Raw - February 24th 2003

Big Time Battle Royal

Raw opens with Eric Bischoff and if you needed a reminder that Stone Cold Steve Austin is back, he’s walking with a limp, has his arm in a sling, and has a swollen mouth and a black eye. Bischoff was beaten black and blue last night. JR and King have a good time laughing at the General Manager’s misfortune until Eric says that Stone Cold isn’t here tonight and is banned from the building. He’ll have a welcoming committee waiting for him when he shows up NEXT WEEK, but the real punishment is that Austin will miss tonight’s main event - a 20 man battle royal where the winner will challenge Triple H for the World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania. He then says that Austin being here means he won’t distract from the biggest start in the world and brings out Smackdown’s The Rock!

The former People’s Champion is on Raw, and JR and King recap the incredibly shady way in which he defeated Hulk Hogan last night thanks to Vince McMahon and a crooked referee. The Rock’s been taking lessons from Hogan because he really milks the crowd reaction which is heavily mixed but turns to mostly boos when he starts to talk trash about Toronto. He is really funny, mocking the crowd for getting excited when he says their name “Yay! That's where we live!” The reason he wanted to come to Raw and come here is because it was here in Toronto where it started and The People TURNED on him at Wrestlemania X8. He’s not wrong - they booed him out the building when he faced Hogan! This is an incredible promo - he’s hilarious and all of his motivations make perfect sense as he gets the Canadian crowd booing his every word. I loved this. He also turns on the crowd for voting Stone Cold the superstar of the decade over him and says that Austin is “nothing” to The Rock. Austin’s comments about The Rock in Raw magazine added some (real life) fuel to that fire too. He gets the crowd chanting Austin which will be important later. The Rock concludes one of his greatest ever promos by saying that he’ll be in tonight’s battle royal and will go on to Wrestlemania and become World Champion once again. 

In the Evolution locker room, Randy Orton discusses his in-ring return tonight in a tag team match with Booker T and Scott Steiner. He assures Batista that his shoulder is now 99% healed and he’s good to go tonight. Ric Flair leads the two to the ring and they come out to Ric Flair’s theme song. This match is also the debut of Randy Orton’s smaller wrestling trunks and this look with the knee pads and wrist tape, is the same look he’s had for 20+ years now. The Canadians are once again all over Steiner just like they were at No Way Out - he is not a popular man North of the border - and there’s much fuss made about the fact that Booker T pinned Triple H in a tag team match last week. They cut off and isolate Booker T as Flair distracts and acts up at ringside which is pretty funny. The match breaks down and Randy hits a nice top rope crossbody on Booker T but he rolls through into a pin of his own to steal the victory. Booker T’s big roll continues. 

Backstage, Kane and Rob Van Dam warm up for the battle royal and both say they’re going to win and be the one who eliminates The Rock. That leads to The Rock in his dressing room and after telling someone on the phone that if Stone Cold didn’t like what he said earlier he can tell that himself next week in person. He then gets his acoustic guitar and signs a song making fun of Toronto and Stone Cold which is sadly edited off this version of the show. He’s interrupted by The Hurricane who expresses his disappointment at The Rock’s change of heart and they have a funny back and forth about superheroes - The Hurricane would beat the Scorpion King, even Brendan Fraser beat the Scorpion King! The Rock gets hilariously angry at Hurricane mocking his fictional alter ego.

There were several videos during the show promoting the return to Raw of Stone Cold Steve Austin next week on Raw. 

Before the main event battle royal, Ric Flair motivates Orton and Batista to eliminate all of Triple H’s main rivals and make sure none of them go to Wrestlemania, name-checking Steiner, Kane, RVD and Booker T. There’s a lot of entrances shown, mostly the big names in this battle royal (and 3-Minute Warning) This will be a challenge to recap so I’ll just do the big moments - Jericho and Christian eliminate Test and then he gets back in the ring and chases Jericho, eliminating him too. JR says that this is the first battle royal on Raw since 1995, which is pretty amazing.

The Rock throws out The Hurricane and is then dumped through the ropes by Booker T so he’s out of the ring but not eliminated. Orton and Batista eliminate RVD and Steiner, Booker then dumps out both Orton and Batista! The Rock joins commentary and spends some time running down all the jabronis in the ring and mocks Stone Cold as well as JR for being his biggest fan. The official final four are Kane, Booker T, Christian and The Rock, still on commentary. After a Kane chokeslam, The Rock picks his moment and finally rejoins the match at that point. He dumps a distracted Kane and Christian over the top rope leaving it as himself and Booker T one on one. He dominates but Booker reverses a charge and sends The Rock up and over the top rope, winning this battle royal and getting himself a shot at the World title at Wrestlemania! The Rock actually smiles and applauds Booker which seemed genuine as he ends Raw with a Spinarooni.

Jericho’s Impact

Stacy has a Toronto Maple Leafs jersey which seems like a cheap attempt to get cheered but Test is a real life fan and supporter. Jericho attacks Stacy and then hits Test with a steel chair. Test and Stacy technically win by DQ but this is about Jericho proving a point. Christian flattens Test with an Unprettier and Jericho handcuffs Test to the ropes so he can force him to watch him beat up poor Stacy Kiebler! What a monster. He locks Stacy in the Walls of Jericho and when Jeff Hardy runs down to help he’s laid out by Christian. Finally, Shawn Michaels runs down to rescue Stacy and Test and Jericho does the impossible and get a Canadian crowd to cheer for Shawn Michaels! 

Jeff is still in the ring after a commercial break, in pain from the attack by Christian and Jericho. His opponent is Chrisotphjer Nowinski who mocks Jeff for the bad job he did of rescuing Stacy so he’s quickly put down with a Twist of Fate and a Swanton Bomb! Jeff Hardy defeats Nowinski and with his adrenaline pumping, attacks Nowinski and beats him down furiously in the corner. The referee doesn’t like that and so reverses the decision and awards the match to Christopher Nowinski by disqualification. That just sets Jeff off even more and he chases the Harvard graduate around the ring and up the entrance ramp. 

Other Happenings

• Women’s Champion Victoria and her creepy boyfriend Steven Richards join commentary to watch the next match which is Jacqueline vs. Jazz, who has got some new theme music which fits her way, way better. Jazz wins a short, kind of sloppy match (the fans boo when they botch) and after the match as she cuts a promo, Trish Stratus returns for the first time in a few weeks in her hometown to attack Jazz! Big pop for that of course and Victoria rushes the ring having issues with both of them. She gets kicked in the face by Trish for her troubles and referees struggle to separate the three women! 

• There’s a video recapping Test at the Girls Gone Wild event which Stacy Kiebler set up for him. In the video, Test was all over the girls and getting a lot of kisses and cuddles from the women. Back at the arena, Maven tells Test how lucky he is and Test reveals that Stacy didn't know what GGW actually meant and is not happy about her boyfriend getting all that female attention. Chief Morley shows up and tells them that as punishment for laughing at Eric Bischoff last night they’ll be in a match tonight - Test and Stacy vs. Jericho and Christian! Test promises to protect his girlfriend and marketing consultant but she doesn’t look too confident.

• JR has a nice sit down interview with Goldust who is still recovering from being electrocuted by Evolution a few weeks ago. He now speaks with a comedy stutter, violently ticking in mid-sentence. He promises revenge on Evolution and wishes his best friend, Booker T, luck in the battle royal later.

• Kane (with RVD) takes on Lance Storm (with William Regal). I mentioned at No Way Out that Regal suffered a serious concussion and along with a bunch of other health issues, that means he won’t be wrestling for a long time. No one knew how serious the injury was yet so he’s still at ringside here as one half of the World Tag Team Champions. The Canadian crowd are actually behind Storm in this match and he puts up a good fight with a nice springboard dropkick but a pair of chokeslams, back to back, gives Kane the victory. The message here is simple - don’t mess with Kane’s mask! 

• Jerry “The King” Lawler faces Chief Morley in a no disqualification match. The former Val Venis is in all black and shows a lot more intensity but continues to get beaten up by the elderly commentator, as he did in their previous match. King also battered Storm and Regal on the Raw before Christmas so really he should be in the running for a title match or something by now. Morley comes back and after a string of suplexes, follows up with his Money Shot frog splash. He has the match won but Morley doesn’t want to win and goes to get a steel chair. Earl Hebner continues to be the worst referee in history as he stops Morley from using the chair even though this is a no DQ match, and Bubba Ray and D-Von come through the crowd. The Dudleyz are suspended but that doesn’t stop them from laying out Bischoff’s Chief of Staff with a 3D and that gives Jerry Lawler the victory. 

Smackdown - February 27th 2003

Lesnar is coming for Heyman

Brian Kendrick goes to see Stephanie McMahon and says he has an idea to prove how badly he wants to be a WWE Superstar and asks to wrestle Kurt Angle tonight. He laughs him off initially, but then tells him that if he can last 5 minutes in the ring with Kurt then he will be the newest Smackdown superstar. He’s overjoyed. 

Back in Stephanie McMahon’s office, she breaks some bad news to Paul Heyman - since Kurt Angle made his own rules and stipulations last week, she’s letting Brock make his own this week. If Lesnar defeats the WWE Tag Team Champions Benjamin and Haas in a handicap match tonight then he can pick any member of Team Angle he wants to fight inside a steel cage next week. Everyone assumes he’ll pick Kurt Angle, if he’s successful.

John Cena, sitting on a laptop and still healing up from Brock Lesnar injuring his leg, mocks Lesnar again. “Your finish is the F5? Well mine is the FU” and that’s the birth of that. 

