March 29, 2004 Observer Newsletter: WWE brand split lottery, more

What was billed as a night that would change the face of the WWE wound up simply being a very entertaining shuffling of mid-carders, and not really addressing the major problem, leaving Smackdown at present with the weakest PPV main event in modern company history scheduled for May.

With the quitting of Brock Lesnar, who had been the focal point of the Smackdown show from when Hulk Hogan quit in August of 2002, until the spot was given to Eddy Guerrero in February, Smackdown’s heel side was weakened. Vince McMahon called for a lottery, theoretically to find a logical way to fill the gap. The decision was made before Kurt Angle called the morning after Wrestlemania with numbness in his fingers, which put his career in jeopardy.

McMahon made the decision almost immediately, under the assumption Angle wouldn’t be wrestling, that he would replace Paul Heyman as General Manager, thereby keeping him as a regular part of the show.

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