WWE Smackdown: A Brief History
On April 29, 1999 Smackdown made its single debut on UPN, named after a word in The Rock’s catchphrase at that time. As of August 26, 1999, it was an official program on UPN. Much like WCW Thunder, WWE Smackdown was taped on a Tuesday night, and replayed on a Thursday night.
In April 2002 WWE, created the official 2 brand extensions of WWE Raw Smackdown, which included two separate rosters, 2 different brand storylines, as well as ‘show exclusive’ characters due to the purchase of WCW and ECW (which remained as it’s own show as a minor 3rd brand). This would give the roster a better chance to function, and not fight over TV time. The only thing that didn’t follow the guidelines of ‘show exclusive brand’ was the fact the both heavyweight titles would be defended on both shows.
As a result of having two different brands, and fearing storylines might become stale in the fan’s eyes, on June 26th 2005, there was an announcement of a yearly draft lottery where anyone could be drafted to and from any WWE Raw Smackdown show that night.
Smackdown became “Friday Night Smackdown” on September 9th, 2005, and had the tagline of “Tv that’s changing Friday Nights.” On April 7th, 2006, general manager Theodore Long announced that after a four year hiatus, “The King of the Ring” would make it’s appearance as a pay per view again that year on Judgement Day. Booker T defeated Bobby Lashley in the finals to become the king for that year.
September 22, 2006 Smackdown, moved over to the CW television network, and since the move, it has become The CW’s second highest watched program with a rough average of 3.0 ratings. Smackdown celebrated it’s 400th episode on April 20, 2007, and over the next few months, it would help the CW network claim the top spot in the ratings.
October 16, 2007, it was officially announced that Smackdown, and ECW would participate in a ‘talent exchange’ where wrestlers on either brand could wrestle on the other’s brand at any time. After 9 years announcing on Raw, Jim Ross moved over to Smackdown in exchange for Michael Cole in 2008. Also in that year, Mick Foley officially left, and for the first time in any of the brand’s history, an exclusive woman’s championship belt was introduced to the brand.
On September 15th 2009, WWE issued “The Best of SmackDown 10th Anniversary.” DVD box set to the public.
As of April 12, 2010, Smackdown had moved to the Syfy network from MyNetworkTV, and since this was a sister company of the USA network, same-week encores of SmackDown were also added to Universal HD's, and mun's schedule as a result of the move.
On April 19, 2010, most of the Raw superstars were stuck in Belfast, Ireland due to Eyjafjallajökull erupting in Iceland and leaving ash hovering over Europe and causing flights to be cancelled. Smackdown superstars appeared on the live program to fill in slots left by the stranded wrestlers and became WWE RAaw Smackdown for 1 night.
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