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Smackdown!WWE SmackDown! is a professional wrestling show that airs in the USA on the United Paramount Network (UPN) and in Canada on The Score Network. It is produced by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). The SmackDown! Superstars will typically perform four shows in a week. WWE generally tapes its Tuesday evening show for UPN to air on Thursday evening of the same week. However, once or twice a year, the show may be broadcast live. Show history Pre-brand extension WWF SmackDown! (as it was originally known) was set up to compete against WCW's Thursday night show, Thunder. In the spirit of the WWF's Attitude Era, the show was originally planned to be two hours of WWF Divas in primetime TV. However, this did not work out, and instead SmackDown! became a complementary show to RAW. Brand extension In early to mid-2002, World Wrestling Entertainment (then known as the World Wrestling Federation) underwent something they called the “Brand Extension”. Basically, this meant that the two WWE television shows (RAW and SmackDown!) would become competition for each other. This came about after WWE purchased their two biggest competitors, WCW and ECW. The brand extension was publically announced during a telecast of WWF RAW on March 25, 2002, and became official the next day. The Brand Extension would bring about a change like nothing the WWE had seen before. Wrestlers would become “show-exclusive”, wrestling for their specific show only. At the time this excluded the champions as originally, the WWE titles would be defended on both shows. However, later in 2002, Brock Lesnar, then the WWE World Champion, refused to defend the title on RAW, causing the title to become SmackDown!-exclusive. Following that, both shows then got their own exclusive championships. In January, 2005, The Oakland Tribune reported that Leslie Moonves, co-President and co-Chief Operating Officer of UPN's parent company, Viacom, announced that SmackDown! will not be renewed on UPN after Viacom's contract with the WWE expires in 2006. This article was later revealed to be in error; Moonves was in fact saying that SmackDown! may not be renewed, as opposed to will not be renewed http://www.pwinsider.com/ViewArticle.asp?id=7967&p=1. The SmackDown! brand has a sister show, Velocity, broadcasting Saturday nights from 11:00 PM-12:00 AM Eastern Standard Time on Spike TV. It consists of low-card matches and recaps of last Thursday's SmackDown!. If SmackDown! is cancelled on UPN at the end of the 2005-2006 season, it is unknown if or how this would affect Velocity; Spike TV is also owned by Viacom. On March 10, 2005, Viacom announced that they would not seek to extend their deal to air WWE programming on Spike TV, most notably RAW, when it expires in September, 2005. http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050311/tv_nm/television_wwe_dc_1 This presumably covers Velocity, which also airs on Spike TV, however SmackDown! will continue to air on UPN at least until the contract to air that show expires in 2006. Current SmackDown! championships Championship Notes:> | b>Current Champion(s) | | a href="/encyclopedia/WWE-Championship" title="WWE Championship">WWE Champion 1 | John Cena | | a href="/encyclopedia/WWE-Tag-Team-Championship" title="WWE Tag-Team Championship">WWE Tag-Team Champions 2 | Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio (scar Gutirrez) | | a href="/encyclopedia/WWE-Cruiserweight-Championship" title="WWE Cruiserweight Championship">WWE Cruiserweight Champion 3 | Paul London | | a href="/encyclopedia/WWE-United-States-Championship" title="WWE United States Championship">WWE United States Champion 4 | Orlando Jordan | 1: This is the original WWE World Championship. It became SmackDown! exclusive when the champion Brock Lesnar refused to defend it on RAW.
2: These are completely new tag-team championships. The original WWE Tag-Team championships became RAW exclusive and renamed to the World Tag-Team Championship.
3:This championship originally was the WCW World Cruiserweight Championship. The WWE adopted it and dropped their own World Light Heavyweight Championship in favor of it. It also became SmackDown! exclusive.
4: The original WCW United States Heavyweight Championship was once disbanded when it was unified with the WWE Intercontinental Heavyweight Championship. However, the title was revived by Stephanie McMahon, along with Stone Cold Steve Austin reintroducing the Intercontinental Heavyweight Championship for RAW.
Recent happenings 1: John Cena defeated John "Bradshaw" Layfield at WrestleMania 21
2:Eddie Guerrero and Rey Mysterio (scar Gutirrez) defeated The Basham Brothers (Doug Basham and Danny Basham) at WWE No Way Out (February 20, 2005).
3:Paul London won a battle royal on "SmackDown!" March 31, 2005, aired (taped March 29. 2005). Other participants in the match were Funaki (Shoichi Funaki), Spike Dudley (Matthew Hyson), Scotty 2 Hotty (Scott Garland), and Akio.
4: Orlando Jordan defeated John Cena on SmackDown! (March 1, 2005, aired March 3).
Roster "Owner(s)/general manager(s)" Past "owners/general managers" Current SmackDown! wrestlers Inactive list Current SmackDown! non-wrestlers/managers Referees Other on-air talent Past SmackDown! wrestlers (since brand extension) (Note: All roster information is current as of February 2005) External links * IMDb entry for WWE SmackDown!
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