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Last night's Smackdown - billed as "Championship Friday" - was slated to feature three title matches, but General Manager Vicki Guerrero intervened before the main event with two startling announcements directly affecting World Champion The Undertaker.
WWE Tag Team Champions The Miz and John Morrison opened the broadcast by successfully defending their titles against Jimmy Wang Yang and Shannon Moore in a very exciting contest. Matt Hardy also retained his U.S. strap over former Champion MVP later in the show.
Batista joined Mick Foley in the ring to address his loss to Shawn Michaels at Backlash. The Animal admitted to letting his guard down at the PPV and made no excuses for HBK winning the match, saying that he respects Michaels as one of the greatest performers in wrestling history (In fact - despite the recent tease of a heel turn - Batista came across as a total babyface here with both his words and mannerisms). Commenting on Chris Jericho’s speculation of Shawn faking an alleged knee injury, Batista warned Michaels that he would hurt him if HBK’s current condition was indeed a ploy.
The Undertaker was scheduled to place his World Title on the line against The Great Khali to close the show. However, Smackdown General Manager Vicki Guerrero appeared on the entrance ramp along with her fiancee, Edge and announced that the bout would not take place. Instead, Vicki informed The Dead Man that he was now prohibited from using the Gogoplata submission hold and proceeded to strip ‘Taker of the World Championship. Vicki requested that the now-former Titleholder leave the ring and personally relinquish the strap to her, but Undertaker refused, prompting the GM to assign Khali the task of retrieving the gold. The Punjabi giant entered the squared circle, but soon found himself on the mat and trapped in the Gogoplata, courtesy of the ex-Champion. Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder took advantage of the chaos by sneaking into the ring and picking up the World Title, presenting it to Vicki after making their way up the runway.
This was a decent program featuring some great in-ring action, although I don’t understand the decision to remove the Championship from The Undertaker. The banishment of the Gogoplata would make sense in regard to storyline purposes, but ending ‘Taker’s reign barely one month following his title win at WrestleMania seems rather pointless to me.
Match Results: WWE Tag Team Champions John Morrison and The Miz over Jimmy Wang Yang and Shannon Moore via Morrison’s pinfall on Moore … Vladimir Kozlov over Colin Delaney via pinfall … Natalya and Victoria over Michelle McCool and Cherry via Natalya’s pinfall on Michelle … Mark Henry over Nunzio via pinfall … U.S. Champion Matt Hardy over MVP via pinfall … Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder over Jesse and Festus via Hawkins’ pinfall on Jesse … Finlay over Julio Denero via pinfall.
Views: 464
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