Video: John Bradshaw Layfield Gets A Big Surprise

GOTCHA! Every now and then, wrestling comes up with a nice surprise to really throw a wrench into someone’s plans. It might be through a debut or a twist or some other sort of a surprise. However, when these things happen, they’re often game changers for the wrestlers and the show as a whole. Some of these are bigger than others, but there is little bigger than the surprise effecting the World Title situation. That’s what happened thirteen years ago and WWE is taking another look.

So close, yet so funny when he doesn’t get there.

JBL wins the new SmackDown Title, but Teddy Long has surprise: SmackDown, June 30, 2005

WWE has posted a new video looking back at the night thirteen years ago to the day when John Bradshaw Layfield won the Smackdown Title in an elimination match. The need for the new title arose from WWE Champion John Cena being drafted to Monday Night Raw, leaving SmackDown with no top champion. As it turned out though, the annual WWE Draft wasn’t done and Batista returned to SmackDown as the final Draft pick.

Opinion: Looking back, this wasn’t the biggest surprise in the world but it was cool to have Batista come out as the top star on the show. If nothing else it’s always nice to see Layfield get the rug pulled out from underneath him. However, the bigger deal was Cena being left alone on Monday Night Raw as the top star of both the show and WWE. It was a changing of the guard and the start of a new era in WWE.

Did you like the surprise twist? Would Layfield have made a good champion at this point? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 50,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 5,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his Amazon author page with 27 wrestling books. His latest book is the NXT: The Full Sail Years Volume III: From Dallas To New Orleans.

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