, Dan Madigan, even knew there was a Japanese imperial family.
* After almost a year of being off of television, Jacqueline randomly won the Cruiserweight Title from Chavo Guerrero on an episode of *SmackDown!*. This culminated in a rematch at *Judgment Day* where Chavo won the title back. Chavo Classic (Chavo's dad) held lingerie up to himself at one point during this feud.
	+ This title change took place because Jacqueline was on her way out of WWE and the company wanted to give her a "thank you" title reign before she left. It is unknown why they felt the need to ruin both the Cruiserweight Division and Chavo's credibility to do so.
* Kevin Fertig debuted at *Judgment Day* as Mordecai, a religious zealot clad in all-white who was obsessed with cleansing the world of sin. Rumors were that he was being set up for a feud with The Undertaker at *SummerSlam*. Mordecai made only a handful of appearances before being squashed by Rey Mysterio and disappearing forever. Fertig later reappeared in the rebooted ECW as Kevin Thorn.
* The Undertaker returned with his Deadman character and proceeded to bury (ahem) anyone he came up against. His first victim was Booker T, who visited a Miss Cleo-esque palm reader that was supposed to teach Booker the secrets to stopping Undertaker's mystical powers. Whatever strategy she had failed, and Booker was easily defeated at *Judgment Day*. The Undertaker then feuded with the Dudley Boyz and had a WWE Title match with JBL at *SummerSlam* that was so bad that the crowd performed the Mexican Wave during the match, among other shenanigans (more on these later).
* Paul Heyman eventually ended up managing Jon Heidenreich, who was last seen on *RAW* in 2003 trying to show his "Little Johnny" to people backstage. Like Kenzo Suzuki, Heidenreich's original gimmick was supposed to be that of a Nazi super-soldier who was cryogenically frozen during World War II à la Captain America (what was it with WWE creative and WWII gimmicks in 2004?). This idea fell through, and Heidenreich debuted as a poetry-reading weirdo.
	+ A story attached to the frozen Nazi super-soldier idea was that, when the man who came up with the idea (Dan Madigan, the same guy who came up with Hirohito) pitched it to Vince, he got very excited about it to the point where he was goose-stepping around the room, prompting Vince to silently leave the room in shock and disgust. Madigan was fired not long afterwards.
	+ At one point, Heidenreich abducted Michael Cole from the commentary booth and appeared to rape him backstage. He read a poem to Cole afterwards and demanded that Cole thank him. Other Heidenreich shenanigans included him climbing on top of the *SmackDown!* Fist and threatening to jump, and reading a poem in Chicago titled "Breaking Wind in the Windy City".
* Longtime jobber Spike Dudley turned heel and became "The Boss" of the Dudley family. He was suddenly a force to be reckoned with and received a lengthy reign as Cruiserweight Champion.

### *The Great American Bash* 2004: We're Bashing The Hell Out Of This Show!

* WWE decided to increase the number of PPV events in 2004, one of which was *The Great American Bash* (which was odd, considering it was originally a WCW PPV). The card gained infamy for how terrible it was; matches such as Charlie Haas vs. Luther Reigns (which was booked in a backstage segment *right before the match took place*), Torrie Wilson vs. Sable, Kenzo Suzuki vs. Billy Gunn and Mordecai vs. Hardcore Holly would barely be passable as *Velocity* main events. The matches that had potential to be good ended up being very lackluster due to the competitors phoning it in. Hardly any of the eight matches hit positive stars, and the show ended up doing a .47 buyrate, one of the lowest PPV buyrates in WWE history (at that point).
	+ *The GAB* also featured JBL ending the only WWE Title reign of Eddie Guerrero in a "Texas Bullrope" match, which had rules no different than a regular strap match (first person to touch all four corners of the ring wins). The match came down to the generic finish where Eddie thought he had touched all four corners but JBL was following closely behind and touched them all first. This was backed up with **EVIL INSTANT REPLAY** from *SmackDown!* General Manager Kurt Angle. So mere weeks after switching from a beer drinking midcarder to evil Wall Street stockbroker, JBL was the WWE Champion.
	+ Worst of all, the WWE Title match was not the main event. Instead, that slot went to The Undertaker vs. The Dudley Boyz in a handicap match where if Undertaker lost, Paul Bearer would be buried in a crypt of cement. The Undertaker, the face, won the match... but proceeded afterwards to pull the lever that sent cement into the crypt, completely burying Paul Bearer and suffocating him (the real Paul Bearer was not actually in the arena and a stunt double was used instead). This shot ended the pay-per-view and caused numerous complaints toward WWE, as in essence they had shown a simulated murder. The live audience, however, saw an extended ending in which Bearer surfaced for air and was carried from the arena on a stretcher. On the following week's *SmackDown!*, Bearer was acknowledged by Paul Heyman to be alive, although he was "gravely injured."
		- As if the show wasn't bad enough, the finish was spoiled earlier in the day when a rehearsal of Undertaker performing the ending was accidentally broadcast over several PPV feeds. The footage quickly made its way onto the Internet, where it remains to this day.

### The Retarded Saga of Nick "Eugene" Dinsmore

* OVW mainstay Nick Dinsmore, an Internet favorite known for high quality matches, was finally called up to the main roster in April. He debuted on *Raw* as Eugene, the mentally retarded nephew of Eric Bischoff. Bischoff and his lackey Jonathan Coachman ridiculed Eugene and placed him under the care of William Regal, who wound up teaching Eugene how to wrestle in vignettes shown over the course of a few weeks.
* Eugene's debut match against Rob Conway was actually well-hyped, and Eugene came to the ring to a huge pop. Bischoff wanted nothing to do with Eugene and hoped that, if Eugene's manager Regal sabotaged the match, Eugene would quit WWE out of embarrassment. Despite Regal hesitantly tripping Eugene, Eugene was able to get the victory.
* The following week featured an in-ring segment where The Coach interviewed Eugene and made fun of him for having no friends on *RAW*, and suggested Eugene just quit. Eugene headed up the ramp crying when suddenly The Rock hit the stage for a surprise appearance. The Rock said he would be honored to be Eugene's friend, and that the fans were his friends as well. The two beat up Coach and his lackey Garrison Cade, with Eugene getting to hit both the Rock Bottom **AND** the People's Elbow.
	+ This segment also spawned the horrific "Popcorn Fart" insult that Rock directed towards Coach.
* WWE suddenly had a **HUGE** new star on their hands. How did they capitalize on this? They proceeded to throw Eugene **all over *RAW*.** Some episodes featured him in nearly every segment, to the point where fans quit reacting to Eugene.
	+ One *RAW* featured Eugene as interim General Manager while Eric Bischoff was on vacation. The show opened with a game of musical chairs for a title shot.
* Evolution took a liking to Eugene due to his popularity, and looked to exploit him. This goes back to the aforementioned Rock segment, where Rock asked Eugene who Eugene's favorite wrestler was, and Eugene answered *"Triple H!"* (because they both like to play games).
* Evolution allowed Eugene to hang out with them (at one point wrestling in tag matches with Ric Flair) until Eugene's antics began costing the group matches and title opportunities. Evolution executed a long beat down of Eugene to end an episode of *RAW* in July.
* Eugene returned a few weeks later by costing Triple H the World Heavyweight Title in an Iron Man Match against Chris Benoit on *RAW*. As a result, Triple H beat the holy hell out of Eugene's manager William Regal and challenged Eugene to a match at *SummerSlam*. The match was a typical Triple H squash and burial. Eugene never recovered from the loss, got busted for drug use in 2005 and spent the rest of his WWE career in midcard hell until his release in 2007.

### *SummerSlam* 2004: Welcome to Bizarro World

* The Toronto crowd violently turned on this show, leading to the creation of WWE's favorite term "Bizarro World" to describe unruly Canadian crowds. Crowd reaction was so bad that WWE drastically cut back the amount of events held in Canada.
* Kane defeated Matt Hardy in a "Winner Marries Lita" match.
* Batista was teetering on the verge of overness and resorting to doing bodybuilding poses to try to get reaction. He was cheered like crazy in a triple threat match against Chris Jericho and Edge (both of whom were faces and booed out of the building).
* **Diva Dodgeball!** The Diva Search contestants won a game of dodgeball against the main roster divas because the Raw and SmackDown divas couldn't get along due to being featured on different shows.
* Undertaker vs. JBL was so bad that the crowd started doing the Mexican Wave halfway through the match. One fan jumped the barrier and began dancing on JBL's limo, which nearly ruined the match's ending when JBL was chokeslammed through the roof.
* A still-green Randy Orton won the World Title from Chris Benoit, just so Brock Lesnar could no longer be declared the youngest champion in WWE history. He was then squashed by Triple H at *Unforgiven* the next month.

### *The $250,000 Diva Search*: WWE is Classy!

* WWE held a "Diva Search" in 2003 that was exclusive to WWE.com and went largely unnoticed. The winner, Jaime Koeppe, got a photoshoot and was shown on camera at *SummerSlam*, but was never seen or heard from again as there was no contract involved. WWE decided to do another Diva Search in 2004, but this time the segments would take place on *RAW* and the winner would receive $250,000 and a contract.
	+ In a press release, Kevin Dunn emphasized how "classy" the competition would be.
* The Diva Search was given its own special on Spike TV, where viewers saw bikini-clad contestants do "classy" things such as standing splits over the heads of guest judges Edge and Triple H.
* The competitors were narrowed down to a Top Ten before the segments began ruining *RAW* in late July (seriously, some segments ran up to *30 minutes long*). The first segment on *RAW* featured the contestants attempting to seduce **Kamala**.
	+ In this same episode, the contestants were tricked into making a mess out of Eric Bischoff's office. The contestants showed their acting abilities by laughing as Bischoff berated them.
* **ICE CREAM SHILLING!** Featuring classy moves such as deep-throating whipped cream.
* Foxy Boxing with oversized boxing gloves! But instead of boxing each other, the ladies boxed The Coach.
* The Rock's final appearance in WWE (until 2011) was a "Pie Eating Contest" in which Christy Hemme performed the classy act of sitting on a pie after declaring that her butt was hungry as a clearly-disgusted Rock looked on.
* **DISS THE DIVA!** What was supposed to be a classy segment went horribly wrong when the contestants were given live mics and encouraged to say anything they wanted to the other contestants. Carmella DeCesare, a Playboy Playmate who was dating then-NFL quarterback Jeff Garcia, was despised by everyone backstage - so the other contestants made sure to air their dirty laundry. Carmella was told that she *"had a gap so wide you could drive a truck through it"* and that *"having a cock in your mouth has nothing to do with wrestling"* before finally being called a *"cum-burping gutterslut"*.
* The contest came down to Carmella DeCesare and Christy Hemme. Before the winner was announced, Women's Champion Trish Stratus came to the ring and buried both the contestants and the entire competition, much to the delight of everyone. Christy was announced the winner and Carmella promptly turned heel, which led to a horrific "match" between the two at *Taboo Tuesday*.
* WWE then made the entire competition pointless by *signing half of the top ten finalists to contracts*. This included Christy Hemme (fired in 2005 for supposedly getting "friendly" with Triple H), Joy Giovanni (fired in 2005 after a weird angle where she was the "special friend" of The Big Show), Amy Weber (became JBL's manager and quit after Randy Orton supposedly shit in her bag), Candice Michelle, Michelle McCool and Maria Kanellis.
* The competition won WrestleCrap's Gooker Award for the year by a very large margin.

### The $1,000,000 Tough Enough: SmackDown Gets A Male Diva Search

* WWE revived the Tough Enough reality show, but this time the segments were aired during SmackDown just like the Diva Search.
* An introductory special aired on UPN before the competition began. It featured contestants trying out on a beach by running obstacle courses and completing other goofy challenges. One man finished an obstacle course after tearing his bicep, and was *signed to a developmental contract on the spot.* Another contestant, Marty Wright, was booted from the contest for lying about his age (the cutoff age for the competition was 35, and Wright claimed he was 30; he was really 40 at the time). Wright was still signed to a contract and later became The Boogeyman.
* The segments on SmackDown were just as bad as the Diva Search segments. Contestants were forced by Hardcore Holly to eat lots of food, then run laps until they puked. Other segments involved playing capture the flag with the Basham Brothers and lifting heavy things with The Big Show.
* One segment was an amateur wrestling contest with Kurt Angle. After Angle easily defeated one contestant, he challenged the rest, and contestant Daniel Puder, an amateur MMA fighter, locked Angle in a kimura lock. Angle was able to escape the hold thanks to quick thinking from the referee (Dave Meltzer said a real MMA fighter would have tapped well before then), but could have been seriously injured had he been left in the hold any longer.
* Puder ended up winning the contest. He made a single appearance in the 2005 Royal Rumble (where he was beaten by Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit, and Hardcore Holly) and was released in September 2005. Much like the Diva Search, many of the finalists were signed to contracts. This included runner-up Mike Mizanin (went on to become future WWE Champion The Miz), Nick Mitchell (Mitch of the Spirit Squad), Daniel Rodimer (a Stephanie McMahon pet project that was rumored to be pushed heavily despite virtually no in-ring talent), and Ryan Reeves (aka Skip Sheffield aka Ryback).

### Miscellaneous Shenanigans

* The Big Show won the US Title from Eddie Guerrero at *No Mercy* in October 2003, and proceeded to *not defend the title until February*. His only defense was against Billy Gunn, and his next defense was at *WrestleMania XX*, where he lost the belt to John Cena.
* With just a simple punch to the face from Garrison Cade, Tajiri was **pinned by Johnathan Coachman** at *Backlash*.
* "Stone Cold" Steve Austin and WWE parted ways in April over the rights to use the "Stone Cold" name in outside projects. WWE announced they had released one of the biggest stars in company history with a generic *"We wish him the best in his future endeavors!"* post on WWE.com on a random Friday night.
* Originally, Randy Orton's World Heavyweight Championship reign was supposed to last longer, but due to his antics on the road (which included causing several thousand dollars worth of damage in a drunken rage to a hotel room), Triple H decided that he needed to be taught a lesson. Trips then proceeded to defeat Orton in a squash match at the *Unforgiven* PPV, reclaiming the World Heavyweight Championship and restarting the "Reign of Terror". Orton would not hold a world title again for three years.
* Shawn Michaels and Triple H had many great matches together, but by 2004, fans were sick of them feuding. The two had a boring, 45 minute-long Hell in a Cell match at *Bad Blood*. This was built up as the final match between the two... until they wrestled again at *Taboo Tuesday*.
* Speaking of *Taboo Tuesday*, it was the second new PPV added to the schedule this year. It took place on a Tuesday night in October during the middle of the World Series (where the Boston Red Sox overcame the Curse of the Bambino), and despite being a colossal failure on all fronts, WWE held another one in 2005.
* The end of The Rock's career, brought to you by Johnny Ace. Basically, The Rock was lowballed on the first contract offered by John Laurinaitis. Johnny then proceeded to not send him another offer until **after The Rock's old contract expired.** This pissed off The Rock because he was keeping his schedule open for talks with WWE and waited for about a month for a new offer, only to not get it. Once Laurinaitis finally sent The Rock an offer, it was another lowball offer which caused The Rock to leave the company entirely. Since then, he only made a handful of appearances until his eventual feud with John Cena in 2012.
* Kane raped Lita and got her pregnant while she was dating Matt Hardy, then forced her to marry him. Lita miscarried the child after Kane landed on her after being hit with a steel chair by Gene Snitsky. This event caused Kane and Lita to bond and go after Snitsky for revenge. Snitsky would torment the couple for the rest of the year, most notably punting a baby doll into the crowd on an episode of *RAW*.
* The Big Show spent most of the year recovering from nagging injuries before returning in the fall. Kurt Angle and his stooges shot Show with a tranquilizer dart, shaved his head and took pictures of Angle standing above Show. Every time this was recapped, Michael Cole made sure to scream that Kurt was *"raping Big Show of his dignity!"* in an homage to Gorilla Monsoon using those words when Big John Studd and Bobby Heenan did the same thing to Andre the Giant in the 1980s. This only served to highlight that Michael Cole is no Gorilla Monsoon.
* Kurt Angle and JBL had a competition to see which of the two could form the shittier stable. JBL created "The Cabinet" which featured jobbers Orlando Jordan and the Basham Brothers. Angle's stable featured Luther "Horshu" Reigns and ex-Natural Born Thriller Mark Jindrak.
* In October, Carlito Caribbean Cool debuted in a huge way, knocking off John Cena to win the US Title. Cena needed time off to film *The Marine* and was written off of *SmackDown!* for a month by being stabbed in a nightclub after the show by Carlito and his bodyguard Jesus. When Cena returned at *Survivor Series*, there were no scars and he easily got revenge on both newcomers. Carlito was Carly Colon, son of Puerto Rico's legendary Carlos Colon, which was never mentioned by WWE as they began to hide that the children of famous wrestlers were, in fact, second- or third-generation wrestlers. This would come to be known as McGillicutty-ing.
* Near the end of the year, Paul Heyman got himself fired from WWE. At the time, he was still on the *SmackDown!* creative team. What happened was that Paul Heyman was caught listening in on a *RAW* conference call with the creative team of that brand. How this happened is a story of its own. Dirtsheets reported that Stephanie McMahon was the main catalyst in getting Heyman removed from the creative team.

## 2005

* After *WrestleMania 21*, Kurt Angle was placed in a feud with Booker T in which he stalked Booker's real-life wife Sharmell and, in one uncomfortable segment rife with racism, strongly implied that he wanted to **rape her backstage**.
* The HeartThrobs debuted as a tag team on *RAW*, losing to William Regal and Tajiri. They eventually found their way onto the WWE webshow *Byte This*, where they tried to strip Todd Grisham naked. This got the producer of the show fired and the whole show was eventually cancelled. The HeartThrobs were wished the best in their future endeavours not long afterward.
* Matt Morgan returned to *SmackDown!* after a lengthy stint in OVW. When he came back, he was given a ridiculous stuttering gimmick and would soon become Carlito's bodyguard, though that arrangement was dissolved when Carlito was drafted to *RAW*. Morgan was released a few months later.
	+ In his final WWE appearance, Morgan was in the middle of the ring as William Regal was making his way to the ring, but the Mexicools interfered during the entrance and attacked Morgan. William Regal awkwardly stood on the entrance path and just watched the beatdown.
* Heidenreich and Road Warrior Animal formed a short-lived revival of the Legion of Doom. Christy "Manager of Forgettable Tag Teams" Hemme was their valet for awhile.
* Due to the growing number of the live audiences booing Cena, Kurt Angle began to speak negatively about black people in an attempt to get Cena some cheers during their feud. Along with this, he turned his back on the troops and refused to perform at *Tribute to the Troops*, took Shawn Daivari (who was last seen with mega heel Muhammad Hassan) on as his manager, and said he hated Jesus (**Daivari:** *"Who did he ever beat?"*). Kurt *still* got a considerable amount of cheers over Cena.
	+ Speaking of Shawn Daivari, his debut match on WWE TV was a win over **none other than Shawn Michaels**. On a shoot interview, his response to the result of this match was *"This is fucking retarded"*.
* **Momma Benjamin.** WWE introduced a fat black female character known as Momma Benjamin, Shelton Benjamin's kayfabe mother. Shelton Benjamin was a young, extremely athletic wrestler who was still very much over on *RAW*, especially after his memorable upset win against Triple H over a year ago, and this was the best thing they could come up with to get him over as a heel. The entire thing seemed to be an attempt to get the crowd to chant *"Momma's boy!"*, but it never really took off.
* Chavo Guerrero jumped to *RAW* in a trade made after the 2005 Draft, then showed up on July 7th repackaged as Kerwin White. The gimmick was racist from the start, as his original catchphrase was *"If it ain't white, it ain't right!"*. This was later completely phased out. Two months later, he was given a caddy (the first appearance of Nick "Dolph Ziggler" Nemeth), and the two tagged together until Eddie Guerrero's death, when the gimmick was dropped entirely. Nemeth was promptly kicked back to developmental and repackaged, becoming Nicky of the Spirit Squad.
* A Hell in a Cell match took place between Randy Orton and the Undertaker at *Armageddon* 2005. During it, Taker busted Orton's father, "Cowboy" Bob Orton, wide open and got his blood all over him. Nobody told Taker that he was risking catching Hepatitis C from Cowboy Bob when he did that, despite John Laurinaitis (yes, him again) having been told and ordering it to happen anyway. He *"didn't think it was important"*. It's a miracle that 'Taker wasn't infected.

* Christian started to become one of the most popular wrestlers on the roster in early 2005. The fans got behind him to the point where he was being cheered over top faces such as Batista and John Cena. It seemed as if the WWE was going to give the fans what they wanted, as they put Christian in a WWE Championship match with Cena at *Vengeance*, but they then threw Chris Jericho into the match and put all of the focus on Jericho and Cena. Unsurprisingly, Christian ended up being the one to eat the pin in that match. He was then drafted to *SmackDown!*, which saw him get tossed back down to the midcard and lose almost every match. The apparent reason behind Christian's de-push was simply because Vince McMahon saw nothing in Christian, and thought that he had a "ratty" face. It was also at this time that Christian's shirt managed to become the top-selling piece of merchandise on WWE's online store. WWE proceeded to remove Christian's merchandise from their website, and would even go as far as not selling his shirts at a Toronto taping of *SmackDown!*. Despite this shithead move, WWE wanted to sign him to another contract on October 31, but Christian declined, let his contract expire and jumped ship to TNA the following month.

### *WrestleMania 21*

* To open the show, the tag team champions opened the show by... fighting each other instead of defending their titles. Throughout this match, Rey constantly adjusted his loose mask to keep it from coming off.
	+ Dirtsheets at the time reported that Eddie and Rey had to approach the creative team with the idea of this match for it to happen. Beforehand, nothing was planned for them, which is especially strange for Eddie Guerrero, who was a *WWE champion* in the previous year.
* Trish Stratus had her first title defense in a long time in this show. It was an over-hyped match that lasted a little over four minutes, with much of the crowd cheering for Trish despite her being a heel.
* Sumo wrestling champion Akebono and Big Show had a sumo match. As if this wasn't bad enough, we all had to see Big Show in a mawashi.

### The Rise and Fall of Muhammad Hassan

* Hassan was originally an interesting concept: An Arab-American man in a post-9/11 world, speaking out about the prejudices he endured because of what ethnicity he was. Never mind that Mark Copani, the man playing the character, wasn't actually of Middle Eastern descent (though his manager, Shawn Daivari, genuinely was).
* Partway through, the writers seemed to stop giving a damn and pretty much turned him into a full-on stereotypical "foreign terrorist" heel, including having Undertaker be carried out by several black-clad and masked "terrorists" on an episode of *SmackDown!* after Hassan and the "terrorists" beat Undertaker down and Hassan garrotted the Undertaker in a tasteless scene meant to evoke terrorist beheadings of hostages.
* Unfortunately, this part aired the same day that al-Qaeda murdered 52 people in a series of suicide bombings in London, England and, without time to edit or otherwise remove it from the program, it aired uncut. UPN threw a massive fit and ordered WWE to keep Hassan off their network, which, for some reason, they interpreted as *"remove him from TV entirely"*.
* Undertaker squashed Hassan at *The Great American Bash*, and Hassan was fired two months later. This experience soured Mark Copani on wrestling as a whole and turned him into a veritable recluse, and it'd be several more years before he'd have anything to do with wrestling again.

### J.R. vs. The McMahons

* On *RAW Homecoming*. the entire McMahon family was given Stone Cold Stunners by "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. Jim Ross was then fired by Linda McMahon for not doing enough to stop it from happening. This marked the first heel turn of Linda's career and she was rarely seen after this, making the entire thing pretty useless. She kicked him in the nuts to close the show and this clip was played countless times by her opposition during her ill-fated 2010 run for the US senate.
* In reality, J.R. needed time off for surgery on his colon and his firing was a way of getting him off of TV. McMahon broke kayfabe and addressed this in a skit that lasted over seven minutes, in which he pretended to be a doctor (Dr. Heiney) who pulled things out of J.R.'s ass. A bottle of J.R.'s BBQ sauce, Mae Young's hand son (again!), a talking "Stone Cold" Steve Austin slurpee cup and J.R.'s own head were among the things found shoved up his rectum.
	+ By the way, this was a repeat of when the Hurricane had done the exact same thing to Triple H years beforehand.
* Meanwhile, Stone Cold was fighting to get J.R. re-hired. GM Eric Bischoff decided that, if he beat Jonathan Coachman in a match at *Taboo Tuesday*, he would hire J.R. back. The match never ended up happening because Creative actually wanted Austin to job to Coach. Austin promptly said *"fuck this!"* and walked out on the WWE again.
* Coach prepared himself by enlisting the help of Goldust, who returned to get revenge on Austin for something insignificant that had apparently happened between the two several years before. Vince came out and announced that Austin had pulled out and replaced him with Funaki, the joke being that Coach is *Raw*'s #1 announcer and Funaki was *Smackdown!*'s. Funaki was quickly beaten up by Goldust. McMahon then replaced Coach's opponent once again, this time with Batista. Batista came down to fight Goldust, only to be interrupted by...
	+ Big Van Vader, who made his bizarre and unexpected re-debut in his first appearance in WWE since 1998 when he was practically used as a jobber. He was so severely out-of-shape that he fell off the ring apron and landed flat on his ass while trying to leave the ring. As Coach and Goldust helped Vader to his feet, he could clearly be heard dropping multiple f-bombs live on-air.
* Batista beat Coach, Vader and Goldust in a Street Fight at *Taboo Tuesday*... but J.R. remained off TV for the rest of the year.
	+ Vader notably jumped too early to take a spinebuster from Batista at one point. They tried it again less than a minute later, with Batista clearly signaling to Vader that he should walk towards him to take the spinebuster.

## 2006

### Eddiesploitation

* Following Eddie Guerrero's sudden and tragic passing in 2005, WWE began using it as a method of cheap heat, which would eventually be nicknamed "Eddiesploitation" and win that year's Gooker Award. This included Randy Orton wrecking his famous lowrider and saying that he was **burning in hell**. Eddie's **REAL-LIFE** wife and nephew - Vickie and Chavo - turned heel by slandering Eddie's legacy live on TV. Never mind that Chavo had just turned face again, having just dropped the Kerwin White gimmick, or anything like that. WWE had to turn him heel again.
	+ Rey Mysterio's world title push was one of the biggest offenders regarding "Eddiesploitation", and even when taking Eddie's death out of the equation, it was a terrible title reign.
	+ Rey's first major feud as the champion was against JBL. To build up their match at *Judgment Day*, JBL got to pick Rey's opponents for the three weeks leading up to the PPV. The champion proceeded to get **squashed** by Mark Henry and The Great Khali for two weeks in a row, making Rey Mysterio into one of the weakest World Champions of the year. Mysterio also lost other matches against RVD, Kurt Angle, Finlay, etc. throughout his reign - someone clearly didn't want him to be over as a champion.
	+ Upon further research, it was found out that this was the year the *Royal Rumble* winner wasn't supposed to be in the main event of *WrestleMania 22*. Angle vs Orton was going to be the match, and the original plan was for Randy Orton to steal Rey's title shot from him, get away with it and eventually win the World Heavyweight Title at *WrestleMania*.
	+ Vince McMahon did not want to let Mysterio have the World Heavyweight Championship because he was too small, but the rest of the creative team wanted to put the title on Rey. Vince was completely against the idea, but eventually caved in, though he made sure that Mysterio's reign was a total failure.
	+ **BONUS:** Vince McMahon also refused to allow the belt to be called the "World Heavyweight Championship" when it was around Rey's waist. It was just the "World Championship" during his reign, barring a few slip-ups on commentary.

### Paul Heyman books OVW

* For 2005-2006, Paul Heyman got to book OVW, and his arrival came with some controversy.
	+ Heyman tried to rush talent to the main roster (*"If the WWE doesn't call you up in 60 days, I'm not doing my job"*).
	+ Planted students and relatives of wrestlers on the camera side of the crowd to make it seem like his angles were getting over. It's been said on different interviews (i.e. Jim Cornette and Rene Dupree's shoots) that he gave them instructions on how to react for different moments. In reality, the finances of OVW were tumbling.
	+ Still, this run impressed WWE management, who didn't know any better than to believe his booking was getting over on TV, and with the success of *ECW One Night Stand* last year, WWE wanted to set up a storyline that led to the creation of a third brand simply known as ECW.
* During this time, Heyman got to work with CM Punk, a guy who was not wanted by WWE. In fact, John Laurinaitis wanted CM Punk to be released at this time. Paul Heyman was repeatedly told through mails and different staff members to *"finish him up"*, but Punk was kept in OVW, and was eventually called up to ECW.

### *Tim White's Lunchtime Suicides*

* Tim White was a WWE referee who injured his shoulder during a Hell in a Cell match between Triple H and Chris Jericho. White was forced to retire after *WrestleMania XX*, when he re-injured his shoulder making a three-count during a match between Jericho and Christian. White then opened a bar in Rhode Island called The Friendly Tap. WWE shot a series of skits there with him where he kept rambling on about the injuries ruining his life, all the while drinking a large amount of alcohol. The segments involved Josh Matthews interviewing him, and every segment involved him trying to commit suicide only to reveal next week that the attempts had always failed. Each attempt became more and more cartoonish with each segment.
	+ The first episode concluded with White pulling out a hunting shotgun and turning it on himself while the camera slowly pans to Josh Matthews who watches in horror.
		- On January 6, 2006, it was revealed that White had shot his foot accidentally during the shotgun attempt. When interviewed again by Josh Matthews about his New Year's resolutions, he proceeded to scarf down a box full of rat poison, and subsequently fell over in his chair. This segment was leaked onto the internet several days earlier and included was the uncut footage of the post-segment which included the producers as well as White goofing around using some mildly foul language.
		- On January 15, 2006, White was interviewed by Matthews again (Does nothing shake this man?) while trying to hang himself. Needless to say, the rope broke.
		- For weeks afterward, WWE's official website uploaded a new video showing Matthews trying to interview White who was about to commit suicide each week in a different way. This became a regular segment on WWE's website and was given the name of "Lunchtime Suicides", uploaded every Thursday at lunchtime.
		- On April 6, 2006, WWE.com uploaded a video where White did not attempt to commit suicide. In fact, he invited Mathews to a party at The Friendly Tap to take place the following week. The next week, Mathews attended the party, and ended up getting shot by White.
			* By the way, all these started ***just one month after the death of Eddie Guerrero.***

### May 19th: Kane vs. "Kane"

* May 19th was originally the date that the horror movie Kane starred in, *See No Evil*, was going to be released in theaters. The month before, Kane started going off the deep end, presumably due to *"voices in his head"*, and attacked anyone who mentioned that date. Later, pre-recorded audio clips and video featuring his mask began playing during his matches. This would be attributed to an impostor Kane (played by the guy who would later become Festus/Luke Gallows) wearing Kane's old mask and costume. About two weeks after the reveal, Kane reclaimed his mask and kicked the impostor out, and the storyline was killed off due to negative fan reaction. Apparently the writers hadn't learned by then that nobody likes "original vs. impostor" storylines.

### The New and "Improved" D-Generation X

* The last *RAW* of 2005 ended with Vince McMahon reviewing the Bret Hart DVD. Shawn Michaels came out and told Vince that he was the only one who hadn't gotten over the Montreal Screwjob and that it was time to let it go. Vince took offense to this logical request and made it his personal mission to screw Shawn Michaels over.
* The two ended up having a decent match at *WrestleMania 22*, but the buildup for the match was your typical Vince feud. Vince brought back Shane McMahon to assist him in making Shawn Michaels' life a living hell, first by eliminating Shawn from the *Royal Rumble* match. Shawn's old Rockers tag team partner Marty Jannetty was brought back in a series of ridiculous segments where Vince forced both of them to join the "Vince McMahon Kiss My Ass Club". Later segments saw Shawn pour urine on Vince during an in-ring drug test and Shane defeating Shawn on *Saturday Night's Main Event* in yet another recreation of the Montreal Screwjob.
* Following *WrestleMania*, the feud did not end. Vince mocked Shawn's religion in a series of wacky segments inside of a church, where Vince decided to found his own religion. This led to a tag team match being booked for *Backlash* between the McMahons and Shawn Michaels and "God". Yes, the McMahons booked **GOD** to be the tag team partner of Shawn Michaels. It was meant to be a handicap match all along, but still silly. The McMahons even needed the help of the Spirit Squad to beat HBK.
	+ The Spirit Squad was a group of 5 male cheerleaders that eventually became the incompetent bodyguards of the McMahons. They debuted on the January 23 *RAW* and would terrorize and annoy everyone until November, when DX put them all in a box and shipped them to OVW. **Seriously, this was how the group was disbanded and written off television.** Each member was then repackaged in OVW and eventually fired except for Kenny, who returned to *RAW* as Kenny Dykstra shortly after, and Nicky, who returned to the main roster in 2008 as Dolph Ziggler.
* Around this same time, Triple H was trying to get back in the WWE Title hunt, meaning he had to go through Vince. Vince attempted to get Triple H to join the "Kiss My Ass Club", but a mickey gone wrong ruined the plan. As punishment, Triple H was booked in a gauntlet against the Spirit Squad, which saw Shawn Michaels run in for the assist, officially reuniting D-Generation X. The next week, DX annoyed Vince with items such as Big Dick Johnson and a penis-enlarging pump, which convinced Vince to destroy DX. Later, DX brought out female cheerleaders to strip and dumped green slime on the Spirit Squad.
* The following weeks saw more "hilarious" DX shenanigans such as imitating Vince and Shane before dropping liquid feces all over them and the Spirit Squad, discussions on how large of a penis the guy who knocked up Stephanie McMahon has, and hijacking the production truck during one of Vince's in-ring promos and playing the infamous "Stand Back" song from the 1987 Slammy Awards, which was repeating a bit done originally by Chris Jericho and Chris Benoit in 2001. DX squashed the Spirit Squad on multiple occasions before finally teaming up against the McMahons at *SummerSlam*. The match was a combination of a video game and something out of the deepest, darkest reaches of Vince Russo's mind, as the McMahons sought the help of the Spirit Squad, Mr. Kennedy, William Regal, Finlay, Umaga and Big Show to even look like a credible threat against DX. They still lost the match.
	+ One ridiculous segment on the July 3 *RAW* saw Triple H and Candice Michelle sitting at a table talking to each other while both appeared to be having seizures. It was later revealed that two women were under the table orally pleasuring the two. As this was going on, Shawn Michaels, who would look away and not participate in Triple H's vulgar antics, was looking for Mr. Fuji.
* The feud **CONTINUED** after that, as DX stole Vince's jet airplane and spray-painted the DX logo on the side, something they also did to the WWE's corporate headquarters in Stamford. A 3-on-2 Hell in a Cell match was booked for *Unforgiven* between DX and the McMahons and The Big Show. Big Show's only purpose in the match was so that Triple H could shove Vince's face up Show's posterior.
	+ This match saw the debut of the newer, larger cell structure... which never came into play during the match.

### ECW on Sci-Fi

* Relaunching ECW as a third "brand" had been discussed as far back as 2004, and the sales of the *Rise and Fall of ECW* DVD combined with the positive response to the *One Night Stand* reunion PPV in 2005 led WWE to finally follow through with the plans. In May, WWE officially announced the relaunch of ECW, with the brand receiving a 1 hour TV slot on the Sci-Fi Channel.
	+ Sci-Fi didn't just want another wrestling show, they wanted more of a wacky science fiction wrestling show with characters like Kane and the Undertaker. Because of this, the first few weeks of the show featured goofy gimmick characters such as The ECW Zombie, Macho Libre and Big Dick Johnson. These characters were usually beaten up by The Sandman with a Singapore Cane. In addition, Kevin Fertig, the former Mordecai, re-debuted as Kevin Thorn, a vampire. His manager was Ariel, a tarot card reader/gypsy played by Shelly Martinez.
* One of the many problems with the new ECW was that Stephanie and Vince McMahon, along with Kevin Dunn, were in charge of the creative aspects, and not Paul Heyman. Heyman would have to submit his scripts to them, and they were usually altered into something completely different from what Heyman originally conceived.
* The first episode was a disaster due to last minute changes by the McMahons (and also because the shows were taped before *SmackDown!* tapings, so the kids in the crowd were there to see Rey Mysterio and not Sabu, and thus reacted to nothing on the show). The first segment featured the invading Edge and John Cena (complete with full entrances and nameplates) attacking RVD, with the ECW roster vowing revenge. Following this segment was The Sandman taking out The ECW Zombie, and a replay of the 30-second Tazz/Jerry Lawler match from *One Night Stand*. After a 90-second Kurt Angle squash of Justin Credible, the audience was introduced to Kelly Kelly, an exhibitionist, who performed a strip tease where she couldn't unhook her bra. The show ended with The Big Show mowing old ECW stars over by winning an extreme battle royale filled with the typical WWE trash can shots.
	+ Despite being critically panned, the episode drew a 2.79 rating, which is around what *SmackDown!* got at the time. However, due to the show becoming an increasingly irrelevant third brand and generally being a watered-down version of ECW (compared to, say, what the *One Night Stand* PPVs showed), the ratings fell quickly.
		- For some comparison, the rating for the *Best of ECW 2006* show in December was a 1.4. The 100th episode of this brand got a 1.0 - **that's right, the show slipped in the ratings so badly that even LOLTNA would get better ratings on few occasions.**
* Rob Van Dam was the first WWECW Champion as a result of defeating John Cena for the WWE Championship at *One Night Stand* 2006. Three weeks into the new ECW, RVD and Sabu were pulled over for speeding in Ohio and were arrested for possession after the cop smelled the duo's marijuana. RVD was suspended for 30 days and lost both of his titles in 2 nights, with the ECW title loss to Big Show coming in Philadelphia in front of a crowd that mostly consisted of original ECW fans that booed everything.
* Over the next few weeks, new stars such as Shannon Moore, Al Snow and Test were introduced to ECW and given huge pushes, while Big Show would defend his title against wrestlers from *RAW* and *SmackDown!*. This led to a special episode on August 1 from the Hammerstein Ballroom that was main evented by Big Show and Batista. The crowd, which had been pretty positive until then (helped by the in-ring debut of CM Punk, who the crowd went crazy for to the point where the reaction actually made him cry), completely and quite predictably shat all over the match. Both men were booed to oblivion, which Joey Styles actually tried to play off as a *"mixed reaction"* for both. Maybe he meant *"mixed reaction"* as in his comment about John Cena's *"mixed reaction"* back at *One Night Stand* 2006: mixed between those giving the finger and those using the F-word. Chants like *"You both suck"*, *"Same old shit"* and *"Change the channel"* were heard, the last one actually being acknowledged by Tazz. Several objects were also thrown in the ring and a roll of toilet paper was clearly visible on the canvas for a good portion of the match. This ended up being the last time a WWE show was held at the Ballroom. While Show played off the chants admirably, outright grinning at times and answering a *"You can't wrestle!"* chant with *"I don't have to!"* in the same cadence, the same couldn't be said for Batista, who was visibly growing agitated during the match and was said to have thrown a massive temper tantrum afterward.
* The "brick" set was eventually replaced by a WWE set with bright lights, officially transforming it into a WWE brand that was largely ignored by much of the fanbase. After a few years of monotony, WWE would use the show as a "proving ground" for younger wrestlers called up from developmental. This version of ECW was more well received by fans, but the show was canceled just as it was starting to gain momentum (see the 2010 section below for more).

### *December to Dismember* 2006

* A grand total of **TWO** matches were advertised for December to Dismember.
* During the show, fans chanted *"TNA!"* and *"Where's Our Refunds?"*.
* Instead of holding the PPV in Philly or New York, where the crowds would shit all over the watered-down ECW product (like they'd done months before), they took the PPV to Augusta, Georgia featuring guys in suits waving inflatable kendo sticks. The crowd then proceeded to shit all over the watered-down ECW product.
* The opening of words of Joey Styles on the PPV are: *"Tonight, we will find out who the next ECW Champion will be!"*, giving away that the finish of the main event would see Big Show lose the title.
* The first match was one of the **TWO** matches booked: The Hardy Boyz vs. MNM. The match lasted about fifteen minutes longer than it should have and was booked as a one-night-only reunion for the Hardy Boyz... who subsequently teamed up the next three weeks on *RAW*.
* Shawn Daivari beat Tommy Dreamer, mostly because the Great Khali squashed him. If you ever needed a metaphor for WWE shitting on ECW, it'd be this match.
* One of the matches was an intergender tag team match between Mike Knox (heel) and Kelly Kelly (at that point a tweener) vs. Kevin Thorn (heel) and Ariel (heel). It wasn't exactly match of the year as the crowd has no one to cheer. Towards the end of the match, Mike Knox abandoned Kelly Kelly to get beaten up by Thorn and Ariel. As Ariel beat the shit out of Kelly, the entire crowd chanted *"**CM PUNK! CM PUNK!**"*. This was because, for the last three months on ECW, Kelly Kelly had constantly shown affection for CM Punk (face), despite dating Knox. She'd even dressed up as him for a Halloween costume contest. Punk had no other major storyline than this going on at the time. Anyway, the crowd kept chanting, the beatdown continued... and Punk never made the save. The angle had been leading to this moment for three months, and we never got a proper payoff. Ariel and Thorn won. The fans were mystified why Punk didn't do anything, because they knew he was in the building because he was booked for the Extreme Elimination Chamber later.
	+ Sandman came out instead to attack Kevin Thorn, even though he previously had nothing to do with this storyline.

