A New World Heavyweight Champion Is Crowned. It's True!

Following on the heels of Edge's surprise title victory on Sunday night against John Cena, there was another surprise title change on Smackdown this week (to air 1.13.2006). This time by Olympic Champion Kurt Angle. At the beginning of the Smackdown tapings it was announced that Batista had been injured his tricep this past Sunday and therefore had no choice but to forfeit the World Heavyweight Championship. Smackdown GM Teddy Long then announced that a battle royale would be held with the winner becoming the new champion. When the match took place later in the night it was announced that Kurt Angle was the surprise 20th entrant in the match. Kurt Angle then went on to eliminate Mark Henry to end the match and become the new World Heavyweight Champion.

While I was surprised by Edge's impromptu match and victory at New Year's Revolution, Kurt Angle appearing on Smackdown and winning the WHC comes as more of a surprise. Edge was actually a member of the brand that the PPV was running under. Angle isn't even part of the Smackdown roster. It should be interesting to see what happens with Angle from here seeing as how he is scheduled to wrestle Shawn Michaels on RAW next week. Will that match now be for the World Heavyweight Championship? I wonder if after RAW if Angle will move permanently to the Smackdown roster and if so, what does RAW get in return if anything. Perhaps this is why Angle had such a bad showing in the Elimination Chamber match this past Sunday. Maybe they wanted to showcase the wrestlers that they knew would be staying with the RAW brand. This decision to put the WHC on Angle was obviously made within the past 48 hours since it was done for the simple fact that Batista sustained the injury mentioned above at this past Sunday's Smackdown house show.

To be honest, I'm not sure quite what to think of this. While, I understand that they are trying to keep the product unpredictable, I think that they should have perhaps put the belt on an existing member of the Smackdown roster instead. Don't get me wrong - I am a huge Kurt Angle fan. In fact he is probably currently my favorite wrestler. It's just that I think that JBL or Randy Orton maybe should have been given the title instead. I recall reading that Orton was supposed to win the title from Batista until Batista decided to work through his lat tear. Why not put the strap on him now? Why bring in an outsider to win the title? This could send a bad message to the Smackdown roster. They could feel that management doesn't put much faith in anyone but Batista to hold the title. Maybe they just brought Angle in for the element of surprise and are just going to give him a short title run. It's possible that since Orton and JBL are already involved in feuds management wanted to put the title on someone who wasn't currently involved in an ongoing Smackdown storyline. It's probably just to add some unpredictablility to Smackdown just like they are doing to the RAW. In addition, I really liked Angle on RAW and would rather see him there rather than Smackdown. We'll have to wait and see what happens next.

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