» On Thursday, April 1, 2004 at 10:59 PM EST Full WWE Smackdown Results
April 1st, 2004
Columbus, Ohio
Commentators: Michael Cole & Tazz
Report by: Mike Siciliano of WrestleView.Com.
WHO IS THE NEXT GREAT AMERICAN ON SMACKDOWN?
New Smackdown General Manager Kurt Angle comes to the ring at the open and says he made the ultimate sacrifice for the Smackdown locker room, show, and the fans of Smackdown by taking his wrestling career, putting it on hold, and becoming the new General Manager of Smackdown. He believes that he can take Smackdown to new heights, but he cannot do it alone, he is looking for someone special, someone who represents his qualities as a "Great American."
He introduces the "Kurt Angle Great American Award", a trophy that will be awarded to a Smackdown superstar at the end of the evening, along with being named the #1 contender for the WWE championship. Angle stressed that Eddie Guerrero does not qualify for the trophy, not because he is the WWE champion, but because he is the furthest thing from a great American.
Winners of a series of matches set by Angle tonight become nominees for the award. Here are the matches that were set up for the award nominations.
Big Show vs. Rikishi
Charlie Haas vs. Rob Van Dam
Booker T vs. Hardcore Holly
John Cena vs. the FBI in a handicap match.
When the smoke cleared at the end of the night, Big Show had won over Rikishi handily after literally shoving the 350 pounder out of his face to avoid the stinkface, and hitting the chokeslam as Rikishi ran in for the splash in the corner. Haas and Van Dam fought to a double count out because Van Dam hit Haas with a plancha over the top rope, but Haas countered it by putting a steel chair up in the air which contacted with both individuals. Haas and Van Dam's match was extremely emotional, with Van Dam even showing some serious disdain for the Seton Hall All American. Both men were counted out, but Angle came out and declared Haas the winner on 'points.' Booker defeated Hardcore Holly after a tremendously hard fought back and forth contest, and Cena squashed the FBI in the handicap match by taking out Nunzio with a slingshot of the Bull sending Nunzio to the floor via a swanton bomb, then pinning the Bull with a throwback, 5 knuckle shuffle, and an FU.
Other matches on Smackdown tonight saw a tag team contest pitting Chavo Guerrero Sr., and the Cruiserweight champion, Chavo Guerrero against Rey Mysterio and Smackdown newcomer Spike Dudley. Chavo came out to new music to further establish his identity as a singles competitor, but at the end of the night, Spike Dudley was the man on the hot seat getting the victory over the cruiserweight title holder, hitting the Dudley Dog while running, literally, up his father's body who was recovering in the corner. A beautiful double team move by Rey and Spike occurred during the contest when Spike hit his patented stomp on Chavo Senior in one corner, and Rey hit the bronco buster on the champion in the other corner. However, Rey and Spike didn't have much time to celebrate as Smackdown's newest heel, John Bradshaw Layfield came out and clotheslines Spike all the way to hell, and powerbombs Rey almost out of his mask. Both men lay in a heap following the brutality by the Big Texan.
Another tag contest pit the Dudley Boyz, Bubba Ray & D-Von against Tajiri's former henchmen, Akio and Sakoda. Bubba and D-Von picked up the victory in the contest via the 3-D.
At the conclusion of the night, Kurt Angle summons Eddie Guerrero to meet him in the ring for an announcement that affects him. He then explains the process of how the Great American Award winner will be determined, via an internet poll on WWE.com, with any fan able to vote for the nominees up till midnight on Monday. The winner of the poll will win the trophy and be named the #1 contender for the WWE title. Guerrero came out, interrupting Angle mid-speech, and Angle is noticeably upset. Eddie tells Kurt that if he is such a threat, Angle should do something about it, right here, right now. Angle says he won't fight Eddie because he is the GM, and he is responsible, but he will introduce the champion to someone responsible, and calls out JBL. As JBL comes out, Angle proclaims him the 5th nominee for the Great American Award. Layfield thanks Angle for the nominee, saying he's a shoe in. He then focuses on Guerrero and says that what happened last week was business, not personal. Bradshaw then says Eddie has something that he wants, and when he wants something, he takes it. Bradshaw focuses on Eddie's WWE title, and tells Guerrero that there is nothing he can do about Bradshaw taking the belt, but that it's business, not personal. Eddie says let's make it personal, goes to attack Bradshaw, who retreats, but Eddie gets his hat. Eddie has the fans fill the hat with whatever they can get their hands on, and then takes it in the ring, stomps on it, and throws it in to the crowd. Bradshaw swears revenge, and Eddie says 'now it's personal', as Smackdown goes off the air.
UNOFFICIAL GREAT AMERICAN AWARD POLL
Ok, ladies and gentlemen, let's do our own poll here. Who out of the five nominees would you, the Wrestleview readers would like to see as the #1 contender for the WWE title. Here are the nominees again.
John Cena
Big Show
Charlie Haas
Booker T.
John Bradshaw Layfield
Let's vote by sending emails to me, and I'll post the results of the poll next week in my column.
Click here to vote for the Great American Award Winner.
Ok. On to other things.
First off, I am tinkering again with the column by writing in paragraph format. Anyone with comments, questions, or criticism, please send it my way via email. I am still trying to find the best and most concise way to get the message across thoroughly, quickly, and pleasantly for all you guys.