In a non-title match, WWE Champion Kurt Angle faces Brian Kendrick and all the newcomer has to do is last five minutes to get himself a job here on Smackdown. Kendrick puts up a gutsy performance, keeping Kurt on the ropes and taking advantage of the Champion taking him lightly but with only 2 seconds left on the clock, Kurt pins him with an Angle slam. Kurt addresses the crowd and says that he and Team Angle had nothing to do with the attack on Edge, and then tells Brian that he has heart, but he won’t make it in this business. That’s mean. He beats Kendrick up some more and finishes with an F5 to send a message to Brock Lesnar.

Before the main event, Paul Heyman pumps up Haas and Benjamin and then they head to the ring for a handicap match with Royal Rumble winner Brock Lesnar. Haas starts the match and with some distractions from Team Captain Kurt and Heyman, as well as some cheap shots, the Tag champions work over Lesnar for a while until he’s ready to mount a big comeback, throwing them around the ring and finishing Benjamin off, rather easily, with an F5 to win the match. That outcome was never in doubt was it? Post match, Lesnar grabs the mic and says that next week he wants to fight Paul Heyman in the cage! Kurt has a big smile of relief as Heyman looks like his life is flashing before his eyes! 

McMahonamania

Smackdown opens with Vince McMahon who tells the crowd that he has some good news and some bad news. He taunts the crowd that both The Rock and Hulk Hogan are not here tonight - The Rock is free to move wherever he likes and he has chosen to move to Raw. He says Hogan says he’s not here because of a family emergency involving his son but really Hogan is just a coward and scared of Vince McMahon. Vince says that Hulkamania is dead and brags about screwing Hogan at No Way Out before declaring that McMahonamania is running wild.

They show the finish to the Hogan/Rock match at No Way Out (introduced by Sylvain Grenier, the crooked referee who helped Vince screw over Hulk on the night), as well as some exclusive footage of Hogan yelling at Stephanie McMahon and wanting to beat up Vince. Hogan will be back on Smackdown next week.

Undertaker gets some backup

The Undertaker heads down to the ring and calls out A-Train, unhappy about being attacked after defeating Big Show at No Way Out. Paul Heyman comes out with A-Train, officially marking himself as Train’s agent too and calls the triangle choke that he used to beat Big Show illegal.

Undertaker wants A-Train but he gets both him and Big Show for another two on one assault. Nathan Jones makes his first in person appearance, running down and saving Undertaker from the attack. Last week he implied that he was going to go after Undertaker but this week, helped him out so what is their relationship? Hilariously, Jones tripped and fell during this and so the segment had to be refilmed quickly and re-edited for broadcast. Here’s the unedited version;

https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/1nyajql/nathan_jones_has_to_redo_his_debut_on_smackdown/?share_id=NBFZyzXZ3gkpKIUtmBypS&utm_content=1&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=3

Other Happenings

• Torrie Wilson and Funaki vs. Jamie Noble and Nidia serves mostly as an excuse to promote that tonight it’ll be announced which Smackdown diva is appearing in Playboy. Noble and Nidia believe it should be her. Dawn Marie runs down to try and cost Torrie the match but she’s knocked off the apron. Funaki and Torrie win and then at the conclusion of the match, General Manager Stephanie McMahon comes out and after teasing the crowd a little that it might be her in Playboy (something Tazz and Michael Cole have suggested previously) reveals that it’ll be Torrie Wilson. It gets a big cheer, and Torrie reacts like she didn’t known and like she’s won an award while Dawn and Nidia react with jealousy - women WANT to be naked in Playboy, which is a long time dream for her says Michael Cole. 

• This week’s Matt Fact is that Matt’s pants are a size 34 waist. That’s pretty skinny I think but I’m the wrong person to ask. The new Cruiserweight Champion thanks all of his Mattitude Followers for supporting and believing in him while he crash dieted to qualify for a Cruiserweight title match. He talks about the people who were less lucky than him at No Way Out, specifically Edge who will be gone for a full year due to neck surgery and wishes Edge well, but if he’d just had some more Mattitude he wouldn’t have gotten injured. That leads into a tag team match against Chris Benoit and his new partner that he alluded to earlier - the returning Rhyno, who is back after an amazing 16 months due to serious neck surgery of his own. We last saw him during the Invasion - think about how long ago THAT feels. Matt is drilled with a Gore and Rhyno wins this tag team match for his team.

• Nunzio, with Johnny The Bull and Chuck Palumbo at ringside, takes on Eddie Guerrero backed up by Chavo. This threesome is now officially known as the FBI and has a theme song to and titantron to match. The Full Blooded Italians provide plenty of interference and distractions on the outside to help Nunzio dominate Eddie. Eddie picks up the win with a roll up, holding the tights for extra leverage, but is then attacked by all three FBI members. It’s three on two so Eddie and Chavo are overwhelmed until Rikishi, who has a match with Chuck later, makes the save. 
• There’s a medical update on Edge who was attacked backstage at No Way Out and suffered a serious neck injury. I talked about that at the PPV itself. Backstage, Chris Benoit gives Brock Lesnar some advice on how to deal with Kurt Angle. He might act goofy but he’s a dangerous, cold hearted bastard. Benoit tells him to use any means necessary to win tonight. Lesnar is very confident, and tells Benoit to worry about himself. He’s not worried about Team Angle coming after him because he has friends of his own to have his back. 

Raw - March 3rd 2003

Rock and Rattlesnake

Out in the parking lot, Eric Bischoff pumps up his “welcoming committee” for when Stone Cold Steve Austin shows up tonight. His first line of defence is Rico, Rosey and Jamal who, armed with weapons, are tasked with caving the Rattlesnake’s skull in, and tells them to make sure they leave a little piece for him too. His first night back on Raw will be his last. 

Backstage, Bischoff continues to make preparations for Stone Cold’s arrival. Lance Storm and Chief Morley (William Regal isn’t here tonight, being by now seriously ill) and Storm is armed with a metal pipe. Morley isn’t with him yet as he has a match with Spike Dudley. Bischoff’s Chief of staff tells Spike that if he wins this match he will reinstate his brothers Bubba Ray and D-Von, but if either of them interfere then they’ll remain suspended. Spike does his best but Morley pretty easily defeats him in the end to keep The Dudleyz suspended.

Bischoff’s tour of the locker room continues and Jericho and Christian are next. They’re more than happy to help him out, assuming Jericho survives his match with Test later. 

Coach tries to get an interview with The Rock, assuming that they’re friends and he can do that but The Rock insults him and is very funny doing so. “Wash ya ass!”. He goes back into his locker room and finds The Hurricane hiding in his closet. This is another legendary segment as Hurricane points out that he acted tough and said he wanted to confront Stone Cold but tonight he’s got Eric Bischoff keeping him out of the building. I can’t do this justice so here’s the whole segment on YouTube

Out in the parking lot, Rico, Rosey and Jamal continue to wait for Stone Cold all night long and get frustrated when a car pulls in containing Goldust who is still stuttering and ticking like he has severe tourettes caused by his electrocution.

The Rock summons Eric Bischoff to his locker room and tells the GM that he’s making The Rock look bad! He needs Stone Cold to be able to get into the building so he can confront him like he said he would and he says that Bischoff and his welcoming committee can have Austin when The Rock is done with him. During this The Rock sang another comedy song mocking the locals but sadly that’s been removed from the show. It makes me sad they cut all these songs out - I guess the tune is copyrighted.

A panicked Bischoff tells his goons in the parking lot to leave Stone Cold alone. They’re all fired up and won’t listen but scatter in a hurry when the Rattlesnake’s pickup truck roars into town, almost running them all over! He comes out with a tire iron looking for a fight but Bischoff holds back the troops and allows him to head out to the ring for his much publicised return to Raw and probable confrontation with The Rock.

It’s a joy to see Stone Cold Steve Austin back on Raw. His first appearance since June 2002. He apologises if he’s rusty, and then thanks the fans both in the arena and sitting at home for standing by him. Austin doesn’t address why he left, or why he came back but says that he brought a big can of whoopass for everyone in the back and that he’s going to raise more hell now than he ever has before. With the benefit of hindsight and knowing that Austin’s body had broken down and he had one match left in him, this promo is bitter sweet. He’s interrupted by The Rock but he’s reluctant to go down to the ring and does his talking from the top of the stage, drowned out by Rocky Sucks chants. Rock tells Stone Cold that the fans will turn on him when he gets as big as The Rock, and says that he has done it ALL but the one thing he’s never done is whoop that bald headed candy ass at Wrestlemania, and challenges Austin to a match - the third time they’ve gone one on one at a Wrestlemania, but Stone Cold won the first two. Before Stone Cold can respond, Eric Bischoff comes out onto the stage with Chief Morley and says that next week The Rock can wrestle Booker T and if The Rock wins, he can pick whether he wants to wrestle Austin or whether he wants to take Booker T’s World title match with Triple H at Wrestlemania. Bischoff says that they don’t have time for Stone Cold to say anymore because the match is running 3 minutes too long. That brings Rosey, Jamal and Rico to the ring but the Rattlesnake fights them off and hits Stone Cold Stunners on all three of them! The Rock tries to attack Austin from behind while he’s distracted but Stone Cold turns around, face to face with The Rock. The Austin chants are deafening and The Rock smiles and backs off, but throws a cheap shot which is blocked and the fist fight is on. The Rock avoids a Stunner and runs from the ring. 

Racial Divide

Raw opens with Booker T who is scheduled to fight Scott Steiner tonight. He is pumped up and reminds us all that he won last week’s Battle Royal and is the number one contender for the World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania. That brings out the champion, Triple H and Ric Flair. This is an infamous segment, up there with the Katie Vick stuff, and is usually the first thing people mention when talking about Triple H’s reign of terror. I don’t want to summarise it word for word but the jist is that Triple H tells Booker that “people like you” can’t be champion, and tells him that his roll is to “come out here and dance and make people laugh” and that “people like you” only exist to serve “people like me”. If you think that, and Triple H telling Booker to dance for him, comes across as enormously racist then you’re not alone and that was very much how everyone else took it too. He makes it worse by talking about his “nappy hair” and the way she says “suckah” and basically calls Booker T a joke who isn’t worthy of facing him at all, never mind being champion. Jesus Christ. He even insults the WCW Championship - he was a five time champion, but so was writer Vince Russo and actor David Arquette. The title was a joke and doesn’t count. Booker doesn’t back down and says he’ll win the title at Wrestlemania. Triple H laughs him off and after implying he’s the one who set up his match with Scott Steiner tonight, wishes him luck. 