#### The Extreme Elimination Chamber

* Sabu, originally booked to be in the match, violated the Wellness Policy the day before the show and was KO'd in a backstage storyline. He was replaced by Hardcore Holly.
* The match opened with RVD vs. Holly before being joined by CM Punk as the first entrant. The crowd was into Punk (despite never saving Kelly Kelly earlier) and booed furiously when he was eliminated first.
* Hardcore Holly was eliminated after a two-count.
* Test's weapon was a crowbar (which is an old pro-wrestling injoke for a stiff guy with no technical ability); he got about two swings of it before it got "stuck" in the chain mesh.
* Lashley's weapon was a table. When Lashley's turn to enter came, the pod door was jammed shut by Big Show. In order to get out, Lashley broke the chains that were the roof of his pod. In doing this, he managed to entangle the table somehow. The table was never used in the match.
* Big Show entered the match with the most feared weapon: The barbed-wire baseball bat. The only use it got is three swings at Bobby Lashley's chair shield before it was completely forgotten about and ignored.
* Bobby Lashley won the ECW Title. Vince would later feud with Lashley and pin him to win the title at *Backlash* 2007, driving away what little remained of ECW's original fanbase.
* This PPV did 96,000 buys, making it the lowest WWE buyrate **EVER** (until all pay-per-views were moved to the WWE Network). Immediately after this number came in, Heyman was fired from WWE. Heyman, in numerous interviews after his dismissal, pointed to Vince as going out of his way to make sure that Lashley won the title that night. Despite Heyman writing plans to have CM Punk win that night, Vince said he was too small to be a champion.
* In an early 2008 interview with *The Sun* newspaper, Heyman stated how he would have booked the Elimination Chamber main event, which included having Punk enter first and quickly eliminating the Big Show by making him tap out to the Anaconda Vise. According to the interview, McMahon disliked the idea, but Big Show liked the direction Heyman was heading and was eager for the opportunity to "make" a rising star like Punk. Heyman also stated that he kept going to McMahon on the night of the pay-per-view to say that *"the people are going to throw this back in our face!"*. Vince ignored him.
	+ In the 2006 Wrestling Observer Newsletter awards, the event was voted the "worst major wrestling show of 2006".

### Miscellaneous Shenanigans

* After being announced for a scheduled match with Viscera, Charlie Haas ran down to the ring, bounced off the ropes and accidentally took out Lilian Garcia, who was on her way out. Lilian could be heard moaning over the PA before she was eventually taken backstage to nurse a broken wrist. The next week, Charlie Haas came out to apologize and was berated by the Love Machine Viscera for not helping Lilian. Then for no reason, both men beat down Lilian and laughed at their grand scheme, which is never revealed or talked about again.
* Despite being a very gritty and violent heel in his first years on *RAW*, WWE decided to turn Gene Snitsky face and give him a foot-fetish gimmick, of all things.
* The Great Khali was signed by WWE in January. He debuted by beating up The Undertaker on *SmackDown!* and **squashed him** at *Judgment Day*. Khali's matches were met with negative reactions because he could barely move.
* One of the notable people squashed by The Great Khali was Gunner Scott. Scott was known as Brent Albright in OVW, and had a Chris Benoit-like shooter gimmick. Upon being called up to the main roster, he received bad reviews from the road agents. In particular, Finlay and Dean Malenko complained that Scott was stealing moves and his style from Chris Benoit. So, in short, when Paul Heyman was booking OVW, Gunner Scott was pushed as a Chris Benoit duplicate, but once he got to the main roster, he was buried for it (despite an initial push) and released. The completely different mentalities between WWE developmental territories and the main roster would cause problems for years to come.
* In the previous year, Vito was introduced as Nunzio's big guy to team with as the Full Blooded Italians. About halfway through this year, Vito was given a ridiculous cross-dressing gimmick. Stephanie McMahon was the one who came up with this gimmick after a character named Vito on The Sopranos was revealed to be gay.
	+ This gimmick became part of an infamous moment at *No Mercy*. At said PPV, William Regal was involved in some skits with Vito where Regal acted disgusted at Vito for wearing a dress. In one of these, Regal exposed his ass and his penis, the latter of which was supposed to be covered by a towel. WWE apologized for this on their website the day after the PPV.
* Paul Burchill debuted a new pirate gimmick early in the year, based heavily on Johnny Depp's character Jack Sparrow from the *Pirates of the Caribbean* movies, complete with elaborate entrance that involved swinging to the floor on a rope and used a C-4 as his finisher. This gimmick got him pretty over until he was abruptly written off TV in June. The reason for this was apparently that Vince McMahon had never heard of the *Pirates of the Caribbean* movies and didn't understand how a pirate character could possibly be a face and canned the gimmick despite its positive crowd reactions, though Burchill himself would later refute this by stating in an interview that Vince was the one who brought the movies up to him when discussing the proposed character. Burchill was later repackaged with Vince's all-time favorite gimmick: A horrible incest angle with his kayfabe sister, Katie Lea.

## 2007

### The Battle of the Billionaires

* The main storyline for *WrestleMania 23* was the "Battle of the Billionaires", a feud between Vince McMahon and Donald Trump. Both billionaires would pick a wrestler to represent them in a match at the PPV, with the losing billionaire having their head shaved.
	+ This was set up when WWE wanted to capitalize on the mainstream feud between Trump and Rosie O'Donnell, who were critiquing each others' appearances like a couple of schoolchildren. WWE held a "Trump vs. Rosie" match on the January 8 *RAW*, which was so bad that the crowd chanted *"TNA!"*, *"VKM!"* (for Voodoo Kin Mafia, the new name for the New Age Outlaws in TNA designed to make people think of Vince McMahon), *"We Want Wrestling!"* and *"Where's Our Refunds?"*. The real Trump was "offended" by the match, leading to his *WrestleMania* challenge to Vince.
* Umaga was chosen to represent Vince and Bobby Lashley was chosen to represent Trump. Unintentional hilarity was created when Trump was on a radio show to hype the PPV, and called Lashley *"a guy named Lindsey"*. Since Trump obviously wasn't on every show to help hype the match, WWE relied on in-ring promos between Vince and Lashley to hype the match. These were terrible and quite possibly the most unintentionally hilarious promos in the history of wrestling. One segment featured Vince trying to bribe Lashley out of the match, and Lashley responding *"**NO!**"* with huge bug-eyes. Another sit-down interview featured Lashley saying Vince was *"old enough to be [Lashley's] dad's uncle"* and that Vince would leave *WrestleMania 23* as *"one bald-headed sonuvabitch"*. Most of these promos are featured in a fan-made "tribute" to Lashley.
* In further attempts to add mainstream interest to the match, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin was appointed as the special guest referee and The Rock cut a taped promo on Raw (his first appearance since 2004), correctly predicting that Trump would win.
	+ WWE would later produce copies of the *WrestleMania 23* DVD with a sticker covering Donald Trump's face. This led to funny memes where fans would photoshop the sticker over old PPV posters featuring wrestlers on the outs with WWE.

### The end of Deep ~~Shit~~ South Wrestling

* Deep South Wrestling was a WWE developmental territory from 2005 to 2007. It gained a negative reputation among anyone involved with it due to Bill "General Hugh G. Rection" DeMott (the head trainer of the territory) and the style of their product.
* To the unfamiliar, DeMott ran a high intensity boot camp style conditioning program that the wrestlers hated. He was seen as trying too hard to "break" the wrestlers and make them "pay dues" in an "old-school" way to the point that trainees grew disgruntled. Some quit and others suffered injuries severe enough to require hospital visits because they were so fatigued before their in-ring lessons.
* DeMott was also criticized internally for being overly harsh verbally toward trainees, jumping on them for any mistakes. It got so bad that WWE brass in Stamford, Connecticut had cameras installed at the training facility so they could monitor his training sessions.
* Despite this, for whatever reason, the WWE office would back him up when talent complained.
* There were also problems with the owner, Jody Hamilton, but Johnny Ace (yep, him again) protected him, but only for a while.
* In August 2006, Simon Dean took over Tommy Dreamer's role of being in charge of WWE's developmental program. Dean wanted a trainer that he was more closely associated with, and so Bill DeMott was released in January 2007... officially speaking. According to Kenny Omega (a former DSW wrestler and future IWGP Heavyweight Champion), it turned out that DeMott kept coming to DSW afterwards, but Jody Hamilton never told the office. Omega even mentioned that there was talks of breaking into Hamilton's office on the day DSW was getting shut down to see if his guns were there... *and check if they were loaded.*
* On April 2007, DSW talent was addressed by John Laurinaitis and Simon Dean. The talent was informed that the WWE office was not pleased with the DSW product, and that DSW was hereby closed down for good. DSW talent had to assist with the removal of all WWE property from the building, and they were all very happy to do so. Before this, Hamilton was told by Laurinaitis that he was shutting them down and Hamilton told him his lawyers were going to talk to him, to which Laurinaitis said *"fuck your lawyers!"* and that WWE had better ones. He then told Hamilton to stay in his office while he talked to DSW talent. Reports from Kenny Omega and Curt Hawkins confirm that John Laurinaitis was pissed off on the day DSW was shut down, as he didn't want to be involved with the territory anymore.
* There was also a disgusting story coming from this territory known as the "naked jelly donut stinkface" story. **There's a picture of this online.** The story is that Drew Hankinson (Fake Kane/Festus/Luke Gallows) was naked in the ring for a long period of time, giving alternating naked stinkfaces to both Zack Ryder and female wrestler Melissa Coates while Bill held jelly donuts over their faces. According to Bruce Prichard, the talent could vote on this happening somehow and the idea was that if you went through this, you'd get out of regular training for the day.

### Miscellaneous Shenanigans: Now 100% Chris Benoit Free!

* The main event of the January 1 *RAW* featured WWE Champion John Cena taking on Kevin Federline. Who, you ask? Remember that guy who was married to Britney Spears in the mid-2000's when she went crazy? **Yeah, that guy.** The match was actually hyped for months after Cena slammed "K-Fed" on an episode of *RAW* in October and Federline actually **won the match** thanks to interference from Umaga and Armando Estrada.
* Kenny Dykstra beat Ric Flair at *New Year's Revolution* 2007. This was one of three straight victories that Kenny had over Ric, and this seemed to point towards a good future for him as the remaining member of the Spirit Squad.
	+ Ric Flair would beat him later and then Kenny was relegated to mainly appearing on *Sunday Night Heat*.
	+ Kenny would eventually be drafted to *SmackDown!*, where he mostly jobbed. In 2008, he was gone for most of the first half of the year until he returned to get buried by the grandmaster of burials himself: Triple H. On November, 10, 2008, Kenny was finally released.
* *No Way Out* 2007 was the last brand-exclusive WWE pay-per-view.
	+ At this PPV, Finlay and The Little Bastard defeated The Boogeyman and Little Boogeyman in 6:44. **Does anything else need to be said about this match?**
* On February 23, 2007, Hornswoggle stopped being known as "The Little Bastard". He was seriously named "The Little Bastard" since his debut in May 2006. He was also used as a weapon by Finlay up until the name change.
* At *Backlash* 2007, Bobby Lashley lost a three-on-one handicap match against Team McMahon (Shane and Vince McMahon with Umaga) for the ECW Championship. Because Vince McMahon scored the pin, he was declared the new ECW World Champion and would go on to hold the belt for an entire month.
* The *One Night Stand* PPV was now WWE's, meaning that the name made no sense anymore since it was no longer an ECW reunion show.
	+ Rob Van Dam beat Randy Orton in a stretcher match. RVD was due to be written off television, so this made little sense until Orton gave him a post-match beatdown.
	+ CM Punk, Tommy Dreamer and The Sandman vs. The New Breed in a tables tag team match where everyone spent a good majority of the match doing nothing extreme at all.
* Hardcore Holly was diagnosed with a staph infection by a WWE doctor, but was told to work through it on an overseas tour by John Laurinaitis. It turns out he wasn't needed that badly since the matches Holly worked on that tour were all battle royales. By the time Holly was in Germany, Holly's forearm got swollen up to *twice its normal size*. Draining the infection wasn't working since the infection had spread to the bone by that point. Holly would be put on a "last resort" antibiotic, which fortunately worked. The doctors told Holly that, if it hadn't worked, he would have had his arm amputated from the shoulder down. In his book, Holly quoted one of the doctors saying *"That man [John Laurinaitis] is the reason you ended up in the hospital and nearly lost your arm"*.
* After coming back to life following the Chris Benoit double murder-suicide, Vince was slapped with a paternity suit and thus the search for his child began. Initial plans were to have Mr. Kennedy as the mystery child, but Kennedy was found to have violated the Wellness Policy a fortnight beforehand. Instead of passing the opportunity to another potential star, they gave it to **Hornswoggle**. This led to many painfully unfunny segments, including one where Hornswoggle made Carlito run head-first into a painted wall *Looney Tunes*-style.
	+ Speaking of Mr. Kennedy, he embarrassed himself and the WWE in a non-WWE interview about the Chris Benoit double murder-suicide. Kennedy wanted to defend the company on one of the many interviews in the news about this tragic event... and proceeded to lie about his use of steroids. His claims were that he used to take steroids, but didn't anymore and that you can't beat WWE's steroid tests, which weren't meaningful tests due to the most popular performance-enhancing drug in use in wrestling and the world of sports at the time being Human Growth Hormone, and the top workers in the company such as HHH being exempted from the tests.
	+ Soon after this interview, the Signature Pharmacy scandal happened - and this released names of people within WWE who were using different drugs (steroids among them). Somehow, most of these people weren't getting busted by the WWE Wellness Policy. Mr. Kennedy's name was on this list, proving that he was lying on that infamous interview. Here is the full list of wrestlers who got busted by this scandal.
* At the *Great American Bash*, Hornswoggle won the WWE Cruiserweight Championship. His legitimacy in the match was because he ran across the ring when the bell rang. Hornswoggle was the last Cruiserweight Champion before the belt was retired.
	+ Because WWE thought people *loved* seeing wrestlers get humiliated by a leprechaun, Hornswoggle would feud with Chavo Guerrero for several months in 2009 and beat him in a bunch of ridiculous match types. Everyone hated it. Chavo actually *defended* this "feud" on Twitter, which had people bewildered as to why he would even bother.
* MVP and Matt Hardy won the WWE Tag Team titles at *Unforgiven* 2007. Despite feuding with one another as they won it, they held the title for **77 days.** They finally lost the titles on November 13, 2007 to The Miz and John Morrison.
	+ During this time, the feud between Matt Hardy and MVP gave us a particularly disgusting segment at *No Mercy* 2007: A pizza eating contest which ended with Matt Hardy vomiting on MVP. Hardy ate two slices while MVP finished none before being puked on, so Matt Hardy won this contest, indicating that WWE didn't know how an eating contest worked in the first place.
* Chris Jericho made his hyped return in November 2007, and vowed to win the WWE Championship from Randy Orton.
	+ Rumor has it that Triple H was against the idea of pushing Jericho in such a strong manner, and so Jericho's feud was changed from being with Randy Orton to JBL. Whether that's the case or not, Jericho's push was notably denied by someone with power backstage, as Jericho would have to wait until next year to win a World title.
	+ It was rumored that he was originally set to return the month before, but it was delayed for some reason. It may have been delayed even longer if it hadn't been for WWE Magazine nearly spoiling it by featuring him on the cover. The magazine was prepared weeks ahead of time, so there was no way it could be changed.
	+ In the meantime, he became an inactive Intercontinental Champion. Jeff Hardy had to drop the Intercontinental title and his Money in the Bank spot to Chris Jericho due to violating the Wellness Policy.

## 2008

### Mike Adamle in WWE

* WWE signed Mike Adamle, former NFL football player and the former host of *American Gladiators*, and had him replace Joey Styles on ECW. He botched damn near every time he opened his mouth beforehand on PPV segments, so there was literally no good reason to put him on commentary except that WWE was paying him too much to be a sideline reporter.
	+ Adamle later attributed most of these botches to his epilepsy, which he'd had since his football days. **Yes, WWE actually put an epileptic man on commentary.** On February 7, 2017, Adamle said he was diagnosed with dementia, and that his doctor saw signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy. He believes this and the past 19 years of epileptic seizures resulted from his concussions in football.
* Mike Adamle became General Manager of *RAW*, and the news was not broken to the boys until Shane made the speech at the end of the show. Adamle was generally seen as incompetent and a joke by both the boys backstage and the audience. The move was hated by almost everyone in and outside of the company. As a result, Adamle was gone from television, with many a joke eventually being made at his expense. His run as GM won that year's Gooker Award in a landslide.
	+ Adamle even botched the announcement that he was resigning as GM of *RAW* by getting up from the announce table too early.

### Mr. McMahon's Million Dollar Mania

* The May 26 *RAW* was main evented by Vince McMahon in the ring pondering if giving away a million dollars would get people to watch *RAW*. **Yes, this seriously happened.** The following week, it was announced that there would be a total of $1 million given away each week on *RAW*, and fans could register on WWE.com to win a portion of the money.
* The first week was a disaster, with Vince struggling to use a phone before finally being Rickrolled. For the next three weeks, fans won various amounts of money, ranging from $1 to $500,000. The contest ended after the June 23 *RAW*, which ended with the stage "collapsing" on Vince. As various wrestlers rushed to assist him, Vince called Triple H "Paul" and said that he couldn't feel his legs. Fans were confused as to what the angle was trying to accomplish, and some were upset as the angle took place exactly 52 weeks after the Chris Benoit double murder-suicide. Million Dollar Mania was never mentioned again, nor were Vince's injuries, and Vince returned in January with no signs of paralysis.

### The Rise and Fall of Vladimir Kozlov

* Vladimir Kozlov was a Russian heel who was powerful. Naturally, despite getting less heat than the canned *SmackDown!* heat would imply, he was pushed to the moon, chasing Triple H's WWE championship.
* Triple H was also feuding with Jeff Hardy at the time. At *Survivor Series*, there was supposed to be a triple threat for the WWE title.
	+ Jeff Hardy was taken out of the triple threat match for the WWE Championship. This began the storyline of Jeff Hardy's "accidents", which was expanded later on in 2009.
	+ This left us with Triple H vs Vladimir Kozlov for the WWE Championship. It was so awful that the crowd chanted *"**TNA**"* and *"**BORING!**"* (Edge was later revealed as Hardy's replacement and won the title).
	+ WWE still did not give up on Kozlov's push: He beat Matt Hardy, the ECW World Champion at the time, eliminated The Great Khali at the *Royal Rumble* in 2009 and even got a **clean** pinfall victory over the Undertaker on *SmackDown!*.
* None of this worked, and Kozlov proceeded to do nothing for a while after Undertaker got his win back. Kozlov eventually became a comedy wrestler, teaming with Santino Marella before being released in 2011.

### 2008 in General

* In January, it was reported on dirtsheets (and later confirmed by Curt Hawkins) that the Major Brothers got their names changed because Vince McMahon didn't know that they weren't real brothers until the topic came up in a creative meeting.
* Vince McMahon had reportedly given his approval for an incest storyline between Paul and Katie Lea Burchill. Thankfully, it never arrived on TV due to the product becoming PG, but fans did get to suffer through awkward handicap matches involving the duo.
* Randy Orton and John Cena, two men who were feuding with each other, had a handicap tag team match against the rest of the *RAW* roster... and proceeded to make the roster look like absolute chumps until Triple H ran in and caused the match to be thrown out.
* Remember the previously-mentioned Matt Hardy and MVP feud? Matt Hardy ruptured his appendix during that and, due to the feud having a planned finish with MVP losing the US title, MVP had to hold the title until Matt Hardy came back. MVP's title reign lasted for a total of 343 days (a record at the time), and for lengthy periods of time, he didn't defend the belt on TV because he had to wait for Matt Hardy to recover.
	+ In 2014, Dean Ambrose would break this record in a similar fashion: His reign was 351 days long, and he also went through long periods of time without defending the belt on TV, though he wasn't waiting for anyone to recover. WWE simply didn't have anything for him to do with the title.
* A fake Barack Obama vs. fake Hilary Clinton match happened on *RAW*. The awfulness of this was slightly alleviated by a Bill Clinton impersonator hamming it up for the camera, though the live crowd didn't get anything out of him.
* Kane's dumb feud with Rey Mysterio: On *RAW*, Kane started carrying around an old bag like he was worried about someone, even going as far as asking *"**IS HE ALIVE OR DEAD?!**"*
	+ Marks and smarks alike were ecstatic at the possibility that Kane could bring back his mask. Instead, Mike Adamle forced him to reveal what was in the bag, and it turned out to be Rey Mysterio's mask. Yes, the story was that Kane wanted to kill Rey Mysterio, and this led to many mediocre matches between them. The worst of these being one where Rey beat Kane clean with an awkward-looking senton. The storyline was created to explain Rey's lengthy absence, but it got progressively worse as it kept going. According to this feud, Batista is such a close friend of Rey Mysterio that he didn't know anything about Rey's disappearance until 6 weeks after he was beaten up by Kane.
* Bam Neely debuted as Chavo Guerrero's bodyguard and had a strong debut by attacking Kane and helping Chavo put him through a table. WWE would follow up on this by having Bam Neely job in most of his matches. He also ended up injuring Evan Bourne during his time in ECW and was released in January 2009 after not being used at all for two months.
* Braden Walker (formerly known as Chris Harris in TNA) made his debut in ECW on the July 8, 2008 episode of ECW. Walker's win against Armando Estrada got no reaction whatsoever from the crowd, and he was noticeably overweight. He then won against James Curtis (the former KC James, who had resurfaced in ECW as a jobber some time after his original team was disbanded and his partner, Aron "Damien Sandow" Stevens, got sent back to OVW), did a promo with Matt Hardy (where Matt Hardy couldn't remember Braden's name), and was released from his WWE contract on August 7, 2008. **Ouch.**
	+ Braden's debut segment deserves its own entry. He was booked as Armando's mystery opponent and walked up behind Armando backstage, saying *"Knock knock!"*. When Armando asked who was there, Braden responded *"Braden Walker, and I'm gonna knock your brains out!"* Braden's entire WWE run has been chronicled in this fan-made WWE DVD.
	+ In the popular *Brian Kendrick & Paul London's Excellent Adventure* shoot, Paul London mentioned a story where Vince McMahon saw James Curtis wrestling on a backstage TV, and asked his staff members who he was and told them to sign him, even though James had been on a WWE contract for a long time and had even been on PPV.
* Starting in October 2008, WWE aired vignettes to promote the debut of Kizarny on *SmackDown!*. There was quite a bit of hype as these promos were aired for months and people backstage reportedly were enjoying Kizarny's work in FCW as Sinn Bowdee. He finally debuted in January 2, 2009, and won against MVP with an awkward-looking finisher. What was next for Kizarny? A quick elimination from an Elimination Chamber qualifying battle royale, and that was his final appearance on WWE. Two months of hype for two matches and then Kizarny was released on March 9, 2009.
* The December 12, 2008 episode of *SmackDown!* aired a vignette for Hade Vansen. He was supposed to reveal his followers and feud with the Undertaker. Vince McMahon had arrived to the *SmackDown!* taping, saw the size of Hade Vansen and said there was no way he was going to put Vansen on TV. The angle was dropped and Vansen was released on January 9, 2009, leaving us with a promo that led to nothing.
	+ It was also rumored that Taker had nixed the feud, with Vansen falling victim to the usual reason for a release (that being *"creative's got nothing for you"*) as a result. A masked monster of a wrestler named Black Pain was supposed to be called up from FCW for this angle, but that was also cancelled. Black Pain would later be turned into Sweet Papi Sanchez - a name that speaks for itself - and would be released in 2010.
* Colt Cabana debuted on *SmackDown!* as Scotty Goldman on August 15, 2008. Knowing his track record on the indy scene, WWE hyped Goldman's debut by... not promoting it at all and just having him lose every match he was in. His final WWE match was a loss to Umaga on February 20, 2009 and he was released shortly after. He also had an online show with WWE ("Good as Goldman") that premiered on January 14, 2009, but it died along with his WWE career.
	+ Ryan Braddock also debuted on this date in a similar fashion. Jobbed to Big Show, got eliminated in a battle royal, lost a match to a fellow future Hall of Famer Ricky Ortiz on ECW, and finally won against Festus... by disqualification because Jesse and Festus wrapped him up with bubble wrap and duct tape. This was his final appearance on WWE TV before being released.
		- Why did Jesse and Festus wrap Braddock in bubble wrap and duct tape? *SmackDown!* was changing networks and they were the *SmackDown!* Moving Company movers. Braddock wasn't the only one to receive this treatment, just the only one who was legitimately written off TV by it, leading to many jokes that he wasn't unpacked and was left in storage. It was as stupid as it sounds.
* Another debut around this time (as part of Teddy Long's New Superstar Initiative) was one Atlas Ortiz. The week after his debut, he told people to call him Ricky. That was seriously the on-screen explanation for his name change. The real reason was that Tony Atlas had debuted on ECW that week, as Mark Henry's manager, and apparently someone thought that people would confuse the two. Never mind that one was an older African-American gentleman while the other was a younger man with tattoos, huge hair and a rally towel or anything like that.
* Gavin Spears debuted in August of 2008, proclaimed himself the crown jewel of the New Superstar Initiative, lost twice, disappeared for several months, resurfaced to lose again and was then released. He wouldn't resurface again until 2013, when he showed up in NXT as "Tye Dillinger".
* During a backstage segment with R-Truth and Funaki, it was revealed by Funaki that his full name was Kung Funaki. In short, he was given another stereotypical Asian gimmick, this time involving martial arts. Aside from pinning MVP twice, this gimmick accomplished nothing.
* Having shed the remnants of the Spirit Squad (and soon becoming the sole remaining member to stay employed), Nick Nemeth debuted for the third time in September 2008 as Dolph Ziggler... by walking around backstage, introducing himself and shaking peoples' hands. He was soon suspended for a month after violating the Wellness Policy and didn't actually have a match on TV until December.
* Batista bladed in a steel cage match against Chris Jericho. During this PG era, Vince McMahon did not want any blood on his shows, so this pissed him off so badly that he fined Batista $100,000, and Jericho got a $5,000 fine (it was less because he was the new World Heavyweight Champion). On top of that, Mike Chioda and Dean Malenko were also fined $5,000... even though they knew nothing about this and had nothing to do with Batista blading. According to Jericho's third book, Batista took responsibility and paid everyone's fines in addition to his own.

## 2009

### Shawn Michaels and JBL

* The storyline was that Michaels had lost his family's personal savings due to the global recession. This was how HBK became JBL's bitch for a while.
	+ At *No Way Out* 2009, the feud between them culminated in an "All or Nothing" match. Despite the match being a singles match where the rules still needed to be followed, Shawn's wife punched JBL in the face while the referee was looking. The referee didn't call for the bell, and Shawn's wife could be seen laughing after the punch.

### *WrestleMania 25*

* Santino Marella won the *Miss WrestleMania* battle royale whilst disguised as his fictitious twin sister, "Santina Marella". Yes, a man went over **the entire WWE Divas division** for no reason other than to make a bunch of painfully unfunny segments for the months that followed, one of which was used to legitimately write Vickie Guerrero off TV.
	+ The Santina Marella gimmick kept going for months, and was finally killed off on June 22 when Donald Trump (who was the special guest host that night) fired Santina. During one of the many horrid segments that involved Santina, the Great Khali was trying to get a kiss with Santina, and Santina responded by saying that she was in love with Jim Ross. The problem here was that Ross was not told that he would be involved in this segment. Michael Cole called him "Mr. Barbecue Man", and Ross spat back with *"Oh, Mr. Barbecue Man! Who fed you that line?!"* - Here is the full segment.
	+ There were some returning Divas in said battle royale, but they were barely mentioned since all the Divas made their entrances without being introduced. Why? Because Kid Rock was performing a song.
		- Kid Rock's performance was so badly received by the audience that it was actually excised from the PPV for the DVD, while the tag title unification match that had been booted to the pre-show so that Kid Rock could take up time performing was included as a bonus feature.
* Roddy Piper swore at Chris Jericho during the 3-on-1 handicap elimination match.
	+ Mickey Rourke came into the ring after the match and gave Jericho a lame looking punch, breaking his hand in the process.
* Rey Mysterio beat JBL for the WWE Intercontinental Title in 21 seconds. This was also JBL's last match before he legitimately retired the following day.
* Triple H and Randy Orton had one of the worst *WrestleMania* main events in history.

### The PG/Reality Era (2009 onwards)

* The Pepsi Center had to cancel the booking of the arena for Raw on the night of May 25, 2009 due to The Denver Nuggets unexpectedly going into the second round of the NBA playoffs, resulting in WWE having to move to another arena. The relocated Raw was run at The Los Angeles Lakers, home arena, the Staples Center Vince threw a hissyfit and dedicated the night to making fun of the Nuggets. A guy impersonating E. Stan Kroenke got beaten up by Vince. Some guy who looked like Jack Nicholson showed up too, as Nicholson has been a longtime fixture at courtside for Lakers games. It was bad.
* At the beginning of one multi-man match, Batista showed up with a basketball. The face team were wearing Lakers jerseys and the heels were in Nuggets jerseys. Besides fitting the evening's theme, which was making fun of the Nuggets, this was goofing on a line he'd delivered to the Great Khali sometime before that had reached meme status: *"Basketballs don't hold grudges!"*.
* Mr. Kennedy finally returned from an injury on May 25, 2009 in a main event ten-man tag team match on *RAW*. It would turn out to be his last match for WWE.
	+ Mr. Kennedy was released on May 29, 2009. The reason being that Randy Orton was upset at Kennedy, blaming him for landing awkwardly on his neck from a back suplex. Orton was visibly pissed during the match as he punched the mat after getting suplexed. Kennedy was lectured backstage about this incident right after the match and was later released.
		- It's believed that John Cena had also complained to WWE management about Mr. Kennedy.
		- USA Network advertised the next week's *RAW* with an ad that said *"He's back!"* as Mr. Kennedy was shown on screen. This kept airing after he was released.
			* Not the first time something like that's been done: Jeff Hardy was kept in advertisements for *WWE Superstars* and the weekend replays on NBC Universal for several months after he left.
* Mid-2009, Tyler Reks debuted on ECW with a surfer gimmick and didn't get much of a response. He soon vanished from TV for an entire year, switching brands midway through.
* In February, after months of dirt-sheets spouting rumors of Christian returning to WWE to be Edge's partner in crime, Christian returned to WWE... *on ECW*. With no build whatsoever, making it a surprise return. This return had Todd Grisham say the infamous *"It... it's Christian"* line.

### The *RAW* Guest Host Era

* In a ploy to reverse the trend of sagging ratings WWE decided to have a celebrity run *RAW* each week. Lacking any enthusiasm and putting no effort into salvaging the terrible jokes written by WWE Creative's failed comedy writers, it made the bulk of 2009's *RAW*s unwatchable. Despite Lawler and Cole's worst attempts at fake laughing through literally every comedy segment, nobody actually thought this was funny.
	+ In May 2010, the GM power of the guest hosts was taken away by Vickie Guerrero, and in August 2010, the role was renamed "Guest Star" and gradually scaled back.
* Jeremy Piven and Ken Jeong were shown multiple times throughout their night of hosting. Their skits were always dreadfully unfunny, they talked down to every wrestler they had to interact with... and Piven forgot the name of the *SummerSlam* PPV, giving us the short-lived "SummerFest" meme.
* Reverend Al Sharpton showed up to promote education reform. Why he decided that a wrestling show was an appropriate vehicle for this, nobody knows. He was jeered by the crowd and didn't bother hiding the fact that he didn't give a crap. According to Haitch, he showed up five minutes before the show and didn't bother introducing himself to anyone. Haitch thought he was the worst guest host.
* Kyle Busch and Joey Logano, who got into a cringeworthy argument with Chris Jericho and introduced his opponent: *Kofi Johnston*.
	+ They weren't the only ones to utterly botch Kofi's name, as the next week Ozzy Osbourne introduced him as *Kobe Kingston*.
* Dennis Miller hosted the *2009 Slammy Awards*, an episode which is regularly panned as one of the worst *RAW*s ever. He started the show by telling a series of conservative jokes (usually reserved for his spot on Fox News' *O'Reilly Factor* and showing photoshopped pictures of Dick Cheney and George W. Bush on DX's bodies. The usually silent Corpus Christi crowd gathered enough effort to boo him at this point. **What a way to start a show!**
	+ It's also worth noting that, in kayfabe, Dennis Miller is responsible for giving Mr. McMahon the idea of bringing Bret Hart back.
	+ Later in the night, he introduced Triple H as "The Show".
* Timbaland hosted one week and looked as if he was stoned out of his mind. In all fairness, that was the only way for ANYONE to get through Raw during this era.
* Jerry Springer's guest hosting gig involved a horrible segment that mimicked his show and ended with him being sexually harassed by Mae Young.
* ***MacGruber.*** Will Forte, Kristen Wiig and Ryan Phillippe, all in character. This got really irritating after a while. R-Truth was also literally blown up, which he successfully no-sold by returning to TV the next week.
* 80-year-old Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin was the host of a commercial-free *RAW*, during which he called the company the "WWF" on-air.
	+ Wouldn't have been so bad, except they had him host in **Canada**. Yep, it was a retread of the time Sgt. Slaughter hosted in Canada, which was also horrible. Apparently nobody realized that we'd already gotten the "Vince hates Canada" joke the first time and wanted to beat that dead horse a bit more.
* Ashton Kutcher hosted one week, appearing once "backstage". It was eventually reported that his one segment on the show was actually pre-taped from Hollywood.
* Quinton "Rampage" Jackson and Sharlto Copley would participate in several horrendous segments in character to promote their movie *The A-Team*. Their co-star Bradley Cooper showed up for all of five minutes at the beginning of the show, then got the hell out of there, presumably before he could be roped into them as well.
* Florence Henderson (AKA Mrs. Brady from *The Brady Bunch*) hosted. She hadn't done anything relevant since the 1970s and was there to plug her autobiography where she wrote that an affair with the former mayor of New York left her with crabs.
* Justin Long hosted with co-stars Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis to promote their movie *Going The Distance*. In an interview after the show, he called the experience "a complete disaster" and claimed that the live audience shouted homophobic slurs at him.
* Others like Snoop Dogg, Michael Strahan and ZZ Top (the last one rumored to not have been allowed to appear before the live audience) just didn't do anything and their presence ended up taking away from the show.
* Boxer Ricky Hatton hosted an episode of *RAW* in Sheffield, England and actually beat Chavo Guerrero in a "Boxer vs. Wrestler" match.
* One week, Jonah Hill was hyped as appearing on the show until the very last minute before the show started, then ended up not appearing as the show had been rewritten and his pre-taped segments had been removed.
* Apparently, having not learned from the negative reception the other in-character movie-promoting guest stars had received, WWE had the actors from the *Three Stooges* movie reboot guest-star one week. After some hideous "comedy" segments with Santino, they were brought out before the live audience... who greeted them with a healthy chorus of boos. One (Will Sasso, who some might remember from *MadTV* and actually faced Bret Hart in a singles match on a 1999 episode of *WCW Monday Nitro*) did a pretty decent impression of Hulk Hogan, but that didn't save them. Thankfully, they were soon put out of everyone else's misery by Kane. Not long after, another of the actors, Sean Hayes, appeared on the Conan O'Brien show, where he mocked the Divas, the fans and said that the last place you'd find him was at a WWE show. Bet he didn't turn down that paycheck from WWE, though. Hayes has proceeded to do fuck all besides provide a voice in the prequel to *Monsters Inc.*, leaving his guest hosting of *RAW* one of his biggest paydays in the past 5 years.

### The Return of D-Generation X

* During the Guest Host era, Triple H was feuding with Ted DiBiase and Cody Rhodes. During the *RAW* episode where Jeremy Piven and Dr. Ken were in charge, Triple H lost to Rhodes and DiBiase in a handicap match.
	+ The week before, HHH cut an angry promo that basically copied Clint Eastwood's quote in a movie: *"Ever notice how you come across somebody once in a while you shouldn't have fucked with? That's me."* - the point is, HHH was angry at Rhodes and DiBiase.
	+ After losing a match to them, HHH cut a very nonchalant promo that might as well have undone the win. He calmly teased reuniting Evolution for help, but then said Orton's a jerk and Batista *"is always hurt"*. Later, he said he would make a call, teasing the reunion of D-Generation X.
	+ The next week, Triple H traveled to WWE's headquarters where, after mistaking a waiter for him (and being mistaken for flirting with said waiter), he found Shawn Michaels (who had not been on TV since *WrestleMania*) working in the cafeteria as a chef. After being convinced to return to the ring, Michaels hit the Sweet Chin Music on a little girl that had been nagging him about food throughout the segments.
* Once reunited, DX was watered down to doing very corny comedy and constantly shilled their merchandise. That is literally what the gimmick became.
	+ For several weeks in the fall, Hornswoggle wore DX shirts and performed crotch chops and tried to be a member of the group, which usually led to Hornswoggle being beaten up or humiliated. DX later sent Hornswoggle a cease-and-desist letter telling him not to wear DX merchandise anymore. This eventually led to a series of segments on the December 21*RAW* where DX was sued by Hornswoggle and summoned to Little People's Court. This is considered to be one of the worst segments in the history of WWE.

## 2010

### *WrestleMania XXVI*

* ShoMiz beat R-Truth and John Morrison in about three-and-a-half minutes. Both teams were laughably thrown together and the short length of the match summed up just how WWE's tag division was doing at the time.
* Jack Swagger took an eternity to get the briefcase down at the finish of the *Money in the Bank* ladder match.
* **Bret Hart vs. Vince McMahon:**
	+ Bret came out first, not wearing the pink and black attack. No, he wore shorts and a t-shirt, looking like he was about ninety years-old.
	+ Then Vince came out with the entire Hart family and announced that they were lumberjacks to stop Bret from running away from the match. This, of course, came after the reveal on *RAW* where Bret had been faking a leg injury in order to get McMahon to sign the match as **NO DQ**. So, Hart had no plans on running.
	+ Matt Striker tried to play this move up as *"genius"* because the Harts were *"jealous of Bret"*.
	+ This match went on for over ten minutes. The crowd had the energy almost completely sucked out of them by the end of it.
	+ The long beatdown Bret inflicted on Vince with a chair was so over-the-top that Vince started to get face heat for taking such a brutal beating.
* The night's ten-Diva tag team match ended with Vickie Guerrero hitting a horrible frog splash on Kelly Kelly. To make matters worse, Kelly Kelly's shoulder came off the mat during the pin and so Vickie just did another lame-looking splash. Everything about this spot was terrible.
	+ Also, Michael Cole mocked Vickie's weight by calling her aforementioned finisher a "hog splash".