Now, I'm back from my vacation, I returned eariler on the forums, but I'm back officially now, and I gotta comment on the draft lottery. At first, I hated it. I hated it because I thought trading Triple H back to Raw took the legitimacy out of the lottery entirely. But, after analyzing Smackdown this week, I am much more positive about the effects of the lottery. I am thrilled with the emotion and passion shown by RVD in his matches with Charlie Haas. Spike Dudley is making an impact in the cruiserweight division, and I personally think it is so overdue it's not funny. The Dudley Boyz will tear up the tag teams, or so called tag teams on Smackdown, since there are none left after Haas & Benjamin got split and the APA got dissolved with Simmons 'firing' and release.
Rene Dupree in a program with John Cena is a good first step, but please, do not make the frenchman win that goregous US title belt.. whatever you do, we'll never hear the end of it, and he'll soil that damn thing. It is too damn goregous to put around that little pansy DuPree.
Why take Heyman out of the GM spot is something I can't figure out. I don't personally like Angle as a GM, because he reminds me too damn much of Jimmy Swaggert on steroids, but I guess we've gotta live with it for now because of his injuries. WWE is not going to risk taking Angle out of the picture with all the top names not being around, or just plain leaving. (Does anyone miss Brock Lesnar as little as I do? GOOD RIDDANCE, YOU IDIOT!)
Why, can someone tell me why The Undertaker is not being seen more on television? I can't comment on the last two weeks, I didn't see the programs from start to finish, but I want more Dead Man on Smackdown, jeez, how much time does he have left, and I am dying to see how that character has developed since Wrestlemania.
I am not thrilled with the prospect of Bradshaw or Booker T as a heel, but I guess it's necessary. The name recognition as the top heels on Smackdown have taken a serious hit with Lesnar gone, Angle hurt, Heyman gone as well, so I guess Booker and Bradshaw are being bred as the next two top heels. I'd prefer them as faces, but Book can pull it off, and I guess this is Bradshaw's first full fledged shot to get it done on a singles level, so, to continue with the 'mission' of the brand extension, its to allow more talent a chance to make pushes to the top of the ladder. Let's see how the big Texan can respond to the pressure.
Smackdown this week was enjoyable. The new faces are providing some new possibilities, and I guess that's what VKM wanted to do with the draft lottery. We can still tinker a little bit, and I hope to see that in the near future, but things are looking up for the blue and white, in this person's opinion. Let's see what we can see.
WALKING TALL
I mentioned this in the forums, but I'll also say it here, since the 'premiere' is tomorrow. I had the chance to see the flick, and I recommend it highly. I give it 3 out of 4 corner turnbuckles. The only thing, the only noticeable critique I could say about the movie is, IT IS DAMN SHORT. I think moviefone said the flick was somewhere close to 2 hours, but damn, if it took 80 minutes, it was a lot of time. Very fast paced flick. Good though, extremely enjoyable. Not much low time. The Rock may be the only action hero that I have ever seen in the movies that can take kicking someone's ass and actually make people laugh about it. Oh, and one other thing, Johnny Knoxville can actually ACT! I'm SHOCKED!
A PERSONAL MESSAGE
Thank you Paul, for allowing me the chance to talk about where I stayed while in Florida. First, a brief overview. If you know me, and you've heard my story with my family, you'll know that my 3 kids all have special needs, yet my youngest has a life-threatening condition known as hydrocephalus. (Anyone who wants info on this, email me.) Well, because of that, we signed up, and were fortunate to have a wish granted to Jonathan.
Jon's wish was to go to Disney World, and that's where we went last week. We stayed at a village near Disney, in Kissimmee, Florida, called Give Kids the World. I cannot tell you enough how impressed my family and I were with this organization. It's a not for profit organization that allows disabled kids, and wish granted kids to stay for a week in the area while going to the various parks. All possible accomodations were made in advance for my family and I, we stayed in extremely comfortable surroundings while at the village, and I kid you not, my kids on more than one occasion would've been more than satisifed to stay in the village complex itself than go to the theme parks in the general Orlando area, Universal and the Disney theme parks to name a few.
Why am I writing about this here? I feel so honored and blessed for being given the experience of staying at that village that I felt it necessary to let other people know about its existence. I would love to see donations sent to it, as it is run by 800 volunteers a week primarily and multiple sponsor grants. We are going to make a donation soon to the village to have Jonathan and his brother's names placed on a stone and laid out in the village square, called a paving stone.. A tremendous amount of these stones were all over the village, and to bring the wrestling connection to this piece, who did my family and I find with stones at this complex? Mick Foley and his entire family.
I encourage anyone who may be in the fortunate state of having a wish granted to them by a various foundation to visit the website of Give Kids the World. I encourage everyone to visit the site and see how a charitable organization is run perfectly. I wish I could provide more for this organization for the enjoyment they gave my kids, for the sheer joy that they gave my family, and for the smile that they gave me. Thanks.
The website again is Give Kids the World (gktw.org) Click here to go to it.
Feedback in the forums will return next week. I'm back! Drop me a line if you want to talk! Click here to send me a feedback on this week's column via email.
KIMOSABE, SUMO!
Three final words. 1. The voting will cease on Monday night at midnight, just like WWE.com's poll will close at the same time. 2. If you'd like to know who's winning the poll, drop me a line. 3. If you have a reason behind your vote, let me know. If I like what I hear, I'll post it here..