For anyone wondering where the other half of Evolution is - Randy Orton and Batista - they’re both injured. On a live event in a tag team match with Bubba Ray and D-Von Dudley, Orton’s shoulder was reinjured and Batista’s bicep was torn. Randy returned in May but Batista actually tore his bicep AGAIN while rehabbing and didn’t return until November. Bad luck for these guys as their careers were just starting to pick up but I’ve got a feeling they’ll be ok.

Booker T vs. Scott Steiner is a match which has a lot of history from WCW and in fact, Booker T defeated Steiner on the final episode of Monday Nitro to become the final WCW Champion. By various metrics, both of these men can claim to be the final WCW champion but the history books show that it was The Rock who held it last. Steiner works as the heel here - he’s more popular tonight than he was on the shows in Canada but not as popular as Booker T so that makes sense. Booker T wins when Triple H and Ric Flair come down and distract Steiner, leading to a roll up. Triple H and Flair quickly leave with smiles on their face and it’s not entirely clear what their plan was here but they’ve screwed over Steiner and helped Booker T win.

Showstopping Challenge

Before his match with Test, Jericho has some words for the fans in New York, offering a heartfelt apology to Stacy Kiebler…that she was so stupid to get herself involved with a loser and cheater like Test and shows footage from Girls Gone Wild of him signing a bunch of girls’ chests. Backstage, Stacy argues with Test about it because he didn’t tell her what happened. He gets mad at her and says it was all her own idea in the first place, and tells her she better stay in the back - he’s not asking her, he’s telling her. Jericho has a good laugh at the argument that he’s caused.

Test runs to the ring and attacks Jericho, beating the hell out of him until Christian forces Stacy to come to the ring. She’s holding her back and it doesn’t look like it’s her fault she’s here, it’s Christian’s but Test is still mad at her for disobeying him. This is one of Test’s best performances with him hitting big move after big move and having the match won if not for Christian but an undetected lowblow and Jericho’s rubbish “breakdown” sleeper slam finisher gives him the victory. He looks like he’s going to attack Stacy Kiebler AGAIN and throws her into the ring, grabbing a steel chair and he and Christian are about to give her a con-chair-to! Test saves her but he gets one himself (he ended up standing in position, waiting for it for ages like an idiot as Christian and Jericho mistimed the move and finally - finally - Shawn Michaels runs down and makes the save. That just kind of makes him look like an asshole for waiting so long to do it, and he hits Sweet Chin Music on Christian but Jericho blasts HBK right in the face with a chair, busting him wide open. Jericho ends the segment by taunting Michaels about trying to be the hero and failing and challenging him to a match at Wrestlemania. 

Other Happenings

• Christian and Jeff Hardy go one on one after their brief interaction last week when Jeff was laid out for trying to save Stacy Kiebler. There’s a loud, girly scream from the crowd when Jeff removes his t-shirt. It’s a back and forth match and Christian picks up a clean victory with the Unprettier. Jeff’s bad luck and losing streak continues.

• Trish Stratus and Jacqueline team up against Jazz and the Women’s Champion Victoria. Steven Richards does his best to get involved but Jackie fights him off and Trish wins this for her team with a roll up on the women’s champion. JR does his best to talk about how she just pinned the champion and the storyline involved but King is too busy squealing about Trish’s chest and relentlessly calling Jazz James Earl Jones. What a dick.
• Harvard graduate Christopher Nowinski comes to the ring and while he’s mid-speech about Stone Cold, the still suspended Dudley Boyz comes through the crowd and drops him with a 3D before leaving the same way. 
• In a hardcore tag team match, ECW originals Tommy Dreamer and Al Snow team up against Kane and Rob Van Dam. This is a bit random and out of the blue, and even King seems shocked to see who Kane and RVD’s opponents are when Snow’s music hits. Kane and Van Dam win a short match with a double chokeslam to Snow and Dreamer followed by a Frog Splash onto them both, stacked on top of each other. Kane and RVD have really found their niche as a tag team.

Smackdown - March 6th 2003

Chaos in the Cage

In the Heyman Family locker room he is terrified of facing Brock Lesnar in tonight’s main event. Big Show and Kurt Angle have different plans to help him - Show says they have his back but Kurt wants to use his brains rather than his brawn and says that he will go and speak to Stephanie McMahon and use his “personal relationship” with her to change her mind and get the match cancelled. Back in 2000, they did have a whole “will they/won’t they” storyline and Kurt seems to believe that Steph still has a big crush on him. It looks like she might be into it but that’s the past and he needs to focus on the future - he’s pissed her off by trying to manipulate her so now if Brock Lesnar defeats Paul Heyman tonight, Kurt will defend the title against Brock Lesnar next week on Smackdown! 

Tonight, Nathan Jones accompanies Undertaker to the ring for his match with A-Train, who is backed up by Big Show. Jones rescued Undertaker last week and it was a surprise to everyone but we get some more context this week with a video from earlier today where Undertaker is training Nathan Jones to be a WWE Superstar. Here’s a video of their training earlier today in front of the crowd before Smackdown, which is mostly worth watching to see what a genuinely terrible actor Nathan Jones was. 

I have no idea what A-Train is wearing when he comes out but he looks absolutely ridiculous and even Tazz mentions it. Maybe he’s trying to dress as a ghost to scare Undertaker? Big Show continually interferes in the match until finally Nathan Jones throws the referee across the ring and gets involved himself. Teacher and student put down Show with a big double shoulder block and Undertaker and Jones are left standing tall in the ring. During the commercial break, Stephanie McMahon had Big Show and A-Train ejected from the building as they protest that they need to be here to help Paul Heyman. He’s losing all his backup. 

Before the main event, Paul Heyman is still terrified and Kurt Angle does his best to motivate his agent and fire him up for the cage. He has no chance. Kurt’s speech is interrupted by the bickering Tag Team Champions, upset about losing to Benoit and Rhyno. Kurt tells Heyman that he WILL win but his agent seems unconvinced. 

Paul has Team Angle as back up and their plan becomes clear as Haas and Benjamin rush the cage and attack Lesnar two on one. He fights them off, slamming them into the cage and throwing them out the door. Lesnar leaves the cage to get his hands on Heyman and Kurt pounces, attacking the Rumble winner but Lesnar throws him into the cage which busts Angle open and it looked like it was legit rather than him blading. Lesnar fights off Angle and gets Heyman into the ring but Kurt climbs in to defend his agent. Kurt keeps Lesnar busy as Heyman continually tries to escape the cage but Brock is way too focused and he sends Kurt into the cage, knocking him down long enough to hit an F5 on Paul Heyman and pin him to officially win this match. Brock Lesnar vs. Kurt Angle for the WWE title next week in Angle’s hometown is official and Smackdown closes with the two face to face in the cage. Is it weird to do the Wrestlemania main event two weeks early on TV? Yes, very but I’ll talk about that next week. 

20 Years in the Making

For the first time since No Way Out, Hollywood Hulk Hogan is here in person and the Hulkster heads down to the ring to call out Vince, who called him a coward last week but perhaps more importantly screwed him out of his match with The Rock at No Way Out. Hogan says he knows Vince would prefer if he just packed up and left but he’s not going anywhere - he wants to fight Vince McMahon and kick his ass. That brings Vince out who takes credit for all of Hogan’s success and for creating Hulkamania but Hogan cuts him off and calls him a liar, and flips it and takes credit for Vince’s success. He wouldn’t be a billionaire without Hogan. They argue back and forth about that - this segment is famous as while trying to say “If you think I was just the right guy at the right time….”, Hogan tripped over his words and called himself a “gay guy”. That’s been edited out of course. Hogan wants to fight Vince, and Vince says that he doesn’t hate Hulkamania or the Hulkamaniacs but he DOES hate Hulk Hogan. He created Hogan and he walked out on him and turned his back on him by joining WCW. There’s a lot of real life hurt feelings coming out between these two men here which I’m sure was all water under the bridge in real life but adds a lot to this feud. This is a pretty great promo. Watching it 20+ years later, this is all old news of course and a story we’ve heard lots of times since but in 2003, this was all extremely fresh and raw. Vince says that Hogan can’t get a match but he can get a FIGHT at Wrestlemania - a street fight but if Hogan loses then his career is over. Vince says he’s going to kill Hulkamania at Wrestlemania, and Hogan tells him to start training and get ready. Will that be Hogan’s retirement match? He’s teased retiring before so it certainly feels possible that McMahon will win! 

Cruiserweight Crown

Smackdown opens with a triple threat match between Rey Mysterio, Jamie Noble and Tajiri and the winner gets a shot at the Cruiserweight title at Wrestlemania. Tajiri and Noble were both already in the ring with only Rey getting an entrance on TV, making it pretty clear who’s going to win. The action is incredible with the best spot being a superplex by Tajiri to Rey while sat on Noble’s shoulders. Awesome. Tajiri looks strong here but a well timed reversal by Rey gives him the victory via rollup. Rey will now challenge the Cruiserweight Champion in his first Wrestlemania match and we’ll find out who that’ll be later tonight when Matt Hardy defends against former champion Billy Kidman.

Matt Hardy defends the Cruiserweight Championship against former Champion Billy Kidman. Kidman and Mysterio have a long history from WCW and that would be an excellent match, but Matt is on a roll as a smug, obnoxious villain so would make a good Wrestlemania opponent for Rey too. This is a smart match. Kidman is focused and actually dominates Matt for much of the match but a trip and distraction by Shannon Moore gets him knocked off the apron but allows Matt to score the Twist of Fate and pick up the win. That’s another match confirmed for Wrestlemania!