### The Straight Edge Society: Gotta Keep Big Show Strong! (and Other Follies)

* Following the summer of 2009, CM Punk was burning hot after winning his feud with Jeff Hardy, which saw Jeff Hardy kicked out of WWE in the finale. This was one of the few occasions in wrestling where the face didn't win in the end, as Hardy was legitimately leaving the company.
	+ Punk began building a stable to further his straight edge gimmick on November 27th, 2009. He took Festus, whose gimmick was that he was mentally challenged, and transformed him into the badass Luke Gallows. Punk claimed that Festus was never mentally challenged, but in fact totally wasted on drugs the entire time.
		- Gallows claimed this to be true. If this was true, this basically meant his former tag partner Jesse (Terry Ray Gordy, Jr) was the worst friend ever.
	+ Gallows became Punk's bodyguard and ran interference for him. Soon, the two took to shaving the heads of (planted) fans in the audience who wished to follow the straight edge lifestyle.
	+ This was how they introduced Serena as their third member. Serena appeared as a fan desperate to have her hair shaved. Serena would appear as Gallows and Punk's valet for the rest of their run, despite being an **excellent** hand in the ring, having been a SHIMMER mainstay for years.
	+ The SES wouldn't really do all that much until Punk began to feud with Rey Mysterio in late 2009 and early 2010. The two would have a *WrestleMania* match where if Rey lost, he would have to join the SES. Rey won. A rematch was had at *Extreme Rules* where the stipulation was that if Rey won, Punk would have to shave his hair (Punk at this point was in Jesus mode, with a huge bushy beard going on).
	+ Punk won after a hooded man interfered on his behalf. On-screen, his identity would be kept a mystery, but it was widely known on the internet that he was a returning Joey Mercury, better known as the Marty Jannetty of MNM.
	+ Another rematch was made, this time with both stipulations on the line. Rey wins and Punk goes bald, Rey loses and he's press-ganged into the SES.
	+ Punk lost due to a run in from Kane (who has accused Punk of attacking The Undertaker recently) and was shaved bald, but Punk hid his baldness with a mask, heavily inspired by Bill "The Masked Superstar" Eadie.
	+ On Smackdown, a video was shown of Serena drinking at a bar, and then the SES showing up and berated her. The word on the net was that this was a shoot comment by the WWE that Serena was partying too hard while employed by them. Serena, both the character and actual person, was walking a fine line.
	+ From this point on (July), SES got into a feud with The Big Show, and would pretty much do nothing but job to him.
	+ The "Mystery Man" angle was **STILL** running. Bear in mind that it started in April. On July 23rd, Big Show ripped the hood off to reveal that it was (shock horror!) Joey Mercury all along.
	+ Joey looked completely different to his MNM days because, as per SES rules, he had a shaved head. In fact, he was almost unrecognizable because he'd been gone so long and looked so different. WWE never played a video package reminding the audience who he was, and likewise displayed minimal effort on commentary to put him over again. In fact, WWE did such a poor job, ***to this day the vast majority of people forget Joey Matthews was ever even in the SES.***
	+ On the 16th July episode of *SmackDown*, Big Show grabbed Punk and casually ripped off his mask to reveal his bald head, humiliating him on live TV. No build-up, no stipulation, it wasn't even a match. Considering that Punk had been hiding his baldness for months, it was **widely** panned as an anti-climatic finish to the angle.
	+ Gallows and Serena faced Big Show and Kelly Kelly in a match where, if they lost, they'd be out of the SES. Serena got the win, and this match was the only one she ever had on screen in the WWE.
	+ On August 27th, WWE.com announced that Serena had been released, making the tag match fairly redundant.
	+ On September 3rd, Punk turned on Gallows following tension between them. Mercury, by this point, *had dropped off the face of the planet.*
	+ On the September 24 airing of *SmackDown*, Gallows confronted Punk, saying that after defeating him later in the night, he'd celebrate by having a beer, pushing the button on a face turn. Punk would go on to win the match. Luke Gallows would later be released from the company almost straight after that night, giving him one of the shortest face runs in WWE history.
	+ With Serena and Gallows released, and Mercury AWOL, the SES was dead. In the space of nine months, the SES angle had started and killed both Luke and Serena's WWE careers.

### Jack Swagger: World Heavyweight Champion

* At *WrestleMania XXVI*, Jack Swagger was the surprise winner of the Money in the Bank ladder match, edging out a clustered field that included Christian, Matt Hardy, Kane, Drew McIntyre, Kofi Kingston, Dolph Ziggler, Shelton Benjamin, Montel Vontavious Porter and Evan Bourne.
* At this point, Swagger had not been with the company terribly long; he debuted on ECW in late 2008 with a strong push, and his work well received on /wooo/. He later bounced around RAW's midcard, chasing the US title. Again, solid, if not spectacular work.
* When Swagger won the briefcase, most believed that Swagger would be gradually built up as a threat, in order to boost his credibility.
* WWE thought otherwise. He teased cashing in his briefcase on the very first *RAW* after Wrestlemania against Cena, but pulled back at the last second. Then, on the April 2nd edition of *SmackDown* (having won the briefcase on March 28th), Swagger cashed in the briefcase against Chris Jericho, who had in kayfabe bruised ribs and just been speared by Edge in an argument. As both Jericho and Swagger were heels at the time, this increased the surprise.
* The general vibe at the time was unsure, but optimistic. Comparisons to Kurt Angle and his rapid push early in his career were often made, as the two shared very similar backgrounds.
* Swagger would retain his title in a triple threat against Edge and Jericho on another episode of *SmackDown*, and then again against Randy Orton at *Extreme Rules*.
* Swagger would then really turn on the Kurt Angle vibes in his promos, bringing a goofy humorous side to them. Memorably, in one segment, Swagger had his massive trophy collection brought out to the ring for him to boast about, only for Big Show to show up and destroy them all.
* This seemed to be the signal that suddenly anyone could take a pot shot at Swagger, because suddenly even midcarders thought they stood a chance against the World Heavyweight Champ... and they weren't wrong.
* Suddenly every episode of Smackdown seemed to see Swagger being one-upped by someone; whether it was Big Show putting him through the announce table, Orton RKO'ing him (**OUTTA NOWHERE** as per usual) or even John Morrison.
* In fact, it wasn't just potshots; Swagger was then put in non-title matches against the likes of Morrison and Kofi Kingston... **and was losing.** The impression that a stiff wind could beat the Champion began to arise fairly rapidly.
* At *Over the Limit*, Swagger retained the title against The Big Show by intentionally disqualifying himself after Big Show went beast mode on him and Swagger decided he'd had enough. Again, the impression that Swagger was only holding onto the title by his fingertips emerged.
* At the *Fatal 4-Way* pay-per-view on June 20, he lost the championship to Rey Mysterio in a fatal 4-way match, also involving CM Punk and The Big Show.
	+ The impression Swagger's reign gives us? That WWE had never soured on a guy faster than this guy. Rumors suggest that Swagger might have gained an attitude problem after winning the title, so factor that in.

### The Rise and Fall of The Nexus: **LOLCENAWINS!**

* June 7, 2010: During the main event of *RAW* between CM Punk and John Cena, all the rookies who had been on NXT Season 1 jumped Punk and Cena together as a unit, all wearing black armbands with a yellow 'N' on them. Wade Barrett was the leader, and led the group in an attack on Cena, Punk, Luke Gallows, Jerry Lawler, Matt Striker, Justin Roberts and other WWE personnel around the ring, as well as destroying everything at ringside, including the announce table and the ring itself. During the attack, Daniel Bryan strangled ring announcer Justin Roberts with his own necktie and also spit on Cena's face while yelling *"**YOU ARE NOT BETTER THAN ME!**"*. This came to be known as the "NXT Riot".
	+ Daniel Bryan was legit released from the WWE the next day for his use of the tie, because people thought it was too similar to how Chris Benoit murdered his family. This caused the Internet to go into a complete and utter meltdown. The story in kayfabe was that Daniel Bryan felt remorse for his action and thus The Nexus kicked him out. This predictably placed Bryan in extremely high demand on the indie scene and was widely mocked by pretty much every other promotion out there. His first post-WWE indie appearance, for CHIKARA, saw the crowd greet him by hurling ties instead of streamers, much to his great amusement.
* June 14, 2010: Bret Hart was guest GM of *RAW* and fired Wade Barrett for his actions, burying all of The Nexus verbally in the process. In response, Nexus stuffed Hart in a limo and had it crash into other cars. The driver of the limo is a mystery to this day.
* **SummerSlam 2010:** The main event was The Nexus vs. Team WWE, seven vs. seven. Miz was teased as the seventh member of Team WWE, but on that night, Daniel Bryan made his surprise return.
	+ The match came down to Cena and Daniel Bryan vs. Slater, Gabriel and Barrett. Bryan made Slater tap out, but then the Miz did a run-in to take him out and he was eliminated. Cena, who had been selling like he had been blasted in the chest with a sawn-off shotgun, suddenly went into Superman mode and no-sold all of Gabriel and Barrett's offence (which would include a DDT *on the concrete floor*) before pinning Gabriel and making Barrett cry uncle with an STF. Edge and Jericho had tried to talk Cena out of doing this before the match, but Cena refused, saying that losing to the Nexus would make him look weak.
		- Cena later admitted that telling Vince to change the ending was a huge mistake.
	+ The next night on *RAW*, Darren Young was excommunicated from The Nexus for losing a match against Cena that he'd volunteered for.
	+ During a house show, Skip Sheffield tore his ACL; he wouldn't be seen for a year and a half until he returned as Ryback.
* ***Hell in a Cell* 2010:** Cena was forced to join The Nexus following interference from Husky Harris and Michael McGillicutty, the two new members replacing Young and Sheffield.
	+ Michael Tarver was pulled from the group due to a groin injury. This was kayfabed by Cena assaulting him with a chair. In 2011, following his release from WWE, Tarver would claim that Cena *legitimately* tried to injure him with a chair because Cena was *"jealous of [Tarver's] potential"*. **Yes, he believed that ten-time World Champion John Cena was jealous of a guy in his first year of WWE.** He then became a Christian rapper.

#### *Bragging Rights* 2010

* Cena and Otunga defeated Cody Rhodes and Drew McIntyre for the WWE Tag Team titles in a match booked out of nowhere. Rhodes and McIntyre had only held the titles for thirty-five days.
* On the same night, The Nexus (sans Cena) attacked The Undertaker during his match with Kane and buried him alive. Taker was widely expected to go over Kane as he had already jobbed to him in their last three matches. Wade Barrett explains this is all part of a bigger picture. This bigger picture was never explained.
* In the main event, Barrett faced Orton for the WWE Championship. The stipulations were as follows; Cena was in Barrett's corner and, if Wade Barrett lost, John Cena would be fired.
	+ Cena outsmarted Barrett by having Orton retain the title via DQ.

#### October 25, 2010 *RAW*

* Cena and Otunga dropped the tag titles to Slater and Gabriel when Barrett forced Cena to lay down or be fired.
	+ In the main event of the night, Cena defeated Orton via disqualification, this time caused by Barrett (who was guest ref), who as a result was allowed to select his own special guest referee for his WWE Championship match against Orton at *Survivor Series*. Barrett chose Cena and declared that if he didn't win the title at the pay-per-view, Cena would be forced to retire, but if he did, Cena would be relieved of all of his responsibilities to Nexus. Basically, they just did the exact same main event as the last PPV, but with **EVEN MORE** stipulations, which is why people confuse *Bragging Rights* and *Survivor Series* 2010 *allllllll* the time.

#### *Survivor Series* 2010

* Barrett vs Orton for the WWE Title II. Stips were that it was a pinfall-and-submissions-only singles match. If Barrett won the championship, Cena would have been freed from The Nexus. If Orton won, Cena would be forced to retire.
	+ Orton retained and, in what would be Matt Striker's second most embarrassing moment on commentary, he erroneously yelled *"**CENA'S FREE!**"* at the top of his lungs. Cole and Lawler both pointed out in irritated voices that the opposite was the case.
	+ Cole and Lawler then started to use their *"Owen Hart has passed away"* voices while thousands of child marks cried. The commentary then cut out and we were left with a silence as it was made out that this was the end for John Cena. /wooo/ IRC bombarded *RIP JOHN CENA 1986 - 2010*.

#### November 22, 2010 *RAW*

* The next night, Cena gave a tearful farewell speech to the WWE Universe. He made it sound like he'd be gone for good.
	+ Cena proceeded not to miss a single episode of *RAW*. He basically made the rampant tears of children at *Survivor Series* mean nothing.
		- As for a reason why he was allowed to do this, he claimed it was because *"security hated The Nexus because they beat them up"*. Nevermind that it was a different group of security guards at every show or anything like that. Logic apparently did not exist for Cena.
	+ Because John Cena was kayfabe fired, he couldn't appear on house shows... **or could he?** John Cena's mysterious masked Mexican cousin ***Juan Cena*** suddenly started showing up at shows, though he didn't make a single appearance on TV.
* In the weeks that followed, Cena (one man) continued to assault The Nexus (seven men) each week. They started to get sick of it. Cena then said he would stop attacking Nexus if Barrett agreed to get Cena unretired. The Nexus threatened to eject Barrett unless he got Cena unretired. Barrett got Cena unretired; surprise surprise, Cena vs. Barrett was set for the main event of the next PPV.

#### *TLC: Tables Ladders and Chairs* 2010: The Death of The Nexus

* Cena literally took out every single member of The Nexus in the run-up to the main event.
	+ The finish to Cena vs. Barrett was Cena literally ***burying*** Barrett under a pile of chairs (but not before covering him with a table for some retarded reason).
		- Angle Conclusion: Take seven rookies and get them huge heat, then have Cena go over every single one of them. **LULZSUPERCENABERRIESDANEXUS!!!**

### Miscellaneous Shenanigans

* Ezekiel Jackson defeated Christian on the last episode of WWECW to become the last-ever ECW World Champion.
* ECW was taken off the air in favor of *NXT*, starting on February 23. What happened to the ECW roster?
	+ Yoshi Tatsu, Christian, William Regal, Zack Ryder, Rosa Mendes and Vladimir Kozlov went to *RAW*.
		- Yoshi Tatsu made very few appearances on *RAW* and even teamed up with Mark Henry for a bit. He also promoted *SmackDown vs. RAW 2011* in Japan. In 2011, he would be drafted to *SmackDown* and get the same treatment. Only *NXT* gave him anything interesting to do.
		- Christian had little trouble getting TV time on *RAW*, and was later drafted to Smackdown.
		- Rosa Mendes did nothing important on *RAW*. She got drafted to *SmackDown*, got some fitness gimmick and went on to not do anything important.
		- William Regal became a pro on *NXT* Season 1 and when he returned to *RAW*, he feuded a bit with Santino Marella, who was trying to team up with Vladimir Kozlov. Regal also traded wins with Goldust and beat Darren Young three times on *WWE Superstars*. Eventually, he became a commentator on NXT, while occasionally competing in matches before retiring and succeeding JBL as NXT's general manager.
		- Ryder went from ending Tommy Dreamer's WWE career to losing to Sheamus in a WWE title match in eleven seconds. Then he became a mentor on *NXT* Season 2, and when that was over, he was just on *WWE Superstars*. He would have to put himself over through making his own YouTube show in 2011. See "The Rise and Fall of Zack Ryder" further down this page for just how well that turned out for him.
		- Kozlov teamed up with William Regal again, despite having been attacked by him and Ezekiel Jackson on *ECW*. He then turned face by betraying Regal and teamed up with Santino.
	+ Trent Barreta, Caylen Croft, Shelton Benjamin, Goldust, Ezekiel Jackson, and Tiffany went to *SmackDown*.
		- The Dude Busters dropped their name for a bit and lost most of the matches they were in. They turned face once they feuded with The Gatecrashers (Curt Hawkins and Vance Archer) on *WWE Superstars*. The team broke up due to Caylen Croft getting released on November 2010. No storyline was made out of this, he just disappeared. Trent had a few neat moments on *SmackDown* and *NXT* before being released in January 2013.
			* The Gatecrashers had also broken up by then, and Vance Archer was released at the same time as Croft. Curt Hawkins was later put with Tyler Reks, and some of their exploits are documented further down this page.
		- Shelton Benjamin looked to have a decent future ahead of him as he beat CM Punk to qualify for the *Money in the Bank* match at *WrestleMania XXVI*. This would be his last match with WWE on the air, because he was surprisingly released on April 22, 2010.
		- Goldust did little on *SmackDown* and was drafted back to *RAW* in the 2010 supplemental draft. He took part in *NXT* Season 3, mentoring Aksana and feuded with Ted DiBiase through this. This feud even managed to get them a pay-per-view match and it unofficially brought back the Million Dollar Championship for a bit. On December 7, 2010, he suffered a shoulder injury and after that, he only made appearances in segments, as he was transitioned backstage and became an agent for the company. He was released in 2012 after it was found out that he suggested a spot for a tag team match between the Prime Time Players and Ezekiel Jackson/Yoshi Tatsu that went wrong and almost paralysed Tatsu.
		- Ezekiel Jackson didn't do much on *SmackDown* at first due to an injury he suffered a month after squashing Jimmy Wang Yang. He was eventually drafted back to *RAw*, got a few matches on TV and even took part in a *Bragging Rights* tag match between Team *RAW* and Team *SmackDown*. He would notably get pinned by a botched springboard splash from Rey Mysterio where he kicked out at the two-count, but was still eliminated. On December 2010, he was drafted back to *SmackDown*.
		- Tiffany had horrible matches on *SmackDown*. Matt Striker called the team of her and Kelly Kelly "The Blondetourage", and would be mocked for this on a pay-per-view. Eventually, she was suspended for an incident with Drew McIntyre and was released in November. Drew would notably go from being "The Chosen One" to mostly losing matches and being relegated to *WWE Superstars* matches.
		- Tyler Reks also re-debuted on Smackdown in October of 2010, sans surfer gimmick, as a heel. He proceeded to challenge Kaval for his spot on the *SmackDown* *Bragging Rights* team... **and won.** This received no crowd response and pissed people off. He was removed from TV again after a few months, during which he would switch brands again.

### *WWE NXT* Season 2

* Speaking of Kaval (Best known as Low-Ki, his name outside of WWE), he was the winner of *NXT* Season 2. Here are some highlights of the season:
	+ Eli Cottonwood delivered one of the worst promos on the "Talk the Talk" challenge by saying he had no mustache, and then saying he had the best mustache of them all. John Morrison (his pro) was seen facepalming with a clipboard, while Mark Henry pantomimed a plane crash. Cottonwood went on to win an award on *The Soup* for this hilariously bad promo. Once NXT Season 2 ended, Cottonwood vanished back to developmental and did nothing until he was put with Bray Wyatt (a repackaged Husky Harris) for a while before being released.
	+ To help put Kaval over, he won the season with a poor record of three wins and six losses.
	+ On the final episode of the season, Michael McGillicutty delivered two of the worst promos of the season. One of these managed to be worse than the mustache promo, here is how it went: *"Starting this moment, from now...from this moment on... this will be the moment... starting now... of the genesis of Michael McGillicutty."* It was originally speculated that a Nexus-esque faction named "Genesis" was going to be started from this, but McGillicutty's delivery was so bad that we'll never know if that was true.
		- The other awful promo was delivered just before that, in a promo exchange between McGillicutty and Kaval. In this promo, McGillicutty seriously said, *"LayCool. Did you seriously submit your adopted ninja baby into the NXT competition? I don't know whether to spank you or breast feed you."*
	+ To top this all off, after Kaval was declared the winner, the other rookies attacked him and the pros came in and took part in the most awkward brawl *NXT* had seen at the time.
	+ Titus O'Neil no-sold MVP's big boot in the corner.
	+ Alex Riley hit his finisher on Percy Watson and then they just teamed up on Kaval like nothing happened.
	+ The referees looked like they were trying to break up the brawl, but instead they only got the pros out of the ring, leaving Kaval to get beaten up. This made no sense whatsoever.
		- When asked about it much later, MVP stated that the brawl wasn't planned beforehand. Officials just sent the rookies to beat on Kaval randomly and weren't even going to send the pros out until someone said something about it.
	+ WWE hyped the holy hell out of the fact that two of the participants, Husky Harris and Michael McGillicutty, were second generation wrestlers (sons of Mike Rotunda and Curt Hennig, respectively). The reason why Husky had a different last name was never explained, while WWE attempted to explain McGillicutty's as him taking his mother's maiden name to get out of his father's shadow. The problem with this, as the Internet discovered and revealed the next day, was that McGillicutty was *not* his mother's maiden name. Even if it was, the explanation still wouldn't make sense as WWE continued to point out who his father was without allowing him to use his actual last name.
		- It was later rumored that the actual reason for that last name was that Vince wanted more Irish-sounding last names.
* In the end, Kaval ended up jobbing most of his matches on *SmackDown* and got released in December 2010. In a shoot interview, he went on to explain that he didn't ask for his release, as it was initially reported. It was another case of WWE Creative having nothing for him.

### *WWE NXT* Season 3

* *NXT* Season 3 featured female rookies. Not much else needs to be said, but here are some highlights:
	+ Aloisia was dropped from the show, with Vickie Guerrero firing her on-screen. It was reported that Aloisia was taken off *NXT* because fetish photos of her were leaked, though none of them were any worse than any photo shoots her replacement, Kaitlyn, had participated in.
		- Speaking of Kaitlyn, she had her very first match on *NXT*. She'd only been in developmental for a few months prior.
	+ Another competitor was Jamie Keyes, who had been the ring announcer for the prior season. Yes, apparently ring announcing qualifies you for these things. She was fired the day after her elimination.
	+ The **very first match** of the season featured the most epic botched finish ever, in which nobody knew what the hell was going on. Here it is in all its glory.
	+ CM Punk was on commentary for an episode. He was supposed to come back for the rest of the season, but didn't.
	+ The challenges were even more moronic than before.
	+ The commentary was typically even worse than before with Michael Cole mostly trying too hard in general. Eventually, he just stopped trying, and he and Josh Mathews turned up the snark.
		- Commentary eventually went completely off the rails and broke the fourth wall during the Goldust/Aksana wedding. Cole and Josh had been given champagne at the announce table, so they were pretty much hammered by the end of the show.
			* The wedding itself came about because an immigration officer by the name of Agent Dickopopolus (can't make this stuff up) threatened to get Aksana deported back to Lithuania, where she claimed she would be beaten with shovels. **That was actually what she said.** So Goldust proposed and they had a green card wedding. Promptly after being declared man and wife by Ted DiBiase Sr. (who Dusty Rhodes had brought in because Ted Jr. had bought off the official conducting the ceremony), she slapped him and stormed off, suddenly turning heel in the process.
	+ Cole fell asleep several times during the season. After waking up one time, Josh revealed he'd received a text from Cole's wife saying that she knew what it was like to *"fall asleep during the action"*. Shortly after that, the arena PA system announced that the antivirus system they were using had been updated. WWE later claimed that this was one of the arena's systems, while people who were actually there confirmed that it was WWE's.
	+ After one competition, Cole brought out a gong and gonged the whole lot of 'em.
	+ There was an entire episode with **no wrestling whatsoever!** Kevin Nash would've been proud of that one.
	+ Kaitlyn won the competition on the strength of a season-long love triangle between herself, Vickie and Dolph Ziggler, which was promptly dropped when she joined the main roster.
	+ Aksana said so many stupid things (like that she saw Kaitlyn on Jerry Springer *"fighting for her babies"*) that some of her goofier quotes were cobbled together into an actual soundboard.
	+ It was midway through this season that *NXT* was booted from Syfy and replaced with *SmackDown*, which had much to do with how crazy it eventually became.

### *WWE NXT* Season 4 and The Never-Ending Season

* *NXT* Season 4 started in December, but no one cared since season three did some irreparable damage to anyone who cared at all for *NXT* to begin with.
	+ During a talent competition, eventual winner Johnny Curtis performed a **ribbon dance.** R-Truth, his pro, was visibly falling out of his chair laughing at the end of it.
	+ After Curtis won, he was pulled off TV completely while runner-up Brodus Clay was immediately put on TV as his pro Alberto Del Rio's bodyguard. After a while, Curtis eventually debuted with a lame series of vignettes where he made puns. By the time he actually debuted, his pro R-Truth had turned heel, so he didn't get the prize he had won (a tag title shot with his pro). It wasn't hard to see who WWE actually wanted to win there. Several years later, Curtis claimed his prize. **On *NXT*.** ***With McGillicutty as his partner.*** Unsurprisingly, they lost.
* Several participants from past seasons (including Darren Young, which made no sense whatsoever because he already had a contract) came back for season five, which eventually was nicknamed the neverending season as it completely went off the rails and became a brand of its own. This went on for a good long while 'til it suddenly came to an end to make way for NXT becoming televised developmental.
	+ Season 5 started off normally enough, but when Chavo Guerrero was fired while still having a rookie (Darren Young) in the competition, things started going downhill. Eventually, every pro had either been fired or had walked away from the competition. Soon, the strangest things started happening. These included panty-sniffing Mike McGillicutty, Dirty Curty, Yoshi Tatsu and Tyson Kidd feuding over the remains of Yoshi's action figure, a Darren Young/Tamina romance (which became extremely funny in hindsight when Young came out of the closet a few years later), and the never ending Curtis/Maxine/Bateman triangle. It was like someone figured nobody was watching anyway so they could just throw on whatever.
	+ Even stranger was that every storyline was dropped on *NXT* as of the May 16, 2012 episode. It became a yellow version of *WWE Superstars* until *NXT* became a televised developmental.

## 2011

### The New Nexus: What Cena Started, Punk Finished

* Following *TLC* 2010, Barrett wasn't on TV, selling his injuries from being literally buried by John Cena. On the last *RAW* of 2010, CM Punk joined The Nexus in his absence out of hate for John Cena.
* January 3, 2011: Barrett returned and confronted Punk over his membership and his attempt to usurp his leadership. Punk told Barrett that if he won a triple threat cage match against Cena and Sheamus, he'd accept Wade Barrett as the leader of The Nexus and remain as a Nexus member.
	+ Barrett looked like he was going to win via cage escape, but Punk did a run-in and cost Barrett the match. After the match, Punk removed Barrett's Nexus armband, symbolically banishing him from the group. Instead of turning this into a feud, Barrett would promptly be exiled to *SmackDown*.
* January 10, 2011:
	+ To start the show, ***CM Punk climbed the Titantron with the help of a harness and teased that he would jump off in an apparent attempt at suicide.*** He didn't do it, and then called the audience fools for believing he would. Trust us, Punk, not even Mark E. Mark believed you were going to do it for a second. /wooo/ IRC discussed why on Earth WWE would run this angle in a post-Owen Hart tragedy world.
		- Cole laughed obnoxiously and said Punk had the world fooled. The only people who had been fooled were WWE into thinking this was a good segment to run.
	+ Punk decided that all members of the New Nexus would have to pass an initiation test to remain in the group.
		- McGillicutty's initiation was that he had to take a beatdown from the rest of the group without fighting back. /wooo/ IRC screamed *"**BLOOD IN, BLOOD OUT, HOLMES.**"*.
		- Otunga's initiation was that he had to take a beatdown from The Big Show.
		- Husky Harris's initiation was he had to be beaten with leather straps.
		- Justin Gabriel and Heath Slater's initiation was that they had to beat each other with Kendo sticks. They refused to do this, and fled to *SmackDown* to rejoin Wade Barrett. *For more on this, see **The Corre** section of the article.*
* January 17 2011: Mason Ryan, an incredibly jacked and **incredibly** green wrestler, joined the New Nexus after interfering in a match between Punk and Cena. For the rest of his run with the New Nexus, he would rarely wrestle or even speak, and pretty much just acted as a devout bodyguard to Punk.

#### *Royal Rumble* 2011

* The New Nexus helped the Miz retain his WWE title against Randy Orton. Punk later explained this was revenge for Legacy attacking him in 2008 when he was World Heavyweight Champion. It was the beginning of a feud that will bury the New Nexus.
* The biggest Royal Rumble in history was held and forty men were entered. For the first half of the match, the New Nexus **DOMINATED** the Rumble via strength of numbers. Instead of playing by the *"every man for himself"* ethos, the New Nexus members did not eliminate each other, and focused on protecting Punk. This generated **MASSIVE** amounts of heat, as the crowd was upset that the New Nexus were "ruining" the rumble. Many, many, *many* faces teased making a comeback against the New Nexus, but were all eliminated, most notably a returning Booker T.
	+ As Booker T made his entrance, Matt Striker yelled *"**THIS IS A MARKOUT MOMENT! I'M MARKING OUT, BRO!**"*. Striker was promptly removed from commentary.
	+ The New Nexus showed no signs of slowing down until...
	+ **BRRRRRRRRRRRR AMADOU!** John Cena stormed the ring and *eliminated the entire group* (aside from Harris, who was eliminated by The Great Khali) by himself. /wooo/ went nuts; instead of using the moment to give someone making their way up the card a rub, the heat was given back to perpetually-over John Cena, who superman'd the group out of the Rumble.

#### From the *Royal Rumble* to *WrestleMania XXVII* to the demise of the New Nexus

* The next night on the January 31 edition of *RAW*, Michael McGillicutty and Husky Harris teamed up in a losing effort against Santino Marella and Vladimir Kozlov for the WWE Tag Team Championship (imagine any version of the nWo being unable to beat Disco Inferno and Steve "Mongo" McMichael).
	+ After the match, Randy Orton entered the ring and punted Husky Harris in the skull, giving Harris a kayfabe skull fracture and putting him out of action. Randy Orton would then, over the ongoing weeks, punt all members of the New Nexus, despite interference by CM Punk, removing each, one by one, sending all of them back to FCW. At *WrestleMania XXVII*, Randy Orton defeated CM Punk, but was unable to punt him in the skull, thus leaving CM Punk as the only active member of the New Nexus. McGillicutty, Otunga and Ryan returned on the April 11 edition of *RAW* and again cost Orton another shot at the WWE Championship, bringing New Nexus back to near-full strength (Harris would remain in FCW), but their credibility was shot at this point. On the April 25 edition of *RAW*, at the WWE Draft, Orton was drafted to *SmackDown* and beat Punk at *Extreme Rules* 2011, thus ending his feud with the New Nexus.

#### The slow, agonizing death of the New Nexus

* On June 20, 2011, Punk cut his infamous worked shoot promo on John Cena. He was no longer wearing New Nexus attire and never spoke about them again after this point.
* The following week, it was announced that Ryan had suffered an injury over the weekend, and the timing couldn't have been more perfect. That was his loose end taken care of.
* At this point, Otunga and McGillicutty were the only members left (the rest were punted back to FCW), and they eventually just stopped coming out to Nexus music.
* That was the final nail in the New Nexus coffin; even their members ***just stopped caring.***

### The Corre: The New Nexus, only somehow worse

* The Corre formed on *SmackDown* in the wake of Wade Barrett fleeing *RAW* to avoid CM Punk and the New Nexus. It wasn't long before Gabriel and Slater joined him, not wanting to be a part of Punk's group.
	+ On the January 14 episode of *SmackDown*, Barrett, Gabriel and Slater attacked Big Show, and were later joined by Ezekiel Jackson who continued the attack by body-slamming Big Show. Thus began the Corre's (four men) feud with the Big Show, which would *last their entire run.*
	+ In the run-up to the *Royal Rumble*, WWE teased a nWo Hollywood/nWo Wolfpac civil war feud between The Corre and New Nexus. They brawled on *RAW* and at the *Royal Rumble* itself, but it never went further than this. For the sake of both groups, it really should have.
	+ At *Elimination Chamber*, Gabriel and Slater became the first to gain a championship within the Corre. They would win the WWE Tag Team Championship by beating Santino Marella and Vladimir Kozlov.
	+ The following night on *RAW*, Gabriel and Slater lost the championship to John Cena and WWE Champion, The Miz. However, Gabriel and Slater immediately invoked their rematch clause and won the rematch and the championship to start their third reign as tag team champions after Miz backstabbed Cena and walked out of the rematch. So basically, WWE pissed on the WWE tag titles again, just to get over the fact that Miz and Cena really didn't like each other.
	+ Barrett slipped down the card after not winning the title at *Elimination Chamber* after being eliminated by Big Show. On the March 25 episode of *SmackDown*, Barrett went over Kofi Kingston for the Intercontinental Championship.

#### The Self-Destruction of The Corre

* If you thought that three fourths of the group holding gold meant that Corre were on their way up, you'd be **sorely** mistaken.
* At *WrestleMania XXVII*, the Corre jobbed to the mishmash patchwork team of Marella, Kingston, Big Show, and Kane ***in under two minutes.*** **GOTTA KEEP ESTABLISHED UNITS WEAK!**
* The next night on *RAW*, the Corre attacked the Rock and John Cena ***for no reason whatsoever.***. Rock and Cena (two) proceeded to kick the entire Corre's (four) ass. Basically, WWE threw Corre under the bus to get people to think Rock and Cena were cool.
* On the April 22 episode of *SmackDown*, the Corre endured further misery when Big Show and Kane (in a reunion of sorts) won the tag team championship from Gabriel and Slater.
	+ Before the match, Kane told Big Show *"you complete me"*. Awkward. **As.** ***Fuck.***
* Corre failed to win back the titles on the April 29 episode of *SmackDown* and at *Extreme Rules*, respectively.
* At this stage, all possible heat had been sucked dry from the Corre.
* Tensions within the group began to flare due to failed interference in each other's matches. On the May 6 episode of *SmackDown*, Ezekiel Jackson refused to celebrate with the rest of the Corre when he defeated Big Show, instead choosing to walk out on them after his match. In return, Barrett, Gabriel and Slater attacked him backstage and removed him from the group, dumping a laundry cart onto him, which inexplicably sounded like shattering glass.
* This would start a terrible feud and a series of terrible matches between the Corre and Jackson, mainly between Wade Barrett and Ezekiel *"The only move I know how to do is a scoop slam"* Jackson.
* On the June 10 episode of *SmackDown*, Barrett, fleeing from Jackson, walked out on Gabriel and Slater in a six-man tag team match against Jackson and the Usos, leaving them handicapped and causing them to lose the match. Gabriel and Slater confronted Barrett after the match to declare the dissolution of the Corre.
* Despite the Corre being dead, Barrett and Jackson continued to feud over the IC strap. Jackson would eventually go over Barrett, and go on to become one of the worst IC champions of all time, ***of all time!***

### Dolph Ziggler's first world title reign

* Ziggler lost the Intercontinental title in January to Kofi Kingston on *SmackDown*. On the same night, Ziggler won a four-way match against Cody Rhodes, Drew McIntyre and The Big Show to become the number one contender to the World Heavyweight Championship.
* He lost his title match against Edge at the 2011 *Royal Rumble*.
* Vickie Guerrero would ban the spear on the next episode of *SmackDown* to help her boyfriend Ziggler out on his quest for the World Heavyweight championship.
* The stipulation was that, if Edge used the spear in the rematch he was going to have with Ziggler, he would be stripped of the World Heavyweight title, and Ziggler would automatically win it.
* On said rematch, Vickie Guerrero would also be the special guest referee. She, for no good reason whatsoever, tried to hit the spear on Edge as both men were down. In kayfabe, she injured her ankle trying to do the spear as she just bounced off of Edge.
	+ As the ringside doctor checked on Vickie's ankle, Edge hit the spear. However, Vickie was still being checked on, so no one was there to make the count. While he was waiting for a ref, Edge hit another spear on Dolph while Vickie was still watching.
		- Then **SUPER BOWL WINNER CLAY MATTHEWS** came out to count the pinfall, and this is how *SmackDown* ended: Even Michael Cole pointed out on commentary that this made no sense because the spear was banned, Dolph should have been awarded the win and Clay Matthews wasn't even an official WWE referee. Cole yelled *"**WE GOT A NEW CHAMPION!**"* as the show went off the air.
* Sure enough, Edge was stripped of the world title on the next episode of *RAW*. Vickie announced that Dolph Ziggler would be crowned as the new champion on *SmackDown*.
* On the *SmackDown* episode that came afterwards, Vickie Guerrero fired Edge, claiming he had attacked Theodore Long several weeks before (this attack was the reason Vickie was the manager in his place), and held a coronation ceremony later that night.
* During said ceremony, Theodore Long returned and accused Vickie of orchestrating the attack. Vickie would then reveal Dolph was the attacker after that accusation. In response, Long rehired Edge and gave him his rematch for the World title on the same night.
* Sure enough, Ziggler lost the rematch and his first reign as World Heavyweight champion lasted eleven minutes and twenty-three seconds. On top of that, Dolph was fired after this so he could just end up going to *RAW*. Upon appearing on Raw, fans were greeted with the short-lived Brunette Ziggler, who was promptly confused with Evan Bourne.

### *WrestleMania XXVII*

* The US Title match featuring Daniel Bryan and Sheamus was bumped to a dark match, replacing the annual battle royale dark match featuring superstars who didn't make the card. The superstars normally reserved for the battle royale became lumberjacks for the US Title match that year, until chaos ensued outside the ring due to the lumberjacks fighting with each other and Teddy Long came out to officially end the US Title match and scheduled a battle royale featuring everyone surrounding the ring. This was won by The Great Khali. Despite being bumped off the card, a year later, this same match, except for the World Heavyweight Championship, was billed as one of the main events of *WrestleMania*. That ended up opening the show and didn't turn out any better.
* Why was the US Title match bumped? So The Rock could open the show with a 10-minute promo.
* The first official match for the PPV audience was for the World Heavyweight Championship. Yep, Alberto Del Rio won the Royal Rumble to curtain jerk *WrestleMania*. Oh, and this would turn out to be Edge's last match before he had to retire due to a neck injury. **Good job, WWE!**
* Later, we got another promo. This time, it was a singing contest hosted by Snoop Dogg and Teddy Long. A highlight of that included Zack Ryder singing Rebecca Black's "Friday". It ended with Hornswoggle rapping with The Bella Twins.
* The Corre then jobbed to Big Show's KO Punch in 90 seconds.
* More "Rocky Madness" ensued when we got to see him interacting with Eve and Mae Young.
* Drew Carey was booed out of the Georgia Dome during the Hall of Fame segment. Seriously, why the fuck is he in there anyway?
	+ So that he and WWE could plug a lame improv show he was starring in that was premiering at the time. It would be canceled within two months of it premiering, so nobody benefitted.
	+ Carey's induction (and the utter confusion surrounding it) would result in an overzealous publicist declaring that WWE was no longer a wrestling company.
* After this, we saw what many thought would be the conclusion to one of the most disliked angles of 2011: Michael Cole vs Jerry Lawler. Instead we saw Michael Cole actually *on offense* against Jerry Lawler for the bulk of the match. Eventually, Lawler would recover and would make Cole tap to the ankle lock. But the shenanigans don't end there. The Anonymous GM reversed the decision and declared Michael Cole the winner. Lawler then blamed Josh Matthews for the decision, for some reason, and Austin gave him a Stone Cold Stunner. Austin then stunnered Booker too during all this. This was WWE's way of having JR and Lawler commentate the rest of the show. It's worth mentioning that prior to this Lawler and Cole were commentating together and would bicker their way through the matches up until this point.
* Oh yea, Snooki had a match at this *WrestleMania*. And she pinned former Women's Champion Michelle McCool.
* Miz had a well-made video package featuring the Nas song "Hate Me Now" which told the story of his wrestling career. Cena then had a all-black choir sing part of his entrance song... because reasons? Nobody knew for sure, but they were booed by the Georgia Dome regardless.
* Cena and Miz then work what was possibly the worst main-event match ever. It ended in a double countout after Cena clotheslined Miz over the guardrail. Miz suffered a legitimate concussion from this.
	+ The Rock came out, disregarded the Anonymous GM and restarted the match under "No DQ, No Countouts" rules. He then turned heel and helped Miz retain the WWE Title after hitting a Rock Bottom on Cena.
* The next night on *RAW*, Cena challenged Rock to a match at *Wrestlemania XXVIII*. The purpose of *Wrestlemania XXVII* was actually to start the feud for Cena vs Rock at *Wrestlemania XXVIII*. Despite attempts to fit Miz into the storyline, he was constantly in the background during the entire buildup, despite being the reigning WWE Champion.

