Week Starting May 18, 2003

The Undertaker is said to be progressing well with the injured elbow he received at the hands of RVD, he is expected to work a few matchs in OVW to wear off the ring rust before a full return to our screens next month. (May 20, 2003)

Sphere is almost ready to return as well after his bout of pnumonia, it is expected he will move to the SmackDOWN! brand (May 20, 2003)

WWE.Com currently has an article up over how Brock Lesnar was robbed last week. This has caused some amusement in the locker room as Lesnar has always insisted his hometown was not a high crime area when others made jokes about it. (May 21, 2003)

Psycho Joe took a very stiff chokeslam at the RAW house show this past Thursday further agrivating an existing back injury. He is expected to be cleared to work Backlash but take some time off thereafter. (May 21, 2003)

It is expected SmackDOWN! will get a new opening theme and title sequence after the pay-per-view, there is no word on the artist (May 21, 2003)

What you didnt see at Backlash
Titan fought TAKA Michinoku in a dark match, TAKA won after Funaki interfeared. Chyna also defeated Stacy Keibler off camera to retain the womens title.
The arena was totally full and the crowd were ruckus, Ric Flair thanked the crowd for being a great audiance after the show. Also after the cameras had stopped half a dozen faces came down to congratulate Dr.S and they held him aloft.
Undertaker was backstage at the event and came out to greet fans before the show.
Top face pops: Steve Austin, Shawn Michaels, Dr.S, Hulk Hogan, The Rock
Top heel heat: Vince McMahon, SA, Nightmare, Paul Heyman, RTC (May 22, 2003)

There was reported to be some friction backstage within management over Shane McMahons input into the SmackDOWN! writing team. Shane is notorious for booking shows at the last minute causing inumrable problems for talent and the writing team (Jesse Ventura and Paul Heyman) (May 22, 2003)

Within the past hour during a hastely assembled press conference at the CNN building Ted Turner announced he has re-purchased World Championship Wrestling (wCw) from Vince McMahons World Wrestling Entertainment. The Atlanta based company was born out of the NWA in the early 90s and by mid 2002 was challanging WWE for the top promotion in the United States and world. After the firing of Eric Bischoff from the company however things started to go downhill allowing WWE to regain lost ground. The comany was sold to WWE that year at the knock down price of $2 million. WWE tried to relaunch the brand late in 2002 under the leadership of Nemesis but to little avail as WWE wanted to keep most of wCws talent, including Bischoff, on its own shows. WWE has only been making DVD and Video profits off the comany since then. Turner, is thought to have paid in the region of $10 million for the name and Videotape libary due to WWEs recent success whereby McMahon had a lot of negotiating power. (May 23, 2003)

WWE CEO Ric Flair and RAW writer Eric Bischoff were guests of WWEs weekly Byte This show, heres a few highlights:
-WWE feels the ´hard split´ will further help the two brands take on distinctive personalitys
-The first solo PPV will be the Tour de force from Sheffield, England for the SmackDOWN! brand and the first American PPV will be RAWs Bad Blood in June
-Eric is eager to return to TV but is enjoying his new writing role alongside Vince Russo who he claims to have no heat with
-Flair likewise is enjoying his backstage and Chief of staff roles but feels that hes in better shape than ´other´ superstars his age and may have one last home run in him
-The Bad Blood theme song will be Trust Companys Downfall
-Flair is worried by the recent injuries to stars including most recently Psycho Joe and Charles Robinson who suffered a concussion from SA
-The pair anticipate an innital downturn in buyrates after the hardsplit
-They then plug Judgment Day and the show finished (May 23, 2003)

There was a huge altercation backstage last night involving Jesse Ventura, Vince McMahon and Steve Austin. Austin is reported to have not been intrested in travelling to England to be at this years Insurextion event, it being ´pointless´ in his view. The argument was then said to have moved on and become heated, Steve Austin left the building before anything could be resolved. (May 24, 2003)