Other Happenings

• The Smackdown intro hasn’t been updated to remove The Rock yet, which is weird because it’s all shots of Hollywood Rock meaning it was only updated the week before he moved to Raw. Stone Cold hasn’t been added back to the Raw one yet either to be fair.
• Los Guerreros, debuting their new theme song which I love and Eddie used a version of it until the end of his career (and life) in November 2005. They’re facing the FBI team of Stamboli and Palumbo, with Nunzio at ringside. Rikishi isn’t here to back up the Guerreros this week as he’s on a PR tour overseas, apparently. This is a surprisingly decent match and Eddie wins it for himself and Chavo with a Frog Splash which landed right on Johnny’s face! Nunzio wraps his leather jacket around Eddie’s head which allows the three Full Blooded Italians to attack and overwhelm both Eddie and Chavo with three on two odds and leave them beaten up.

• After a recap of last week’s big announcement that Torrie Wilson will be featured in Playboy, there’s a video recap of her photoshoot. No, I’m not capturing that one you perverts but I am confident that if you google it, it’ll be all over the internet. During the video, Torrie has a poster of Billy Kidman on the wall of her dressing room which would confirm that they were indeed still dating in real life at the time. The photoshoot actually took place weeks or months ago but they need to promote it now that the magazine is coming out. After that video package there’s a second one of Nidia going to the Playboy magazine, jealously trying to steal Torrie’s thunder and get herself on Playboy magazine. She also promotes the Girls Gone Wild PPV which has been mentioned on every Raw and Smackdown all month. I wonder how much GGW gave them for all of these adverts. Nidia challenges Torrie to a “body challenge” at that PPV, whatever that is. It’s misleading because they’re telling us that both of them will be fully naked on that PPV, which simply isn’t true. A bait and switch worthy of Vince McMahon himself.

• In a non-title match, the WWE Tag Team Champions Charlie Haas and Shelton Benjamin take on Chris Benoit and Rhyno. This is a real showcase for Benjamin and Haas who control the match and get to show off a lot of their in-ring skills. Rhyno rescues Benoit from the Haas of Pain and Gores Benjamin in half, followed by a Crossface on Haas for a tap out victory and a non-title win for Benoit and Rhyno. Good match.
• Once again, John Cena has some comments for Brock Lesnar. His knee is healing and he’s up on his feet and walking with a cane. He continues to threaten revenge on the Next Big Thing.

Raw - March 10th 2003

Apology Rejected

In the locker room, Eric Bischoff has all the heels assembled and tells them that he made a mistake and that he wants Stone Cold welcomed to the arena tonight. They all assume he means beaten up but Bischoff corrects them - he doesn't need Austin as an enemy for the rest of his career so tonight he’s going to call the Rattlesnake to the ring to bury the hatchet and make peace. He dismisses all of them but is then interrupted by The Rock who asks Chief Morley to leave so he can have a private chat with Eric Bischoff. He asks him if he’s ready for his match with Booker T, but The Rock says that it won’t be happening - he’s not afraid of Booker T but as important as fighting for the World title is, something is more important to him. The only objective left for him is to defeat Stone Cold Steve Austin at Wrestlemania - it eats him alive that he’s tried twice and failed. Bischoff’s happy with that but he has sponsors and advertisers who are expecting to see The Rock wrestle tonight so he says that he won’t face Booker T but he will find his own opponent.

Stone Cold Steve Austin arrives at the arena. Goldust warns him about Bischoff’s plans to call him out, stammering and flailing as he does until Stone Cold shoves his hotdog into Goldust’s mouth to stop him. Stone Cold seems quite chill since returning really!

In The Rock’s locker room his opponent for tonight shows up - it’s The Hurricane. The Rock talks about all his superpowers as the Scorpion King but Hurricane has his Hurri-powers bitch! The Rock says he lost the battle royal because he tripped, and he’s not afraid of Stone Cold. The Rock wishes Hurricane luck and a handshake, but then drops him with a cheap shot! 

Eric Bischoff heads down to the ring to give his apology to Stone Cold Steve Austin. He says sorry for last week, for firing him from WCW and even apologises to JR for how he treated him. He says that he deserves some credit because if he hadn’t fired him from WCW then he’d never have become Stone Cold! He says they should be friends - they both took on Vince McMahon, and they both love to hunt and fish. Stone Cold comes down to the ring and after taking his time saluting the crowd and enjoying the big reaction as JR and King agree that Bischoff SEEMS sincere and is making some sense. Eric offers Steve a handshake. Austin barks at him to call him sir and continues his old drill sergeant lists of things so that the crowd can bellow WHAT along with him as he speaks. I’ve missed Stone Cold very much. He’s not convinced and shoves his middle finger in the boss's face and says that Bischoff is starting to piss him off. Austin gets right in Eric’s face and tells him how boring he is. Bischoff looks pretty determined and in fairness to him, unafraid of the Rattlesnake. Before it can turn physical, The Rock comes out onto the stage! The Rock repeats his challenge from last week and Stone Cold reminds him that he’s whooped his ass at Wrestlemania not one but twice. Stone Cold wants a fight tonight and actually lays down, daring The Rock to come and attack him. The Rock doesn’t want to fight until Wrestlemania. Stone Cold says he’s not leaving this arena without kicking someone’s ass and he attacks Eric Bischoff! He catches The Rock trying to attack him from behind and he quickly backs down. 

Back in Bischoff’s office he complains to Chief Morley about his treatment at the hands of Stone Cold and the Chief of Staff gives him an idea by mentioning Mr. McMahon - Vince is so busy dealing with Hulk Hogan on Smackdown that he’s free to do anything he wants on Raw. It’s going to be the way it should have been at No Way Out - Eric Bischoff vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin with whatever rules and as much interference as he likes! 

The main event is easily the biggest match of The Hurricane’s career and this short feud with The Rock is still remembered as his greatest moment. The Rock has fun with Hurricane and puts the superhero’s cape on as he beats him down and grinds him out with a long sleeper hold.

Hurricane mounts a comeback and JR is great on commentary here, cheering him on and making you believe that he could do it. He’s vastly outmatched by main eventer The Rock of course but the fans explode when a Rock Bottom is blocked and turned into a chokeslam! The Rock kicks out at two. As The Rock sets up a People’s Elbow with victory in sight, Austin’s music hits to distract him. With The Rock focused on Austin, Hurricane rolls him up and gets the biggest victory of his career, pinning The Rock in the main event of Raw. The show closes with the Rattlesnake very pleased with himself, having screwed over the People’s Champion.

Booker T strikes back

Number one contender for the World Heavyweight Championship Booker T comes down to the ring to address the crowd. He was supposed to be wrestling The Rock tonight with his World title shot on the line - the booking is a little messy here and I wonder why they changed their mind since last week. Booker addresses Triple H’s comments from last week. He doesn’t call them out for the racist dogwhistles that they were, but after saying that he entertains for all the people shares some personal history - the youngest of 8 children, his father died when he was young, he had some run-ins with the law and ended up in jail for 19 months for armed robbery. Booker getting all serious here loses the crowd a little sadly and they started to WHAT him at one point, which is such a dick move when he’s pouring his heart out. He says that if Triple H wants to see him dance, he can come down to the ring and see it up close. Booker is all fired up but its not Triple H who comes out, it’s Nature Boy Ric Flair.

He says that Triple H is a class act and won’t lower himself to Booker T’s level and says that he has a choice. Next week on Raw, Booker T can meet Triple H’s jet and carry his bags for him and drive the car for them because that’s all he’s qualified for - this is still all deeply racist for no reason - or he can show up at Raw and get his ass whipped (and I have to believe the use of the word “whip” was intentional too). Booker rocks Flair with a big right hand and decides to go back to Triple H’s locker room and see him. When he gets there, he throws money at him and tells him to “get me a towel” so Booker attacks the World Champion, slamming a door on his head! He deserved that and more. After a commercial break, Flair and Triple H console each other and Triple H claims he was jumped from behind (he wasn’t) and they set off to find him before he leaves the arena. They fail, and he’s gone.

Backstage Triple H confronts Maven and someone else who’s name I don’t know. The segment has sound issues due to a tech glitch but it comes back in time to hear Triple H threaten Maven and challenge him to a match later.

Triple H vs. Maven should be a very one-sided match, and it is. King says that Maven is also “one of those people” and JR gets all over him, calling it disgusting and telling him to re-evaluate what he repeats which would seemingly confirm that this was always intended to be a racist thing, despite what Triple H has claimed in the many years since. A Pedigree ends the match and then Triple H hangs Maven up in the ropes leaving his neck trapped between the ropes. So now he’s hanging black men. Al Snow runs down to try and help Maven and he gets a Pedigree too. Amazing to compare what The Rock did in the main event to elevate someone lower on the card vs. what Triple H did here to absolutely bury someone. 

Other Happenings

• In the opening match, Chris Jericho and Christian face Kane and Rob Van Dam. It breaks down and after RVD hits the Frog Splash on Christian, as he’s still selling Jericho scores with a Lionsault to steal the victory. A big victory for Jericho and Christian and as Jericho leaves he walks right into Sweet Chin Music at the top of the ramp! Shawn Michaels is here and with a smile he accepts Jericho’s challenge for a match at Wrestlemania, making it official. 

• Jeff Hardy faces Rico. He fights off interference by Rosey and Jamal to pick up the victory. No after match drama for Jeff this week.
• Trish Stratus faces Jazz to determine the number one contender for Victoria’s women’s championship at Wrestlemania. Just as the match gets going, Victoria runs to the ring and hits both of them with her title belt, clutching it to her chest and screaming “it's mine!” over and over until referees chase her out of the ring. 
• After promoting the Girls Gone Wild PPV which Test and some other WWE stars will be at, Stacy makes a call to her boyfriend who isn’t here tonight and can hear girls giggling in the background. Is Test a dirty cheat?