### The Summer of Punk II: Kevin Nash Ruins Everything

* The big summer angle of 2011 was CM Punk beating John Cena, winning the WWE title at *Money in the Bank* and leaving the WWE with it. Things went awry fairly quickly, but not A-RY, because that would've been even more awful.
	+ With CM Punk having taken the WWE Title with him out of the company, a tournament was held to crown an interim champion. John Cena, the former champion, was not included because he was going to be fired by Vince McMahon for allowing Punk to leave with the title. Before Vince was able to fire Cena, Triple H showed up, revealed that he had been put in power by the Board of Directors and eventually got around to firing Vince.
		- The tournament final would be bumped to the following week just for that segment. With all the time Triple H took getting to his point, they could've had the match anyway.
	+ Rey Mysterio beat The Miz in the finals to win his first WWE Championship and third world title, a huge moment in his career. John Cena challenged Rey to a title match *that same night*. Somehow, the fresh John Cena managed to *overcome the odds* and defeat the exhausted underdog Rey. Cena was now the interim WWE Champion.
	+ Immediately afterward, Punk returned, declared himself to be the real WWE Champion and challenged Cena to a title unification match. Bear in mind that Punk had been gone less than two weeks, and the belt Cena held effectively had no credibility when compared to the one Punk had.
	+ Punk beat Cena again at *SummerSlam* and became the undisputed WWE Champion. However, after the match, Kevin Nash jumped the rail and delivered a Jackknife Powerbomb to Punk. Alberto Del Rio then cashed in his *Money In The Bank* briefcase and won the title in a screwjob. He would rename it the "WWE Mexican Heavyweight Championship" the next night on *RAW*.
	+ Nash explained his actions the next night, claiming that someone had texted him to help Del Rio win the WWE Title. With Stephanie McMahon hanging around backstage, Hunter acting suspicious and being friends with Nash, Vince being fired because of Punk and Del Rio cashing in, there were a whole host of possible suspects. To add to the list was John Laurinaitis, who began a suspicious habit of texting at the end of segments. In the end, WWE fucked up any possible decent storyline *by having Nash admit that he himself was the mastermind* and that he attacked Punk because he'd disrespected Triple H.
		- Interestingly after this angle was done with, Laurinaitis continued to text no one.
	+ Anyway, the match clearly in the build is Nash vs. Punk. However, the match never took place because Nash failed a medical examination, bringing up the question *"**Why then was Nash introduced in the first place if he wasn't fit to wrestle???**"*.
	+ The only other way WWE could take it was a Triple H vs. Punk match.
	+ Bear in mind that the entire reason Nash was brought in was supposedly creative felt Punk needed to go over a big name to establish himself.
	+ At *Night of Champions*, Triple H went over Punk in a street fight. Punk **NEVER** got the win back.
	+ While Punk and Nash were trading words, Cena beat Del Rio for the "Mexican Heavyweight Championship". **CENAWINSLULZ!!!**
		- The grand result of the Summer of Punk II? At a time when everyone though Punk would be the new "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, Punk lost the belt, got involved in a moronic program with Kevin Nash and then Triple H went over him. **End of Story!**

### The Awesome Truth Angle

* At *Hell in a Cell*, the main event was Punk vs. Cena (c) vs. Del Rio for the strap. Del Rio regained the title after hitting Punk with a lead pipe. The bell rang and Cena went to attack Del Rio. The cell began to rise, and suddenly a hooded Miz and R-Truth rushed in and began to beat the shit out of Del Rio, Cena and Punk (Miz and R-Truth had been recently fired and were supposed to be barred from entering the building). The cell began to lower (take note of that because it's important). Miz and R-Truth continued the beatdown as everyone started to go loco. The entire roster poured out to try and stop them, but no one could open the cell. Cole kept screaming *"**WHO LOWERED THE CELL?!**"* (implying someone was helping Miz and Truth, though that someone was never revealed). The police showed up and they used a bolt cutter to gain access to the cell. Miz and R-Truth dropped to their knees and allowed themselves to be arrested so that the roster wouldn't attack them. Triple H attacked them anyway before being pulled off.
	+ The next night on *RAW*, the heels kicked up a fuss about *"workplace environment safety"*. They basically said that the WWE was too crazy to work in under Triple H, and the dangerous Miz and R-Truth just broke the camel's back. They organised a vote of no confidence measure against the COO Triple H. The entire roster voted. Not only did all the heels vote against Triple H, but so did all the faces on the roster, including Jerry Lawler and Booker T. Booker later criticized the people that walked out and explained on *SmackDown* that he thought the show was over and had to use the bathroom. They literally all walked out on him, the only exceptions being the mightiest of the mighty faces: Cena, Punk and Sheamus. Also note that Zack Ryder was absent during the walkout and would appear during a commercial break to support HHH... and got pedigreed for his troubles.
	+ Effectively, for that segment, Trips managed to turn all but 3 of the WWE roster heel against him. He would compound it the next week by saying he could have a better match with a broom than with everyone who walked out.
	+ Cena and Sheamus agreed to work a match, Trips would ref and Punk would ring the bell and commentate. /wooo/ thought the whole thing was nonsense, but was willing to swallow it if Punk got to commentate.
	+ *Punk didn't get to commentate* because the match was interrupted by Vince McMahon, who, *despite being just having been ousted*, was sent by the Board of Directors to tell Trips that John "Johnny Ace" Laurinaitis had been made the new *RAW* GM.
	+ Ace hired Miz and R-Truth back, but instead of acting like the fearless gangstas who rolled into *Hell in a Cell*, they showed up in suits and acted like Ace's lapdogs. They didn't step out of line again from there on, and took fines with a smile.
	+ The main event of *Vengeance* was Punk and Trips vs Miz and R-Truth. Joy of joys, Nash interfered to give Miz and Truth the win. **Pros:** Miz and Truth won. **Cons:** Nash was somehow still a part of the WWE, despite fucking up the Summer of Punk II.
	+ Nash turned on Trips for returning his... erm, respect? Seriously, the gay undertones were overpowering. We knew where it was going though, a Nash vs. Trips match... but it had to be delayed because...
	+ *Survivor Series* was upon us and the Rock was coming back. The main event was Rock and Cena vs. Miz and Truth. Cena had the choice of picking **ANYONE** he wanted in the world to be his partner, but he ended up picking the Rock because **???** (Alternatively, *"**THE RAWK!**" \*spitwad\**). Miz and Truth lost their heat at this stage, and while they got a decent heat section during the match, the crowd didn't buy it for a moment. Miz and Truth were borderline squashed by Cena and Rock, who couldn't even get along during the match, yet somehow were just so talented they could beat Miz and Truth despite this massive handicap. This was made all the more ridiculous and pointless by the fact that Cena had single-handedly beaten **BOTH** men **BY HIMSELF** on the *RAW* prior. Yup. But, much like bad writing in a script, the WWE needed a way to advance the insipid, grating and execrable snore of a feud that was Rock/Cena at this point; and so, Awesome Truth were fed to the lions.
		- Even being heavily featured on TV and main-eventing a PPV wasn't enough to stop Truth from screwing the pooch, as he was busted for using synthetic weed two days before the PPV even happened. Awesome Truth went out with a whimper the *RAW* after *Survivor Series*, as Cena mindscrewed Miz into attacking Truth, which was how WWE wrote him off TV for 30 days.
	+ Next month at *TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs*, Nash and Triple H finally had their blow-off match. The gimmick of TLC is that all the major matches had to include at least one of the weapons in the name of the event. Satan declared his hate for mankind again by influencing WWE Creative to have the Nash vs. Trips be a ladder match, despite the fact that both had infamously blown out their quads multiple times. It went down as one of the worst ladder matches of all time.
		- Angle Conclusion: Awesome Truth were killed off, only Haitch went over and we never did find out **WHO LOWERED THE CAGE?!?!?!**. Nash is never used in the WWE again after this, outside of Kliq and nWo reunions.

### The Sudden Rise and Rapid Fall of Zack Ryder

* Zack Ryder started a YouTube series, *Z! True Long Island Story*, in which he and his friends appeared in comedy skits. He turned himself face with the show and became **VERY** over with fans despite being a jobber. He quickly became a top merchandise seller, with wigs, t-shirts, headbands and more.
	+ To give you an example of how well the show and Ryder caught on with the fans, during one Rock/Cena confrontation segment, the fans ignored two megastars for a moment to chant *"**WE WANT RYDER!**"*.
* Ryder gradually started getting more TV time, from backstage cameos to being paired up with John Cena. He also got a spot on *SmackDown* as the assistant general manager. His push got stronger than ever when he won the United States Championship.
* Things only got worse from here, though. From this point on, he was used as cannon fodder in a filler John Cena vs. Kane feud during the wait for *WrestleMania XXVIII*. He was also attacked by Kane every single week.
* He lost his job as assistant general manager and lost the United States title to Jack Swagger a few weeks after winning it. Swagger proceeded to not defend the belt until he lost it to Santino Marella, who rarely ever defended it.
* Meanwhile, *Z! True Long Island Story* moved to the WWE channel. Why? Because WWE signed a contract with YouTube to produce 4 shows, 50 episodes each. The success of *Z! True Long Island Story* was the main reason for this. However, Zack Ryder was given no storylines and seldom appeared on *RAW*, never with John Cena. WWE constantly removed and rejected content from *True Long Island Story*, leaving Zack Ryder to complain about his show having run its course on Twitter.
* In a weird turn, it seemed to be kayfabe that Zack Ryder was the best at battle royales as he won two in a short space of time. The first was to become *SmackDown* general manager for the night, in which he barely did anything (he didn't even book himself) and the second to have a shot at Antonio Cesaro's United States title, in which he was unsuccessful.
* During most of 2012, Zack took to Twitter to constantly moan and whine about not being on TV. While having a genuine complaint, he became intensely irritating with this whining and became his own worst enemy.
* *Z! True Long Island Story* finished with its hundredth episode. It was also heavily speculated that Zack Ryder would be released due to post-election spring cleaning, which didn't happen.
* Ryder soon returned to where he started, barely appearing on TV and jobbing when he did.
* A new episode of *Z! True Long Island Story* was uploaded, in which Ryder walked out midway through. He stopped taking care and spiking his hair, as well, leading to speculation regarding a possible heel turn...
	+ ...nothing came of it. Eventually, he started a second YouTube series, *Last ReZort*, which nobody cared about and which ended when WWE told him to knock it off.
* In 2015, Ryder was busted down to *NXT*, where he'd form the Hype Bros team with Mojo Rawley and actually see some success in the tag division.
* The moral of the story? Don't get yourself over without the WWE's help, or the machine will turn on you to keep everyone else dependent on it. Vince McMahon infamously gave a pep talk to the whole roster before the post-Wrestlemania Raw every year for many years, telling the wrestlers to "Grab the brass ring" and get themselves over. The year after the Zack Ryder burial he did not repeat the speech, and never gave it again.

### 2011 in General

* The highlight of this year's *WWE Tough Enough* was "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's reaction to Ariane "Cameron" Andrew admitting that her favorite wrestling match was Melina vs. Alicia Fox at *SummerSlam* 2010. Cameron was given a WWE contract shortly afterwards and would remain with the company until 2016.
* Brian "Grandmaster Sexay" Christopher returned to *RAW* in March for a Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler segment, and the crowd greeted him with complete silence. This was supposed to be a serious segment with Michael Cole using Jerry's family against him, and yet Brian came out doing his dance from when he was in Too Cool (along with a theme song that was last used by Scotty Too Hotty), leaving the crowd very confused and quiet at what they were seeing. Here's the segment, starting with Brian's entrance.
* Kharma debuted as a force to be reckoned with and destroyed Divas after their matches for a couple of weeks. Then one week, she went down to confront several divas at once, only to start crying when she got in the ring. The week after this, she explained that she was pregnant and would be taking an entire year off. Kharma delivered a stillborn baby and then was released a few months later in 2012 after an appearance at the *Royal Rumble*.
* *WWE RAW* Presents: Power to the People **OPTION B**.
	+ For a special three-hour *RAW*, WWE Fans were given the opportunity to vote on stipulations and opponents. The first match of the night was who would get a Divas Title Shot with the options being: **A)** Beth Phoenix, **B)** Kelly Kelly or **C)** Eve. The Universe, with all its might, voted for **B)** Kelly Kelly.
	+ The problem was that the voting system the WWE used was processing the votes so slowly that, by the time the voting started for the next match, the first match's votes were still coming through. This resulted in a returning Evan Bourne, who could've faced either **A)** Jack Swagger, **B)** Mason Ryan or **C)** Sin Cara, facing Mason Ryan as Kelly's votes plagued the rest of the show.
		- Bourne was visibly bewildered and said *"Really?"* when the result was revealed. WWE made up for the massive voting snafu by putting on Bourne/Sin Cara (which everyone knew would've won) the next week.
* **"Be A Star".** The WWE, in association with the GLAAD, set up an anti-bullying campaign called "Be A Star". They encouraged young children not to use insults or to make fun of people for no reason. Meanwhile, Jerry Lawler continued to mock Vickie Guerrero's weight (which had dropped considerably for the better during their period), getting every fat joke he could in about her. Fans eventually had enough of this after a skit during the Slammys and contacted the "Be A Star" campaign. As a result, Lawler's commentary about Vickie's weight was toned down, though not eliminated entirely.
* ***RAW* 2011: Starring Michael Tarver as Waldo!** Michael Tarver began to re-emerge on RAW following the death of The Nexus, but never in front of the crowd. Instead, Tarver began appearing during the backstage segments of other wrestlers, never speaking. Sometimes, he'd just be hanging out, sometimes texting, sometimes watching a match. The biggest thing he would do was perhaps react if someone was laid out or dissed. The angle never went anywhere and Tarver was pulled off TV again, this time for good.
* Tyler Reks would again re-debut midway through the year, this time on *RAW*. Unfortunately for him, he would only be on *RAW* once (in a backstage segment) before being kicked down to *NXT*, teaming with Curt Hawkins to cause trouble. He would stay there in some fashion through the rest of the year and into 2012.
* Christian won his very first World Heavyweight Championship at *Extreme Rules*, celebrating the win with Edge, who had recently retired due to a spinal injury. Returning backstage, Christian was said to have hugged Vince McMahon and thanked him for the opportunity. He lost the title to Randy Orton two days later in a squash match on the *SmackDown* after the PPV (which was not well-received by the Internet **at all**) and had all his momentum killed off by a lackluster heel turn in which he constantly whined about wanting *"one more match!"* before getting injured once again.
* WWE Shop briefly sold a shirt that appeared as if Sin Cara had an erect penis, once again failing to notice it until the Internet had thoroughly mocked them for it. Despite attempts to cancel orders for it once they noticed, a few of the shirts made it into circulation and onto eBay.

### The WWE Tag division sucks, even in kayfabe!

* *RAW*, May 23, 2011: Otunga and McGillicutty won the WWE tag team titles as part of the New Nexus, in what would be one of the group's few achievements. However, the New Nexus broke up during the reign and Otunga and McGillicutty were left with little direction or even a gimmick. Considering they were the tag champs, you'd think WWE might have had them focus on being strong champions. The opposite happened. After winning the titles, Otunga and McGillicutty made barely any title defences on television; probably because at this point both were quite terrible in the ring (yes, even McGillicutty). In fact. Otunga and McGillicutty had such little going on for them that Jerry Lawler, seldom known for calling things as he sees them, openly began criticizing Otunga and McGillicutty during their matches. Eventually. Otunga and McGillicutty called Lawler out on this, and Lawler retorted that they needed to do something to prove their worth as Champs. Essentially. the gauntlet had been thrown down...
* ...and was never picked up. Otunga and McGillicutty changed nothing about their act and didn't have any big title defences. Instead, they dropped the straps to the extremely new tandem of Kofi Kingston and Evan Bourne and both Otunga and McGillicutty were taken off *RAW*. Otunga would later return, but would seldom wrestle and McGillicutty would be shipped back to *NXT*.
* Otunga and McGillicutty reigned for 91 days. **Three whole months.**
* Speaking of Kingston and Bourne, they won a match or two together on *RAW* before declaring *"hey we're a unit now and we've decided to go after the tag titles!"*. The two would later be given the tag name "Air Boom" by the fans via twitter. Basically, WWE put Kofi and Bourne together because they acknowledged the current champs were shit and the division needed a kickstart. They beat Otunga and McGillicutty fairly for the straps. The division would remain sucky, even after that.
	+ Bourne would go on to reward WWE's push of him by embarrassing them by getting busted for smoking synthetic weed. As punishment, Air Boom would drop the titles on a house show of all places to the Colon Brothers and then Bourne would be pulled from TV following a televised rematch.

## 2012

### January – March

* At the tail-end of 2011, Divas Champion Beth Phoenix jobbed out to Alicia Fox in under 2 minutes. During the match, Alicia botched her finisher and injured Beth. Beth disappeared from TV for 6 weeks despite being champion, whilst Alicia made regular on-screen appearances.
* Tamina Snuka was pushed at the start of the year and received a title shot at *Elimination Chamber*. She lost, and was promptly forgotten about, making sporadic appearances on *NXT*.
* WWE started dropping subtle hints at a YouTube channel "itbegins" around November 2011. The channel contained a cryptic video featuring a schoolboy furiously scribbling whilst a girl taunted him. These videos soon made their way to the television program after half the audience missed the link on *RAW*. The videos began mentioning that the person returning would take back what was theirs and it would be the end of the world as we knew it. Many interpreted this as the return of The Undertaker, but there was wild speculation. Soon, the videos made clear the person would return on January 2, 2012. On the night itself, it turned out that the person returning was Chris Jericho. For the first three weeks, he made his way out to the ring, only to say absolutely **NOTHING**. The week before the Rumble he finally spoke, saying *"This Sunday will be the end of the world as we know it"*. Jericho would go on to lose the Rumble to Sheamus and none of the video was ever explained, nor was the statement of it being the end of the world. Later down the road, he told the audience *"I was trolling you!"*. Eventually, he would state offscreen that the videos were just complete creepy nonsense.
* Proving that they hadn't learned from the Sin Cara penis shirt debacle, another instance of miscommunication in the merchandise department resulted in the release of what were termed kayfabe t-shirts, featuring terms like heel and jobber. This seriously annoyed a lot of people, particularly veterans who didn't like that the terms used were being used for commercial purposes. After an attempt to trademark the word "kayfabe", WWE eventually gave up and pulled the shirts.
* Despite all other matches on the card being a title match, Kane vs. John Cena in an Ambulance Match **main evented** *Elimination Chamber*.
* After just over **two whole months** of *"Brodus Clay is going to re-debut next week!"*, including vignettes, Brodus Clay finally redebuted... as "The Funkasaurus". This broke the wrestling fanbase in half, as some found it hilarious and others found it horrible.
	+ When the camera cut away from Clay and the Funkadactyls (who were not called that at the time) dancing, Curt Hawkins, Clay's opponent for the night, had a hilariously perfect *"fuck my life!"* expression on his face.

### *WrestleMania XXVIII*: 18 Seconds

* Sheamus and Daniel Bryan were scheduled to face each other at last year's *WrestleMania XXVII* for the United States title; however, they were bumped off the card at the last minute and jobbed to The Great Khali in a dark battle royale. In 2012 at *WrestleMania XXVIII*, the two were scheduled to be one of the **MAIN** events of the evening, having both soared back up the card during the last 365 days. The audience saw it as a great story of two men who had totally turned things around on their careers, and the expectation was through the roof. On the night, their match was on first and lasted **only 18 seconds**. Once again, the match is rumored to have been fucked around with by Kevin Dunn. The internet couldn't control its rage. Following that night, Daniel Bryan's popularity would explode as the audience became very sympathetic to him, almost turning him face. Sheamus's popularity, at no fault of his own since he was only following orders, would take a heavy dent as the audience placed the blame on him, since he *"benefited"* from the win, and since they couldn't take their frustration out on Dunn.
	+ Bryan would later reveal in his book that both he and Sheamus were planning on redeeming themselves from the year before and were just as pissed off at the decision as the fans were.
	+ The next night on *RAW*, the crowd booed the faces, cheered the heels and chanted *"Daniel Bryan!"* and *"**YES!**"* at every chance they got. Things they didn't like received *"**NO!**"* chants. Alberto Del Rio received *"**SI!**"* chants. They came unglued when Bryan finally came out during the dark match, chanted *"**YES!**"*, *"**NO!**"* and *"Daniel Bryan!"* the entire match, and booed Sheamus out of the building. *"**YES!**"* and *"Daniel Bryan!"* chants followed the fans out of the arena, down the block and into at least one hotel lobby. They even chanted *"**YES!**"* with their car horns in the parking lot.
	+ For at least a solid month afterward, WWE tried to control the *"**YES!**"* chants on *SmackDown* by replacing them with boos... but then they'd cut to crowdshots showing people obviously **NOT** booing, making them look incredibly stupid for editing the chants out in the first place.
* Divas champ Beth Phoenix was pinned by D-list celebrity Maria Menounos at *WrestleMania*, during a tag match that saw Eve as Beth's partner and Kelly Kelly as Menounos'. Maria promptly buggered off and the match was never mentioned again, making it completely pointless, other than as a desperate stab at attracting viewers of mainstream show *Access Hollywood* to the product that didn't work.
* After more than a year of largely pointless build-up, including an hour-long television special, The Rock vs John Cena **main-evented** *WrestleMania XXVIII*. The Rock won, and this started a storyline where Cena's life went into a "downward spiral" as a result of his loss.

### April - June

* The *RAW* after *WrestleMania*, Brock Lesnar returned to the WWE ten years after he debuted, having been a dominant Heavyweight champion in UFC during his absence. Brock came in as a dominant force and was booked in a "No Holds Barred" Match with Cena at *Extreme Rules*. Rather than building the storyline of *"Can anybody stop Brock Lesnar?"* for next 'Mania, or postponing the Cena match 'til at least *SummerSlam*, Cena **main-evented** *Extreme Rules*, pinning Lesnar after a 20-minute-long beatdown from Lesnar. **With two moves.** He was even able to promo afterward, which reportedly pissed Lesnar off.
* Lesnar's next big storyline was not appearing on television whilst his lawyer Paul Heyman traded endless lawsuit discussions with Triple H.
* Following *WrestleMania*, Beth Phoenix claimed that she has no competition left in the Divas division after holding the title for 200 days. Despite being a heel, all of the commentators **AGREED** with Beth, burying everyone else in the division even further.
* Matt Bloom (formerly Albert/A-Train) re-debuted on *RAW* as a Japanese warlord named "Lord Tensai". Despite being a huge star in Japan, he failed to get over on *RAW*. He beat Punk and Cena in consecutive weeks and was billed as being undefeated and still no one could care less (beyond chanting *"Albert!"*, that is). This would probably be due to the fact there were already two big guys (Brodus Clay and Ryback) beating up people in squash matches. Eventually, Tensai was relegated to *Superstars* duty before pointlessly attacking his manservant, who was soon kicked back to developmental to make way for Tensai's repackaging.
	+ Someone apparently thought it'd be hilarious to have Tensai wear lingerie one week. The culprit still has not been identified.
* At *Over the Limit*, John Cena faced Johnny Ace in a match where, if Ace lost, he would be fired from WWE. The stupidity of the match came mostly in the set-up and the aftermath. The set-up was Big Show mocking Ace's gravelly voice backstage, which then caused Eve Torres to grass on him and force him to apologise or be fired. After a long, drawn-out segment of *power porn* where Show begged and pleaded for his job, he was fired by Ace. Cena then went to the board of directors and told them not to fire Ace for this, but instead to wait until he'd beaten him in a match where no employee could interfere or else they would be fired. Ace vs. Cena **main-evented** *Over the Limit*, and naturally, Big Show interfered on behalf of Ace and turned heel. In the worst piece of writing in history, WWE Creative fucked up their own storyline by having Ace reveal that he had secretly rehired the Big Show on Saturday. This was not an Adamle, the script said *"Saturday"*. Nobody in WWE remembered their own stipulation or noticed the utter epic fail they'd made of it, but the Internet did and soundly mocked them for it. At that point, they finally caught on and tried to cover their own asses by having Cole say that Show was rehired on Monday morning instead.
* Not to worry, because for the next PPV, they repeated the stipulation with a steel cage match featuring Big Show vs. John Cena **main-eventing** *No Way Out*. Cena won (obviously) and Ace was fired from WWE.
* Vince McMahon returned to TV and cut several backstage comedy segments. In one segment, he mocked Jim Ross's bell's palsy by distorting his face, putting on a cowboy hat and shouting Ross's catchphrases, all done in plain view of a "Be-A-Star" poster. It was also rather annoying because, whenever Russo was mentioned on WWE TV or DVD, they always found a way to work in that Russo had Ed Ferrera impersonate Ross and that he mocked Ross's bell's palsy, and that it was a downright despicable thing to do, despite the fact that Russo and Ferrera had both apologized for doing so.

### WWE Championship *Money in The Bank*

* On June 25, Vickie Guerrero announced that only previous WWE Champions may participate in the *Money in the Bank* Ladder Match for the WWE Championship contract.
* She announced Kane, Chris Jericho, Big Show and John Cena would be the only participants. This was a prime example of WWE not understanding the concept of building up new stars.
* Even though CM Punk and Daniel Bryan were on the card for the second pay-per-view in a row, and all the internet still marking over it, it was placed in the middle of the show. Followed by a Ryback squash, a clusterfuck Diva tag-match, and finally the WWE *MitB* match.
* The Miz would go on to insert himself in the match, swerving everyone into thinking he would win. Cena would go on to **win the main event** of *Money in the Bank*.
* Cena would go on to cash-in two weeks later at *RAW 1000*, but failed to win the title after CM Punk turned heel and helped Big Show beat down Cena and the returning Rock, completely ruining the concept of *"Any MitB holder can, and will, go on to win the title"* that had been built up over the past 7 years.
* In his first PPV back in the WWE title scene in 9 months, Cena **did not** main-event Summerslam.

### July 9 2012 *RAW* (AKA *RAW* Episode 998, *"Worst! Episode! **Ever!**"*)

* *RAW* opened up with AJ Lee cutting a dreadful promo in which she ended up proposing to CM Punk. The crowd chanted *"boring!"* through the whole segment. Lee said that, by the end of the night, she'd pick a man. However, the show ended with another match ending in 2 minutes, followed by Lee not choosing CM Punk or Daniel Bryan. The highlight of this night happened though, with WWE bringing back the Anonymous *RAW* GM; however, this would be ruined later on. This promo lasted a good **20 minutes**.
* First match of the night? Jack Swagger, a former world champion, lost to Sheamus (who, at this point, was getting heat for being booked too strongly) in 58 seconds.
* WWE decided that it was time to build up *Money in the Bank*. They did it with a random tag team match where Tensai beat Christian with a crossbody in a minute-and-a-half.
* Brodus Clay squashed Drew McIntyre in 36 seconds and danced with kids afterwards. 3 matches, not even 4 minutes of wrestling.
* We finally got some wrestling. It was John Cena and Kane (who were trying to kill each other earlier in the year) vs. a reuniting JeriShow. The match went for a good 30 minutes (2 commercial breaks) and ended when Big Show was disqualified for breaking up a pinfall. Never mind that this was usually done in tag matches without being DQ'd for it or anything.
* Another squash! This time, it was Sin Cara against Heath Slater.
* At some point in the show, WWE announced a WWE.com poll to ask the audience if they wanted to see Jerry Lawler vs. Michael Cole. They made no effort of hiding that the poll was fixed when they showed "Yes" winning at 75%. Lawler defeated Cole almost instantly with an airplane spin, then the Anonymous *RAW* GM reversed the decision.
* At this point, Santino Marella, who had been shown in backstage segments looking for the Anonymous *RAW* GM, came to the ring where WWE revealed the Anonymous *RAW* GM, who was getting over as a character. However, he/she had disappeared from TV for several months with no explanation until this *RAW*, where WWE revealed it to be... *Hornswoggle.* **We kid you not.**
	+ Creative had actually wanted to wrap up the Anonymous *RAW* GM storyline before that, but by then, Vince had lost interest and suggested that it be revealed to have been Laurinaitis *"in a throwaway segment backstage"*. That would've been better than Hornswoggle.
	+ Hornswoggle being the Anonymous *RAW* GM was later retconned when the Anonymous *RAW* GM randomly showed up again on the post-*Survivor Series* 2014 episode of *RAW*.

### July 30 2012 *RAW*

* During a tag team match between Kofi Kingston and R-Truth and the Prime Time Players (Titus O'Neil and Darren Young), the PTP's manager, Abraham Washington, who was hooked up to a live mic, yelled out while Titus was in control *"**My boy Titus is like Kobe Bryant in a Colorado hotel room, he's unstoppable!**"*. While hilarious, the joke was considered by many to be in bad taste and he apologized via Twitter. TMZ, of course, ran with the story, while at the same time flogging pictures of female celebrities in accidental stages of undress. **Stay classy, TMZ.**
* The very next day, Tensai sent out a Tout (social media thing; if you're reading this outside the year 2012, you probably won't even remember it - it was like a video version of Twitter and soon discarded when WWE discovered Instagram and Vine) where he cracked a joke about how it's dangerous to drive with Asian people. He then turned to Sakamoto (who is Japanese) and hit him before yelling *"**OPEN YOUR EYES!**"*. WWE scrambled to issue an apology.

### *WWE RAW* Christmas Eve: *Who Killed Kris Kringle?*

* This edition of *RAW* drew a 2.2 cable rating, the lowest rating in over 15 years. The last time *RAW* got a lower rating was in March 3, 1997... and that drew a 1.9 rating.
* The show started off with the WWE roster singing "Jingle Bells". Only a few heels were still in character for this segment.
* Alberto Del Rio had just turned face at the *TLC* pay-per-view. Just 8 days later, Del Rio was a heel again for this show. How did he become a heel again? **He ran over Santa Claus with his car.**
	+ By the way, the car wasn't moving at all, Santa actually threw himself onto Del Rio's car off-camera while it had already stopped.
* Booker T did a hilarious face as John Cena screamed about wrestling Del Rio later that night *"**FOR SANTA!**"*.
* **Zack Ryder won a match for once!**
* Great Khali sang *"Merry Christmaaaas, I wish youuuu. And happy new year, too."*
* John Cena and Alberto Del Rio had a ridiculous "Miracle on 34th Street Fight". The gimmick had been done the year before by Randy Orton and David Otunga, and had been much better received then.
	+ One of the weapons inside the boxes was a teddy bear, which Del Rio threw at Cena... **who completely no-sold it.** This was the highlight of the match.
	+ At one point, Cena screamed *"**SANTAAAAAAA!**"* before hitting Del Rio.
	+ Cena threw a bowling ball straight at Del Rio's groin.
	+ When the show was taped, Santa Claus forgave Del Rio post-match in the spirit of the Christmas season. Come the actual broadcast, this segment was mysteriously absent.

### 2012 in General

* 2012 was not Natalya's year. To start the year off, she was pinned by Aksana, who was a valet 95% of the time to former GM Teddy Long, in 7 seconds. Then the shit really began to hit the fan; she was soon given a farting gimmick. In segments on *SmackDown* and *NXT*, Natalya would break wind at inopportune times. It only got worse as Michael McGillicutty was roped into things on *NXT* as a weirdo stalker who would sniff Natalya's ring attire. Later, Nattie turned face by farting in Eve Torres's face. The Divas of Doom (Natalya's team with Beth Phoenix) dissolved without a word, and then Natalya was squashed by AJ Lee, the smallest girl on the roster. We have no idea who she pissed off, but they're powerful.
* The Divas Championship was the only title in history where winning it makes it **LESS** likely you'll appear on TV. At the start of the year, Beth Phoenix went 6 weeks without appearing on TV. After *Elimination Chamber*, she didn't compete in a match again until *WrestleMania*, where she would be pinned by celebrity talk show host Maria Menounos for the second time. Layla won the belt from Nikki Bella at *Extreme Rules*, but soon after went five weeks without wrestling on *RAW* or *SmackDown*. As of August 1st, she had yet to wrestle a singles match on *RAW*.
* Remember the time when Zack Ryder was one of WWE's brightest young stars? The guy reinvented himself on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, and became insanely over with the crowd despite rarely ever being used on TV. Eventually, they caught on and gave him some air-time. He became even more popular and found himself in a feud for the US Title with Dolph Ziggler. Things went south for Ryder after winning the belt. He found himself being John Cena's BFF in the middle of his feud with Kane. Kane beat the shit out of him on a weekly basis. After one of his beatdowns, he lost the US title to Jack Swagger. Ryder also found a love interest in Eve Torres. WWE had Eve cheat on him with Cena, and had Eve admit on camera that she was just using him to get close to Cena, subsequently having Cena find out and slut-shame her for it, somehow remaining a face the entire time. Nevertheless, Ryder didn't give up on her and she repaid him by... turning heel and kicking him in the gonads at 'Mania. Ryder later admitted in an interview that *"That thing with Kane and Eve ruined my career"*. Showing yet again that, despite WWE encouraging its talent to get themselves over, they don't really mean it.
	+ Jack Swagger would proceed to do nothing with the US title. He was simply given it to have it taken off Zack.
		- Santino would win the belt off of Swagger and hold it for over 150 days. He rarely ever defended it, despite claiming that it was *"the most important thing"* to him.
* Abraham Washington, having not been seen since the death of WWECW, showed up inexplicably the day after *WrestleMania XXVIII* talking to Mark Henry backstage about joining up. For the next few weeks, Washington scouted talent to join his company, "AW Promotions". The first people he picked up were the Colon Brothers and their manager Rosa Mendes. Washington preached that they needed to wait for the perfect time to use their rematch clause against the new champs, Kofi Kingston and R-Truth, so they would show up every so often during their matches, just kinda watching. It was hinted that AW Promotions had also acquired the (supposed) talent of Mason Ryan. I mean, one would think because he was hanging around Washington and the Colons, but it was never confirmed if he actually joined up. Michael Cole just referred to Ryan as a *"Possible Talent Acquisition"*.
	+ Well now that we had some of the pieces for a new heel stable formed, what was their first move? Well, there wasn't one. They disappeared from TV for weeks on end and the Colons lost their right to a rematch because they didn't invoke the rematch clause within 30 days. The next time they were seen (now conveniently missing Mason Ryan) was for a Fatal Four way tag match to determine the new number one contenders to the tag titles. Washington turned on the Colons, joining with the upcoming Prime Time Players (Darren Young and Titus O'Neil), effectively destroying whatever plans there originally were for the Colons, Rosa and Mason Ryan.
	+ Washington acted as manager to the Prime Time Players now and yet still said every time he shows up that he was the owner of AW Promotions, implying that he could acquire more talent. **He doesn't.** Instead, they hooked him up to a live mic so he could yell *"**COME ON TITUS! COME ON DARREN!**"* at the Prime Time Players during their matches. He got a little more comfortable with the live mic after about 2 weeks, and actually became quite good at providing some genuine entertainment (depending on who you ask). One night during a match, Washington slipped up big time, making a reference to Kobe Bryant's alleged 2003 rape of a girl in a Colorado hotel room (see above for the remark). Michael Cole apologized for the remark after the commercial break and Washington apologized via Twitter the next day. It seemed as if the whole incident was over and done with until a little over a week later, when Washington announced via Twitter that he had been fired. To reiterate, Washington was canned over a reference to something that would go completely over the children who watch WWE's heads while things like Jerry Lawler constantly making fun of Vickie Guerrero's weight and The Rock running around making sexual innuendos like it's 1999 went by with little-to-no fanfare.
		- It's been suggested that he was actually fired for tweeting his support for Linda McMahon's then-ongoing senate campaign. If he can be believed, he was told to do so. He received a lot of sympathy for being fired, which all went away once everyone got tired of paying attention to his never-ending stream of complaints and attacks against people who disagreed with him.
* On the last *RAW* of 2012, Mae Young gave birth to Hornswoggle. For some reason, this was kept in the Hulu rebroadcast while matches were cut.
* **Tyler Reks jumped brands again!** After their minor role as Johnny Ace's security ended and the never-ending fifth season of *NXT* actually came to a close to make way for it becoming televised developmental, he and Curt Hawkins turned up on *SmackDown*, only to be squashed by Ryback, then by Undertaker and Kane (as part of a group of midcarders on *RAW 1000*). After being squashed by Ryback yet again, they were told by Booker T that they needed to *"step it up"*, leading to them debuting a Magic Mike-esque stripper gimmick. Reks quit the week after.

### New WWE Shows

* WWE introduced *Saturday Morning Slam* in August. This show would end up being aired on CW's *Vortexx* programming block.
	+ Said block already had a lot of infamy due to the ridiculous amounts of censorship the anime series that were airing on it were subjected to (e.g. *Dragon Ball Z Kai* and *Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters*).
	+ WWE would also fall victim to this censorship, with moves that targeted the head and neck being banned.
		- This included finishing moves. For example, the RKO was censored by switching the camera from the ring to the announcers, who were clearly reading the script. In fact, this was how most singles matches were censored and it looked awkward every time.
			* However, it turned out that the banning of head and neck moves was WWE's own edict, not the network's. The claim was that supposedly these moves were too violent for the show's target audience. It was feared that this would spread to the main shows.
		- Later, the show wound up on the chopping block, as the CW viewed it as something they could air in seasons like everything else on the *Vortexx* block.
		- In the end, the show never came back. All references to *Saturday Morning Slam* were later removed from the WWE website. Rumors state that CW wanted WWE to change the format of the show to something like *NBA Inside Stuff* and talks fell apart from there.
	+ *WWE Main Event* would be introduced in October. Despite the US title changing hands on one episode, it was mostly just another version of *WWE Superstars*. Eventually, WWE gave up pretending it was anything but that, and turned it into a televised version, cutting what was good about it (hype videos, promos, intros with Cole and Miz in the ring talking about what would happen that night) in the process.

## 2013

### General Madness

* Bo Dallas won a battle royale on *NXT* to earn a spot on the 2013 *Royal Rumble*.
	+ Dallas would go on to eliminate Intercontinental Champion Wade Barrett in the Royal Rumble. Barrett came back later and got Dallas eliminated. This started a feud where Bo won a non-title match against Barrett and then they would attack each other on different occasions as if a rematch was being hyped.
	+ This rematch never happened (not on WWE TV, anyway) and the storyline was quietly dropped, with Dallas being kicked back to *NXT* in the process. Another noteworthy point of this feud was a promo that Bo Dallas cut before a match where he was clearly looking away from the camera as he was reading a script, and smiled through this same promo, even though it was supposed to be serious.
	+ Upon returning to NXT, Bo subbed in as Adrian Neville's tag partner in a tag title defense and was a complete douche to him in the process, which implied a heel turn as the title defense ended badly. However, Bo promptly went on to win a title shot and dethroned Big E Langston while still being portrayed as a face. This was violently rejected, to the point where people actually **turned their backs** on the ring. Part of that had to do with the fact that, while Langston was a heel on WWE programming, he was still a very popular face at the time on *NXT*. Soon, Bo's title defenses were greeted with *"No Mo' Bo!"* chants and fans still turning their backs on the ring. Instead of continuing on with happy-go-lucky face Bo, however, he soon became a delusional heel who believed he was a beloved face, a change which was better received, and he kept the gimmick for a short time when he was eventually called back up.
	+ On *NXT*'s last show of the year, Bo's title win was edited to portray his win as something the fans liked. This confirmed that WWE wanted him to be a face, but were forced to turn him heel.
* Speaking of Wade Barrett, there was supposed to be an Intercontinental Cup to set up a number one contender to challenge Wade. This was dropped in favor of bringing in Bo Dallas.
	+ Richie Steamboat's debut was also potentially dropped for Bo Dallas. Several weeks before the Rumble, Barrett harassed Ricky Steamboat, which led to Santino stepping up to face Barrett on Steamboat's behalf. Nothing came of this, and it was never mentioned again.
* More from Wade Barrett. He played a bit part in *Dead Man Down*, which he hyped himself as being the star of, only to be verbally harassed and insulted by Sheamus for several weeks, for pretty much no good reason at all. **NOTHING CAME OF THIS**, as Sheamus was already part of a revolving group of challengers for the Shield. It only made him look even more like an ass. The movie bombed, which was no surprise considering that this was the only kind of hype WWE gave it.
* In a partial retread of *"Brodus Clay debuts next week!"*, WWE TV was bombarded with vignettes for Johnny Curtis's new gimmick, Fandango (originally Fandangoo... *for some reason*). The vignettes stopped for a while, then started up again. When it came time for him to actually debut, he refused to, because nobody pronounced his name to his exact specifications. When they eventually did start doing that, other things started happening to prevent his debut. His debut was teased and not actually done seven times, only finally happening at *WrestleMania XXIX*.
	+ On the March 18th edition of *RAW*, Fandango actually made it to the ring. After doing his usual ballroom dance on stage, he continued down to the ring, and once in it, posed as a pyro silhouette of him went off above the ring. Everyone agreed that his entrance was based as fuck. He bailed on the match immediately afterwards.
* R-Truth started rapping again, officially bringing his current WWE run full circle and right back to boring.
* Because his gimmick was apparently too close to Jack Swagger's *"We the People!"* schtick and we just can't have people with similar gimmicks around, Antonio Cesaro's Uber-American gimmick disappeared. What was it replaced with? **YODELING.**
	+ Eventually, even the yodeling was taken away, as Cesaro was added to the long list of people complaining about having no competition. Yep, like that ever ended well for anyone. Recently, the reason for his sudden depush surfaced: Apparently, WWE felt he was boring. Taking away his gimmicks, not allowing him mic time, jobbing him left and right, then punishing him for "being boring"? Sounds about right.
* The May 13th edition of *RAW* started with a dance-off between Chris Jericho and Fandango, during which Summer Rae feigned twisting her ankle, which led to Jericho being attacked by Fandango. An actual pro dancer, Edyta Śliwińska, had been brought in to be Jericho's partner, so she basically got paid for standing around and doing absolutely nothing. To top it all off, this stupidity went **TWENTY** minutes, while most of the matches on the show did not go past three.
* On the May 6th episode of *RAW*, Brock Lesnar and Paul Heyman entered WWE Headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut and proceeded to terrorize basically everyone they found there and completely trash Triple H's office, a segment many people thought was legitimately good. All night long, WWE built the whole thing up, showing pictures of the completely destroyed office in Tweets from some of the employees, as well as other Tweets from those same people talking about how terrified they were, leading to the obvious questions of *"How would Triple H react? What will Triple H do?"*. The answers turned out to be *"As anticlimactically as possible!"*. When we finally got to hear from Triple H himself about the harassment of his employees and coworkers and the complete destruction of his office, he wasn't bothered by it one bit, using the cheesy old cliche that is *"the ring is my office!"*. Many wondered why they bothered building it up at all if the person with logically the most to lose was just going to blow the whole thing off like it was nothing, besides making Triple H look like a cool, unbreakable badass, of course.
* **July 1st:** Ryback got buried *hard*. The Miz was working on his leg throughout their match, and at one point, drop-kicked it while Ryback's leg was caught on the ropes. Here, Ryback screamed, telling the ref to stop the match. Jericho, the *face of this feud*, came into the ring right after this and hit Ryback with the Codebreaker.
	+ Later, Stephanie McMahon told Vickie that her job would be evaluated on the next week's episode of *Raw*. Reports came in ahead of the segment saying this was WWE "spoofing" TNA's Gutcheck segments.
* On the July 15th edition of *RAW*, Mark Henry, who had predictably jobbed to John Cena the night before at *Money In The Bank*, took the ring and began cutting a promo. Midway through, the Shield entered the ring and destroyed him. Despite Henry's buildup before the PPV, as a man who was willing to use his children for cheap sympathy in his infamous swerve promo, he was instantly turned face by this. The Shield's reason for attacking Henry, if there was any at all, was also never revealed. It's rumored that his face turn would've resulted in him teaming up with Big Show to challenge for the Tag Titles, but Henry got injured, so the entire thing was scrapped.
* While originally blamed on the USA Network, it was soon revealed that the massive amount of McMahon bullcrap was booked by the McMahons themselves, as this year's summer storyline. Unfortunately for them, it didn't do anything for the ratings and people complained about having to see them on every show confusing Vickie Guerrero (and later Brad Maddox) with contradictory orders and generally being ridiculous.
* ***WWE Payback*:**
	+ In what might have been a first in his career, John Cena did a dive from the turnbuckle to the outside onto all the lumberjacks in his match. It wasn't pretty, but it got the job done: Cena wiped out the entire roster pretty much...
	+ ...except for Sin Cara, who stumbled to the ground after seeing that everyone else fell down.
	+ Kaitlyn had AJ Lee beat after hitting her with a spear, but instead of pinning her right away, she held AJ's head up and blew a kiss to her before getting a two count. After losing this match by submission, Kaitlyn cried, and the crowd had none of it: They chanted *"**YOU TAPPED OUT!**"* repeatedly at her.
* *SummerSlam* 2013 started with Bray Wyatt vs. Kane in a ~~Inferno~~ "Ring of Fire" match, in which Wyatt, who had been built up as a terrifying monster heel, spent 90% of the match being thoroughly taken apart. At one point, in a very hokey spot, Luke Harper took out a kendo stick and tried to give it to Bray, only for it to catch on fire. Wyatt got the pin after Harper and Erick Rowan got in the ring after finding a fire-retardant blanket that put out the fire on one side of the ring. Dave Meltzer called this *"easily a Worst Match of the Year contender"*.
* After *MITB*, Sin Cara had yet another match with Alberto Del Rio. It's interesting to think about the amount of times Sin Cara had to job to Del Rio. The two of them have heat with each other that goes back to their days in Mexico.
	+ On an *MLW Radio* show, Konnan noted that Cara started to get a *"big head"* in Mexico after becoming a star as the original Mistico. He went on to say that Del Rio once approached Cara backstage at a show in Mexico, and either Cara or a member of his posse pulled a gun on Del Rio and threatened to shoot him. In fairness to Mistico's bodyguards, Del Rio worked as the masked Dos Caras Jr. and was, as is tradition, never in public without his mask, which is why he wasn't recognized.
	+ Anyways, on the August 19th episode of *RAW*, Sin Cara's match had to be stopped early because he dislocated his pinkie finger while doing a suicide dive onto Del Rio. Reports would come in later Sin Cara would get quite some heat for not working through his "injury" - Del Rio stomped on Sin Cara numerous times after the match was stopped, and the ref had to push him away so he would back off. As he was doing so, Del Rio told the ref to *"get the fuck out of the way!"*.
	+ Months later, Hunico finally returned to the ring and, after jobbing for a bit under that gimmick, he replaced Mistico as Sin Cara once again.
		- The change was immediately given away, not only by the announcers making some rather unsubtle references, but by the fact that Sin Cara was suddenly sporting a very large tattoo on one shoulder/arm. Hunico had been featured on NXT around the same time with the exact same tattoo. They'd never bothered to try to cover it up!
		- Del Rio didn't escape from this unscathed, as Hunicara gave him a concussion not long after reassuming the gimmick.