• Jerry Lawler hosts a wet t-shirt contest later in the show to promote the same GGW contest and it’s as cringe and awkward as you’d hope. He’s about to wet down the girl’s t-shirts with a water gun when Stacy Kiebler comes out to take his place and do it instead. King takes the time to introduce the contestants like anyone cares. Stacy blasts them with water one by one - I don’t think I’m a prude so maybe this kind of thing just isn’t sexy to me personally? The big payoff is King spraying Stacy’s butt with the supersoaker. The audio on this segment was odd as the music for the GGW PPV played the whole time and the crowd’s cheers sounded very fake and piped in. I suspect it’s been edited a lot since its original live airing in 2003.

• Bubba Ray and D-Von Dudley are here, which seems to be a big surprise to everyone including JR and King who assumed they were still suspended. Their opponents are Chief Morley and one half of the World Tag Team Champions Lance Storm as William Regal is still out injured, as discussed previously. There is a twist - this match is in fact D-Von in a handicap match against Storm and Morley and if D-Von wins then The Dudleyz are suspended but if he loses or anyone interferes then The Dudleyz remain suspended. The two on one odds are too much for D-Von and he’s defeated by a Morley splash off the top rope. 

Smackdown - March 13th 2003

Angle vs. Lesnar

Earlier today, both Kurt Angle and Brock Lesnar arrived at the arena with very different attitudes. Kurt looks terrified, and Brock looks confident. Wrestlemania has come early to Smackdown and it has a big fight feel, to make sure everyone believes that this match really is happening tonight.

It’s been hyped up all night long with interviews with fans about who will win and recaps and videos of the previous few weeks but the time is now, and Kurt Angle defends the WWE Championship against Brock Lesnar two weeks before Wrestlemania. I hinted that there was a reason for this unusual situation and here it is - Kurt Angle needs neck surgery. It was a poorly kept secret that the WWE Champion was on borrowed time, physically and it was horrible timing with Smackdown having just lost Edge for the same reason. It seemed unlikely that Kurt would be able to compete at Wrestlemania at all and so this was set up so people would believe that Lesnar might win the title early so that he could then defend the title against someone else on the biggest show of the year. It made sense and is definitely what everyone was expecting to happen on this Smackdown. Kurt’s weakened state is the reason he hasn’t had a proper, intense one on one match since the Royal Rumble, and if you’ll remember they came up with a knee injury storyline to make sure he didn’t have to wrestle for several weeks in the run up to that PPV too. I will talk a lot more about Kurt’s neck surgery at Wrestlemania but let's get back to tonight. 

Kurt Angle enters first, all alone and gets into the ring to do what looks like praying in the corner, head down and hood up like he’s asking God to help him get through this match. Lesnar is supremely focused and runs to the ring, immediately hitting Kurt with an F5, exactly as you would to get a match over with quickly against an injured opponent. Lesnar covers but then breaks his own pin, looking very confused. He looks around angrily, fighting off Haas and Benjamin when they run down to the ring. As he’s distracted, a second Kurt Angle comes from under the ring and rolls the F5’d one out of the ring. Lesnar returns and is quickly rolled up into a small package and Kurt Angle pins Brock Lesnar to retain the WWE title! A jubilant Angle runs away, celebrating with his WWE title belt and leaves a confused and angry Brock Lesnar in the ring. He goes and gets the fake Angle - the one he gave an F5 - and beats the hell out of him, driving his knee into the ring post with another F5. Long time fans will recognise Kurt’s real life brother Eric who pulled this same switcheroo with Kurt at Survivor Series 2000 against The Undertaker. Kurt Angle outsmarted Brock Lesnar, but still has to face him for the WWE Championship at Wrestlemania.

Tag Team Chaos

Team Angle face Billy Kidman and Rey Mysterio in a non-title match. Rey has a Cruiserweight title match at Wrestlemania and Team Angle will defend their Tag Team titles against either Chris Benoit and Rhyno or Los Guerreros depending on the outcome of their number one contenders match later. This is four amazing athletes so even in a short, non-title TV match it’s a fun watch. Kidman and Mysterio have some spectacular dives to the outside but the more experienced team picks up the win. Afterwards, Kidman is frustrated by another loss and shoves Mysterio.

Rhyno and Chris Benoit take on Los Guerreros and the winners get a WWE Tag Team Championship match at Wrestlemania. There’s some nice story telling in this match as Eddie, who is normally unashamed of his cheating ways, is reluctant to cheat against his former friend Benoit. He holds Chavo back from losing his temper a couple of times and is conflicted about getting in cheap shots while the referee is distracted. This ended up being quite a long match and a lovely showcase for both these four men and Smackdown’s tag team division in general with multiple very close near falls and last minute saves. After a flurry of finishing moves - Frog splashes and Gores and Crossfaces - the Tag Team Champions pick their moment and Haas and Benjamin attack both teams with their title belts, laying everyone out. They should watch Raw because Victoria did the same thing and got rewarded with a triple threat. The same thing happens to Team Angle when they get backstage - a triple threat defending against both teams. In kayfabe, what was Haas and Benjamin’s plan? To not have a match at Wrestlemania at all? 

Killing Hulkamania

After a recap of their heated confrontation last week, there’s a video package about Hulk Hogan vs. Vince McMahon’s match at Wrestlemania, specifically focusing on their history and the rise of Hulkamania in the 80s and early 90s. Nice to see lots of footage of young Vince and Hogan at the peak of his powers without all of the sad, distressing and downright disgusting things that have come out about both men in the many years since.

After the video, Vince talks to us about the video and focuses specifically on one moment in the video - the only time Hulk Hogan ever said thank you to him for anything. He talks openly about he and Hogan’s very close real life friendship and how much Hogan hurt his feelings when he walked out of the WWF and screwed him over. He says he forgave Hogan for all of that, but he’ll never forgive him for forcing him to kill his own creation, Hulkamania, at Wrestlemania.

Other Happenings

• Brian Kendrick drops in to see Stephanie McMahon and gives her a bunch of flowers to thank her for the opportunity against Kurt Angle a couple of weeks ago, even though he came up short.

• Jamie Noble went to the Playboy mansion earlier on today to complain that Torrie Wilson was put in Playboy and not his girlfriend Nidia. He is eventually escorted from the premises by security.

• Rikishi is back from his PR tour this week for a match with FBI member Chuck Palumbo. Nunzio and Johnny Stamboli are at ringside too. They try to get involved but Eddie and Chavo Guerrero are quick to run down and even the odds, allowing Rikishi to put down Chuck with a superkick and a Rampshaker to win the match, thanks to Los Guerreros. 

• Undertaker goes looking for Nathan Jones backstage. It’s been confirmed that they’ll meet A-Train and Big Show at Wrestlemania. He finds him sitting alone, in the dark trying to get his mind settled. Jones is a weird, intense guy. Undertaker gives him some obvious advice, telling him he should watch Big Show and A-Train tonight so they can learn what to expect at Wrestlemania as Jones acts like a simpleton - he probably shouldn’t have needed to explain that. The match is next and seems enormously unfair as the massive Big Show and A-Train face cruiserweights Tajiri and Funaki. Earlier, they discussed strategy and Tajiri seemed confident they could chop them both down to size. Show just joins commentary and lets A-Train beat up both men single handedly. Funaki and Tajiri end up being a little too much for the big man two on one so Show has to rejoin the match and they do still pick up the victory with a Trainwreck on Tajiri. 

• Backstage, Sean O’Haire makes his first appearance in a few weeks and once again gets in someone’s head and manipulates someone into doing something. He convinces Dawn Marie to channel her upset over being passed over for Playboy into flashing the crowd here tonight on Smackdown. This is all promotion for both Torrie’s Playboy shoot and the Girls Gone Wild PPV which I hope is never mentioned again after this episode of Smackdown. Torrie joins the show “live from the Girls Gone Wild PPV” to reveal her Playboy cover. She obviously filmed this days ago because Smackdown is pre-taped. Dawn does head down to the ring to flash the crowd, using the word voluptuous multiple times which, as I’ve commented on before, is very clear evidence that Vince McMahon wrote this segment. Dawn actually does flash the crowd, and if you go a little bit of searching online, you can find the pictures where she was actually wearing flesh coloured pasties over her nipples. Cole and Tazz act like oversexed teenagers who’ve never seen a boob before - thank God Jerry Lawler isn’t on Smackdown.

• Rey Mysterio watches backstage as Cruiserweight Champion Matt Hardy has a public sparring session in the ring. Matt explains that this is to keep his skills sharp before his defence against Rey Mysterio at Wrestlemania. His mystery opponent is a masked man with non-descript theme music. He hands the ring announcer a piece of paper and is announced as being a hometown boy, the Pittsburg Penguin! It’s pretty clear that the masked man is in fact Brian Kendrick, chasing another opportunity to earn a job. Matt gets focused and unmasks the penguin to confirm for everyone that it is indeed Kendrick and he fires up on the Cruiserweight Champion and shows off a nice springboard dropkick. He has Matt on the ropes and Shannon pulls his sensei to safety and the two leave - Kendrick wins via countout. Will that get him a job with Smackdown?

Raw - March 17th 2003

Rock on Top

Raw opens with Eric Bischoff in the ring, spotlight illuminating the General Manager. He says that tonight’s main event is himself vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin and it’ll be a lumberjack match. Every single Raw superstar will be around the ring and any of them who doesn’t “do their job” i.e. attack Austin and help him, then they’re fired. 

Backstage while Terri tries to get an interview with Stone Cold, she catches Shawn Michaels going into the Rattlesnake’s locker room and after a commercial break, we get to see that private meeting. Shawn came to tell Austin face to face that he’ll be a lumberjack tonight because he has to be. It’s a funny interaction as Shawn keeps casually bringing up the weather. They point out to each other that their respective Wrestlemania opponents will also be at ringside. Stone Cold accuses HBK of just coming in here to stir things up and upset him. Austin ends by telling Shawn that if hes going down, he’s taking Eric Bischoff with him.

Backstage, Theodore Long approaches The Rock and sucks up to him a bit before revealing that this month’s WWE magazine has The Hurricane on the front cover. Long promises that his man Rodney Mack will take care of Hurricane tonight and everyone will forget that he beat The Rock last week. Long says that it was all a conspiracy and a blatant attempt to keep a brother down. 

That match is next - Rodney Mack vs. Hurricane. Theodore Long and Rodney Mack have no theme music but I have never heard this song before in my life which makes me think its either been edited or he only used it a couple of times. It’s certainly not Teddy’s Mack Millitant, the song he’s used for over two decades since. Hurricane is about to end Mack’s winning streak when The Rock runs down to attack him. Hurricane actually fights The Rock off initially and the crowd goes wild but he’s too much for Hurricane and beats him to the outside, dropping him crotch first across the security wall and then hammering him with chair shot after chair shot to the back and ribs. In truth, it was very safe but thankfully the camera angle changed to hide the fact that The Rock was barely touching Hurricane with the chair on each swing. 

Backstage before the main event, The Rock tells Eric Bischoff that he’s going to host a Rock Concert next week on Raw - a night with The Rock, singing songs and entertaining the millions - and then has an idea for tonight’s main event. He says all those lumberjacks make Bischoff look like a wuss so he should cancel that and make it a no disqualification match and tells Eric to trust him - he’ll come down and lay out Austin and make sure he comes out on top, lumberjacks not required. Eric seems deeply skeptical about it but The Rock assures him that he can trust him and The Rock will take good care of him.

For the first time since June 2002, Stone Cold Steve Austin is in action on Raw and is in his traditional ring gear (at No Way Out he “wrestled” Bischoff in jean shorts). It feels right to see the Rattlesnake on Raw, but little did anyone know this would mark the final match on Raw in his career. Stone Cold chases Bischoff around the ring, stopping briefly to beat the hell out of Chief Morley, and it looks like The Rock’s plan has backfired. Or maybe he actually does want to see Eric get beat up too.

Stone Cold stomps Bischoff down in the corner as the fans chant WHAT along with every kick but finally the Chief of Staff gives Austin a low blow and finally Bischoff is able to land some kicks on the Rattlesnake. His advantage doesn’t last long and Bischoff takes a Stunner but The Rock finally picks his moment, running down and giving Stone Cold a Stunner of his own. Bischoff covers but Stone Cold kicks out, so The Rock runs back to the ring but misses his People’s Elbow and Austin fights back, knocking The Rock out of the ring and dropping both Morley and Bischoff with more Stunners to win this match. He gets no time to celebrate as The Rock gets back up and drills him with a Rock Bottom closing Raw by taking some of Austin’s beers and toasting him from the top of the entrance ramp. I mentioned it at No Way Out that due to some legal issues, Stone Cold wasn’t allowed to drink beer so this is a clever way of showing that he WOULD have if The Rock hadn’t ruined it. The Rock has the last laugh tonight.

Cheap Shots and Mind Games

World Heavyweight Champion Triple H and Ric Flair head down to the ring and The Game repeats his talking points from previous weeks - Booker T isn’t worthy of a title shot, isn’t in Triple H’s league etc. He calls out Booker T because “a champion doesn’t attack people from behind” which is obviously something Triple H has done dozens and dozens of times himself. It’s not Booker who comes out, it’s Goldust who gives a passionate speech about Booker T and how he’ll win the World title but it’s rendered ridiculous by his new tourettes gimmick due to being electrocuted. Triple H and Flair laugh hysterically at Goldust who eventually gets sick of their mocking and starts a fight but the two on one odds are too much and Goldust is beaten up.

Booker T runs down and saves Goldust from a Pedigree and the former Tag Team Champions beat up Triple H and Ric Flair and send them packing out of the ring. Backstage, Triple H is furious and tells Flair to go and get Bischoff to make a match between him and Goldust later tonight, which Goldust gladly accepts.

Booker T accompanies Goldust to the ring for his non-title match with Triple H. King has decided that making relentless jokes about Booker T’s legal issues and Goldust’s stammer is the way to go here which winds me up in a way that it shouldn’t. I think I just hate him too much to enjoy the heel shenanigans. Booker T gets into a fight with Ric Flair at home but a fan hits Booker in the back with a crutch! He removes his hood revealing that it is infact injured Evolution member Randy Orton - he’s only here because this Raw takes place in his hometown. He’s escorted out by security but with Booker T down, Flair is able to interfere and Triple H finishes Goldust with a Pedigree.

Table for the Traitors

Kane and Rob Van Dam take on Chief Morley and one half of the World Tag Team Champions Lance Storm. Before the match, Morley wishes William Regal a speedy recovery and decrees that if The Dudley Boyz interfere in this match there will be dire consequences. Bubba Ray and D-Von are still suspended without pay. Kane and RVD continue to work seamlessly together and with a chokeslam to Chief Morley, they pick up another victory. RVD wants to give him a Frog Splash for good measure but he escapes. Or does he? The Dudleyz come down the ramp and attack Morley, throwing him back into the ring and setting up a table. Bubba and D-Von are going to put Morley through a table..but then they attack Kane! The Dudleyz give Kane a 3D through the table instead and even Morley looks confused by their actions! 

Backstage after a commercial break, they explain themselves - Morley told them that they had a choice to either join him or to stay suspended so even though Bubba Ray and D-Von aren’t happy about it, they have made their decision and will do Bischoff and Morley’s bidding unwillingly. He lifts their suspension and shakes both of their hands, telling them to stick around because he’s sure Eric will need more help against Stone Cold later. Poor Bubba and D-Von are so conflicted.

Other Happenings

• Maven takes on Rico (with Rosey and Jamal). Despite interference from Rosey and Jamal, Maven maneuvers Rico into a backslide for the victory and smartly bails out of the ring before 3-Minute Warning can attack him.
• In an odd match, Trish Stratus and Jazz are forced to team up against Victoria and Steven Richards. This match also comes with the announcement that at Wrestlemania, Victoria will defend her women’s title against Trish and Jazz in a triple threat match. Earlier today, Victoria was cradling her women’s title belt and talking to it like it was equal parts her baby and her lover. Creepy. Jazz ends up walking out on Trish leaving her easy pickings for a Richards spinebuster and then a Widow’s Peak. Victoria and Richards win but they aren’t done and the women’s champion gets a steel chair, wanting to injure one of her Wrestlemania challengers. Jeff Hardy runs to the ring to rescue Trish, fighting off Richards and preparing to give Victoria a Swanton Bomb but Steven pulls her to safety. A grateful Trish plants a kiss on Jeff Hardy afterwards - they’ve teased Trish and Jeff becoming a couple multiple times over the years so maybe they’ll finally put them together. 

• There’s a nice video of Shawn Michaels talking about how meaningful performing at another Wrestlemania is to him personally. 

• Afterwards, Chris Jericho has some comments of his own which are far less reverential. He says he used to dream of being Shawn Michaels but now he dreams of ending Shawn Michaels career. Up next, he and Christian have a tag team match against Test and a mystery partner. Stacy Kiebler goes to check on her boyfriend Test but he’s too busy sneakily looking at Torrie Wilson in Playboy. I can’t blame him for that, but this is the third or fourth week in a row where Test has been a neglectful and borderline cheating boyfriend. Test’s partner is Big Poppa Pump Scott Steiner! This is a good match with a lot of counters between Jericho, Test and Christian and a ton of near falls, broken up at the last second. Steiner rescues Stacy from Christian and then catches her when she’s knocked off the apron. Test sees them and gets jealous and angry at Freakzilla holding his girlfriend and the distraction lets Jericho steal the pin with a roll up. Test and Steiner lose but the bigger story is that Test is acting like a jealous asshole towards Stacy.

Smackdown - March 20th 2003

Advantage: Kurt

Smackdown opens with a recap of last week’s genius ploy by Kurt Angle, using his brother Eric to outsmart Lesnar and steal the victory in their Wrestlemania main event preview. Here’s the video which is more entertaining than my description of it at the end of last week’s show.

John Cena has another rap aimed at Brock Lesnar, saying he’ll be back on Smackdown next week and offering an open challenge for a rap battle to anyone who’ll accept at Wrestlemania. I’ll talk about that at the show, but basically it happens on Sunday Night Heat, not Wrestlemania.

The WWE Champion Kurt Angle leads his brother Eric - on crutches - down to the ring to discuss Brock Lesnar’s attack of him and Kurt’s big, totally fair and legit victory over Lesnar last week. Kurt says that Eric was an innocent man and no one lays a hand on his brother Eric. Cole and Tazz go on about how he and Kurt look like twins but personally I don’t see it. They’re dressed the same and both have shaved heads. Kurt calls Brock a big loser and an embarrassment and disgrace to amateur and professional wrestling alike. Kurt demands an apology from Brock Lesnar but it’s not the Next Big Thing who comes out, it’s General Manager Stephanie McMahon. She makes some rule changes to Wrestlemania - if anyone gets involved or if Kurt gets himself disqualified or counted out then he will forfeit the title to Lesnar. Kurt accepts all of that - he won a gold medal with a broken neck so he can definitely beat Brock Lesnar - and says he’s still not leaving without an apology. Lesnar then comes out but doesn’t look like he’s in an apologising mood and rushes the ring. Kurt uses his brother as a human shield which is cowardly but it works as Kurt then gets on top of Lesnar with a low blow and drives him through a steel chair with an Angle slam, focusing his attack on Lesnar’s back and stretching him out with a camel clutch until referees finally end the assault and Kurt leaves with his WWE title belt held high in victory. 