### Jack Swagger's new gimmick (We, The People)

* Jack Swagger returned on *SmackDown* with a more aggressive attitude. He would get a new manager (Zeb Colter, FKA Dutch Mantell), a racist and xenophobic heel who held anti-immigrant beliefs. This led to a lot of media attention, as the gimmick was discussed and debated.
* For some reason, WWE thought it was a good idea to invite right-wing commentator Glenn Beck to Raw to air his thoughts on the matter.
* Glenn rejected said invitation and went on to rant on his show about how the WWE "demonized" the Tea Party.
* As if this wasn't enough drama, Swagger would get arrested on February 19, barely a week after returning, for driving under the influence, speeding and possession of marijuana. It's been rumored that he would've won the title at Wrestlemania, if not for this screw-up.
	+ This led to many *"weed the people!"* jokes since Jack Swagger now said *"We, the people!"* with poor delivery (a phrase that would later be improved by only having Zeb Colter do the talking, to the point to where *it got over*) at the end of promos. WWE responded by taking away signs that make reference to Jack Swagger's arrest.
* Swagger lost at 'Mania, hung around the main event for a bit longer, managed to give Dolph Ziggler a concussion and was then injured himself. At the same time, he went to court for his aforementioned arrest, and was placed on probation and fined, with the marijuana offense dismissed. In the meantime, Zeb started managing Antonio Cesaro. When Swagger came back, he was promptly placed in a tag team with Cesaro, and would never leave the midcard again. It was ironic that Cesaro was involved with Zeb and Swagger, considering that his Uber-American gimmick was taken away so that Swagger could have *"We, the people!"*.
* As an epilogue to this chapter in his wrestling career, when the crowd began heckling Jake Hager as Chris Jericho introduced him as part of his Inner Circle on the inaugural episode of AEW Dynamite, Jericho quickly broke character to bury and disown the gimmick once and for all, getting a huge pop for declaring it "A stupid idea from bad creative".

### MaddoxGate

* On the March 10 episode of *RAW*, Jericho hosted the *Highlight Reel* and The Miz was his guest since they had to advertise the movie he was in. Wade Barrett came out and talked about the movie he was in, and this led to trash talk among the people involved in the segment. Brad Maddox came out to set up a match, but he horribly messed up his lines. The commentary loudly buried him by begging for a commercial break. This segment confused people watching the show on TV and led to lots of aggressive damage control from Maddox's fans, as well as people pointing out how counterproductive it was to bury it to begin with.
* That segment was reportedly rewritten on the day of the show due to Vince thinking it was *"really bad"* in the first place. Then, the TV used for the Jeritron messed up while a *The Marine 3* promo was airing, so the ring crew had to remove it. That's when Jericho ad-libbed and mentioned his Jeritron magically disappearing.
* Maddox's promo was supposed to mention the Jeritron, so it not being there is what supposedly caused him to flub his lines when he came out. Although Brad Maddox was the one taking the fall for the segment, it should be noted that McMahon had already told Cole and Lawler through their headsets to bury the segment before Maddox even came out. Despite this, it seemed like everything was okay afterwards as Maddox was back on commentary on *SmackDown* that week.
* However, Maddox's TV time would be very limited after this. The only times he was on camera tended to be when Vickie Guerrero was there at the same time, at least until he was named sole General Manager in her place.

### *WrestleMania XXIX* Hype

* The price to order *WrestleMania* on PPV went up another $10.
* Each match on the card was poorly hyped or thrown together.
* Brock Lesnar vs. Triple H was built up with a few hilarious moments:
	+ Triple H fought Lesnar on an episode of *RAW* and the seat of his pants got wet. This was clearly visible on camera, and edited out of the weekend replays.
	+ On the night the contract for the match was signed, Triple H gave Paul Heyman a very awkward beating. After being saved by Brock Lesnar, Heyman announced that the stipulation for their match at *WrestleMania* was that a loss would end Triple H's career. **Yes, Triple H came out of retirement from the ring for a retirement match.**
* WWE took advantage of Paul Bearer's death to get CM Punk massive heat for his match against The Undertaker. At one point on *RAW*, Punk was playing with the famous urn, dropped it and said *"Oh shit!"*. This was barely censored live, and when it was replayed the first time on *RAW*, it wasn't censored.
* WWE, still not realizing that nobody wanted to see musical performances on wrestling PPVs, announced that P Diddy would be performing at 'Mania. An announced match (Tons of Funk/Funkadactyls vs. Rhodes Scholars/Bellas) was actually bumped from the card to make room for this. A month or two later, it was revealed the WWE may have **deliberately** planned to pull the rug out of the 4 vs. 4 match in order to upset the Divas, so they could film it and use the footage for a Diva based reality show called *Total Divas* that would air on E!.
* WWE decided to hype the rematch between The Rock and John Cena by putting John Cena on the "road to redemption" from 2012 being the worst year of his career in that, while he didn't hold the title, he still main-evented almost every PPV that year, even if his match was insignificant compared to many of the other matches on the card. He also won the majority of these matches and only suffered a handful of losses the entire year, almost all of which were dirty. Also keep in mind the fact that the title matches he *did* participate in, he was simply handed them as another chance, which was done to no end, even to the point where even in kayfabe, CM Punk was getting pissed with how hard WWE seemed to be trying to put the title on him.
	+ WWE also decided it would be tasteful to bring up John Cena's real-life divorce and actually said that his marriage fell apart because he was so hung up on his loss to The Rock the previous year (in reality, it was because he allegedly drilled porn star Kendra Lust). Coupled with Cena's childish insistence that The Rock didn't beat him, he beat himself, and you had one awful story.

### *WrestleMania XXIX*: Twice in a Lifetime!

* The Miz won the Intercontinental championship from Wade Barrett on the kick-off show match, only to lose it back to Wade the next night on *RAW*.
* The Shield vs. Randy Orton, Sheamus and Big Show: This was another case of WWE not knowing how to handle faces. Randy Orton tagged himself in as Sheamus was trying to reach Big Show, and got himself pinned. Big Show rightfully knocked both Sheamus and Randy Orton out, and yet we were supposed to be booing Big Show.
* Ryback lost to Mark Henry after putting Henry on his shoulders to try to hit him with the Shellshocked, and then falling over with Henry on top of him. It made Ryback look stupid. After the match was over, Ryback hit the Shellshocked on Henry, leaving many people wondering what the point of the finish was.
* Team Hell No beat Big E Langston and Dolph Ziggler in a thrown-together match no one really cared about.
* Fandango won against Chris Jericho after being mostly dominated by him in the match with a roll-up. Because we all know that if you want to put someone over, you make their win seem like a fluke via roll-up pins.
* Jack Swagger's entrance for his world title match against Alberto Del Rio was omitted. He unsurprisingly lost.
* The Rock vs John Cena, despite having ***26 months of build-up behind it*** (albeit, in fairness, on-and-off buildup) completely flopped with the crowd, who ranged from dead silent to awkward murmuring to outright hostile. Even the *"Let's go Cena!/Cena sucks!"* chant attempted to start up at the beginning of the match before awkwardly shutting itself up after about two chants of each.
	+ In the match itself, the first 1/3 consisted of Rock and Cena awkwardly staring each other down and occasionally taking a potshot at each other, going on for several minutes. The second 1/3 consisted of an average and unremarkable exchange between the two. The last 1/3 consisted of an extended spamming of finishers, the ending of which was simply Cena anticlimactically hitting Rock with an Attitude Adjustment one final time and getting the pin. The show then ended with Rock "passing the torch" to Cena as the crowd booed them both out of the building. 26 months of build-up ended in a whimper.
* Overall, *WrestleMania XXIX* was very mediocre, with none of the rematches being that great.

### *RAW* After 'Mania: The Night The Fans Took Over

* The following night on *RAW*, the fans made sure they were heard.
* For the first 2 hours of the show, fans consistently booed faces and cheered on heels in every segment. Daniel Bryan, Kane and The Undertaker were the only faces who got a decent pop.
* John Cena was booed out of the building and received both *"Boring!"* and *"Same old shit!"* chants, which went completely uncensored during both his opening promo and his main event match. To his credit, Cena rolled with it, making a heel turn joke, responding to some of the *"Sexual Chocolate!"* chants mentioned below with *"It's a raucous crowd, they wanna have sex with chocolate!"* (prompting *"**YES!**"* chants and laughter), and dancing a bit during the endless "Fandangoing". It took until after the show for him to actually win the crowd over.
* The announcement that Rock was still going to receive a rematch received boos, and his absence due to injury received *"Bullshit!"* chants.
* Mark Henry received *"Sexual Chocolate!"* chants, and people were singing his theme song as well.
* *"Let's go, Barrett!"* chants were loud during Barrett/Miz, and a botched neckbreaker was greeted with uncensored *"You fucked up!"* chants.
* *"**WE WANT ZIGGLER!**"* was loudly heard at least three times during a handicap match which had Alberto Del Rio against Jack Swagger and Zeb Colter, which ended up being one-on-one anyway because Swagger never tagged out. When Dolph Ziggler's music hit after the match, he received a massive pop, which only got louder after he successfully cashed in his *Money in the Bank* contract.
* The only heels that were booed the entire night were 3MB, which is definitely saying something considering their opponents were R-Truth, Zack Ryder and Santino, who the crowd had no reason to cheer for at all.

* ***Randy Orton vs Sheamus*** was the 2nd hour main event, and ran much longer than it should've thanks to a Rock segment being canceled due to Rock's injury, a related Brock Lesnar segment being canceled due to Rock not being there, and Triple H canceling his scheduled segment when he realized the fans were out of control and were going to eat him alive if he went out there. The match was preceded by crowd pandering by both, Orton forgetting his lines (and audibly asking Sheamus what his line was), and a bait and switch Twitter vote to see which one got to face Big Show, which was completely disregarded and just used to get something to trend. All this annoyed both the crowd and the Internet, to the point where the fans just weren't having any of it. Throughout the match, the fans went completely rogue, chanting everything and anything they could think of rather than watch the match.
	+ At one point: (the camera focused right on JBL during a chant for him, revealing he had a huge smile on his face) **Cole:** *"Are they chanting for you? Oh my lord! This place is insane!"* **JBL:** *"Smart fans! They're not insane, they're brilliant! These folks are brilliant!"* (The crowd popped huge at his response)
		- **Cole:** *"And now listen! Now they're chanting for Lawler!"* **JBL:** *"They'll never chant 'Cole', I can guarantee you that!"* (The crowd proceed to chant for Cole)
			* **Cole:** *"Listen! They're chanting my name!"* **JBL:** *"They've gone nuts!"*
	+ *At one point they momentarily ran out of chants and started doing the wave.*
		- **Lawler:** *"Look at this! I don't know if you can see our crowd now, but they've resorted to a wave!"*
	+ **Lawler (in response to Randy Savage chants):** ***\*laughing\*** "The wrong Randy!"* **JBL:** *"Randy could RKO sixteen thousand of the WWE Universe before we're done."*
	+ Big Show would interfere and end the match, to a massive pop and *"Thank you, Big Show!"* chants
		- **Lawler:** *"Thank you, Big Show?!"*
	+ *"One more chair!"* (in response to Show throwing the announce table's chairs at the ring, only for them to hit the ropes and bounce back)
	+ It's been reported that Orton threw a massive temper tantrum backstage after the match was finished. As for Sheamus, he later tweeted that he'd be telling his future grandkids that he was there that night.

* ***Fandango*** would go on after this segment, and for the rest of the night, the fans were singing Fandango's theme. Reports came in afterwards that the fans in the parking lot following the show were honking their horns in the beat of his song as well.
	+ Jericho's arrival to attack Fandango was greeted with another massive pop and chants for the Lionsault.
	+ The announcers, who'd completely cracked up during Orton/Sheamus, lost it even more when the crowd started singing Fandango's theme.
	+ Ryback attacked Cena at the end of the show to signify that he was back in the title picture. This was supposed to be a heel turn for him, but the crowd popped like he'd just discovered the cure for cancer.
	+ All the chants were preserved in their uncensored glory for the weekend Universal HD replays.
	+ The best part of the night? Instead of trying to pretend that it never happened (like they did the year before with Daniel Bryan and YES!), WWE embraced the chanting, tried to make "Fandangoing" a thing, and will now treat the post-'Mania *RAW* as a very big deal.
		- What was once a bored crowd's form of self-entertainment took off in a hurry. "ChaChaLaLa" (Fandango's theme) was soon played everywhere, from VH1's "Best Week Ever" to several sports games and even nightclubs. Videos have been made of people "Fandangoing". The UK fans even spearheaded a successful effort to get it into their top 40 for the week.
			* Unfortunately, all of this didn't prevent them from looking like idiots again by trying to dub boos over Fandango's entrance on *SmackDown* that week while cutting to crowdshots of people obviously dancing and singing along at the same time. When the announcers (who were possibly redubbed after the whole thing caught fire) pointed out the "Fandangoing", the badly-dubbed boos mysteriously vanished, allowing the crowd to be heard.
* The very next week, it reverted to status quo as the Greenville, SC crowd sat on their hands for the majority of an awful *RAW*.
* Fandangoing, surprisingly enough, continues to happen during shows. WWE backed off on promoting it too much after a pandering segment on *RAW* the week after it started got barely any response.

### Ryback Rules, Cena Drools and Foley Begs The Fans!

* On April 8, 2013, the show ended with Ryback attacking Cena, turning heel for the first time since 2010. The following week, a very bizarre, almost Marlon Brando in *Apocalypse Now*-esque taped segment aired in which a dimly-lit Ryback sat in front of the camera and explained pretty thoroughly why he hated John Cena, which was for some reason periodically interrupted by actual footage of the match he was talking about.
	+ Even though Ryback explained that his beef with Cena was that he personally gave him a huge push, then never helped him when he was attacked by The Shield, the commentators seemed to refuse to understand this for weeks, often stating after this that they still had no idea why Ryback turned on Cena.
		- For several weeks, *"Is this actually a heel turn?"* was asked by fans, as Ryback had a very easy to understand reason for it. It wasn't the first time Cena had pulled that on people, just the first time he'd been called out on it.
* One day not long afterward, news began floating around that Cena badly injured his Achilles tendon and may not even have been able to compete against Ryback. This was almost certainly confirmed to be a work when, on the following *RAW*, Cena was seen bouncing excitedly and at one point *sprinting to the ring* as part of his usual entrance, all with no visual signs of discomfort at all.
	+ Cena sold his "injury" approximately once, during a match against The Shield. Cena tagged out to Daniel Bryan and was seen sitting on the apron rubbing his ankle for about ten seconds before continuing with the match as normal.
		- One video package of the night included JBL telling the viewers to look at Cena's ankle, as you can tell it's still bothering him. This soundbyte was played over that same shot of Cena **sprinting to the ring**.
* Mick Foley came to *RAW*, and backstage, he was asked how the Attitude Era compared to today's WWE. His answer boiled down to *"There's different stuff but they're more or less the same, now let me talk about John Cena and Ryback for a few minutes"*.
	+ Later that night, Foley went down to the ring to confront Ryback and *surprisingly* threw his full support behind Cena and talked down to Ryback for holding a grudge. The grudge about getting attacked six times while your alleged friend did nothing about it.
* It was around this time that WWE posted this, effectively *retroactively* creating a feud between Cena and Ryback that covers a span of six months, the vast majority of which the two spent as either friends, opponents with no real hostility between them in sanctioned competition, and ignoring each other. This was despite the fact that, at this point, the Cena-Ryback feud was only a couple weeks old.
	+ The timeline also completely failed to explain why Ryback and Cena were feuding in any way. The timeline more or less went *"**1.** Cena threw his support behind Ryback, **2.** Some stuff happened with The Shield, **3.** Cena won a few matches, **4.** Ryback lost a few matches, **5.** Ryback turned on Cena."* As if even WWE knew that Ryback was at least mostly right and wanted to downplay it and make it look like Ryback turned on Cena for no reason.

### Who Wished For This?!

* The April 29 edition of *RAW* featured John Cena promoting the Make-A-Wish Foundation by bringing out three ill children and saying that they would not only be given front row seats, but would be considered honorary wrestl-ummm... WWE Superstars for the night. Possibly in no coincidence, these are things that actually happened that night.
	+ The Make-A-Wish promotion was for their World Wish Day, which also included some fluff vid-packages. Irritatingly, WWE chose to focus on Cena's contributions to the organization only, ignoring everyone else's.
	+ Since Dolph Ziggler, Alberto Del Rio and Jack Swagger were having a triple threat match for the World Title at *Extreme Rules*, WWE thought it would be a great idea to have their *familiars* Big E Langston, Ricardo Rodriguez and Zeb Colter in a triple threat match to determine who would pick the stipulation for the match.
	+ 3MB (**BEYBAY!**) interrupted a Shield promo and prepared to attack them. Team Hell No interrupted this for some reason, chased The Shield off and destroyed 3MB for no particular reason.
	+ Mark Henry faced both Brodus Clay and Sweet T/Tensai... *in a tug-of-war.* After he was done with them, Sheamus challenged him, then humiliated and attacked Henry just before he was about to lose.
	+ The Great Khali and Natalya defeated Fandango... *in a dance-off.* Read that again, Fandango, a guy **with a dancing gimmick**, **lost a dance-off** to The Great Khali, a man who's less mobile than a fibrodysplasia patient.
	+ This episode also marked the true shilling of Ryback's incredibly stupid new *"Ryback Rules!"* catchphrase, which sounded like something a 6-year-old would write, and considering the Make-A-Wish kids' presence, it seemed entirely possible that one did.
	+ Despite this, the hilarious irony was that the main event ended with Cena getting pinned clean, sending the Little Jimmies and the Make-A-Wish kids home sad, along with all of the adults because of pretty much the entire show before that.

### Mark Henry proves that Sheamus is a Twat

* Sheamus and Mark Henry had a post-*WrestleMania* feud that began with Mark ambushing Sheamus every time he was interviewed for a backstage segment. Sheamus would eventually get payback by returning these attacks in kind. At that point, Henry stopped ambushing Sheamus, but their feud continued, as WWE gave up on any legitimate reason as to why Sheamus was the face and Henry was the heel.
	+ As noted above, Mark Henry began trying to prove his strength, so he inexplicably decided to do this by holding a tug-of-war, beating both Brodus Clay and Tensai, then Sheamus came down to the ring and challenged Mark to a third round. The two fought for much longer, but just as Mark was about to pull Sheamus over the line and legitimately win cleanly, Sheamus let go of the rope, sending Henry falling on his ass. He then followed this up with a Brogue Kick and celebrated while the commentary talked about him getting payback.
	+ Next, Mark Henry challenged Sheamus to a wrestling match... an *arm*-wrestling match, that is. First, Mark defeated Sheamus cleanly. Then Sheamus told Mark that he'd be a coward if they didn't have a rematch immediately, this time with their left arms. The second it started, Sheamus sucker-punched Henry, Brogue Kicked him again, and celebrated again. As the commentators talked up how Sheamus was just getting revenge. **Again.** During the match, Sheamus attacked Mark Henry, knocking him out of his chair. In response, Henry ripped the belt off an EMT and beat the shit out of Sheamus with it, setting up a strap match for *Extreme Rules*.
	+ On the *RAW* after this, Mark Henry set a world record by pulling two tractor trailers twenty feet. This was odd because WWE was really unconvincing in whose alignment was where in the whole feud with Sheamus, and only complicated things by having Henry break the record, at least mostly in his heel character for it, then had him celebrate in a very face-like way and had the audience applaud him. As a note, because of the dialogue at least being a work, a lot of people weren't sure if *any* of it wasn't a work and expected to see Sheamus attack him during the segment.
	+ Sheamus won their strap match blowoff and was immediately put in a feud with Damien Sandow, where he proceeded to look like even more of a jackass. Henry disappeared for a while, teased retirement and got a title match against John Cena. Guess we know who really won that one.

### Let's (kind of) push Curtis Axel

* The night after *Extreme Rules*, rumors went around that Paul Heyman was going to introduce a third client. Names were thrown around, including a returning RVD. Eventually, Heyman named his new client: **Michael McGillicutty**, repackaged and renamed Curtis Axel, supposedly to honour his father and grandfather by taking something close to his father's first name and a mutation of his grandfather's nickname instead of going by his real name. The disappointment and apathy was almost palpable. Triple H then showed up and completely disregarded Axel as a threat, then destroyed him in the main event, only actually losing it because of a (kayfabe) concussion he'd received from Lesnar the night before. Trips and WWE caught a lot of flak over starting a concussion storyline so soon after Dolph Ziggler's legit concussion and for making Axel look like a total putz in the process.
	+ The week after that, Axel and Heyman challenged Cena to a match, which ended via countout when Ryback came out in an ambulance and lured Cena away. With that "win", Axel went beyond looking like a total putz and started looking like a total fluke artist. It took until *SmackDown* the same week for Axel to actually win a match legitimately, and he was against Sin Cara at the time!
	+ Week three of the Axel saga started with Trips/Axel II being announced, until Stephanie came out and kiboshed it, burying Axel by saying he was "beneath" Trips and actually lecturing the crowd regarding being selfish. Yep, we were all lectured by the Billion Dollar Princess herself about selfishness. The pot was most certainly calling the kettle black. Vince then came out and basically reiterated Stephanie's words, burying Axel even more before joining in the lecturing as well. The hypocrisy was quite strong with those two. Trips showed up, was pissed, took his ball and went home. So Vince booked Cena/Axel again, and once again, it ended in a countout. If they were just going to make Axel look pathetic from the start, why waste time repackaging him in the first place?
	+ Week four brought on Trips/Axel II and III, which were both ended in quick succession by Vince. When it became clear that Trips was going to keep restarting it, Vince actually ran off with the ring bell. Complete waste of time for all involved.
	+ Eventually, Vince came around on Trips/Axel, but by then, Trips didn't want to do it again, so the whole thing ended up becoming completely pointless. At that point, Axel was launched back into the midcard, where he took the place of a concussed Fandango and won the Intercontinental title from Wade Barrett, inheriting Wade's feud with Miz in the process.

### *Money In The Bank* build-up and idiocy from the PPV

* ***Monday Night RAW*:**
	+ John Cena failed to pick up Mark Henry. This was soundly mocked, as Cena had effortlessly picked Henry up countless times in the past, as well as Big Show and Great Khali, and now we were suddenly expected to believe he couldn't do it.
	+ Alberto Del Rio vs. Sin Cara was interrupted by Dolph Ziggler, who cut a promo as the match kept going. Del Rio left the ring as he'd had enough of Ziggler, then Ziggler attacked Del Rio (Ziggler is a face, by the way). Instead of calling for the bell, the ref did nothing. Sin Cara dove onto Alberto and the match just ended. TNA-tier refereeing right there, folks!
	+ WWE's *Gut Check*: In a segment that dragged on for a while, Stephanie McMahon let the fans decide whether Vickie should be fired or not. The fans voted against Vickie (75% against vs. 25% for, yet another of WWE's suspicious voting percentages) and thus, she was fired. This would later be nominated as an "LOL Moment of the Year" nominee for the Slammy Awards. **BE A STAR AND FAT-SHAME VICKIE GUERRERO!**
	+ Ryback later told Vickie that it was going to be okay, and that she deserved better than this. He even gave her a hug. By the way, he had a match against Chris Jericho on the pay-per-view. Tonight would have been a good time to hype it up in a better way than simply implying Vickie could've been Ryback's manager. If there were any plans for an angle between these two, it was apparently scrapped, because the two were not seen interacting with each other in any way afterward and the segment was never mentioned again.
	+ Kane beat Christian. Right afterwards, the Wyatt Family finally debuted. After leading them down to the ring in the darkened arena by lantern, Bray Wyatt sat on a rocking chair out of the ring while his partners basically killed Kane. As Kane was knocked out, Bray went and posed near Kane. It was fine, except the crowd chanted *"**HUSKY HARRIS!**"* and the crowd had popped for them as they made their entrance.
		- During Christian's entrance, a massive production screwup gave him part of Mike McGillicutty's Titantron display. Yep, for some reason they kept that, even though he was repackaged a while back.
	+ Alicia Fox and AJ Lee vs. Layla and Kaitlyn with the Bella Twins on commentary. Yep, this was a good way to kill off the crowd and the fans watching at home. Layla and Alicia Fox were horrendous in the ring while the Bellas buried the match in a second by just saying *"yawn!"*. They said something about Kaitlyn being fat and promoted *Total Divas*, but no one cared.
		- The match broke down before AJ Lee was killed by a spear from Kaitlyn, and that was it. Second No Contest of the night.
	+ CM Punk beat Randy Orton clean in the main event. Daniel Bryan attacked both men with a ladder, climbed on top of it and took the briefcase. With this, only the *Money In The Bank* ladder matches were properly hyped, while everything else was either weak or seen before. Or both.
* IC title match: The Miz got Paul Heyman kicked out of the match by making a punch noise while the ref wasn't looking and pretended to be in pain.
	+ There's just one problem with this plan: The ref should have ended the match by DQ. So, either The Miz's plan was retarded or he knew the referee was going to forget the rules.
* AJ Lee won with the Black Widow as she pulled on Kaitlyn's arm that was not injured.
* Ryback cemented his status as a dangerous powerhouse by beating Chris Jericho with a *roll-up pin*. What was the point of this feud? This did not put Ryback over and made Jericho look like an arrogant fool.
* Like everyone expected, Mark Henry lost to John Cena.
* While the *MitB* main event was good:
	+ Curtis Axel interfered and got instantly put in his place by CM Punk, who hit a GTS that knocked him out.
		- In said interference, Axel had attacked Daniel Bryan first, as if a feud was being set up with this. Nothing came from this attack, though.
	+ Randy Orton won the match, and the crowd died when he got the briefcase.

### Build up to *SummerSlam*

* Brad Maddox let John Cena choose his opponent at the end of a *Monday Night RAW* show.
	+ In this segment, a bunch of superstars lined up on the entrance stage while Cena named a bunch of them from the ring to play with the crowd for a bit.
	+ At certain points, Zack Ryder could be seen looking like he did not want to be there while wishing he was back in 2011.
* John Cena selected Daniel Bryan, and WWE quickly got to work on pushing Bryan to the moon.
* This push was at risk of being halted in a gauntlet match where Ryback once again looked like a bitch.
	+ After Daniel Bryan had beaten Jack Swagger and Antonio Cesaro in 1-on-1 matches (and the match with Cesaro in particular was all-out and has been considered a match of the year candidate), he had to face Ryback.
	+ The dominant Ryback looked horrible when you consider that all he had to do was beat a guy half his size who just wrestled twice.
	+ Near the end of the night, Ryback set up a table outside the ring. Daniel Bryan was supposed to jump off the apron onto Ryback, who would then powerbomb him through said table.
	+ What happened instead was that Ryback completely missed the table and just threw Bryan down onto the mat hard. It would later be reported that Ryback was berated backstage by Triple H for this.
* To avenge his challenger, John Cena challenged Ryback to a tables match for the next week's show and won in classical fashion: Cena no-sold two of Ryback's signature moves to hit him with the Attitude Adjustment *from outta nowhere.*
	+ Earlier in the same episode of *RAW*, a segment was shown where all of two people were getting food from the catering table. Ryback proceeded to bully the guys there, asking them if they said anything. Rudeback then shoved a guy to the wall, slapped him with a loaf of bread and said he'd put Cena through a table like the one in that room.
	+ By the way, *this is the same fucking guy that was known as **CRYBACK** a few weeks ago.* Ryback slammed the guy he was bullying through the catering table.
	+ Why was a cameraman randomly filming people getting their food to begin with?

### The Streak of Mediocre PPVs

***Night of Champions* 2013**:

* The night started with a long promo between Triple H, Paul Heyman and Curtis Axel. This literally felt like a *RAW* episode you had to pay for. All of this was just to set up an IC title defense for Curtis Axel.
	+ Axel defended his title against Kofi Kingston. No one cared. WWE has made it clear that, while Axel is the IC champion, he will still be put down by someone with more star power (usually CM Punk).
* The Divas title was defended in a sloppy Fatal 4-Way match. At one point, Natalya applied a double sharpshooter on Brie Bella and Naomi. Jerry Lawler had another **WEEP WOOP** moment, claiming that this was the first a double sharpshooter has been done.
	+ Natalya did this before to Laycool and Eve Torres. **More than once.**
	+ According to numerous sources, Alberto Del Rio and Drew McIntyre were involved in a huge barfight. It was not against each other, it was the two of them against a group of guys, and sources say that they had to get out of the bar and looked quite beat up back at the hotel. Del Rio's face still looked bruised and had a black eye that was noticeable through his match with RVD.
* CM Punk lost the No DQ handicap match against Curtis Axel and Paul Heyman because Ryback interfered. Commentators would constantly mention later that the record books will say Heyman pinned CM Punk, but never mention that Axel was also in this match.
* Fortunately, the night ended with Randy Orton losing the WWE Championship to Daniel Bryan. This was considered to be the highlight of the worst PPV of the year. As good as the match was, the ref counted to 3 fast, leading to Bryan being stripped of his WWE Championship on *RAW* the next night.
	+ People were so annoyed by the decision being overturned that some demanded refunds... and one cable company, Cox Cable, actually gave them.
* This meant Daniel Bryan's two WWE title reigns lasted less than a day in total.

***WWE Battleground* 2013: Worst PPV Finish of the Year**

* Alberto Del Rio's feud with RVD ended with him defending his World Heavyweight Title on the opening match of this show. Even after feeding RVD to him, Del Rio got little heat from crowds and would soon be John Cena's next victim.
* The Real Americans beat Santino Marella and The Great Khali. By this point, Antonio Cesaro's giant swing officially became a signature move of his, and this match was just there to let him do his swing to The Great Khali. There were some glaring problems with the execution of this strategy:
	+ Khali was pinned after the giant swing and could be clearly seen counting along with the ref.
	+ They had a rematch on *RAW* with the same finish, taking away one of the few reasons anyone would have to buy the PPV replay.

* Cody Rhodes and Goldust had come back on *RAW* shortly after being fired and in a promo with Dusty Rhodes, Trips and Stephanie McMahon, they were told that they could get their jobs back if they beat The Shield at the PPV.
	+ This promo was a source of controversy because Dusty Rhodes was doing his part without a script. At one point, he was facing off with HHH and Dusty was going to put his palm on Stephanie's face. She slapped his hand away and was reportedly upset with what Dusty did backstage.
	+ It should also be noted that Stephanie's segments always led to her burying the faces hard.
* CM Punk pinned Ryback for the win after kicking him in the groin. **Seriously.**
* Randy Orton and Daniel Bryan's storyline continued with questionable logic. Instead of simply giving Orton his title back, Triple H vacated it, with the rematch being booked as *Battleground*'s main event.
* The WWE title match ended with Big Show running in and knocking out both Daniel Bryan and Randy Orton for the no contest finish after a clusterfuck involving a ref bump, and Brad Maddox coming out to send another ref who would also get knocked out. It's like WWE didn't bother to hide that this was a throwaway PPV.

***Hell in a Cell* 2013**

* CM Punk's feud with Heyman and Ryback finally ended with Punk having a weak Hell in a Cell match with Ryback. Paul Heyman was in this match as well, but he came out on top of a scissor lift and had himself raised onto the roof of the cell, so he had nothing to do with the action.
	+ Heyman's entrance was very poorly executed for a few reasons. As he came out, some backstage staff had to come out to tell the driver of the lift to stop because he was about to crush some lights and props on the ground. The commentators buried the entrance as the driver was clearly struggling to get Heyman to the cage.
* Vickie Guerrero had announced a few weeks before the PPV that Alberto Del Rio would be defending his World Heavyweight title against John Cena. Apparently, if you're John Cena, you don't need to go through #1 contender matches. Though, one could say the point of this was that Vickie was sticking it to Del Rio for bad mouthing her on Smackdown, Cena did not like her either and was vocal about it in promos, so this didn't even make much sense in that regard.
	+ Like everyone expected, Cena won the World Heavyweight championship. Originally, Cena said he would be out for 4-6 months on *RAW*, but he ended up coming back in two months instead.
* On the *RAW* after *Battleground*, Brad Maddox set up a Hell in a Cell match between Daniel Bryan and Randy Orton. The fans were then allowed to pick the special guest referee and they picked Shawn Michaels.
	+ While this wasn't a bad match, it was marred by another messy finish. HBK was hit at one point and sold it as if he was Charles Robinson getting hit by The Great Khali.
	+ This led to HHH getting in the cage, then getting knocked out by Daniel Bryan hitting the worst running knee ever (he clearly missed, so the camera angle was changed for the sake of making this look better).
	+ Shawn saw that HHH was knocked out by Bryan and he turned heel by hitting the Sweet Chin Music on him. Orton won the WWE title, and this would be the end of Daniel Bryan's push.
* The next night on *RAW*, Daniel Bryan and Shawn Michaels had a segment where Michaels called Bryan a "little puke", said he was happy that he screwed him over at *Hell in a Cell* and then got put in the Yes! Lock.
	+ This was followed by Daniel Bryan being attacked by the Wyatt Family. With this, Bryan was relegated back to the midcard while The Authority's storyline fully shifted its focus to... **The Big Show!**
* The night after *Hell in a Cell*, Damien Sandow attacked Cena's injured arm, cashed in his *Money in the Bank* contract... and was *cleanly defeated* by Cena. Sandow's career never recovered from this.

***Survivor Series* 2013**

* The Divas *Survivor Series* tag team match took a page out of old *Survivor Series* matches where people were pinned with common wrestling moves.
* Ryback was reportedly in the doghouse again for using a spear and a jackhammer against John Cena on a *SmackDown* episode without permission from the staff. This time, he jobbed to a returning Mark Henry.
* Big Show turned out to be a poor replacement for Daniel Bryan in the feud against The Authority. Orton and Big Show were greeted with *"boring!"* chants, and Orton's DDT was botched by Big Show, who fell off the turnbuckle too early.
* To top this all off, Cena came out for a face-off with Orton to tease a title unification match. This made Daniel Bryan's push come off as mere filler for when Cena was gone.
* The next night on *RAW*, the Divas tag match was done again in a similarly silly fashion.

### Holiday Follies!

* Despite having him booked on a house show that same night, WWE advertised the last *RAW* of 2013 with commercials that featured Big Show dressed up as Baby New Year and dancing around in a diaper. **We kid you not.**
* After flopping under Paul Heyman's management, Ryback and Curtis Axel became a jobber tag team. On a *Main Event* episode, they were involved in a segment with Santa Claus where The Miz suddenly turned face. At the time, he was in a rather heated feud with Kofi that had originally turned him back into a heel, but that angle was dropped.
* In the final *RAW* of 2013, Daniel Bryan finally gave in to Bray Wyatt's mind games and joined the Wyatt Family in the last segment of the show. This heel turn lasted for only two weeks before WWE turned him face again due to bad crowd reactions.

## 2014

* Kofi Kingston, played off as a rather unremarkable challenger, pinned WWE Heavyweight Champion Randy Orton in a non-title match. Despite this feat, more of a deal was made out of Orton assaulting John Cena's dad. The next *RAW*, there was a rematch and Cena showed up in the last few minutes to attack Orton. The new unified champion was unable to defeat the title shot-denied Kofi Kingston.
	+ On that note, a big part of John Cena's gimmick for the past several years has been his devotion to the business, claiming he's the first one through the doors at every WWE event and he always puts in 100%. On this episode, Cena didn't show up until minutes past 11PM, when the show is technically supposed to be over already and gave no explanation for where he'd been the entire night.
* **The original Sin Cara was finally released.** Mistico confirmed this in an interview on Mexican TV where he blamed the WWE for his failure, claiming they limited his work too much. He also claimed to have the rights to the Sin Cara character, which was odd considering that WWE is still using the character to this day. WWE later confirmed his release in late March.
	+ He also told a story in which he slapped Darren Young and screamed at him about not having to know English to work a match, claiming he *"doesn't like the language"*.
	+ Later, when pictures of Hunico as Sin Cara at the premiere of the new *Scooby Doo* movie were tweeted by the WWE account, he fired off (and later deleted) an angry tweet, calling Hunico a fraud.
* After failing his cash-in on a one-armed John Cena at the end of last year, WWE would seemingly go out of its way to completely destroy the career of Damien Sandow. Sandow, previously the "uncrowned champion", would rapidly slip down the card, all the way to being a Zack Ryder-tier jobber; from being the first guy eliminated in the 2014 Royal Rumble to dressing up in ridiculous costumes, getting squashed in almost every match since and worse until he became Damien Mizdow in August.
* In November, WWE seemed to be making another foray into guest hosts. On November 17, they booked Grumpy Cat, who was literally just a small cat with a permanent frown, as their guest host. She, being a cat, did nothing except lay around while wrestlers talked around her. WWE kept cutting to Grumpy Cat supposedly watching *RAW* and, at one point, she was clearly seen to have fallen asleep. On November 24, they booked Larry the Cable Guy.
* At the Slammy Awards show, WWE awarded Roman Reigns "Superstar of the Year" purely to keep him strong, despite being possibly the guy who had done the least to earn the award out of all of the nominees. Reigns' accomplishments for the year include setting a record for eliminations in the Royal Rumble and teaming with Rollins and Ambrose to kill Evolution, but failing to accomplish anything in his main event matches and floundering in a meaningless feud with Orton. He was awarded this over the likes of Dolph Ziggler, who scored the pinfall that was supposed to serve as the final nail in The Authority's coffin, Daniel Bryan, who capped off a months long feud by winning the title against 3/4 of Evolution by himself in what was probably one of the greatest *WrestleMania* moments of all time, Dean Ambrose, whose feud with Seth Rollins was regarded as one of the best of the year, and most glaringly, **Brock Lesnar**, who demolished The Undertaker's streak at *WrestleMania* and basically made John Cena his bitch at *SummerSlam*. WWE didn't even try to hide the fact that it was rigged.
	+ Another controversial award winner was Team Cena vs. Team Authority winning the "Match of the Year" award. Even Ricky Steamboat, who was presenting the award, looked disappointed at this. As for the crowd, they were mostly dead with this announcement while Dolph Ziggler came out to accept the award.
	+ The cherry on top of all this was the attendance for the Slammys, because the arena was only about half-full.
* **The New Day:** After Kofi Kingston and Big E lost a tag team match on a July 21 episode of *RAW*, Xavier Woods (FKA Consequences Creed in TNA) came out and cut an intense promo, which got some fans thinking that there would be a new Nation of Domination. After *one match*, the gimmick was dropped from television, with all three members doing nothing of note and Xavier's promo was never mentioned again. It wouldn't be until November that the stable would be reunited as a group of jolly black men who clap to get the crowd pumped, which was viewed as incredibly racist. After it bombed spectacularly, they were turned heel and became a three-man gang of thugs who beat up anyone they felt wasn't being "positive" enough.
* On the post-TLC *RAW*, WWE held a poll to determine the stipulation of a match between Chris Jericho and Paul Heyman. The problem was that the audience's options were No Disqualification, Street Fight or Extreme Rules. Jerry Lawler would spend the entire night burying the poll by alluding to the fact that all three options were functionally the same thing. Worse, this wasn't even the first time WWE has given a poll like this.
* WWE apparently took quite a liking to the concept of interference in 2014, as approximately *half* of their main event matches on all televised or PPV shows would include a run-in that resulted in disqualifications, dirty finishes and no contests everywhere, with Kane and Big Show being the ones running in the majority of the time. WWE received a lot of criticism for this, as it eventually began to feel like every show ended in roughly the same way and usually sent the audiences home with no conclusive ending.