Later, Lesnar is in the trainer’s office in a lot of pain complaining that it's the same rib that he broke previously which is giving him trouble.

Signed in Blood

During the show there’s a few video interviews with celebrities and former old time performers like Bobby “The Brain” Heenan talking about Hogan and McMahon’s match at Wrestlemania and the history behind it. 20 years in the making has become the match’s tagline.

In the final segment of the show, Hogan and McMahon sign the contract for their match at Wrestlemania. Beforehand, Vince checks the contract with his lawyers to make sure that Hogan has no choice but to retire if he loses and the contract signing itself is emceed by Mean Gene Okerlund, which is a nice touch. As heated as their verbal sparring sessions have been over the past month, it seems impossible that they’ll now sit across a table from each other and stay calm. Hogan gives us the classic “well let me tell ya something Mean Gene….” at the start of his promo which was also a nice touch.

Hogan gets all his catchphrases in while saying that Vince will never kill Hulkamania because the Hulkamaniacs won’t allow it, etc and so on. As Vince makes his way to the ring he smugly tells everyone backstage to get to a TV and watch because no one will believe whats about to happen to Hogan. His music hits and then Vince, who has apparently teleported, appears behind Hogan and hammers him with a steel chair! That little video on the titantron must have been pre-taped! He hits Hogan again and again across the back with a steel chair, ranting that he made Hogan 20 years ago and he never said thank you. The crowd goes mental for Hogan begging him to get back up but a final chair shot right to the head not only lays Hogan out but busts him wide open. Vince cheerfully signs the contract and then, in the final insult, stabs Hogan with the pen so that he can sign in his own blood. 

Other Happenings

• In the arena, the opening match is a singles match between Charlie Haas and Rhyno, with Shelton Benjamin and Chris Benoit at ringside for their respective tag team partners. Haas focuses his onslaught on the left leg of Rhyno, chipping away at his knee and hamstring. As soon as Haas gets in trouble, Benjamin knocks down Benoit and hits Rhyno with his tag team title belt to cause the disqualification and Team Angle make their getaway.
• In Stephnie McMahon’s office, after telling off Brian Kendrick for having a match last week against her wishes, gives him a match tonight with Shannon Moore and promises that if he wins then he will receive a contract for Smackdown. 
• Eddie and Chavo premiered another Lie, Cheat and Steal video. This time, Los Guerreros cheat at golf to fleece a couple of guys out of a lot of money

• Eddie and Chavo team up with Rikishi tonight against the entire FBI trio of Nunzio, Palumbo and Stamboli. This match breaks down into chaos almost immediately and it’s Eddie who wins it for his team with a Frog Splash on Chuck. The crowd was really into this.
• Rey Mysterio faces Jamie Noble (who made out with Nidia before the match and it got INTIMATE). This is a big showcase victory for Rey who takes out Nidia with a dive to the outside and finishes off Noble with a 619 and West Coast Pop.
• Nathan Jones watches on from backstage as his teacher and mentor The Undertaker faces Bill Demot. He quickly wins with a barrage of his trademark moves and a tombstone as Jones smiles and nods while watching the screen.

• Matt Hardy accompanies Shannon Moore to the ring for his match with Brian Kendrick. Both Matt facts this week are Shannon Moore focused - he graciously included Shannon in his book, and Matt is Shannon’s idol. Brian Kendrick comes out with no music and gets lots of girly screams - he’s a cutie for sure, I get it ladies. This is a spirited match and when Matt tries to help out Shannon, Rey Mysterio runs down and takes him out with a DDT on the floor. Kendrick hits the still-unnamed Sliced Bread Number 2 out of the corner and pins Shannon Moore to officially become a WWE Superstar. Rey celebrates with him afterwards.

• In the other half of the equation, Shelton Benjamin faces Chris Benoit. Benoit gets Benjamin into the Crossface and when Haas tries to interfere, he runs into a Gore from Rhyno. Shelton taps out and Benoit wins and gets more momentum ahead of the WWE Tag Team title match at Wrestlemania.

Raw - March 24th 2003 

Rock Concert

In the arena, the show opens with Stone Cold Steve Austin marching to the ring. He immediately starts arguing with a referee - there is a match scheduled but Austin doesn’t care about that and gives him the finger. Last week The Rock gave him a Stunner and a Rock Bottom so nothing else is happening tonight until The Rock brings his candy ass down to the ring so they can even the score. He even tells The Rock to bring his guitar and he can sing him a song if he wants.

 It’s not The Rock who comes out, it’s Test. He was scheduled to be one half of Raw’s opening match so it looks like they’re trying to just start the show whether Austin is in the ring or not. Test looks pretty reluctant and tells him that he means no disrespect - Bischoff told him to go out for his match. Austin isn’t in a reasonable mood and drops him with a Stunner. The Rattlesnake says he’s going to sit at ringside and wait for The Rock. Lance Storm, Test’s opponent, runs down and tries to just pin him after the Stunner but Stone Cold is having none of that and gives him a Stunner too! Next up is Eric Bischoff himself to try and get this show back on the rails but he’s not alone and is flanked by about 20 police officers. He has a restraining order against Austin which means he has to leave the building or he’ll be arrested. Bischoff sarcastically asks if Austin can stun all 20 of them and the crowd cheers because honestly, yeah he probably can! He’s Stone Cold Steve Austin! He has no choice and does as he’s ordered, leaving the arena under duress. 

In Eric Bischoff’s office he’s on the phone to someone but is interrupted by Coach with a security emergency; Stone Cold is still outside the arena and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Bischoff tells Coach to go out and tell Austin that if he doesn’t leave, Bischoff will make his life miserable and if he doesn’t then he’s fired.

Out in the parking lot, Coach does as he was told and tells Austin what Bischoff said, but doesn’t give him any time to respond and just backs off saying that they’re cool. 

The Rock drops in to see Eric Bischoff with an idea, which the GM is reluctant to listen to given that his last ideas got Bischoff beaten up. Stone Cold is still here and no one wants him to come back inside, but he’s still here because he wants to hear The Rock’s concert! He tells him to set up some speakers out in the parking lot so that Stone Cold can hear everything he says later in the show. 

In the main event of the show, The Rock performs a concert. It’s not A rock concert, it’s The Rock Concert. He struts to the ring with his acoustic guitar and I’m wondering, given how his other little original songs have been edited off these retro shows, whether this one made the cut. Out in the parking lot, Stone Cold doesn’t look too happy to have the speakers set up right in front of his truck and sure enough, the music portion of this show is missing from my version. That’s a shame, but the gimmick is The Rock strumming away on what he says is Willie Nelson’s guitar, singing songs that insult the city they’re in as well as Stone Cold. A lot of this anti-city comedy is usually sports team focused so is lost on me anyway. Stone Cold has had enough and his truck roars into the building as The Rock screams that they need to arrest Austin for breaching his restraining order. When the truck parks up its not Austin inside, it’s The Hurricane and The Rock gleefully laughs him off and has him arrested.

They swarm him and escort him to the back but it was a ruse and with the security gone, Austin reveals he was hiding in the back of the truck. He attacks The Rock and thanks to his headmic we can hear every moment of the stomping in the corner! The Rock escapes but leaves his precious Willie Nelson guitar behind so Austin has fun teasing and taunting him with it, threatening to smash it to pieces until finally he stamps on it, crushing it and smashing it up. The Rock looks near tears, calling to the Rattlesnake that he’ll pay for that at Wrestlemania.

Momentum for Booker

Tonight Goldust and Booker T take on Triple H and Ric Flair. In their locker room, Booker and Goldust have a heart to heart and Goldust violently ticks and stutters far worse than he has the previous couple of weeks. Booker keeps a straight face which I’m sure was a challenge. He’s proud of Booker T and knows he’ll win the World title at Wrestlemania, is the jist. 

For the tag team match, Triple H, Flair, Booker T and Goldust all get their own entrances and theme music which struck me as a little odd as usually Flair and Goldust come out to their respective partner’s music for tag team encounters. Flair and Triple H cut off and isolate Booker T, focusing on his leg and using plenty of cheap shots and distractions of the referee to chip away and him and soften him up for Wrestlemania. Booker finally makes the tag but Goldust is quickly shut down and its his turn to be hammered and worked over by the World Champion and his manager/mentor/whatever Flair is to The Game these days. When Booker gets the tag, the match breaks down from there and he goes right after Triple H, beating him from pillar to post on the outside and busting him open on the ringsteps. In the chaos, Booker hits Triple H with his Scissors Kick and pins the World Champion once again, leaving him bloody and broken in the ring. Backstage afterwards as Flair tries to pump Triple H up and says he’s the man and no one can beat him, Triple H doesn’t seem so sure and is shaken by Booker T’s drive and focus. He’s worried now!

Wrestlemania Warning

Chris Jericho heads down to the ring to address the people about his Wrestlemania meeting with his childhood hero Shawn Michaels. Jericho calls HBK down to the ring and promises no tricks or sneak attacks, he just wants to talk to him. He seems sincere as he talks about how much he loved and respected Michaels. This promo forms the bulk of the video package for their match at Wrestlemania so I won’t lay it out too much and you can just hear it all there but he shows multiple clips and photos from earlier in his career to prove how much he copied Shawn Michaels but now be doesn’t want to be the next Shawn Michaels, he wants to be the first Chris Jericho because now he knows he’s better than Michaels ever was. He says he’ll beat Michaels at Wrestlemania and then he’ll have no choice but to admit that he is better than him. Jericho starts to rant and lose his temper and slaps HBK across the face, which only gets a laugh out of HBK. He slaps Jericho back which gets a smile of its own and they get nose to nose and head to head, but it doesn’t come to blows and they leave peacefully during the commercial break. Good stuff.

Tag Team Moves

Backstage, Chief Morley has a major announcement. Due to William Regal’s illness and injury, the World Tag Team Championships are now vacant. He does have the authority to name new champions and so awards the titles to himself and Lance Storm. Kane and RVD show up and say that seeing as they won their match last week, they should get a shot at the Tag Team titles at Wrestlemania. Morley isn’t keen but Van Dam accuses him of having no balls, so the Chief of staff gets flustered and gives them a number one contenders match against Bubba Ray and D-Von Dudley tonight. Morley and Storm look very happy with the arrangement, presumably assuming they can help The Dudleyz win and then give themselves an easy Wrestlemania title defence by making the new reluctant members of the Bischoff regime lay down for them.

The Dudley Boyz look motivated for this number one contenders match and obviously haven’t connected the same dots I have that if they win, they’ll be expected to just lay down so probably don’t want to win. They isolate Kane which is an interesting choice given that he’s the bigger, stronger opponent. Storm and Morley do come down to try and help The Dudleyz but it backfires when Storm’s big kick misses Kane and hits D-Von. A chokeslam and a Frog Splash gives Kane and RVD the victory and a World Tag Team title shot at Wrestlemania (which doesn’t happen at Wrestlemania, but I’ll talk about that on the night!) 

Other Happenings

• I haven’t mentioned it for the past few shows, and I have no idea what was going on in America at the time, but Raw opens with Lillian Garcia singing America the Beautiful. Smackdown opened with a tribute to the US armed forces, as did last week’s Raw. It’s all a bit much - WWE is terrible for forgetting that their audience doesn’t only live in the United States. Multiple wrestlers during the show also had USA flags or the red white and blue added to their ring gear. Weird. 
• Trish Stratus and Jeff Hardy team up tonight against Victoria and Steven Richards. Trish watches Jeff with a smile and clearly has a little thing for Hardy. I mentioned last week that they’ve teased this relationship multiple times before. Trish wins the match with a Stratusfaction on Victoria and is about to kiss Jeff again to celebrate but is attacked by Jazz, who attacks Victoria too and leaves both of her Wrestlemania opponents laying.
• Big Poppa Pump Scott Steiner takes on Christian. Steiner defeats Christian convincingly with a big suplex off the top rope.
• The Rock and Austin segment certainly felt like the end of Raw but all night long, JR promoted some “bonus coverage” and an extended run time and so Vince McMahon comes down to the ring and shows the segment from Smackdown where he and Hogan signed their contract for Wrestlemania in full, followed by the Kurt Angle and Brock Lesnar segment. Got to get those last minute Wrestlemania buys I guess so there’s no harm in them promoting the two big Smackdown matches on Raw. 

Smackdown - March 27th 2003

Hogan’s Final Message

Hulk Hogan arrives at the arena with Jimmy Hart and teenage son Nick in tow. Hilariously he calls his own son Brother, too. The interviews and testimonials about Hogan and McMahon continue this week with the most noteworthy one being from Rowdy Roddy Piper, but Arnold Schwarzenegger also drops in to give his prediction that Hulk Hogan will win the match.

Hulk Hogan heads down to the ring for what Michael Cole says might be the last time ever on Smackdown if he loses at Wrestlemania. Hogan says that McMahon fears Hulkamania and as much as he knew Vince, he guess he never REALLY knew how sick and twisted he was. He recaps the events of No Way Out and the contract signing last week and asks if should have put his career on the line, knowing how evil Vince McMahon is and the depths he’ll stoop to, especially in a street fight. He concludes by promising that his career isn’t over and he will leave McMahon in a pool of his own blood at Wrestlemania.

Cena’s Revenge

John Cena is back on Smackdown. Josh Matthews catches him and asks what he has planned and he raps about how he’s going to call out Brock Lesnar and teach him a lesson about payback tonight. His raps are getting better. Later when Brock arrives Josh asks him and he tells Cena to do whatever the hell he wants because all he’s focused on is Wrestlemania.

Backstage, WWE Champion Kurt Angle is walking around looking for Brock Lesnar’s locker room which you’d assume is going to lead to a fight but when he finds Brock they instead have a conversation. Kurt seriously talks about Brock’s career and his future, but says that he’s a kid. A 25 year old rookie. He has his whole career ahead of him and this match at Wrestlemania - his first Wrestlemania - it’s going to change his career and his life. This might be his last Wrestlemania because Kurt is bringing everything he’s got. Lesnar returns the same compliments and threats. Both men are willing to lay it all on the line for the most important championship in all of wrestling. Here comes the pain. Kurt’s comments about this being a career ending match hits different when you know how messed up his neck was at the time and how scared he must have been. 

In the main event of Smackdown, John Cena makes is in-ring return after being F5’d into the ring post by Brock Lesnar last month. This match is also the debut of his Word Life theme song which he sung himself, and all these weeks of rapping promos have gotten him a much better crowd reaction than he got when he was last on Smackdown in person. 

His opponent is Rikishi and he’s quickly overwhelmed by Rikishi but wins the fight when it goes to the outside. Back in the ring, Rikishi drops Cena and gives him a Stink face but the attempted Rump shaker is blocked with his knees and the doctor of Thuganomics wraps his chain around his fist and knocks the big man out with a punch. Rikishi kicks out of that, but that just gives Cena a chance to show off his new finishing move - the one he’s christened the FU - to pick up the win. New theme song, new finishing move and a big victory for John Cena. He is very much on his way, post knee injury. 

Cena grabs the mic and challenges Brock Lesnar to come down and face him like a man! He doesn’t have to wait long for the 2003 Royal Rumble winner, but gets impatient anyway and goes backstage to find Lesnar himself. He finds him and shows zero fear, rushing Lesnar and the two start to furiously brawl in the back. Kurt Angle takes advantage of the situation and breaks a 2x4 over the challengers back and seemingly re-injuring his ribs only three days before Wrestlemania. 

WWE Tag Team Championships

Eddie Guerrero, accompanied by Chavo, takes on one half of the WWE Tag Team Champions Charlie Haas, with Shelton Benjamin. Later tonight, Chavo and Shelton will have a match of their own, because that’s classic tag team booking. This is a short match and Eddie gets the clean victory with a sunset flip powerbomb. 

In their match later in the show, Shelton focuses on Chavo’s leg and shows off his impressive mat wrestling game. Much like earlier, Haas tries to help his partner but Eddie is able to neutralise him and Chavo gets the win with a roll up. As Los Gurreroes celebrate, Rhyno and Benoit come out to observe. The Tag Team Champions get in cheap shots with their tag team titles belts so Benoit and Rhyno rush the ring and put them in their place with a Crossface and a Gore to be the last team standing tonight. 

The Colossus of Boggo Road

Undertaker goes to get Nathan and he says that he has already had his first match and opens the door to show Palumbo badly beaten up in the locker room. Undertaker laughs it off and says that his first match will just have to be the tag team match at Wrestlemania. The reason for this, which I’ll discuss at Wrestlemania, is that Nathan was terrible and clumsy and no one trusted him to get in the ring knowing the fans would see how terrible he is and it would kill any aura he had. 

Backstage, Nathan Jones runs into A-Train and Big Show who taunt him and dare him to start a fight. Show makes a joke about Jones having been in prison and being Australian which is impressive that he fitted both in to such a short conversation.

Big Show and A-Train have a warm up match against another team with a big tag team encounter to get ready for at Wrestlemania, Chris Benoit and Rhyno. The story of this match is what you’d expect with the big men dominating the smaller Benoit as he shows off how tough and plucky he is and fights back, finally able to make the tag to Rhyno. Nathan Jones, clearly upset about Big Show’s jokes about Australia, runs down and attacks A-Train and Big Show to cause a disqualification. He's about to pay for it with two on one odds but Undertaker is fast to make the save and they clear their Wrestlemania opponents out of the ring. 

Other Happenings

• Smackdown opens with Brian Kendrick in his first match as a WWE superstar teaming with Rey Mysterio against Cruiserweight Champion Matt Hardy and Shannon Moore. This week’s Matt Facts are that he will make Wrestlemania a success, and that he is very humble. Kendrick has his own theme music now and I quite like it! 

• Kendrick and Mysterio work well as a team but Matt’s experience is the difference maker and he finishes off Brian with a Twist of Fate after dropping Rey on the security wall. Mysterio isn’t done, drilling Moore with a 619 and the West Coast Pop but Matt gives him a Twist of Fate too to end up on top of his Wrestlemania challenger.
• Nathan Jones makes his in-ring debut against Chuck Palumbo of the FBI. Before the match there’s a video of Nunzio, Stamboli and Palumbo in New York city roughing up some guy for not having their money. I like these little videos a lot, like the ones they’ve done for Los Guerreros. This is pure Paul Heyman.
• Backstage, Nidia and Jamie Noble find a big cardboard cutout of Torrie’s Playboy cover and mock it and Nidia promises to make Torrie ugly in their match tonight. That leads into a video promoting Torrie’s Playboy cover and the press conference for it. I’m sure lots of men will enjoy hearing Stephanie McMahon talk about how amazing Torrie Wilson’s body is.

• Jamie Noble trips Torrie from the outside to give his girlfriend the advantage but Torrie wins with a jumping DDT and quickly runs away before Noble can attack her.

And so we arrive at another Wrestlemania - my fifth one on this website! This also marks what could be my final Preview as I’m stopping this journey through 2003 at Wrestlemania XIX. I’ve enjoyed it very much but I crave some new faces and energy so I’m planning to jump all the way back to 1993 and the birth of Raw. For anyone who’s read along with me, I hope you’ve enjoyed watching the company change as much as I have - I said so many times that each year during the Attitude era felt so dramatically different from the year previous but as we’re now deep in the Ruthless Aggression era, that energy is gone and the WWE has remained more or less unchanged ever since.