### Fumble at the Rumble

* In the lead up to the 2014 *Royal Rumble*, a few expectations were made: CM Punk was made the #1 entrant and expected to be screwed by The Authority in some way; Batista had returned and Del Rio had repeatedly called him out; Roman Reigns was expected to run hot, especially after his *Survivor Series* showing back in 2013; and Daniel Bryan was a favorite to win the Rumble after months of being screwed. Furthermore, Daniel Bryan had joined the Wyatt Family, only to ditch them not two weeks later, ending the penultimate *RAW* before the Rumble sitting tall atop a steel cage and channeling a *"**YES!**"* chant that got the entire audience involved. The rushed ending to Bryan being with the Wyatt Family was said to have been connected to the chant's popularity outside of wrestling, which was later confirmed by Bryan in his book.
* The Royal Rumble arrived... and Daniel Bryan **LOST** to Bray Wyatt in the opening match of the PPV. Bray Wyatt then cost John Cena his title match against Randy Orton (which was heavily booed to the point that a *"We Want Divas!"* chant broke out) to set up a *WrestleMania* feud, which subsequently went unmentioned after the PPV as the Wyatts began to feud with The Shield.
* Del Rio was disposed of by Batista during the Rumble like yesterday's trash.
* Daniel Bryan was not even in the Royal Rumble match. When #30 came out and was revealed to be Rey Mysterio, the crowd shat all over the match.
	+ Once Rey got eliminated, the crowd popped as he hit the floor.
* CM Punk lasted to the final four of the Rumble, only to be eliminated by Kane, who came back after being eliminated and in plain view of the referees. This would be CM Punk's last appearance before he walked out on WWE the next day.
* The final three men were Sheamus, Batista and Roman Reigns. As all three men were on the ground, the crowd booed louder.
	+ They also chanted *"**NO!**"* at Sheamus when he was preparing to do the Brogue Kick.
* Reigns set a record by eliminating 12 competitors, breaking the streak Kane had made in 2001. Reigns was eliminated last by the Rumble's winner: **Batista.** To try to hide the booing here, the music and commentary was made louder.
	+ The crowd started cheering Reigns near the end, specifically because they didn't want Batista winning at all.
* After the PPV, many took to Twitter to complain, most notably Mick Foley, who later filmed himself destroying his TV with a baseball bat.
* To make matters worse, Batista reacted to the booing after the show ended. First, he flipped off a fan as he was going up the ramp, and once he got to the top of the entrance stage, he mocked Daniel Bryan's *"**YES!**"* chant while giving the crowd his middle fingers instead of pointing his fingers up. Unsurprisingly, he was not punished for his actions.

### The Road to *Elimination Chamber*: Punk No More and Other Follies

* Triple H opened the first *RAW* after the Royal Rumble by asking *"What's wrong, did someone not get what they wanted last night?"*, basically giving the middle finger to the entire crowd.
* CM Punk basically took his ball and went home, with no official explanation given. Daniel Bryan, set originally to face Sheamus at WrestleMania (this was later confirmed in his book), was effectively booked in place of Punk to face down the Authority.
* Christian was one of six men booked into the Elimination Chamber match. WWE showed their respect for the veteran by having him be the only competitor to lose to Randy Orton in a one-on-one match leading up to the PPV and were reportedly wondering about replacing him after the booking.
* Despite the reaction of Batista winning the Rumble, he was continued to be booked as a face, having a one-sided feud with Del Rio that no one cared about since Del Rio clearly was outclassed. During their match at Elimination Chamber the crowd chanted *"Boo-Tista!"*.
* Naomi was receiving a push and rumored to even be the one to finally win the title off of AJ Lee - at *WrestleMania XXX*, no less. Then Aksana botched a move which resulted in Naomi's eye socket getting broken. A match against AJ Lee at Elimination Chamber featured Cameron (the same woman who once told "Stone Cold" Steve Austin that Melina vs. Alicia Fox at *SummerSlam* 2010 was her favorite match ever), still pretty green, winning via DQ against the champion. This abysmal match also had the pleasure of following the much-hyped "Evil vs. Evil" match between the Wyatt Family and The Shield, which ended up being the PPV match of the night.

### *WrestleMania XXX* and *Extreme Rules*

* WWE had this event be the first *WrestleMania* to be streamed live on the WWE Network, which was launched on February 24. Due to this being *WrestleMania* season, WWE expected to have over 1 million subscribers (1 million paying subscribers being the number needed for the network to break even). Later in April, they announced just how badly they fell short of that, with 667,000 subscribers.
	+ The wrestlers ended up paying for the mistakes of the upper management. Due to the underwhelming start of the Network, wrestlers got stiffed on their royalty checks.
* This *WrestleMania* was held in the Louisiana Superdome. However, the night opened with Hulk Hogan mistakenly calling it the "Silverdome". He was mocked numerous times for this on the same night and the *RAW* that followed.
* **Brock Lesnar ended The Streak.** The crowd's reactions on camera were an image goldmine of GIFs and WEBMs, but the overall reaction was quite negative as The Streak was broken by a part-timer who could have still been a great draw without being the one to break the streak.
* Once again, the Divas' match was put in the worst place possible - right after The Undertaker's Streak had ended. Fans chanted *"No one cares!"* at the Divas.
	+ As if that wasn't enough, the finish was botched. Initially, AJ Lee was supposed to make Naomi tap out to the Black Widow by grabbing Naomi's hand and using it to make her submit. This almost went as planned, but then Naomi tapped out with her other hand.
* On the same night, the supposedly revived tag team division had their match on the pre-show.
* The *RAW* after *WrestleMania* had Randy Orton and Batista absolutely demolishing the Usos, who were still the tag team champions.
	+ On this same *RAW*, the Bulgarian (remember this for later) Alexander Rusev made his debut on the main roster with his Russian manager, Lana. He came off as just another foreign monster heel.
	+ **Paige debuted!** She came out to answer an open challenge from AJ Lee, who claimed that there was no more competition for her in the Divas' division. The resulting title match was embarrassingly short, with AJ having her Black Widow reversed into the Paige Turner to end her record-breaking title reign. To make matters worse, Lee jumped too late to take the finish properly.
* Around this time, Antonio Cesaro and Big E Langston lost parts of their names. Now they were simply known as "Cesaro" and "Big E" for whatever reason. Alexander Rusev would later lose his first name too.
* A tournament to determine the #1 contender for the Intercontinental Title ended with Bad News Barrett winning the title shot. Meanwhile, Big E was booked to be a weak champion who was struggling to beat Alberto Del Rio, a man who lost in the **first round** of the previously mentioned tournament.
	+ Just two days before *Extreme Rules*, Big E couldn't even get a clean win over Titus O'Neil. It ended in a DQ win for the champion, who proceeded to give a very awkward beatdown to Titus, who slipped and stumbled as he was supposed to be thrown into stairs and the announcers' table.
	+ By the time the *Extreme Rules* PPV came, the crowd turned against Big E and cheered the heel Bad News Barrett, who mercifully ended Big E's IC title reign.
* Rusev was struggling to get heat, as his gimmick had been done several times in the past. So, what did WWE do to help him get heat? Did they add some depth to the character? **Nah!** They changed his intro so that Rusev was *"now residing in Russia"* and his titantron had imagery of Russia and Vladimir Putin. **Seriously.** Lana even dedicated Rusev's *Extreme Rules* match to Putin and would keep doing this every week.
	+ A few months later, the Ukrainian conflict turned into a civil war and a Malaysian airliner was shot down by pro-Russian terrorists, resulting in the deaths of 300 innocent people. WWE cut all references to Putin soon afterwards.
* John Cena defeated Bray Wyatt clean at *WrestleMania*, but the feud did not end there. It's rumored that Bray was originally supposed to win at 'Mania, but the result was changed at the last minute, somewhat supported by the fact that the commentary and general narrative afterward seemed to treat it as if Bray had won. They later proceeded to have an overbooked crapfest of a steel cage match at *Extreme Rules* where Bray Wyatt won. Even though the match was basically a 3-on-1 handicap match between Cena and the entire Wyatt family, Cena made the entire family look like pushovers, only to lose after getting jumpscared by a child in a sheep mask.
	+ WWE also milked the everloving fuck out of Bray Wyatt's song, specifically the verse that went *"He's got the whole world in his hands"*. The two biggest examples of this was on the *RAW* before the PPV where Bray had a choir of children sing it to Cena, and at *Extreme Rules*, where the aforementioned sheep-masked child used to set Cena up for a match-ending Sister Abigail... and though it was genuinely freaky on *RAW*, the *Extreme Rules* moment was just stupid as the kid had a demonic voice filter **because spooky!**.
	+ The feud ended with Cena absolutely destroying Wyatt in a Last Man Standing match at *Payback*.
* Kane was Daniel Bryan's major challenger at *Extreme Rules*. Bryan actually managed to look strong and even put Kane through a flaming table... which would have been cool except the fire on the table went out just at the spot where Kane landed. Kane then proceeded to be sprayed with a shitload of fire extinguisher foam while clearly telling the guy spraying him to stop.
	+ On the following night's *RAW*, Bryan's win over might as well have been undone. Bryan and Brie Bella took part in an awful horror movie-like skit with Kane and trying to escape the building in a car. Even worse is that this feud was cut short once Daniel Bryan suffered a neck injury that kept him from wrestling for the rest of the year.
* John Cena inherited Bryan's feud with Kane and the results were predictably awful. One infamous *RAW* main event saw Cena win a stretcher match against Kane by giving him the Attitude Adjustment onto a stretcher, somehow knocking Kane out.
* In one of the more positive instances of LOLWWE, Hornswoggle inexplicably turned heel and aligned with 3MB for the sole purpose of feuding with El Torito and Los Matadores, resulting in the members of 3MB losing to El Torito multiple times, goofy segments, an even goofier "WeeLC" match at *Extreme Rules* (which actually turned out to be a pretty good match), and El Torito's tail literally being ripped off. The last notable match in the feud was a hair vs. mask match between 'Swoggle and Torito, which Torito won. This surprisingly good run ended when Jinder Mahal and Drew McIntyre were suddenly future-endeavored.
	+ Several months later, the feud between Hornswoggle and El Torito would continue, this time with Hornswoggle acting as the mascot for Slater Gator, the makeshift tag team of Heath Slater and Titus O' Neil, with Hornswoggle being dressed up like an alligator. This lead to a horrendous match between the two on *RAW*, the match being so bad that the crowd ended up chanting *"this is stupid!"*.

### *Money in the Bank* and beyond

* June featured a seriously weird and awful angle between The Authority, Roman Reigns and Vickie Guerrero, which kicked off when Triple H and Stephanie banned Roman Reigns from the battle royale to determine the last spot in the *MiTB* match for the vacant WWE Title. Roman Reigns, being a WWE babyface, responded by spiking Trips and Stephanie's coffee, making Steph violently ill. In typical WWE comedy fashion, this ended in Vickie Guerrero getting covered in vomit, getting disgusted enough to put Roman Reigns in the match as revenge. How Reigns could have predicted things would turn out this way specifically, nobody knows. Surprisingly, Roman Reigns wouldn't face any punishment for essentially **poisoning his boss**.
	+ Unsurprisingly, Triple H was spared Stephanie's fate because his coffee got spilled.
	+ Who would receive punishment for this? **Why, Vickie Guerrero, obviously!** Stephanie booked herself into a match with Vickie, the stipulation being that Vickie would be fired if she lost. Come time for the match and it turned out that the match would be won by one throwing their opponent into a pool of sludge (which WWE tried to imply was supposed to be shit, but was clearly butterscotch pudding). Since Vickie was legitimately leaving the company, Vickie lost to write her off TV and threw Steph into the sludge afterward. It was rumored that both the vomiting and "shit pool" segments were the result of Vince McMahon's direct input.
		- On a positive note, Vickie ended her WWE career by paying a final tribute to Eddie and exiting the building to his classic "Lie, Cheat, Steal" theme song.
	+ Later, The Authority, or Trips specifically, would completely contradict himself. After making such a huge deal about trying to deny Reigns a title shot at *Money in the Bank*, Trips simply handed him a title match later at *Battleground*, just a week later.
		- Even later than that, Triple H would tweet in such a way as to imply that giving his supposed enemy a title match was all part of his plan. This plan was never mentioned on TV and an actual explanation was never given.
* *Money in the Bank* had a main event ladder match to determine the new WWE World Heavyweight Champion. The end saw Cena hit an Attitude Adjustment to Kane, another to Randy Orton (who was legitimately bleeding due to a ladder bouncing off his head), and with an unbroken climb up the ladder... **CENAWINSLOL!**
	+ So maybe this match's ending isn't the worst thing WWE's ever done. What would be pretty shitty? Doing *the exact same finish* at the very next PPV, except with Cena pinning Kane instead of climbing a ladder.
* On June 30th, Australian Diva Emma was arrested for stealing an iPad case from a Walmart, a crime which turned out to have been an accident. Two days later, WWE addressed this situation by **firing** Emma. This caused a major outcry, with fans calling WWE out on their bullshit as some people still employed with WWE had committed far worse crimes (such as Cameron, who was not fired after being arrested for a DUI and bribing a cop in 2012). Emma was rightfully reinstated hours later.
* After re-debuting not long after *WrestleMania*, Bo Dallas started his latest main roster campaign undefeated and he actually became fairly over. After starting 17-0 (or 17-Bo), this would end on the July 28 episode of Raw in an utterly random match against R-Truth.
* On August 7th, Alberto Del Rio was fired for "unprofessional conduct" after getting into a confrontation with an employee. WWE's now-former social media manager was told to clean his plate at catering, replied with *"But that's Del Rio's job!"*, refused to apologize to Del Rio when confronted and then calling him an ethnic slur, leading to Del Rio beating the tar out of him. Said social media manager got Del Rio fired after threatening a lawsuit (Del Rio was originally going to only be suspended), kept his job (though he has since left the company), went completely unpunished and was even allowed to use the WWE Twitter account to bury Del Rio. **BE A STAR, GET A MINORITY EMPLOYEE FIRED!**

* On the 8/18th Raw, Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose put on the best match of the night on an otherwise lackluster episode of *RAW* by having a Falls Count Anywhere match which culminated in Dean Ambrose receiving the Curb Stomp on a cinderblock from Seth Rollins. WWE would follow up this awesome main event on the 8/25 *RAW* by putting Roman Reigns in a handicap match vs. Seth Rollins and Kane. To say it didn't live up to the Dean Ambrose vs. Seth Rollins main event on the previous *RAW* was an understatement: All three wrestlers in the match had a very noticeable lack of chemistry.
	+ WWE also decided it'd be a good idea to have Roman Reigns throw a cinder block at Seth Rollins' head while he was against the ringpost, something that, if it'd been a real cinder block and Rollins hadn't ducked, pretty easily could've **killed** him. Because it's Reigns, WWE acted like his clear act of attempted murder was fine because he was the face and even had Reigns laugh off accusations that he'd gone too far and say that the audience hadn't seen anything yet.
* John Cena was made Brock Lesnar's bitch at *SummerSlam*, was out for a week, then came back and completely buried the Wyatt Family with the assistance of Big Show and Mark Henry, possibly injuring Bray Wyatt (who had recently been put over by Chris Jericho) in the process with unsafe-looking clotheslines and throws. The internet immediately blew up with negative comments, and even Jim Ross questioned the booking decision.
	+ It was an exclamation point to a *RAW* that consisted of nothing but hotshot booking and matches that lasted under 5 minutes. John Cena was originally advertised as having a one-on-one interview for the 8/25 *RAW*, but it was inexplicably changed to him wrestling in the main event. Not only was John Cena not selling the brutal beating he took from Brock Lesnar at *SummerSlam*, but the Wyatts were given no entrance at the arena (so as not to take the focus off of Cena), making it look like to the viewers at home that the Wyatts suddenly teleported to the ring. The crowd was noticeably quiet due to not getting to see the Wyatts' entrance before erupting in boos at seeing John Cena bury Bray Wyatt in a very poor Brock Lesnar impersonation where he could be heard shouting at him to *"stay down!"* and did several crappy looking German Suplexes, and stiff clotheslines. The match ended via DQ when Erick Rowan and Luke Harper interfered. Mark Henry and Big Show came to Cena's aid and the match was then changed to a six-man tag - a six-man tag match in which Mark Henry and Big Show's purpose in the match was simply to hot tag Cena so he could bury the entire Wyatt Family and gave them all an Attitude Adjustment. John Cena totally did away with the storyline believability of his *SummerSlam* beating by having a match. Bray Wyatt's momentum had recovered when Chris Jericho had put him over to stop the bleeding from Bray's earlier feud with Cena, only for Cena to kill it again.
		- It was later revealed that Vince McMahon had booked the entire thing, reportedly because he thought Cena's fans would *"lose faith"* in him if he didn't look strong, seeming to have forgotten that Hulk Hogan got his ass handed to him every three months or so in the peak period of the 1980s without it being a problem.
* WWE would take one of their international tours, this time in Japan. While this itself is nothing to raise an eyebrow, WWE as usual made bogus claims such as them selling 12,000 seats in the Ryōgoku Sumo Hall. As reported by 411Mania, this is impossible because the Sumo Hall only has a maximum capacity of 11,066 seats. [That's not the only number they overstated though.] For a company that likes to claim it's the biggest deal in the wrestling industry, WWE didn't even make as much as smaller Japanese wrestling promotions did and they only made half of what NJPW does.
* During an episode of *RAW*, WWE sent out an open mic invitation to Michael Sam, an openly gay football player who was cut from his team, to appear on the following week's *RAW* (which was also the day *Monday Night Football* started) and talk about what happened. WWE hyped this invitation, graphic and all, for the rest of the episode... despite all of it having nothing to do with their actual product. The following day, Sam was pursued by the Dallas Cowboys for their practice squad, and as a result WWE took down all mentions of Sam from their website, social media pages and YouTube, before putting up a congratulations days later. This made the entire endeavor a complete waste of time.
	+ The same day all the mentions of Michael Sam were removed, WWE announced that Jerry Springer would appear on the following week's *RAW* for a segment with the feuding Bella Twins. This, like every other moment of the Bellas' feud, was stupid and ended with the 70-year-old Springer getting injured during a "catfight" between Brie and Nikki.
* After writing Dean Ambrose off TV so he could film *12 Rounds 3: Lockdown*, WWE booked Roman Reigns in a match against Seth Rollins at *Night of Champions* to seek revenge for his former Shield partner. WWE then randomly decided to have Reigns go over Rollins clean in a match on the *RAW* before the PPV. The *NoC* match was cancelled days before the PPV when Reigns suffered a hernia and was put out of action for months as a result.

### *Night of Champions* and the aftermath

* WWE brought on country singers Florida Georgia Line (to which the general response was *"who?"*) on commentary for the Intercontinental Title match between Miz and Dolph Ziggler. During the match, they announced that they'd be accompanying WWE at their *Tribute To The Troops* show later in the year and described it as being *"very important to them"*. It was apparently so important to them that they totally mangled the name of the event and called it *"The Support The Troops Thing"*. The segment ended with the two of them punching out Damien Sandow.
	+ Speaking of the Intercontinental Title, The Miz won it from Ziggler, only for Ziggler to win it back from him on the post-*Night of Champions* *RAW*.
* We got yet another John Cena vs Randy Orton match at *Hell in a Cell*.
* Grumpy Cat was a guest for a *Monday Night RAW*. On that night, WWE's Twitter pushed the hashtag of #MemeDayNightRaw.
* Goldust and Stardust won the tag team titles at *Hell in a Cell*, and proceeded to lose almost every televised match since then, until finally losing the belts in a Fatal 4-Way tag team match at *Survivor Series*.

### *Survivor Series*: The "death" of The Authority

* **Team Cena vs. Team Authority:** In the build-up to this, Team Cena members were beaten up on *Monday Night RAW*... and Cena, the brave face of the company, literally did nothing about this. He just let his teammates get their asses kicked. The worst of these would be Sheamus. In WWE's kayfabe, his assault at the hands of The Authority would put him on the shelf for *months*.
	+ In the actual match, Big Show turned heel for the gazillionth time. Earlier, Big Show eliminated Mark Henry in one punch pretty much the second the match started.
	+ WWE decided to finally give Ryback another push and made it a big deal which team he'd side with, even teasing a feud between him and Triple H in the process. He decided he'd be on Team Cena... and was the first guy eliminated from his team, making the entire buildup pointless.
	+ Team Cena still won with Ziggler overcoming incredible odds with the help of the debuting Sting. This went over very well with the crowd, and yet Ziggler then proceeded to go back to his usual midcard status on *RAW* and Sting was given all the credit.

### *Tables, Ladders, Chairs and Stairs*: Totally Losing the Crowd

* NXT's special show, *NXT TakeOver: REvolution*, was generally agreed to have completely knocked it out of the park in its performance. It was reported that WWE's main roster was pumped up to not be outshined by their developmental. In a word, they failed *hard*. Most of the matches had ridiculous finishes. It was later rumored that some had phoned it in as a form of silent protest in favor of Triple H running things.
* The Tag Team Titles match ended in a disqualification when Miz and Mizdow decided they were done with the match, then nailed the Usos with their Slammy trophies when they tried to stop them, rendering the match a waste of time.
* Big Show and a newly-face-turned Erick Rowan had a "Steel Stairs Match", and literally just for this match, the name of the PPV was changed to "Tables, Ladders, Chairs and Stairs", thus killing the entire point of the name. The match itself was a slow and stupid affair and ended with Big Slow beating Rowan clean, killing all of Rowan's momentum in the process.
	+ Due to this match, the show ended up having the name of *Tables, Ladders, Chairs and Stairs* - and Cole messed up the name twice, calling it *"TLC and Chairs"*.
* Jack Swagger lost to Rusev for the 7th time on televised WWE shows. The build-up to this match had Zeb Colter get injured in kayfabe, removing him from TV for a very long time, if not forever. Since this loss, Jack Swagger naturally became much less over, since Zeb Colter's promos were much of the reason he was over. In 2015, it got to the point to where Swagger hardly showed up on *RAW* anymore, becoming a *WWE Main Event*/*Superstars*-tier wrestler.
* John Cena (**LOL**) won against Seth Rollins with the inexplicable help of Roman Reigns. After the match, Reigns was interviewed and he declared his entrance in the *Royal Rumble* and totally botched the line. Those acting classes he took had obviously helped him.
* Nikki Bella beat AJ Lee in a few minutes by blinding her with pepper spray.
* Dean Ambrose and Bray Wyatt had a legitimately good TLC match, which unfortunately had quite possibly the dumbest finish of the night. Dean Ambrose went to hit Bray Wyatt with a monitor, and since the monitor was plugged in, it somehow exploded in his face when he yanked out the cord, allowing Bray to finish him off with a Sister Abigail.

### End of the Year Shenanigans

* At the end of the last *RAW* of the year, a long and painfully drawn-out ending segment saw John Cena return The Authority to power after Seth Rollins threatened to kill Edge. They'd only been off the show for about a month.

### The War of the Bellas

* Really, everything the Bella Twins did in 2014 deserves some mention. It all started off with Brie Bella returning to support her real life husband Daniel Bryan after his big win at *WrestleMania XXX*. Things would go awry very quickly.
	+ Daniel Bryan's feud with Kane took a page out of the burial of Zack Ryder, with Kane playing the part of the slasher movie villain again. This included ludicrous segments where Kane would stalk Bryan and Brie, including reusing the spot where Kane's victims have car trouble. Although it didn't last the entire night this time, Kane predictably appeared in the backseat to ambush Brie as she let out some hilariously uninspired screaming.
	+ Throughout the feud, Stephanie McMahon would try to force Bryan to give up the WWE Title under threat of firing Brie. To get around this, Brie quit WWE. On her way out, she called Stephanie a "bitch" and slapped her, which would both become recurring themes in this feud. Once Bryan had won his feud with Kane, it was reported that he'd be going out of commission to receive surgery, so he ended up relinquishing the title anyway.
	+ Purely to spite Brie, Stephanie began booking Nikki Bella into blatant screwjob matches like 4-on-1 handicap matches. On the July 21 episode of *RAW*, during one of these matches, Brie was in attendance as an audience member. When Brie called her a "bitch" again, Stephanie slapped her. Stephanie would be kayfabe arrested for this, leading to a long segment where two cops led her out of the building and into a cruiser, her tits visible throughout the entire segment. Notably, Stephanie hasn't worn anything as revealing since.
		- On July 28 and August 4, their segments would **main event** *RAW*.
	+ Stephanie got Brie to drop the charges by re-hiring her, which led to Brie challenging her to a match at *SummerSlam*.
	+ This is where things would somehow get so dumb, they had to take a page out of TNA's book on the subject. On the August 11th episode, Stephanie brought out Daniel Bryan's trainer, a woman named Megan, and had her claim that she and Bryan were having an affair. Brie slapped Megan and Megan had her arrested for it. This segment was *eerily* similar to the infamous Claire Lynch angle from TNA, to the point that Frankie Kazarian and Christopher Daniels would tweet insisting that they had nothing to do with it and "Claire Lynch" began trending on Twitter.
	+ Brie lost to Stephanie in a match that ended with Nikki predictably turning heel on her sister. Stephanie would basically disappear from the storyline shortly afterward, as the twin sisters would have a feud that was somehow even worse than the one that led to it.
	+ Nikki's heel promos toward Brie were *really bad*. Her lowest moment was when she tried to gain heat by screaming at Brie *"**I WISH YOU'D DIED IN THE WOMB!**"*
	+ Nikki aired several pre-taped segments termed "Growing Up Bella", during which Nikki would recount several other reasons why she hated Brie: stealing her prom date, stealing her license/wrecking her car and being forced to cheat for her to pass an exam. This was generally considered to be an annoying timewaster, but Twitter would have quite a lot of fun with the associated hashtag, #GrowingUpBella. Stephanie then attempted to give Nikki a Divas Title shot, drawing AJ Lee and Paige into the whole mess for no good reason at all. This also raised the question of, if Nikki hated Brie her whole life the way she claimed, why did she team with her for seven years like they were best friends?
		- At one point during one of these segments, WWE seriously suggested the hashtag "#RawIsWomb".
	+ WWE brought in Jerry Springer for this angle, which in a perfect world would need no further explanation, but it actually got worse than that. The segment with Jerry Springer ended with Nikki and Brie getting into a really lame catfight, which resulted in Springer getting knocked over and legitimately injured. At the end, he was carted off on a stretcher.
	+ This all led to a match between Nikki and Brie at *Hell in a Cell*, the stipulation being that Brie would have to become Nikki's servant for a month if she lost. Nikki won. The angle with Brie being her servant really didn't go anywhere. Nikki would occasionally treat her like dirt, but for the most part, Brie was just her manager.
	+ At *Survivor Series*, when Brie's servitude to Nikki was officially almost over, Brie turned heel by screwing AJ Lee out of the Divas Title, before reconciling with Nikki and revealing that their entire "feud" was actually an evil plot to get the title on Nikki.
		- From then on, the Bellas basically became LayCool 2.0, with Nikki and Brie destroying the rest of the Divas Division and utterly devaluing the Divas Title in the process (As if being called the Divas Championship and the belt being a big butterfly hadn't already devalued WWE's women's division enough).

## 2015

* The first *RAW* of the year featured the men who joined John Cena's *Survivor Series* team being beaten in matches and generally humiliated, with Dolph Ziggler losing the Intercontinental Title to Bad News Barrett, before another long and painfully drawn-out 'power porn'-style ending segment featuring Triple H and Stephanie McMahon firing them all and Cena looking sad. It was widely considered to be very bad, and sparked an absolute firestorm on Facebook in response.
* On the January 5 episode of *RAW*, WWE debuted former NXT Tag Team Champions, The Ascension, to the main roster by having them squash Miz and Mizdow. JBL would spend all of the Ascension's segments completely burying them, apparently because Vince McMahon hated them.
	+ Two weeks after their debut, The Ascension would be buried by the nWo, New Age Outlaws and APA. That's right, the team that dominated the NXT Tag Team Division for an entire year was beaten up by a bunch of retired old men. They'd get a small dose of revenge by beating the New Age Outlaws, but aside from JBL putting them over on commentary, they got nothing from this angle, and would essentially become hardcore jobbers afterwards.
* In a long-story-long summary, CM Punk left WWE in early 2014, won a court case against them over use of his name and merchandise later in the year, and then claimed on Colt Cabana's podcast that WWE's medical staff were horrendously incompetent and kept prescribing him Zithromax Z-pak for an enormous welt on his lower back that turned out to be MRSA, which that medicine would do nothing to treat, while the doctor that treated it for him claimed that it could've killed him in the months he'd been working with it. Unhappy over being portrayed as an incompetent back-alley doctor, WWE's Dr. Chris Amann filed a defamation lawsuit against Punk in February, with WWE claiming that Punk's story wasn't true and he never went to their medical staff about the issue. Everything is alright on all accounts, as the exact truth is hard to pin down... however, WWE decided to try and prove Punk's story false on February 20 by uploading this 4-minute video of Punk's ass during his last match at the 2014 *Royal Rumble*, an astonishingly petty and embarrassing act regardless of whether Punk's story was true or not.
* In February, Darren Young criticized WWE's tour of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates because homosexuality is a crime in the country. WWE issued a statement on this, which is all well and good, except for the fact that they had Darren Young *remove the tweets criticizing the tour*.
* After years of incriminating stories about him, Bill DeMott left the WWE. In the past, WWE claimed to have done "thorough investigations" of some of these stories and supposedly found nothing against DeMott. A letter from Judas Devlin (former NXT wrestler who was released) opened a can of worms, with other former talent speaking out against DeMott and Triple H.
	+ Ryan Nemeth (Dolph's brother) had given an interview a year earlier where he spoke out about the culture of bullying in NXT, implicating Triple H: *"My female friends who were being mistreated on a daily basis begged me to say something because I was now was in a position to do so. Once I did, they were very happy and said thank you. Then Triple H announced to the current locker room that I was a bitter liar who was making up stories. And the girls' jobs and reputations were threatened. And so my friends begged me to take it down. So I took it down."*
	+ In the middle of this, Chris Jericho **defended** DeMott on twitter with the classic *"if you can't handle it, then quit!"* argument, but quickly deleted his tweet. It's been assumed that he jumped the gun and tried to defend him without knowing too much about the situation.

### Fumble at the Rumble 2: Starring Roman Reigns as Batista!

* The 2014 *Royal Rumble* was generally considered a trainwreck all around. WWE had pushed a not-particularly-over big man as the Rumble winner over far more over guys who could've really used the rub. To combat this, WWE did... essentially the same thing for the 2015 *Royal Rumble*.
	+ In response to the fans' outright revolt to Daniel Bryan not even being included in the 2014 Rumble, WWE made sure to book him in the 2015 Rumble. When Bryan entered at #10, he got the biggest pop of the night. This would unfortunately not last, as he would be eliminated in only about 10 minutes, less than halfway into the match. In a bit of hilarious juxtaposition, the next entrant directly after Bryan's elimination would be Goldust; the camera cut from Bryan sitting disappointed on the floor to Goldust's entrance, with a gigantic *"**SHATTERED DREAMS**"* on his Titantron, almost as if mocking anyone who wanted him to win.
	+ The fans would once again go into a full-on revolt, as they would spend almost the entire second half of the rumble booing it profusely. Only a handful of wrestlers, such as Damien Mizdow, Dolph Ziggler and Dean Ambrose, would be spared from their anger.
	+ Toward the end of the match, Kane and Big Show would go into full-on "Burial Squad" mode and team up to eliminate about seven guys in fairly quick succession. Wrestlers like Dean Ambrose, Dolph Ziggler and Bray Wyatt would be eliminated by the two of them simply picking them up and tossing them out like an afterthought.
	+ Eventually, after the giant heels eliminated Ambrose, this led to the final three being Kane, Big Show and Roman Reigns, in what one would assume would be a handicap match... except the second they knocked Reigns over, the two immediately turned on each other, allowing Reigns to look really, really strong by scoring a cheap double elimination on two opponents who were too distracted with each other to notice him. The crowd would erupt in chants of *"Bullshit!"* and *"Where's Our Refund?"*.
	+ After Reigns eliminated them, Kane and Big Show would gang up on Reigns until the Rock inexplicably made the save. Although the crowd initially popped for him, they quickly resumed booing.
	+ Once everything looked to be over and done with, Rusev pulled a Santino Marella and jumped into the ring to attack Reigns, having been rolled out of the ring without actually being eliminated. The crowd popped huge for this... before Reigns tossed Rusev out ten seconds later as if he were an afterthought.
		- Also note that Curtis Axel would suffer a similar fate to Rusev, getting attacked by Erick Rowan before he even got to the ring, but he just disappeared for the rest of the night.
	+ The winner this year was Roman Reigns, to the surprise of absolutely nobody, meaning WWE would push yet another mediocre big man over much more talented and popular wrestlers.
	+ After the show was over, the outrage over this repeated debacle would be felt, as fans began cancelling their WWE Network subscriptions en masse, with a #CancelWWENetwork hashtag becoming the *number one trend* on Twitter and so many people cancelled that the **cancellation page crashed**. It was even reported that the live fans were straight-up *rioting* outside the arena and attempting to block the WWE employees from leaving, in one instance mocking the Usos with *"Y'all say move, we say no!"*.
		- Mick Foley, following up from the previous year's TV destruction, tweeted *"Does WWE really hate their own audience?"* after the event ended.

### *WrestleMania 31* build-up and post-*WrestleMania* blues

* After the Rumble, the build-up for *WrestleMania* began and it was mostly pisspoor. The Intercontinental Title was once again made to look like a jobber belt with Bad News Barrett constantly losing and having his belt stolen by different people. This led to a 7-man ladder match for the Intercontinental Championship.
	+ Stardust's involvement in this was nonsensical. As *Fastlane* (a forgettable PPV between *Royal Rumble* and *WrestleMania*) approached, WWE finally pulled the trigger on breaking up Goldust and Stardust, with the latter turning heel. However, the team had become such an afterthought after their poor WWE Tag Team Championship reign that no one cared about the feud. Goldust vs. Stardust was greeted with deafening silence at *Fastlane*. Strangely, Goldust won the match, but Stardust went on to fight for the Intercontinental Championship and Goldust just kind of fucked off and only really appeared in battle royales and the like.
* For whatever reason, WWE decided to make it so that The Undertaker did not appear on TV to hype-up his match with Bray Wyatt.
	+ Staging the show in an open-air stadium in California also had its most unfortunate side effect of making both men's entrances a bit underwhelming. Bray's entrance involved a lot of actors dressed as scarecrows and Undertaker's was surprisingly simple, just him walking to the ring through fog. When two guys are centered quite a bit on being dark and mysterious, having them make rather basic entrances in broad daylight can take away from the mystique a bit.
* In order to hype the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royale, WWE had a lame battle royale on a *RAW* before *WrestleMania*. Big Show ended up winning the battle royale at *WrestleMania*, just so they could call him "The Greatest Giant of All".
	+ During this match, Damien Sandow finally turned face and ended his partnership with The Miz. WWE would cap off this much-anticipated payoff by having Big Show toss him out like garbage several seconds later. His ultimate payoff for breaking up his jobber tag team with Miz was losing to him in the blow-off match, then immediately being put in a directionless tag team with Curtis *"I Want Mah WWE Title Shot!"* Axel.
		- Due to a leaked sex tape in which he repeatedly said the n-word, Hulk Hogan got fired from WWE and the team of Curtis Axel (with the Axelmania gimmick) and Damien Sandow (as Macho Mandow) was killed off with no on-screen explanation, leaving Sandow off WWE TV until November.
	+ Hideo Itami (FKA KENTA in Pro Wrestling NOAH) made his main roster debut during this match, having won an NXT tournament at *Axxess* for the right to compete, similar to how Bo Dallas got into the 2013 Royal Rumble. He was also eliminated by Big Show.
* Curtis Axel had an Axelmania gimmick based on him getting over with fans after an attack kept him from participating in the Royal Rumble. Obviously, WWE made sure to keep jobbing him out. They also had a segment the week before *WrestleMania* that was basically just Hulk Hogan and Snoop Dogg burying the gimmick.
* Nikki Bella successfully defended her WWE Divas title against AJ and Paige, to build up... a tag team match at *WrestleMania*, which the Bella Twins lost.
* Sting's involvement with WWE started many months before *WrestleMania*, and it was announced his first match would take place here. His first WWE opponent would be... Triple H. Some people were let down by this, since Undertaker vs. Sting has been one of the biggest dream matches in wrestling for years and Triple H seemed like kind of a random choice. So when it came time for the match itself, it turned out to not be all that bad, but there were a few things that are probably worth mentioning.
	+ Sting's entrance very randomly involved a bunch of guys banging on Japanese Taiko drums. Nobody was quite sure what the hell this had to do with Sting. Triple H's entrance, by comparison, was a comically over-the-top production in itself that involved more bells and whistles than pretty much anything else on the show. It included a long segment of flashing imagery that looked more like something Chris Jericho would use, a cameo by Arnold Schwarzenegger, Triple H on a rising platform dressed as a skull-faced cyborg surrounded by Terminator statues, cyborg vision cycling through the entire roster before singling out Sting, and a bundle of severed Terminator heads for no apparent reason.
	+ The match itself started off like the two were feeling each other out, but pretty quickly went off the rails and became severely overbooked. It ended up being focused almost as much on the interference of DX and the nWo (who were supporting Sting despite them traditionally being enemies) as the two men in the match themselves.
	+ Throughout the entire feud, Triple H randomly balked away from Sting whenever he pulled out his baseball bat, even though Trips was holding a sledgehammer every time. This came to a head during the match in a ridiculous and hilarious spot where Sting somehow snapped Trips' sledgehammer handle in half with one swing from his bat.
	+ So in the end, WWE decided to thank *"the last great legend to never go to WWE"* for finally going to WWE by having him lose to Triple H in his first match. The fact that the two men shook hands afterward apparently meant that this was the end of the feud and Sting's debut match consisted of nothing but WWE burying WCW one more time 14 years too late and Trips finally putting himself over the last great name of the generation. By the way, that last part was not just conjecture, that was basically the kayfabe reason he even wanted to wrestle Sting, because there was one last guy he hadn't beaten.
	+ At one point, the Spanish announce team mentioned TNA by name and the fact that Sting had been there for a long time before coming to WWE.
* With the negative reaction Roman Reigns was getting from fans after the Royal Rumble, WWE figured that Reigns would get over with a win against Daniel Bryan at *Fastlane*. This did not work, so they had Bryan and Reigns be friends on TV afterwards. This also did not work, since the crowds would cheer Bryan and boo Reigns whenever they were in a tag team. Paul Heyman verbally fellated Roman Reigns with some of his promos, and this did not get Reigns over with the crowd any better than before.
* The last bit of build-up for Brock Lesnar vs. Roman Reigns had the two of them get into a tug-of-war for the belt they were fighting for, which just looked like two little kids fighting over a toy, before cutting off so abruptly that many thought it was a production botch. **That is actually how the final *RAW* before *WrestleMania* went off the air.**
* AJ Lee and Paige defeated the Bella Twins at *WrestleMania*. AJ Lee then followed her hubby CM Punk out of WWE a week later.
* At *WrestleMania*, Roman Reigns (the face) was noticeably booed. WWE made a last-minute decision not to have him win the championship. This reportedly angered Reigns' family who were present. His father (Sika) reportedly wanted Reigns to quit the WWE.
* Rollins cashed in his MITB contract during the main event, making the match a triple threat, and pinned Reigns to win the belt. He could audibly be heard saying *"Thank you so much!"* to Reigns as he pinned him.
* Despite all that, the actual *WrestleMania* exceeded expectations due to the pisspoor buildup. Sadly, the good times in the post-'Mania *RAW* were cut short after Brock Lesnar attacked the announcers and a cameraman. Following this attack, WWE sent out *Byron Saxton*, of all people, to replace the attacked commentators. This did not go well to say the least, and Jerry Lawler didn't do much to help matters once he came out.
	+ It should be noted that Vince McMahon called an audible to have Jerry Lawler come out to help Byron Saxton.
* Sheamus returned on the post-'Mania Raw and turned heel, debuting a ridiculous new look: a mohawk with braids on his beard. This got the crowd to chant *"**YOU LOOK STUPID!**"*.
* At the end of the post-'Mania Raw, the crowd shat all over the main event, hijacking the match and booing Roman Reigns out of the building as he got the pin for his team's victory. WWE clearly didn't give up on pushing Roman, and the fact that he was teased as a mystery partner to Randy Orton and Ryback made matters worse for him on that night.
* WWE decided that the best way to start rebuilding Roman Reigns' popularity would be to have him feud with the Big Show. Seriously, they were booked for a Last Man Standing match at *Extreme Rules* and their feud was the same stuff that led audiences to not care about Big Show and did nothing to get Reigns over before.
* Shortly after *WrestleMania*, WWE actually banned Seth Rollins' Curb Stomp finisher out of concern about head injuries, meaning the move that closed out *WrestleMania* just weeks prior and that Rollins had been using for years was now shelved in favor of what was essentially CJ Parker's DDT finisher.
	+ At *Extreme Rules*, a video package of Seth winning the title was aired, but any uses of the Curb Stomp were cut out. This is a bit of a problem when it was the Curb Stomp that Rollins won the title with, so it showed Lesnar setting Rollins up for an F5 and Reigns spearing Lesnar out from under him, then just cut to Seth pinning Reigns for the win without showing what happened.
* Rusev jobbed to Cena for the second PPV in a row (*Extreme Rules*) after he'd been undefeated until *WrestleMania*. At *Payback*, Rusev jobbed to Cena for the third PPV in a row. This would also cause a storyline breakup between Lana and Rusev, with Ziggler being part of a love triangle. So, to recap: Rusev went from feuding with John Cena, losing said feud, losing his US title and got demoted to feuding with Ziggler in a bad romance angle where Lana was *"just friends"* with Ziggler, despite kissing him. **BUILDING NEW STARS, INDEED.** Poor Rusev would then suffer an injury during his feud with Ziggler and was taken out of the *Elimination Chamber* PPV.
	+ Also around that time, he reverted to being billed from Bulgaria. While he is Bulgarian in real life and the decision was probably connected with geopolitics, Rusev was very over in Russia, and some moments of his career, including Big Show ripping off Russian flag during Rusev's entrance on RAW and especially Rusev's *WrestleMania* entrance, actually were covered by Russian mainstream media (bear in mind that the only wrestling programming available in Russia are hour-long *RAW*s and *SmackDown*s without PPVs).
	+ The Ziggler/Lana "romance" angle would continue afterward, despite the two of them having zero chemistry together and audiences not even pretending to care about it. They then threw Summer Rae in as Rusev's replacement girlfriend for lord knows what reason. The worst part? Some sources say the reason for Rusev and Lana's on-screen breakup was because Vince McMahon was hoping to *actually* break them up in real life, as they are legitimately dating off-screen. His reason? *"Guys like Rusev don't get girls like Lana!"*.

### *Elimination Chamber* and onwards

 File:Elimination2015.png
* *Elimination Chamber* this year had NXT Champion Kevin Owens shockingly defeat John Cena, but the LOLWWE parts came from how underwhelming the actual chamber matches were. The chamber match for the Intercontinental Championship was especially horrible. It had midcard geeks doing nothing for a while, Mark Henry replacing Rusev, and a bunch of men standing around, looking lost. The confusion came from two major spots: The glass on Mark Henry's pod was broken, and so he got into the match before the countdown. Sheamus got stuck in his pod in a later spot (this one was planned), and the other men already in the chamber literally stood still like they had no fucking clue of what to do. The worst part was that this PPV took place in Corpus Christi, so the crowd was practically silent for much of this match.
	+ Even though Sheamus getting himself stuck was a planned spot so that he could get in the match in a heel fashion, the commentary did not pick up on this.
* In a story that showed WWE's pettiness, ROH released an action figure of Kevin Steen (now known in WWE as Kevin Owens). Reportedly WWE and Mattel (WWE's toy partner) were not happy, as a star they were pushing had a figure making money for another company, even though he had wrestled in that company for many years.
	+ It was later revealed that WWE was now actively attempting to kill Ring of Honor by signing any free agent talents, matching them with a small NJPW crossover by booking Jushin Liger for *NXT Takeover: Brooklyn*, and attempting to book shows at Ring of Honor arenas to try and squeeze them out.
* It seems the bad luck for Intercontinental Champions continues. The morning after the 7/13 edition of *RAW*, WWE medical staff found that Ryback had a staph infection in his right knee and immediately rushed him to the hospital to have it drained. They succeeded, but his recovery time forced him to miss his IC title defense at *Battleground* against Big Show and The Miz. The match ended up being scrapped and was replaced with a *Miz TV* segment in which Miz got beaten up by Big Show.
	+ Fans, of course, quickly brought up comparisons to CM Punk's staph infection going undiagnosed for 3 months to Ryback's immediately-diagnosed staph infection. Conclusions drawn ranged from Punk's accusations causing WWE medical to be more attentive, to the med team giving less of a shit about Punk than management did.
* *Battleground* took place on July 19th, to mixed reactions. Most of the complaints came from the way the show ended: During the WWE Title match between Seth Rollins and Brock Lesnar, the Undertaker made his return and turned heel by kicking Brock in the groin. The show ended 15 minutes early with **no mention of WWE Champion Seth Rollins, where he and the referee had vanished to, or what the outcome of the match was.**
	+ The show also featured Kevin Owens tapping out to John Cena, drawing much fan ire. Owens, who had been an unstoppable monster in NXT and debuted by taking everything Cena could throw at him and winning anyway, lost the feud with Cena and soon had a gimmick where he walked out on other heels during tag matches and ended up in a directionless feud with Cesaro.
	+ Since winning the US Title at *WrestleMania*, John Cena had embarked on a new angle, where he would hold an open challenge every night on *RAW* and defend his US Title against whoever answered. A lot of people thought this was possibly the best work in Cena's career, as it kept him from hogging up all the spotlight for himself, let him put over up-and-coming talent by letting them look strong against him, and kept him strong by retaining the title as well. It was the "old guard" type that many people were waiting for Cena to become as he began winding down his career to allow WWE to transition to the next stars after him. WWE then noticed that this process meant Cena's merchandise sales were slipping, panicked, and had him go over Kevin Owens in their feud at *Battleground*, putting him in a main event feud with Seth Rollins the next night on *RAW*. In the process, he cut almost the exact same promo on Rollins that he did on CM Punk in 2012, where he told him the WWE Title has been meaningless since he won it.
* In another attempt to destroy Wade Barrett's career, WWE's payoff for him winning *King of the Ring* in 2015 was entering a feud with R-Truth where he would do almost nothing but job to him in quick, fluky matches. Not only was this feud awful, but it went on for an unreasonably long time, with the feud continuing after the alleged payoff by having Truth beat Barrett again in another fluke victory, setting up yet another match at *Battleground*.
* Tyson Kidd suffered a life-threatening (and ultimately career-ending) neck injury after Samoa Joe botched a Muscle Buster during a dark match, which was revealed to have been thrown together at the last minute with very little planning.

### *Tough Enough* 2015: Be A Star!

* WWE and USA Network revived *Tough Enough* (yet again) in late June. Rather than following the formula of past *Tough Enough* seasons (taping weeks in advance like a reality show and having trainers make eliminations based on ability), this version of *Tough Enough* took place live from Full Sail University, with a fan vote deciding who would stay and who would go home, effectively turning the show into a popularity contest. The live portions were accompanied by short taped segments, showing the contestants doing everything but learning how to wrestle. Scripted fights were set up between female and male contestants, and only a handful of contestants received a decent amount of airtime. Hulk Hogan, Paige and Daniel Bryan were brought in as judges, but due to the fan vote deciding who stayed, their opinions were rendered worthless. In addition, the fan votes lasted for the duration of the final commercial break.
* A few days after the third episode aired, The Wrestling Observer reported that USA Network was unhappy with many things about the new *Tough Enough*, including the taped/live format, lack of a dynamic presence from host Chris Jericho compared to previous host "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, the amount of time given to fans to vote, and the fact that previous *Tough Enough* winners never amounted to anything in wrestling. USA Network reportedly thought that the fans saw the show as pointless, and believed that the popularity of wrestling is trending downward based on the show's low ratings.
* Despite allegedly being based on the audience's vote, WWE told the contestants how to act to make sure ones they did not want to win got voted off. The biggest example of this was contestant ZZ, who was constantly chastised for his looks and his weight. At one point during the contest, Paige told ZZ that he had bigger boobs than she did. WWE even went so far as to upload a video of Billy Gunn berating ZZ during a training session.
* The Miz was brought in to replace Hulk Hogan after Hogan's racist sex tape was leaked. In his first episode as judge, he used his veto to keep Amanda Saccomanno in the competition because he thought she was hot.
* The finale on August 25 saw Sara Lee (who was constantly called boring and untalented throughout the whole competition) and Josh Bredl (rumored to be loved by Vince and Kevin Dunn for looking like the white version of Roman Reigns) winning the contest. This was not without drama, as the female runner-up, Amanda, attempted to slut shame Sara Lee by outing her as a ring rat for NXT trainees. She had done the same thing over Twitter the week prior before a furious WWE made her delete the tweets. Mick Foley was so upset that he posted a rant over the situation to Facebook, though he kept surprisingly quiet about the bullying of ZZ.
	+ Mere days after the finale, Amanda was photographed hanging around the stars of *Total Divas* in front of the show's cameras. It was later revealed that WWE had indeed signed her to a contract, and eventually confirmed that she'd be replacing Naomi on *Total Divas*. A few weeks later, ZZ was also signed to a contract, along with Patrick Clark, Mada Abdelhamid and Daria Berenato, continuing the trend and proving USA's point that winning Tough Enough is pointless.
		- Meltzer soon reported that, when looking to hire the rest of the cast, one female contestant's "troubled past" was discovered, resulting in her being red-flagged. This prompted the internet to investigate, revealing that Gabi Castrovinci had been a stripper and escort, possibly still doing the latter all the way up until the show's premiere. Eventually, Meltzer confirmed that it was indeed Gabi who had been banned.

### *SummerSlam* and beyond (AKA "Monday Night Football is Back!")

 File:Cena-Stewart.jpg
* Undertaker faced Brock Lesnar in the main event at *SummerSlam*. The match itself was a much better contest than the one at *Wrestlemania XXX*, but the finish ruined it for a lot of people. Lesnar locked Taker in the Kimura Lock and, while trying to get leverage to pin Lesnar during the hold, Taker tapped out, but the ref didn't see it as he was preoccupied with checking if Lesnar's shoulders were on the mat. However, the timekeeper, despite the tapout being obscured by Taker's leg from his angle, saw the tapout and rang the bell on his own accord. Lesnar and Heyman began celebrating, the commentators were confused and the ref started shouting at the timekeeper that he didn't call for the bell and waved off the end of the match. Taker then hit a low blow on Lesnar and locked him in the Hell's Gate. The match ended with Lesnar giving Taker the middle finger and then passing out. This ending was made worse as most of the crowd in the arena and practically everyone watching it on PPV/Network were confused with this finish until the replay was shown of Taker tapping **AFTER** the match was already over.
	+ So what was the point of this finish? To give Taker his win back and set up a rematch, most likely for *WrestleMania 32*.
	+ **This was not even the first screwy finish of the evening!** The other main event, Seth Rollins vs. John Cena in a WWE/US Title unification match, ended when guest host Jon Stewart interfered and attacked Cena with a steel chair. His reasoning was revealed the next night on *RAW*; Stewart did not want John Cena to surpass his idol Ric Flair's record of 16 world title reigns. *SummerSlam* also saw the "hot feud" between Dolph Ziggler and Rusev end in a lame double countout.
* The night after *SummerSlam*, Seth Rollins was to be presented with a bronze statue of himself by The Authority after he unified the WWE and US titles. During the presentation, the cover that was concealing the statue earlier was lifted to reveal... **Sting.** Sting proceeded to beat up Rollins and tossed him out, ending the show by challenging Rollins to a title match.
	+ How did the Authority punish Sting for this? By giving him a title shot at *Night of Champions* against Rollins, despite him having lost his first match with the company.
		- The entire segment lasted over 20 minutes, and featured Triple H and Stephanie singing "Happy Birthday" to Vince McMahon, who turned 70 that night. When the curtain was pulled to reveal Sting, he had been behind it for so long that half of his facepaint had peeled off from sweat.
	+ The next week, Sting would open *RAW* with a promo. Instead of trying to hype the match, Sting would spend the entire length of the promo putting over HHH while pretty much burying Rollins, only saying how Rollins *"wasn't even half the man HHH is"*.
* The *RAW* after *SummerSlam* also saw the return of The Dudley Boyz, to a huge crowd reaction. They started a feud with The New Day, who were upset at the Dudleys' mistreatment of tables. Rather than build up to a Tag Title match at *Night of Champions*, the two teams faced off unannounced on the next episode of *RAW*.

 File:Pointless.jpg
* The Ziggler/Rusev feud continued, with Summer Rae claiming Dolph exposed himself to her, and that she enjoyed it. Lana, who had started dressing in a Canadian tuxedo and had her ass/panties exposed on several occasions, saw the footage of Summer's interview and started crying.
	+ The following week, WWE would air a video package of this segment and the Miz TV segment from *SmackDown* a couple of times during *RAW*. It's bad enough that **THIS** storyline was somehow important enough to get its own video package over anything else that did deserve one but didn't get it, but the package itself was horrible, looking like something made by TMZ than WWE, with a cheesy voiceover and and words like *"Scandal!"* and *"Diva Done Wrong"* on the screen during it.
	+ As if things couldn't be worse with this storyline, the weekend after this portion of the storyline started, Lana would break her wrist, meaning the end of this storyline might be pushed back even further (this story had already been delayed several times due to Rusev getting injured and Ziggler shooting a movie).
	+ On October 11th, TMZ broke the news that Rusev and Lana had gotten engaged. While this came nearly a week after Summer Rae proposed to Rusev on *RAW* (which he semi-accepted), it's fine considering it's TMZ and not WWE themselves... and then the next day an article about their engagement was posted to WWE.com, completely throwing the storyline through a window. With WWE being forced to acknowledge Rusev and Lana's engagement on TV, the storyline was killed off, meaning it was **completely pointless for everyone involved**.
	+ Interestingly, right before this happened, Rusev had jobbed to Ryback in under 3 minutes. While this may just be a coincidence, it also wouldn't be a surprise for WWE to do something as petty as punish a guy for deciding to marry the woman he loves, simply because it messes with kayfabe storylines.
	+ The *SmackDown* after the breakup, in a backstage interview, Summer stated that, unlike some people, she could keep her personal and professional life separate. While this line was obviously fed to her by management, it's ironic that this line is being said by the woman that just a week ago was **proposing to the superstar she was managing during *RAW***.
	+ A week later, Rusev was completely shunted out of the feud in favor of Summer's new charge, Tyler Breeze. It's actually fortunate that Rusev's part in this feud ended when it did, or else it would've been extended even further as he was soon injured again.
* Even though *RAW* had aired without interruption for many years, the September 14th episode of *RAW* was called the "Season Premiere" - WWE did this last year as well when the NFL season started.
* At *Night of Champions*, Seth Rollins became something of an underdog despite being a heel because he was forced to defend both the US and WWE championships in one night. He lost the US title to John Cena, but retained the WWE title against Sting, with the latter match making WWE's booking of Sting more questionable than it already was. The worst part was that Sting suffered a serious neck injury (which would ultimately prove to be a career-ender) after Rollin powerbombed him into a turnbuckle. The night ended with Sheamus trying to cash in, but failing to get the match started due to Kane interfering.
* The build-up to *Hell in a Cell* saw Kane (now "The Demon" again) enter a feud for the a World Title in 2015 against Seth Rollins. On the *RAW* prior to *HIAC*, Demon Kane beat Seth Rollins in a lumberjack match. By this point, Rollins was losing so much that his title reign could be compared to Rey Mysterio's first World Heavyweight Championship reign.
	+ On screen, the feud ended with a match where the stipulation was that if Kane lost, Corporate Kane would be fired. The problem with this was that during the feud, they were doing a gimmick where Kane had a split personality, and it was actually over with fans. So this all led to a lose-lose situation: if Kane won, Rollins would look like a shitty champion, and if Kane lost, then that would mean killing off a Kane gimmick that was one of the better parts of *RAW* at the time.
* During the *Hell in a Cell* match between Taker and Lesnar, both men ended up bleeding. Many viewers claimed they both were obviously blading, while other claimed hardway. Either way, it seems like this wasn't planned, as both Vince McMahon and Kevin Dunn were reportedly incredibly pissed over this, since they had been pushing for no blood since the PG era started. It was reported that Vince was yelling through the headsets to send doctors out immediately (then was reportedly pissed that Lesnar shoved one), and Dunn was demanding black and white replays.
* Alberto Del Rio returned to WWE as a heel, with Zeb Colter managing him, even though this could have been a good time to make him return as a face. Due to this, he soon became #LatinNoHeat again, despite the initial pop he got for his return and beating John Cena for the US Title.

### Roman Reigns' feud with Bray Wyatt

* Roman Reigns was in a feud with Bray Wyatt for what felt like ages. A while before this feud, Luke Harper and Erick Rowan were reunited as a heel tag team, which was good since WWE was looking like they had almost nothing for them to do as singles wrestlers. Unfortunately, Erick Rowan got injured somewhere along the way, so WWE called up Braun Strowman from NXT to be the new member of the Wyatt Family.
	+ At the time he got called up, Strowman didn't even have a televised match on *NXT*, and looked green once he wrestled on the main roster.
	+ With time, the feud became Dean Ambrose and Roman Reigns vs. The Wyatt Family - Reigns and Ambrose needed a partner for *Night of Champions* and that partner was Chris Jericho, who... was smaller than all of the opponents and unsurprisingly cost his team the match. Prior to Jericho being revealed as the mystery partner, a fan dressed in Shield gear got into the ring and stood behind Reigns and Ambrose. While amusing to watch (Bray and Dean even had a laugh about it in kayfabe), it revealed a serious problem with security at WWE events, as this was the fourth incident involving a fan in a span of a few months.
	+ After the match, Jericho would push away Ambrose and walk out on both him and Reigns, seemingly turning him heel. This went nowhere as Jericho proceeded to not show up at any shows after the PPV.
* On the October 12 episode of *RAW*, Reigns delivered a promo that got shit on by the crowd. Acknowledging the *"boring!"* and *"what?"* chants didn't help Reigns much, and the match he had with Braun Strowman only made matters worse. Strowman's undefeated streak was ended here with an anticlimactic countout loss.
	+ After the match, Bray Wyatt and Luke Harper got in the ring, and Roman ran away. Despite the 3-on-1 advantage, the Wyatt Family did nothing when Roman Reigns punched Bray in the face from outside the ring, making everyone involved look silly.
* The go home episode of *RAW* to *Hell in a Cell* saw Erick Rowan's return to the Wyatts in the least impressive way possible. He just shows up with Bray and Strowman in place of Harper, who wasn't at the show due to personal reasons. There was zero reaction from anyone to his return aside from a quiet note of his appearance from Cole.

### The Wyatts vs. The Brothers of Destruction

* After losing a Hell in a Cell match to Brock Lesnar, Undertaker was beaten down and abducted by the Wyatts. The next night, Kane attempted to get revenge, only to get the same treatment.
* A week later, Bray came out to proclaim that he had *"consumed the Brothers of Destruction's souls"* and gained their powers. Apparently, their powers are having the pyro guy do what they tell him to, since Bray's "display of power" was just a bunch of pyro overlapped by lightning effects that somehow looks **WORSE** than the effects they used in the late 90s.
* The next week, Bray held an eulogy for the Brothers. At the end of it, the lights went out and Undertaker and Kane came out to get payback, with no explanation as to how they got their souls back. The rest of the Wyatts showed up to help Bray, but, despite being in a 4-on-2 advantage, they got demolished by the Brothers, with Bray taking a double chokeslam to close the show.

### Limping to the End of the Year: Elevated Liver Enzymes 2.0

* The main event scene was **fucked** towards the end of the year. John Cena was taking some time off, Randy Orton got a shoulder injury (rumor has it that he got it whilst taking out the garbage), and none other than Seth Rollins got a serious knee injury at a house show in Ireland on November 4. As a result, WWE set up a tournament to determine the new WWE World Heavyweight Champion.
* Said tournament was extremely predictable aside from Kalisto's win over Ryback. The semifinals and final would take place at *Survivor Series*. There was just one problem with that: midcard champions were also in the tournament, so the card couldn't get filled by matches for the IC and US title. Plus, the titles were essentially an afterthought at this time. This resulted in a chunk of the *Survivor Series* card feeling like a *SmackDown* episode.
* Roman Reigns won the tournament and the crowd shat all over him. Sheamus then cashed in his *MITB* contract and won the title in a screwjob, joining The Authority and becoming their "corporate champion" in the process.
	+ After losing his title, Reigns, the babyface, ***CRIED***. The crowd booed this and Reigns soon went back to looking strong on TV.
* The November 23 *RAW* received the lowest non-holiday rating since 1996, coming in at a ***2.16*** with an average of **2.96 million people** watching the show. For comparison, the November 24, 2014 episode had an average of **4.23 million people** watching.
* People on the shelf as of *Survivor Series*:
	+ Cena
	+ Rollins (out past *WrestleMania 32*)
	+ Bryan (forced to put his career on hiatus due to concussion and neck issues)
	+ Orton (out for a very long time since he'll need a neck surgery after his shoulder heals)
	+ Cesaro (out past *WrestleMania 32*)
	+ Tyson Kidd (career ended by Samoa Joe)
	+ Nikki Bella (wouldn't return until *SummerSlam* 2016)
	+ Sting (career ended by Seth Rollins)
	+ Rusev
	+ Lana
	+ This isn't even everyone. There's also people on part-time basis like Lesnar and Taker.
* Brad Maddox, who had disappeared from television following his removal as *RAW* GM and just recently resurfaced in dark matches with a new "Total Package Lex Luger"-esque gimmick, was fired on November 25th. The reason for him being canned, which he confirmed afterwards, was that he swore at a group of fans during a house show.
* 3 days after forming, the League of Nations (consisting of Sheamus, Rusev, Del Rio and Barrett) end up looking like complete shit by **LOSING A 4-ON-1 HANDICAP MATCH TO REIGNS** by count-out on *SmackDown*.
* On the *RAW* after this *SmackDown*, WWE did some weird shit, presumably to get the ratings up. The opening promo set up a Fatal 4-Way elimination tag team match with teams of 4, where if one member of a team got pinned, the whole team was out of the match. The Wyatt Family was involved in this, and got eliminated first by *Tommy Dreamer* of the ECW Originals. The League of Nations then eliminated the ECW Originals, which was fine as they needed to look strong somehow, but then Roman Reigns eliminated the League of Nations by **pinning Sheamus** to get the win for his team. From then on, the show decayed to such a point that fans were reportedly leaving the arena before the main event segment with Roman Reigns and Sheamus. The final rating? ***2.15*** - The lowest rating since September 1997.
	+ Said opening also saw the main roster return of Rhyno (Rhyno had been in *NXT* since February), who got only a small reaction from the South Carolina crowd. Why WWE decided not to have him return in Pittsburgh with Dreamer, where he would've gotten a much better pop, is anyone's guess. Made worse was the fact that his return was overshadowed by the two top heel stables already being in the ring and Reigns and company coming out seconds later.
* *TLC* had Sheamus defend his WWE title against Roman Reigns. Fans were not pleased with having to see this, so there were chants of *"**WE WANT CENA!**"* and *"**WE MISS ROLLINS!**"* throughout the match. It wasn't until after the match that Roman finally got a huge pop for beating the stuffing out of the League of Nations and HHH, with the latter suffering the worst beating. Since ratings were down, WWE got the bright idea to capitalize on Roman Reigns' pop at TLC by bringing Vince McMahon back on *RAW*, and setting up a rematch where Roman Reigns won the WWE title **just one day after *TLC***.
	+ On the plus-side, Reigns stopped talking so much and finally acted like the unstoppable badass he always should have been (going from crying over a title loss to beating the tar out of Vince McMahon and the entire League of Nations). On the downside, Alberto Del Rio, a United States Champion who'd recently beat John Cena clean, was now not only facing a legitimate threat from former "designated jobber" Jack Swagger, but was also cannon fodder for Reigns. To put it simply, a month after the League of Nations had formed, Reigns had singlehandedly destroyed them.
* John Cena finally returned on the last *RAW* of 2015 to try and reclaim the US title. Predictably, the match ended in a no contest. One week later, he was put back on the shelf with a shoulder injury.

## 2016

### Starting off the Year

* So WWE was going into 2016 with most of their card on the shelf. Daniel Bryan, who was cleared by 2 doctors, was still refused to be cleared by the WWE. In the end, he had to retire on February 8, leaving WWE without one of its hottest stars on the wrestling roster. He would go into non-wrestling roles later in the year. At the very end of his retirement segment on *RAW*, Titus O'Neil grabbed Vince McMahon by the arm and got shoved by Vince for it. This happened as *RAW* was going off the air. WWE then suspended Titus for *90 days*, and that was later lowered to 60 days.
* Kalisto began getting pushed in John Cena's place for the US Title against Alberto Del Rio. He became the new US champion on *RAW*, then lost it back to Del Rio on *SmackDown* **in the same week** after outside interference from King Barrett. In the *Royal Rumble* rematch, Kalisto won the title back, but WWE gave up on pushing Kalisto in May, when he lost the championship to Rusev. Following the WWE draft, Kalisto delivered the infamous *"good lucha thing"* promo and was essentially relegated to being a midcard dork.

### *Royal Rumble* 2016 and the Road to *WrestleMania*

* Since the WWE had a very thin roster going into *Royal Rumble*, Vince decided the only way to spice up the card was to have Roman Reigns defend the WWE World Heavyweight Championship in the Royal Rumble match. This was called very predictable by many, with people knowing Roman was going to be number one and would either retain, or Triple H would eliminate him and win the title.
* The show itself wasn't too bad, but there were some noteworthy blemishes. For one thing, the camera work was poor at times, with numerous spots being missed throughout the Rumble match - **including AJ Styles' surprise WWE debut**.
* Some major logic holes came in the storylines that involved the Royal Rumble. At one point, Vince McMahon sent out the League of Nations to attack Roman Reigns. Instead of throwing him over the top rope (you know, to eliminate him) Roman went under the bottom rope to the outside to get beat up. The fact that Vince didn't get mad at the League of Nations for not eliminating Roman made it seem like Vince himself didn't know the rules. The beatdown that Roman got was so severe that he was taken out of the match... and later came back, without really selling the injuries.
* Brock Lesnar got eliminated by the Wyatts, who were all eliminated by Brock earlier except for Bray. Instead of going on a rampage, Brock strangely accepted his elimination in peace.
* The beatdown earlier didn't work at all as the fans booed Roman heavily, only to cheer loudly when Triple H (who was number 30) eliminated him. WWE had once again failed at making Roman the new face of the company, and they were back to square one.
* On top of that, the final two were Triple H and Dean Ambrose. This could have been a neat time to put over Ambrose since he was still not quite ruined by WWE just yet. Sadly, this couldn't happen because the Rumble was meant to set up Roman Reigns vs. Triple H at *WrestleMania*.
* With all of that out of the way, the road to *WrestleMania* had truly begun. The League of Nations were basically already branded as failures by fans, but that could have been salvaged if WWE could just put them over The New Day, who were the tag team champions. So, at *WWE Roadblock*, Sheamus and Barrett challenged Big E and Xavier Woods... and failed yet again.
* At *Fastlane*, it was Dean Ambrose vs. Brock Lesnar vs. Roman Reigns to determine the #1 contender for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. The finish saw Lesnar coming close to beating Reigns with a Kimura Lock, followed by Ambrose stopping him with a steel chair. This left Ambrose, the fan-favorite with a huge chance to win, but Roman Reigns was the chosen one for WWE, so he ended up beating Ambrose while Lesnar was down. Once again, the crowd booed Reigns.
* Despite that, Ambrose got a shot at the World Heavyweight Title at *WWE Roadblock* after he called out Trips on an episode of *RAW*, vowing that he would take his title and *"hijack WrestleMania"*. Despite him obviously losing in the end, Ambrose was cheered on by the Toronto crowd as if he were the second coming of Jesus, showing that they wanted him to be the company's top star instead of Reigns.
	+ Ambrose was then booked in a No Holds Barred Street Fight with Brock Lesnar at *WrestleMania*. In the build-up to the match, Ambrose was given a barbed-wire bat by Mick Foley and a chainsaw by Terry Funk. He was also beaten down easily by Lesnar, so the build-up led fans to believe that the match would be a *violent hardcore match*, and put Dean Ambrose in a situation where he *had to win*. **Keep that in mind.**
* **Shane McMahon came back!** Vince McMahon wasn't happy, but a deal was made. If Shane could win a match that Vince chose, he would be in charge of *RAW*. If Shane lost, he had to give Vince the key to a lockbox. What was in the lockbox? **No one ever found out.** Anyways, the match that Vince McMahon chose was Shane McMahon vs The Undertaker in a Hell in a Cell match. The storyline never explained why Undertaker would ever take Vince's side, so they had to have Shane insult Undertaker for this to make any sense.
* Roman Reigns attacked Triple H as he was getting in a car with Stephanie McMahon. This segment was laughed at by fans due to Stephanie comically screaming her head off in fear, even though she's been around guys fighting before.
* The Dudley Boyz turned heel, attacking the Usos. This set up a match at *WrestleMania*, which would end up being relegated to the pre-show. **You read that right, the Dudley Boyz were relegated to the pre-show.** ***Let that sink in.***
* There was also a 10-Diva tag team match set up that involved Team Total Divas. No one cared. Eva Marie was on Team Total Divas (despite being a heel) and that team's opponents were "Team BAD and Blonde".

### *WrestleMania 32* and the aftermath

* The League of Nations went over The New Day. This was a 3-on-3 match that was inexplicably **NOT** for the tag team titles, making it utterly pointless. The next night on *RAW*, Barrett and Sheamus tried to win the tag team titles and failed, making the match at *WrestleMania* completely pointless.
* Chris Jericho went over AJ Styles **clean**. For whatever reason, WWE felt the need to give him a win, even though AJ Styles needed it more to be a firmly established star. Jericho went all the way to pleading the case to Vince that he should lose to Styles, as AJ beating Jericho would be a way to show that he was a big deal, only to be told that the finish would NOT be changed.
* Brock Lesnar beat Dean Ambrose in a very disappointing hardcore match. Ambrose would later complain on "Stone Cold" Steve Austin's podcast, explaining that he had a vision for the match to be *"the craziest thing imaginable"* and pitched ideas to everyone, but was *"was met with laziness"*. He also mentioned that Brock *"didn't want to do anything"*, and it showed throughout the match.
* Out of nowhere, WWE released a new Women's Title belt on the pre-show. Charlotte was the Divas Champion going into the show, but abruptly, her title was vacated in favor of a new belt. Luckily for WWE, not many complained since fans didn't care for the butterfly belt. Some build-up to this new title would have been nice, though.
* Kalisto and Ryback feuded over the US title. During one promo before 'Mania, Ryback took a page out of Triple H's playbook and said that *"people like you (Kalisto) don't deserve to win championships!"*.
* Undertaker beat Shane McMahon, but the stipulation was thrown out the night after the match. Shane McMahon became the *RAW* GM less than 24 hours later.
* In a very random *WrestleMania* moment, The Rock showed up and beat Erick Rowan in 6 seconds. The entire Wyatt Family then got beaten up by Rocky and a returning John Cena.
* Roman Reigns had a crowning victory at *WrestleMania*, but the crowd still shat all over him.
* Almost one month after *WrestleMania*, the League of Nations imploded during a 6-man tag match against Cesaro, Kalisto and Sami Zayn on a random episode of *SmackDown*, making the group a complete and utter failure. Everyone involved was arguably less over than before.
	+ It's worth noting that King Barrett was taken out of the group on April 4th after Sheamus brogue-kicked him in the face for losing a tag team match. This was his final appearance for WWE. Despite being very over with his "Bad News Barrett" act, they totally wasted the guy over time, and he was released on May 6th.
* Dolph Ziggler vs. Baron Corbin became one of many pointless midcard feuds.
* After *Payback*, there were a bunch of releases. Among them was Cody Rhodes, who notably pleaded with writers to end the Stardust gimmick for more than 6 months. Damien Sandow was also released, which really didn't sit well with fans who felt like he was being underused. There were plans to have him as Macho Mandow to team up with Curtis Axel, who had an Axelmania gimmick. Hulk Hogan's leaked sex tape completely killed off this gimmick, and the idea of the team was dropped.
	+ Cameron was *"made an example of"* and fired for voicing her support for Ryback, who had just gone on a lengthy Twitter rant against Vince McMahon and WWE creative after being suspended for arguing with management over a pay dispute.

### The Road to *SummerSlam* and The Brand Split 2.0

* Dana Brooke became Charlotte's sidekick. WWE's big idea was that, eventually, Dana Brooke would turn face and become a major star. This ended up being a terrible plan, and it seemed like she was working hard to earn the nickname of "Dana Botch".
* The New Day's tag team title reign kept going on and on with rematch after rematch. Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson joined WWE back in April, and it seemed like a good time for them to end New Day's reign. It's worth noting that New Day was very over at this time, but the title reign was getting quite stale.
* Apollo Crews (formerly Uhaa Nation) got called up from *NXT* on April as well, and was initially getting a decent push. However, his main weakness was his mic skills, and soon enough, WWE creative would go sour on him.
* Before the draft, WWE had its *Money in the Bank* show. This was a hell of a night, as Roman Reigns lost to Seth Rollins and then Dean Ambrose cashed in his *MITB* contract to win the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. That ending went over great, but the main reason it happened was because Roman Reigns got suspended due to a Wellness Policy violation. Apparently lazy superhero booking was not the only thing keeping Roman looking strong!
* On the same show, there was a Fatal 4-Way clusterfuck of a tag team match. The referee could not keep up with who the legal man was, and some positioning botches were noticeable. An illegal man ended up getting the pin to end the match, and that's how The New Day retained their tag team titles.
* For months, WWE aired vignettes for Primo and Epico's new gimmick: The Shining Stars. When they finally debuted on the May 16 *RAW* episode, they had a weird match where the commentators were talking as if this was the first time Primo and Epico had ever wrestled as a team on *RAW*. It didn't help that the match was just a by-the-book debut squash match, and the gimmick of welcoming people to Puerto Rico wasn't great heel material.
* A new WWE Draft took place on July 19, with the brands having different rosters again. This would end up helping *SmackDown* greatly, since it had become something of a skippable show after the death of the previous brand split. We also got new titles out of it. *SmackDown* got the main world title, as well as *SmackDown* versions of the Women's and Tag Team titles, while *RAW* got the widely-panned Universal Championship and later a new Cruiserweight Title. Some *NXT* wrestlers got called up, and sure enough, the quality of the weekly *NXT* show suffered for months due to this.
* After the draft, *Battleground* took place. Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens had what was built up to be possibly the last time they'd face each other. Of course, that's not what really happened, as they've faced each other innumerable times since.
* WWE ripped off TNA's "Final Deletion" segment. They did this through a brawl between The New Day and The Wyatt Family at the Wyatt Compound and... **Holy shit, it was bad!** Not in a *"so bad, it's good"* way, just a lot of shitty filters and shaky camera work.
* Just before *SummerSlam*, Alberto Del Rio got suspended for a Wellness Policy violation, and promptly quit WWE. Apparently, a lot of promises weren't lived up to, and he was unhappy with his position on the card. Suspension aside, he was right to be disappointed. Pairing him with Zeb Colter was a mistake, and the failure of the League of Nations only cooled him off further.
* **LET'S MAKE DARREN YOUNG GREAT AGAIN!** For whatever reason, WWE paired Darren Young up with Bob Backlund. With a new theme song and Bob Backlund's Crossface Chickenwing, Young was pushed, and it was a total waste of time as the gimmick didn't really get over. The segments hyping it up went on for weeks and, since Backlund's parts were filmed at a different location from Darren, fans were treated to numerous awkward pauses.
	+ **Darren Young:** *"Wait a second, coach, wait a second! Are you giving me your finishing hold?"*
	+ **Bob Backlund:** ***\*looks at cue card\*** "**YES!**"*

### *SummerSlam* and beyond

* At *Summerslam*, Sheamus and Cesaro began their best-of-seven series. The finish to said series was rejected by fans since it ended in a no-contest, and people were sick of seeing them wrestle each other.
* Charlotte lost her Women's title to Sasha Banks on the July 25th *RAW* episode. She then won it back on *SummerSlam* after Sasha got injured. Later, she lost it back to Sasha on the October 3rd episode of *RAW*. The Boss then proceeded to lose the title back to Charlotte at *Hell in a Cell* - **in her hometown, no less.** This match in particular had a number of problems with it.
	+ The build-up was terrible because, most of the time, the Hell in a Cell match was treated like some kind of reward to Charlotte and Sasha Banks for all they did for women's wrestling, instead of the fearsome, punishing match it is. On the *RAW* before the match took place, it seemed like someone finally got a clue and had Mick Foley put over the danger of that match.
	+ Sasha Banks strangely became a late chapter of Eddiesploitation. WWE took the fact that she's an Eddie Guerrero fan and abused it for no good reason. It's not like Sasha wasn't already over, there were *"**WE WANT SASHA!**"* chants during the muddled "Divas Revolution" angle.
	+ Aside from being a weak Hell in a Cell match, the damn table didn't break for a spot near the end. So, Charlotte tried putting Sasha through it repeatedly, causing the match to fall apart.
		- They weren't done with this game of hot potato until *Roadblock: End of the Line* (there were **two** *Roadblock* events this year, one in March and one in December), where Charlotte won the title for the 4th time and mercifully ended the feud.
* The Miz defeated Apollo Crews. From this point on, Crews became a jobber who even suffered a loss to the returning Curt Hawkins, who would later go on to have a 3-year-long losing streak.
* Gallows and Anderson failed to win the tag team titles at *SummerSlam* after Jon Stewart interfered. They got numerous title shots afterwards and failed in all of them, making them look like total goofs. The low point of the feud with New Day was the "Old Day" segment on *RAW*. It wasn't until December that the New Day finally dropped the Raw Tag Team titles, and that was against the makeshift team of Sheamus and Cesaro.
* The Dudley Boyz said goodbye to the WWE not long after *SummerSlam*. Though they did put over some tag teams, their return was generally underwhelming. Gallows and Anderson attacked them on their last night because they needed to get some heat after losing so much.
* Finn Balor and Seth Rollins fought for the newly unveiled WWE Universal Championship at *SummerSlam*, and the title looked so lame that the crowd chanted against it for parts of the match. Worst of all, Finn Balor got injured by the same move that Rollins injured Sting with, and despite finishing the match, he had to vacate the title the next night on *RAW*.
* On the *Smackdown **LIVE*** (they call it that all the time to remind people that it's no longer taped) side of things, Dean Ambrose faced Dolph Ziggler at *SummerSlam*. The choice of opponent was not well-received since, not long ago, Ziggler had been putting over Baron Corbin in weak matches and now everyone was supposed to buy him as a main eventer.
* In the main event of *SummerSlam*, Brock Lesnar shot on Randy Orton and legitimately busted him open to end the match. Though this made for a great visual, it wasn't exactly the smartest thing to do, considering the concussion lawsuit at the time. Backstage, Jericho got into an altercation with Lesnar over the spot because no one backstage gave him a clear answer to whether this was a work or not.
* Darren Young feuded with Titus O'Neil for a bit. On August 22's episode of *RAW*, Titus royally fucked up his promo before attacking Bob Backlund. The feud was mercifully dropped after this disaster of a segment.
* Jack Swagger was initially drafted to *RAW*, but later moved to Smackdown because his *"RAW contract"* expired. A big deal was made about him moving over to *SmackDown*, but he proceeded to do almost nothing of relevance aside from losing to Baron Corbin at *No Mercy*.
* Ambrose's WWE World Heavyweight championship reign was not going so well. At *Backlash*, things got to the point to where the crowd cheered the heel AJ Styles on as he defeated Ambrose for the title.
* Bray Wyatt's big feud around this time period was with Randy Orton. In a weird turn of events, Orton ended up turning heel and joining forces with Wyatt, with the Wyatt Family now consisting of Wyatt, Orton and Luke Harper. This had brief success, with Orton and Wyatt winning the Tag Team Championship from Heath Slater and Rhyno. However, they lost the titles to American Alpha in a fatal 4-way elimination tag team match, planting the seeds for some awful shit in 2017.

#### The WWE Cruiserweight Division

* On *RAW*, the Cruiserweight Division was being butchered, starting with the champion. The strange thing about this was that the Cruiserweight Classic tournament went over very well with mostly good-to-great matches. TJ "Suicide" Perkins won said tournament and became the first new WWE Cruiserweight Champion since Hornswoggle back in '07. Unfortunately, WWE took the fact that he likes video games and made the worst of it, trying to make TJ Perkins into a totally cool and hip guy who talks in video game terms (*"Whoa, hit the pause button!"*). The awful main roster writing, combined with him not being great on the mic, made for a poor combo, and the nearly constant dabbing didn't help. Getting fooled by Brian Kendrick through the oldest trick in the book (pretending to be injured) basically killed off his character, and he eventually turned heel and became Adrian Neville's "disciple".
	+ As for the rest of the division, they all struggled to get over due to being unfamiliar to most of the TV audience. WWE didn't do much to introduce all the people in the Cruiserweight division anyways, at least not on *RAW*.
	+ Gran Metalik was one of the best-received competitors in the tournament, but he was hardly put on WWE TV for the rest of 2016. Even after he was finished with all his business in Mexico, Metalik's appearances were generally sporadic throughout 2017.
	+ There were so many damn wrestlers that another show had to be made for the Cruiserweights and it was called *205 Live*. The show premiered on November 29, 2016. Let's cut to the chase: the big problems are that it's taped after *SmackDown* (which means that the crowds that just saw the TV main event are tired and quiet, with some of them leaving), and generally, it exposes the weaknesses instead of the strengths of the division. For instance, instead of exciting, high-flying action that fans saw on the CWC, 205 Live offered bland mat wrestling with a few dives in it. Plus, many wrestlers on *RAW* are capable of doing that, so having another show that doesn't offer a different style isn't very productive. *205 Live* doesn't pick up as many views as expected on the WWE Network due to these issues.
* Towards the end of the year, Noam Dar started his seemingly never-ending feud with Cedric Alexander over Alicia Fox.

## 2017

### Fumble at the Rumble 3 and the Road to *Wrestlemania 33*

* Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows had been turned into geeks throughout their failed chase of the New Day's Tag Team titles. They finally managed to win them from Cesaro and Sheamus here, but the damage had already been done.
* Roman Reigns was #30 at the Rumble. Yes, WWE still hadn't given up on making him main-event *WrestleMania*. Reigns eliminated an overweight Undertaker, setting up the feud between the two. Randy Orton ultimately won the match after eliminating Reigns.
* Tye Dillinger came into the Rumble at #10. He was a surprise entrant and though this may seem crazy to read in later years, he was quite over at the time with his "Perfect 10" gimmick, with *"10!"* chants taking place even outside of WWE shows. WWE then did everything possible to make Dillinger look like a lower-card dork, seriously hurting, if not killing, his overness. It's almost as if they merely wanted to kill the *"10!"* chant.
* Braun Strowman helped Kevin Owens retain his WWE Universal championship against Roman Reigns. This set up a now-infamous feud between Strowman and Reigns. It was designed to have Reigns slay a giant to put him over... but Strowman ended up getting surprisingly over instead. However, that came after *WrestleMania*. In the early part of the feud, it was the same old routine. Roman won, got booed and WWE carried on pushing him as the face of the company.
* Bray Wyatt won the WWE Championship at *Elimination Chamber* - though it seemed like he was finally at the top of the mountain in some way, WWE made sure to make his title reign forgettable at best (really shitty at worst) with a dumb feud with Randy Orton. This feud really shouldn't have been tough: Orton had joined the Wyatt Family. Simply betraying them and turning Harper and Wyatt against each other would have been enough. However, WWE decided this wasn't enough and got wacky with shit that involved a crucifix, arson, and topped off this part of the feud with a poorly-received *WrestleMania* match between Orton and Wyatt (Orton won, obviously).
* American Alpha won a tag team turmoil match to defend their tag team titles at *Elimination Chamber*. While winning the titles from Orton and Harper was a big moment for them, the win on this night ended up cooling them off. They ran through months of storylines in one match, and due to a lack of ideas, American Alpha ended up disappearing from TV every now and then during their reign. Eventually, their cold title reign was mercifully ended by The Usos.
* Enzo Amore and Big Cass chased after the *RAW* tag team titles while Gallows and Anderson were champs. They ultimately failed, and their match at *Fastlane* would end up being their last good chance to become champions as a team. Prior to this show, Enzo Amore had a singles match with Cesaro where he couldn't throw himself over the top rope properly. Cesaro could barely hide his disgust at his opponent, and this was merely the beginning of the end for Amore, who was clearly coasting on his promo ability, and offered little in-ring ability.
* You may have noticed that *205 Live* is hardly mentioned so far in this section. That is because WWE did everything possible to make that show as dull as possible, with wrestling that is just too grounded and limiting on its exciting Cruiserweight workers. The word is that Vince McMahon was mainly booking that, much like *RAW* and *SmackDown* (yes, *Smackdown* is his show, not Road Dogg's).
* Bayley won the *RAW* Women's Championship from Charlotte... at *Fastlane*. This was merely a small mistake compared to the madness that came for Bayley later in the year, but it's worth mentioning because Bayley won it with help from Sasha Banks. Stephanie McMahon confronted Bayley about this on a Raw later, and said she should relinquish the title. Bayley admitted that she didn't win it in the best way, but kept the title anyways. Many thing were wrong with this: Where was Stephanie during all the other title changes that had interference involved in them? Why does she suddenly care about interference? And why set up a situation where Bayley couldn't win in any way? Seriously, if Bayley gave up the title, she'd look like a geek, and if she kept it (which she did), it would go against her nice, innocent character.
	+ Despite this, at least a storyline was already set for a triple threat for the *RAW* Women's title. Charlotte and Sasha Banks were the obvious challengers, but despite Nia Jax being greener than a freshly-mowed field, WWE felt the need to throw her into the chase as well. This is why *WrestleMania 33* had a fatal 4-way for the *RAW* Women's championship.

### *WrestleMania 33* and the aftermath

* Mojo Rawley won the Andre The Giant Memorial Battle Royal, last eliminating future WWE champion Jinder Mahal. **No, that is not a joke.** Also, Rob Gronkowski got involved with the match, getting heated with Jinder Mahal. This was a storyline, but a female security guard wasn't clued in, so she tried to stop Gronk from getting past the security wall around the ring before being told that this was a work.
* Dean Ambrose went from winning the WWE World Heavyweight title last year to being dumped onto the pre-show against Baron Corbin.
* The Hardy Boyz made a surprise return to *WrestleMania* and won the *RAW* tag team titles after being added into the triple threat that involved Gallows & Anderson, Enzo & Cass and Cesaro & Sheamus. This was pretty much a given due to how hot the Broken Hardys gimmick got outside of WWE. However, due to a legal battle with *Impact Wrestling*, the Hardys couldn't be Broken just yet. Once Matt was becoming broken, WWE's handling of the gimmick made some people wish that WWE never touched the gimmick (more on that later).
* John Cena and Nikki Bella beat The Miz and Maryse - the build-up for this was very well received, but the match itself greatly under-delivered. Cena seemed to take fewer and fewer risks in the ring as the year went on, and his time as a full-time wrestler was coming to an end.
* Randy Orton ended Bray Wyatt's WWE championship reign in a match that is mostly remembered for the stupid images of insects that were projected onto the ring.
* Finally, Roman Reigns beat Undertaker in the main event of *WrestleMania*. This match was badly received due to Undertaker huffing and puffing his way through this 23-minute bout. He was clearly injured and seemed to get lost a couple of times with regards to his positioning, and the timing (this led to a sad botch where Reigns couldn't reverse 'taker's tombstone properly into one of his own).
* On the famous *RAW* after 'Mania, WWE did the same dumb routine to try to downplay the crowd reactions. Basically, the WWE narrative is *"they boo people they normally cheer, and they cheer people they usually boo!"*.
* The week afterwards, Braun Strowman had his star-making segment where he attacked Roman Reigns repeatedly, famously screaming *"**I'M NOT FINISHED WITH YOU!**"*
* WWE began pushing, of all people, **Jinder Mahal**. He pinned Sami Zayn to win a WWE championship shot in a multi-man match after interference from the Bollywood Boyz (now the Singh Brothers). Mahal would then steal the belt from Randy Orton, with this being a serious tease of him winning the title.
* Alexa Bliss began her feud with Bayley, becoming the #1 contender for her Women's Championship. Prior to the PPV match, WWE already got to work on making Bayley look like a moronic babyface by having her chase Bliss for a bit in a segment. She stopped once Bliss was out of sight, turned to the crowd to talk to them, and then Bliss attacked her from behind. This is WWE's modern babyface booking in a nutshell.

### *Payback* 2017 - Here We Fucking Go Again!

* The feud between Randy Orton and Bray Wyatt kept going. Since WWE couldn't bring the 'Broken' gimmick from TNA into WWE just yet, they tried doing their own wacky pre-taped segment in a dark place. This led to the House of Horrors match between Orton and Wyatt, which was very badly received by both the audience at home and the fans in the arena. They tried to go for a serious horror vibe at times, but it just fell flat at best. After the pre-taped part, the show went on as usual, with Rollins and Samoa Joe having their match.
* Following that, Wyatt and Orton got into the ring and had a dreadful but short match, which ended with Wyatt winning after interference from the Singh Brothers and Jinder Mahal.
* Bayley, the hometown hero, lost her title to Alexa Bliss **clean**. A pretty tough loss, but this was just the beginning of the end for poor Bayley...

### Jinder Mahal: WWE Champion

* At *Backlash*, the unthinkable happened: **Jinder Mahal beat Randy Orton for the WWE Championship.** His push was met with backlash, oddly enough, from numerous fans who felt the push came way too fast. He was a jobber even as late as *WrestleMania 33*, and now people were supposed to believe he was a main-eventer. There were also some ~~retards~~ ~~fans~~ shills defending this push, because as we all know, if it's something new, it must be good and accepted by fans no matter what.
* On April, Shinsuke Nakamura had been called up to the main roster, and went to *SmackDown*. Guess who ended up being fed to Mahal multiple times? **Yep.** The underwhelming quality of the matches between Mahal and Nakamura didn't help matters at all, seriously hurting Nakamura's reputation as a main-eventer.
* The peak LOLWWE moment of Mahal's title reign came in the form of a *SmackDown* segment where he was mocking pictures of Nakamura's face. See, the idea was that he was mocking Nakamura because he was Asian. At one point in the segment, Mahal said *"you people always **ROOK** the same!"* before doing an incredibly racist "slant-eye" gesture. After this, any proper booker would have Nakamura successfully beat Mahal for the WWE title. However, this is the WWE, where Booker T was famously beaten by Triple H after the latter's infamous *"people like you don't deserve to be champions!"* line. So, of course, Nakamura lost to Mahal in a situation where losing would have made him look like complete shit.
* Arguably, the other possible peak LOLWWE moment in Mahal's title reign was when Mahal defended his title against Randy Orton in a Punjabi Prison Match at *Battleground*. This was very badly received because, for one thing, the fans in the arena could barely see the match. On top of that, it was nearly 30 minutes long and had the Great Khali making a return to WWE to help Mahal. This was ultimately pointless because Khali didn't stick around (i.e. he wasn't going to be a full-time wrestler for WWE). The cherry on top of all this was that Khali strangely decided to take the belt from Mahal and raised it with his arms, supposedly (according to Edge) to work the marks in India into thinking he may chase the title.
* Eventually, WWE actually teased Brock Lesnar vs. Jinder Mahal in a champion vs. champion match at *Survivor Series*. For whatever reason, the wrestling gods smiled upon the fans for once and prevented this from happening. On a random episode of *SmackDown* taped in Manchester, England, just before *Survivor Series*, AJ Styles ended Jinder Mahal's reign of terror and would go on to hold the WWE Championship for over a year.
* Mahal's reign was officially a failure because, on top of his own limits as a wrestler, the fact is that WWE booked him in worse manner than expected. Supposedly, the idea was to push him hard to get fans in India to spend lots of money on tickets for WWE's tour of the country. This didn't work for a few reasons:
	+ Social media fandom does not mean that all of those fans are going to be willing to spend money on a WWE show.
	+ Jinder Mahal isn't that relevant in India, mainly due to him being Canadian. It's his parents that are Indian.
* WWE's India tour was reduced to having one show, where Jinder Mahal jobbed out to Triple H.

### The Burial of Bayley

* As the feud with Alexa Bliss kept going, WWE kept making Bayley look like a dork. One segment had Bliss ask Bayley if she'd ever kissed a boy.
* The most infamous segment of this feud was "Bayley: This Is Your Life!". Booker T actually said on commentary, *"This is hard to watch..."*. Bliss brought out numerous people from Bayley's past, all of which revealed humiliating stuff about Bayley. Instead of getting sympathy on the babyface being humiliated, it just made fans hate the show for having such a shitty segment, and it made Bayley into an even bigger geek of a character. Also, two of the extras made out on camera because someone thought the crowd would give a shit about extras that would never appear again.
* This segment was so bad that WWE had Alexa Bliss bury it on camera in another episode of *RAW*.
* The payoff to all of this could have been done at *Extreme Rules*. They had a "Kendo Stick on a Pole" match, so the way to redeem Bayley seemed obvious: You have her unleash a tremendous beating on Bliss for the win, showing that while Bayley is a nice character, she is not someone to mess with. Instead, they had a very basic match where Bayley outright refused to use the Kendo Stick and promptly had the tar beaten out of her by Bliss before getting pinned clean as a whistle.
* As if that wasn't enough, Bayley was pinned in a tag team match by Bliss on the next night's *RAW*. The feud was supposed to keep going, but then Bayley got injured during a match with botch machine Nia Jax. With that, the feud ended abruptly and fans were left wondering who Bayley pissed off backstage.

## 2019

* In October, WWE 2K20 was released and was an absolute trainwreck. The game had major bugs and glitches and many players reported the game would crash while playing. A list of the majority of the issues of the game was made soon after launch. The game's quality was due to Yukes, the developers of the previous 2K games getting canned and the game developed in house at 2K by an expanded version of the team that used to only handle DLC content creation.

## 2022

* On the May 31, 2022 episode of *Raw*, which took place the night after AEW *Double or Nothing* 2022 (where CM Punk won the AEW World Championship from Adam Page), the fans started chanting "CM Punk" once again to express displeasure at boring and inane segments.

## The Destruction of the WWE Women's Division

* 2002 to 2004 is often described as the "golden age" of the women's division in WWE. Off the back of a strong roster of women including Trish Stratus, Lita, Molly Holly, Victoria, Jazz and Gail Kim, the division was made more prominent on the shows and given time to put on good matches. Trish and Lita especially stood out, getting storylines with the males (e.g. fighting Chris Jericho and Christian at *Armageddon* 2003) and even main-eventing an episode of *RAW* in late 2004.
* However, from late 2004 to mid-2005, the division took a nosedive in quality. In the space of a short few months, Molly Holly, Jazz and Gail Kim were released. Lita injured herself again at *New Year's Revolution* 2005 and dropped the title to Trish. When Lita returned, she became a valet for Edge and barely competed in the ring. In a funny twist of fate, Trish herself was injured after *WrestleMania 21* and had to remain on the sidelines for five months. Despite this, she kept the title, leaving *RAW* without a women's championship for almost half a year.
* 2004 also saw the introduction of the first televised *WWE Diva Search* (as an untelevised one had taken place the year before), a competition where women competed for a grand prize of $250,000 and a WWE Contract. This competition saw the women engage in no actual wrestling. Instead, they competed in 'wacky' contests such as pie eating (in which Christy Hemme infamously declared that her butt was hungry and sat on a cream pie while a visibly-disgusted Rock looked on), dodgeball, asking Kamala out on a date and a disastrous "Diss the Diva" segment which nearly landed the WWE in hot water when the women went completely overboard with their insults towards Carmella, who they all hated (e.g. Christy calling Carmella a *"cum-sucking gutterslut"*).
	+ The 2004 *Diva Search* was the winner of the 2004 Wrestlecrap Gooker Award for Worst Wrestling-Related Thing of the Year.
	+ It's rumored that WWE had rigged the voting to keep Carmella around until the finals, despite the fact that she had the personality of a piece of cardboard, pissed off the other *Diva Search* contestants (leading to the disastrous "Diss the Diva" segment mentioned above), and made no secret that she was going to use WWE as a stepping stone to other things.
* Even though it had little credibility in the first place, the WWE pissed on the *Diva Search* by not only signing the winners, but also several runners-ups each year. This led to a long list of women who had little to no experience in the ring getting signed - Christy Hemme, Joy Giovanni, Amy Weber, Maria Kanellis, Michelle McCool, Ashley Massaro, Kristal Marshall, Layla El, Rebecca DiPietro, Maryse Ouellet, Eve Torres, Lena Yada, Milena Roucka (later known as Rosa Mendes), the Garcia Twins (later known as the Bella Twins), Brooke Adams, Angela Fong, Amy Zidian and Taryn Terrell (later known as Tiffany). Thankfully, many of these women didn't last long in the company, but for the ones who did last, it took them **YEARS** before they were considered passable in the ring.
* Amy Zidian's tenure with the company deserves its own entry. After she was called up to *SmackDown* to serve as Jimmy Wang Yang's valet, she proceeded to immediately endear herself to the rest of the Divas by mockingly asking Layla if she was upset that Zidian, who'd finished in eighth place in the same *Diva Search* that Layla had won, was getting a push while she was *"collecting dust"*, then upset Kristal Marshall by making fun of her hair extensions.
	+ As if that wasn't bad enough, Zidian's next move was to ask Vickie Guerrero how, based on her looks, she was able to get a job as a Diva. Guerrero responded that since she was *"not pretty enough"*, she should leave *"your (Zidian's) locker room"*. Zidian genuinely didn't know who Vickie was or why she was an on-screen talent, something that five minutes of research would've cleared up for her. Her ignorance was not appreciated by others. There was a push to fire her based on it, but John Laurinaitis (yes, him again, he always shows up in these situations) persuaded everyone to give her another chance.
		- This second chance went even worse than the first one did. Stephanie McMahon spoke to Zidian, attempting to give her some advice on proper backstage behavior. In front of a crowd and with attitude in her voice, Zidian asked Stephanie who she was to be giving out advice. Yes, you read that right. **She didn't know who one of her bosses was!** Zidian's reaction to learning Stephanie's identity was not apologetic, and her fate was sealed. She lasted barely a month. Laurinaitis, who was responsible for all this by calling her up in the first place, unsurprisingly kept his job.
* An influx of new talent led to the WWE creating a second women's belt, the WWE Divas Championship, on *SmackDown* in mid-2008. This would've been seen as a positive step forward for the division, however:
	+ Firstly, the belt had an awful butterfly design that made it look like a toy, not a championship.
	+ Secondly, the inaugural champion was Michelle McCool, who won it by beating the more talented in-ring veteran Natalya. The dirt-sheets were quick to report that Michelle only won the belt to please The Undertaker, who was dating Michelle at the time. Natalya and Victoria are then depushed in favour of former *Diva Search* contestants Maryse, Maria and new debutantes The Bella Twins.
	+ Finally, the belt was rarely defended on TV. Michelle's inaugural reign lasted five months, yet she only defended the title twice. Maryse then had a seven-month title reign, yet failed to appear on PPV until she dropped it to Mickie James.
* In 2010, the female roster got so small that the WWE decided to unify the women's and divas title belts. The WWE Women’s Championship, a belt with over fifty years of history, was retired in favour of the Divas Championship, a butterfly belt with two years of history with notable ex-champions such as Jillian Hall (who only held it for about five minutes before losing it to Melina) and Alicia Fox.
* The complete lack of any storylines and mic-time led to a series of unexplained face (Rosa Mendes in 2010, Alicia Fox in 2011 and Natalya in 2012) and heel (Melina in 2011, Tamina in 2011, Rosa Mendes in 2011 and Natalya in 2012) turns. Alicia Fox in particular would be hit hard with this, as seemingly she would turn depending on which side she was placed on in random tag matches.
* In 2011, Gail Kim quit WWE. Despite putting on great matches in TNA and being instrumental in the rise of their Knockouts division, WWE essentially just had her to put over whoever they wanted to push instead. One night on *RAW*, Gail Kim intentionally eliminated herself from a Divas battle royale. Kim and Natalya were literally told to *"just do whatever!"* and so that's what Gail Kim did. Afterwards, she told John Laurinaitis that she quit, and called out the agents for not caring about the women. Johnny Ace just laughed in her face.
* **The "Divas of Doom" debacle:** In the summer of 2011, Beth Phoenix and Natalya joined forces and formed the "Divas of Doom", and went on a mission to rid the WWE of its "barbie dolls". Initially, the angle seemed promising, but it quickly unraveled when not only did it take Beth Phoenix **THREE** attempts to beat Kelly Kelly for the Divas title (and even then needed outside interference to win), but Natalya jobbed left-and-right on a weekly basis. In December, an angle was shot on *SmackDown* where Kaitlyn turned on AJ Lee and joined the Divas of Doom, but it never made it to air. In early 2012, Natalya turned face and the Divas of Doom broke up with no explanation given.
* The revolving door of flavor of the month pushes led to over half of the Divas on the current roster having Diva title reigns. A prime example of this type of push – Tamina, who was pushed strongly at the start of 2012, lost her title match, and then did not wrestle a match on *RAW* or *SmackDown* for six months.
* Any female in the company that even dared to have any outside interests were punished. Mickie James and Maria were released for attempting to pursue their music careers. Once Kelly Kelly and Maryse went into modelling, their TV time and pushes diminished rapidly.
* Over the past several years, the following women either quit or were released – Maria, Mickie James, Katie Lea Burchill, Serena, Tiffany, Gail Kim, Melina, Maryse, The Bellas, Maxine, Kharma, Kelly Kelly, Beth Phoenix, Eve and Kaitlyn.
* The average Divas match on *RAW* and *SmackDown* in 2012 was one minute forty-two seconds long. That included eleven matches that lasted under a minute.
* In 2013, despite there already being several Divas in developmental and the main roster Divas receiving less time than ever, WWE re-signed the Bellas and made an attempt to re-sign several others who had left.
	+ It's additionally rumored that the only reason the Bellas were rehired was because they were linked to Daniel Bryan and John Cena.
	+ The Bellas were immediately booked to hang around Damien Sandow and Cody Rhodes (a retread of their "guest host escort" gimmick), plus antagonize the Funkadactyls for no good reason. The former also had the added side effect of killing off Kaitlyn's burgeoning storyline with Rhodes, which was pretty much the only TV time she was getting outside of random matches, despite being Divas champ at the time.
	+ When they did start wrestling again, the Bellas went right back to using their old tactics, including "Twin Magic". Apparently, nobody in WWE realized that, since Nikki almost immediately got a boob job after they left, that tactic really didn't work that well anymore. It took several matches and countless pointing out that they could now easily be told apart for WWE to finally take the hint and kibosh "Twin Magic".
* A Kaitlyn/AJ match was teased for *WrestleMania XXIX*, but ultimately didn't happen. The other Diva-related match scheduled for the show, which involved the Bellas and the Funkadactyls, was canceled so that a musical performance by P Diddy could go on instead.
* Yet another *Diva Search* happened, this time offscreen. Yep, they still hired Divas despite there being even more of a decline in TV time for main roster Divas not named Nikki and Brie Bella.
* The Bellas, Natalya, the Funkadactyls and the two *Diva Search* winners were announced to star in a reality show. Neither the Divas champ at the time the show was announced (Kaitlyn) nor the Diva that they hyped up the most not too long ago (AJ Lee) were anywhere to be found.
	+ It's rumored that the eight-person tag that got axed at 'Mania was actually axed to create drama for this show.
		- *Total Divas*, while pulling in fairly strong ratings on E! (enough for a season extension, then a second season), has completely failed to bump the ratings for other WWE programs.
* WWE finally gave us Kaitlyn/AJ, except the buildup included an awful "Secret Admirer" storyline. After AJ won the title, Stephanie McMahon lectured her on behaving like a champ (which, considering the antics she got up to during her run as Women's champ, was considered really hypocritical), then turned around and yelled at Kaitlyn for coming out and interrupting her, which just about wrecked the segment as a whole.
* Soon, AJ and the Divas not featured on *Total Divas* (with the exception of Kaitlyn, at first) began feuding with the Total Divas. Nobody cared. The two *Diva Search* winners, JoJo and Eva Marie, were fairly quickly hustled into a multi-Diva match (with the latter participating into more than one). While JoJo never tagged in, Eva Marie was tagged in during each of her matches. During one, she faced Rosa Mendes and the results were predictably terrible.
	+ Eva Marie later had her first singles match against Alicia Fox on the 2/14/14 episode of *SmackDown*. It was said to have been really bad, and was cut from the show entirely.
		- It had also come out during a season finale of *Total Divas* that she had **three weeks** of training before they decided to put her on TV.
* Speaking of *Total Divas*, to give people in doubt a reason to watch that, WWE decided to use a Miz TV segment on *RAW* to promote it.
	+ The cast of *Total Divas* was sitting in the ring and The Miz called Jerry Lawler into the ring. He said hello to all the Divas and tried to introduce himself to Eva Marie, who said she didn't like how Jerry looked at her and gave him a lame slap. The crowd did not care about this at all.
	+ Brie Bella had a nip slip during this segment, which wouldn't have been so noticeable if her nipple wasn't hard enough to poke someone's eye out. The Bellas apologized for this on their Twitter account after the show.
* So, over time, you got feuds that were rooted in *Total Divas* and mostly led to segments no one cared about. Eventually, the Divas division was centered on The Bellas, and as of April 2015, most of the division was made up of heels. WWE's solution to this was to turn The Bellas face for literally no given reason in kayfabe.
	+ After Nikki's short feud with Naomi ended, the Bellas soon turned heel again.
* A shoot interview by a former WWE writer claimed that, as far as the writing team is concerned, the Divas Division actually has no real heels or faces and that, for the most part, the Divas are *"catty chicks"* who are *"mentally unstable"* by default.

## The Divas "Revolution" (2015-16)

* In a move that made little to no sense in kayfabe, Stephanie McMahon introduced new challengers for the Bella Twins (who were on The Authority's side, as their heel turns in 2014 indicated) in the form of *NXT* call-ups. This may as well have been WWE's way of giving Stephanie McMahon credit for what is referred to as the Divas Revolution. 3 Diva stables formed on the same episode of Raw where these challengers were introduced: The Bella Army (Alicia Fox and The Bella Twins), Team B.A.D. (Sasha Banks, Naomi and Tamina) and Paige's team (Charlotte, Paige, Becky Lynch).
	+ WWE decided to name Paige's team the "Submission Sorority". They soon had cause to reconsider the name, when it was revealed that Googling it led directly to a porn site. The team name was changed to "Team PCB". Paige told a couple of writers about the problem with the "Submission Sorority" name, but WWE just went with the name anyways, until they came to the same realization. Paige would soon be revealed to know a little bit about explicit videos herself.
* This revolution turned out to be a disappointment. For starters, the initial idea was to have Charlotte win the title quickly. The Divas Revolution name would make sense since Nikki Bella would be overthrown in that scenario, but instead, Nikki didn't even defend her title on TV after *WWE Beast in the East* (July 4, 2015 - before the *NXT* women got called up). So, for a while, the commentators were talking about a revolution that didn't happen yet.
	+ Another problem was the lack of chemistry between the newly-called up Divas and the old guard. So, while fans got longer matches, this didn't mean the matches were much better than before. In short, Divas matches used to be short and shitty, and now they were longer and merely mediocre, which still feels like a waste of time.
	+ Bad luck also plagued this storyline. Alicia Fox got concussed in a match. The highly-praised Charlotte (not just by WWE, even Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez raved about her work in *NXT*) was now looking so sloppy that she botched a knife-edge chop and, yes, the figure four leglock. Becky Lynch was legitimately unable to break the pin in a *SmackDown* tag team match where Naomi won, but was clearly unhappy at the improvised finish. Meanwhile on *NXT*, the division was still red-hot with Bayley and Sasha Banks having a **very** well-received match for the NXT Women's Title at *NXT Takeover: Brooklyn*.
		- However, earlier in the night, another finish got botched - a fatal 4-way match with Charlotte, Emma, Dana Brooke and Becky Lynch ended with the wrong Diva winning. Someone was supposed to break Emma's pin on Becky, but when no one did, they just had to go along with the finish (this is a rule for WWE refs: if you counted to 3 and the wrong person won, just go with it).
* On the monday after *NXT Takeover: Brooklyn*, the Divas Revolution hit its lowest point. An awful *Miz TV* segment in this episode exposed that nobody in Team PCB or Team Bella could talk on the mic. By this point, Charlotte's schtick was *"Hey, y'all! I'm Ric Flair's daughter! Remember the Four Horsemen? **WOOOOOOO!**"* - It got so bad that when The Miz said *"when this hand goes up, your mouth goes shut!"*, everyone cheered him. Poor Miz actually tried to get some heat by telling the crowd *"that goes for you too!"*, but the crowd ignored him.
	+ The match that followed this segment was Team Bella vs. Team PCB and it was so painfully mediocre that the crowd (which was the same one that went crazy for Bayley vs. Sasha Banks) completely shat all over the match. Divas Revolution marks on Twitter and Tumblr hilariously blamed the fans as if they were being given a good match. Some of these marks were unfortunately actual wrestlers including The Bellas and Paige.
* Charlotte petitioned to have her title shot against Nikki on the *RAW* before *Night of Champions* in order to stop Nikki from becoming the longest-reigning Divas Champ. Going into the match, everyone was expecting Charlotte to win, since Charlotte winning the belt would get the Divas Revolution finally going in the right direction. The match itself wasn't bad, but, in vintage WWE fashion, it was ruined by a dogshit ending.
	+ In a repeat of the Nikki/Paige match from *Money in the Bank*, the Bellas attempted to do Twin Magic, but Charlotte rolled up Brie for the 3-count. As Charlotte was celebrating, Brie told the ref she was the one pinned, even pulling out the tissue padding in her bra she used to make the switch more believable to prove it. However, instead of the ref restarting the match like before, Stephanie came out to say that Nikki was disqualified, meaning she kept her belt and that she would break AJ Lee's record. Steph then immediately booked a rematch for *Night of Champions*, where if Nikki lost in any way, she would lose her belt. WWE once again dropped the ball on this Revolution, just so they could spite AJ for marrying CM Punk.
* The night after Charlotte won the Divas Title, Paige turned heel. Next week on *RAW* and on a WWE Network special coming from Madison Square Garden, Paige **teamed up with Becky Lynch and Charlotte again**.
* Proving that even the WWE doesn't care about their pink butterfly belt, the Divas Championship rematch between Nikki and Charlotte at *Hell in a Cell* has been practically ignored in place of Team PCB's in-feuding ft. Natalya, and The Bellas and Alicia feuding with Team BAD
	+ During the buildup to the match, Brie Bella *pinned Charlotte clean with a missile dropkick*. This was after nearly a full year of Nikki holding the belt and almost never doing a clean job. Needless to say, Brie has yet to get a title shot despite pinning the champion.
* Paige eventually earned a title shot against Charlotte at *Survivor Series* 2015. The build to this match was mostly forgettable until the go-home *RAW* episode, when WWE suddenly decided to make this important by putting a Divas contract signing in the main event segment.
	+ The ensuing promo became instantly memorable when Charlotte invoked the memory of her brother Reid Flair, who died of a drug overdose. Paige would later turn this back on Charlotte by saying Reid *"didn't have enough fight in him"* and that he *"deserved to die"*, prompting a pull-apart brawl. This segment caused immediate backlash, not just for the way WWE exploited a real-life family tragedy, but for the way they attempted to inject heat into a heatless feud in the cheapest way possible.
		- Ric Flair revealed on his podcast that WWE never told him they were planning to run this angle and he was deeply upset, to the point of crying when it aired on TV. Ric also went into detail about how, if Charlotte had been approached about the angle, she would have been scared to turn it down because she was still new to the roster. Ric refrained from giving his thoughts on the angle because he didn't want to jeopardize Charlotte's career, a move that really shows WWE's pettiness. Charlotte's mother was also enraged by the whole incident. This won Wrestling Observer's Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic by a landslide.
* Speaking of Wrestling Observer awards, the Divas Revolution also won Worst Feud of 2015! Yeah that's right, they somehow beat the godawful feud of Rusev vs. Ziggler! Despite this, fans got behind the idea of pushing women's wrestling, just not the way WWE was going about it.

## Eva Marie: All Botch Everything!

* In an effort to sabotage the NXT Women's Division because it's showing up the one on the main roster, Vince decided to send Eva Marie down there to get "better" after returning from getting her burst breast implant repaired. She apparently had training from The Brian Kendrick, and yet she was still making horrific errors you learn on the first day of wrestling school, like forgetting to kick out of a pin.
* At a live event, she managed to injure Carmella, who herself is an example of how to properly rescue a disliked character. Naturally, this made Eva even less popular with the Full Sail crowd.
* Eva's new finisher is the "Sliced Red". Basically, a "Sliced Bread" botched horribly to the point where, if she keeps doing it, she's going to fall on her head and get a neck injury.
	+ Taking note of this, on the 11/4 episode of *NXT*, she switched to a sliding, kneeling version of Shelton Benjamin's "Paydirt", which nearly broke her ankle on the first try and looked so awful people have started calling it the "Complete Shit".
* Her propensity to make the first Sin Cara look botch-free has led to calls for her to be taken off TV. Astoundingly, whoever wants her pushed decided to use this to turn her into a deluded heel who thought she was a face. Essentially, reusing Bo Dallas's hilarious *NXT* character without actually putting any humor into it, so it's just boring.
* On the 11/18 episode of *NXT*, Eva challenged Bayley for the Women's Title. The crowd booed so loudly that Bayley couldn't hear what Eva was saying on the mic. She even tried pleading for the crowd to quiet down, to no avail.
* Despite all signs pointing to her being hopeless in the ring, she was drafted to *SmackDown* on July 19, 2016. Even though she didn't get to wrestle on TV, she was clearly being given too much of the spotlight with a new gimmick: Eva was given an epic entrance with an announcer hyping her up. She would then suffer some unfortunate event that would keep her from wrestling.
* Though WWE deserve some credit for finally going with the heat she was getting, the problem was that eventually, she'd have to wrestle. The gimmick she had needed some kind of payoff. On August 18, Eva Marie got herself suspended and was replaced by Nikki Bella at *SummerSlam*.
* The suspension wound up being fatal to her WWE career. She never returned to WWE TV, and by February 2017, all references to WWE were removed in Eva Marie's social media accounts. On August 4, 2017, her WWE career was officially finished.
* …until 2020, when WWE decided to bring her back! When vignettes aired for her return on *RAW* in 2021, WWE had already released Mickie James, Chelsea Green, The Iiconics, Ruby Riott and Lana for "budgetary reasons". Eva herself ended up released after less than a year herself.

## WWE on Social Media

* WWE jumped on the social media bandwagon and started spending a good majority of their shows bragging about trends on Twitter and begging for likes on Facebook.

### Social Media Ambassadors

* With guest hosts going bust, WWE decided to bring the concept back but by using social media. Every week, they would pick a random "celebrity" (seemingly at random) to tweet about *RAW*. Just about every single person that did never, ever tweeted about WWE prior and were never following any WWE-associated accounts.
* It became very evident that the vast majority of these "ambassadors" knew nothing about WWE, its product or its fans. Dominic Monaghan spent his reign as Social Media Ambassador arguing with fans who kept asking what he knew about the product and promoting his new movie.
* Since most of these people had no connection with wrestling whatsoever, the mass majority of their followers would confusingly mock them for tweeting about WWE out of the blue, and wrestling fans would mock them for having absolutely no clue what they were tweeting about.
* Many of these hosts also sent out the exact same tweets, leading to suspicion that WWE was simply feeding them lines to post. DJ Pauly D and Khloe Kardashian both said *"These WWE Divas are fierce!"* in back-to-back weeks. Other such compelling tweets featured *"John Cena is cool!"*, *"CM Punk is a jerk!"* and *"Vickie Guerrero is loud!"*.
* WWE went a step further by having an extremely clueless Larry King as ambassador and insult Miz by calling him a punk. WWE thought this was so great that they brought Larry back on air next week to do a *Larry King Live* mock show.
* The first "ambassador" was Charlie Sheen. WWE hyped that he would be live-tweeting *RAW 1000*. Mere days before the show aired, he quit Twitter. Not wanting to take that as an omen regarding how the whole "ambassador" concept would turn out, they had him Skype instead. **It was awful.**

### The WWE App

* WWE got a new app for smartphones. Wanting absolutely everyone on the planet to have one, they wasted time on every *RAW* for Michael Cole to give a step-by-step tutorial on how to download it.
* While, at first, the app featured some nifty exclusives such as backstage interviews, WWE was not satisfied with its features. So they took an extreme step by letting matches and angles end during commercials and telling fans that they could only see the finish on the WWE App.
	+ Later on, things that were supposedly app-exclusive were shown on TV anyway. **What's the point in making it app-exclusive, then?**
* WWE made an attempt to move *RAW-Active* voting to the app, but they didn't count on the app crashing every time they put something up to vote on it. One week, it took them **a whole hour** of plugging the app for voting purposes to notice that the app was crashing too much to be viable. Meanwhile, complaints poured in over Twitter about the crashing. They had to move the vote to their website. That was the end of voting on the app for at least a month or two, as Twitter began to be used for voting again after that.
	+ The voting returned to the app on the May 13th, 2013 episode of *RAW*, bringing a crapload of plugs for the app along with it. The app was plugged during **EVERY MATCH** on the show, mostly with stuff completely unrelated to the match, which quickly became really annoying. The commentary for one fairly quick squash match was literally just plugging the app, giving the (likely correct) impression that they just didn't care about what's happening in-ring.
		- WWE soon started fluctuating on referring to their app. Some weeks, it was plugged to hell and back. Others, it was not even mentioned.
		- Some of the most obnoxious ways of pushing the app included ending a Kofi Kingston vs. Cesaro match during a commercial break and having a whole Rusev vs. Sin Cara match take place during another commercial break.
* Soon enough, plugs for the WWE Network and demonstrations on how to sign up for it largely replaced the near-constant app plugs, with the app soon being referred to as the *"gateway to the WWE Network"*.

### The WWE Network

* The WWE Network was originally supposed to launch in early 2013 to coincide with *Wrestlemania XXIX*, but there were problems with how the network was to be distributed at the time. The original plan for the WWE Network was to have been a traditional cable network and the WWE was even shopping around the idea of purchasing the failing G4 Network to take over its spot (The deal fell through and led to the later-failed bid to turn G4 into the Esquire Network). The falling profits of traditional cable networks as well as the success of entertainment services such as Netflix and Hulu Plus led to the WWE making a deal with the producers of the MLB Network to make the network into a paid streaming and on-demand service for WWE programming.
	+ This is the main reason behind the delayed airing of *WWE Legends House*. Originally filmed in 2012, the show had many delays due to the problems with the network. Despite being a critical success, as of 2014, WWE has no plans for making a second season of *Legends House*.
* To tout the "value" of the WWE Network, in a similar manner to the constant WWE App plugs mentioned above, the WWE would eventually plug that the WWE Network was available for *"the low, low price of $9.99!"*. The problem was that, during the first year of the WWE Network, the "$9.99" price was based on those who agreed to pay for a six-month commitment to the network. Those who wished to opt out of this could cancel, but they had to wait until their six months were done before the billing would end and access to the network ceased. A few months after this, the WWE would make a bi-monthly payment plan that was instead $12.99, but those who took it would no longer be billed a month after cancellation. The WWE would later make the $9.99 price standard and cancellation similar to the original $12.99 plan.
* Not everybody was happy with the WWE Network. Cable providers hated this idea due to them losing out on profits they made from extra pay-per-view revenue from cable subscribers, which lead to a lot of cable providers threatening to no longer air WWE PPVs (only Comcast and DirectTV made good on their threats, although Comcast later changed their mind). The wrestlers in WWE also hated the idea, as the lack of PPV revenue from cable providers also meant that their big PPV paydays were going to be cut in half.
	+ On a related note, during *WrestleMania* season, the WWE would literally chastise those who would order the PPV rather than buy the WWE Network to watch it, basically telling those people that they were idiots on television by saying *"Why order a $49.99 PPV when you can get the WWE Network for $9.99?"*.
		- This actually won WWE a Wrestling Observer Award for Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic.
* The WWE Network had a very shaky launch when it was launched in Europe. A mere two hours before it was set to go up in the UK in November 2014, it was delayed indefinitely, apparently due to SkyTV taking issues with their broadcast rights to *WWE Main Event* (which, at the time, was being aired live on the Network in the United States). WWE Network eventually did launch in January 2015, but *WWE Main Event* has not aired on the WWE Network live since the UK launch.

## Related Pages

* LOLTNA History
* LOLGFW History
* LOLIMPACT History
* LOLROH History
* LOLAEW History