[2000-08-31-WWF-Smackdown] Eddy Guerrero vs Kurt Angle

[soup23]

Really good promo that keeps the angle developing. I have no issue whatsoever with the HHH/Angle stuff and kind of thought it would decline after SummerSlam. Angle talks about what happened Monday and Chyna comes out to refute. Angle has some video evidence of Chyna checking on HHH instead of Eddy. Chyna makes her way to the ring and Angle says he doesn’t want to put his hand on a woman like HHH. Angle says his hand was forced as he gives Chyna an Angle Slam. After that we get a series of backstage segments with HHH blowing a gasket when he arrives seeing Kurt in the dressing room with Stephanie. Stephanie slaps HHH for hugging and talking to Chyna. HHH then apologizes after he has cooled off. Just as Stephanie goes up for the make up kiss, HHH brings up Angle and her and then goes nuts again. Just Joe is getting an earful from outside the locker room. Joe relays the message to Kurt. Kurt thinks Stephanie might be hit again and Kurt is pissed. Chyna and Eddy are backstage talking it out and preparing for the triple threat match. HHH and Stephanie are also prepping and HHH apologizes again for losing his cool. A police officer comes in and says that they have received a spousal abuse complaint. HHH gets carted away to jail and Foley needles him some more by telling Stephanie that she has to be in Angle’s corner. A tad of a mis step here as that feels pretty harsh for Foley. Eddy starts the match off first pissed. Michael Cole gets in a good line about being surprised that Angle doesn’t have a letterman jacket for Steph to wear at ringside. Chyna swings at Kurt on the outside and Kurt misses a retaliation punch at her. The match is just a preview of the chemistry these two will have in a few years. I liked the interaction between Steph and Chyna and that pays off in the finish with a lot going on involving the referee distracted and Angle able to use the IC belt to gain the win. After the match, Chyna knocks out Kurt and then Stephanie talks shit to Chyna. Chyna gives her a DDT and we end SmackDown with Angle helping Stephanie to the back. **1/4

[GSR]

Moments after the show opens Triple H’s music plays and Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler say how we’ll be hearing from ‘the Game’ to open up this episode of Smackdown, only it’s not ‘the Game’ it’s his wife, Stephanie, who hasn’t been seen since Summerslam.  She would like to thank everyone for their concern about her whereabouts on Monday, although didn’t appreciate all those dirty, nasty rumours that people were spreading in regards to where she was Sunday night!  Not that anyone deserves an explanation, but for the sake of her reputation she says how she spent the entire night by the hospital bed of her injured brother Shane “oh it’s true!”  Haha, the look on her face after she let that one slip out!  In regards to her marriage she wants everyone to know that Hunter and her are experiencing wedded bless again, at which point out walks Kurt Angle.  He lets her know that he admires her and that it amazes him how a beautiful and delicate woman like she can put on such a brave face after her husband manhandled her.  With her none the wiser in regards to what he’s talking about, he eagerly replays the footage from Summerslam, explaining how HHH struck here, even though he had plenty of time to pull back from the punch.  Steph is having none of it, saying that she knows it was an accident and so does Kurt too.  While he agrees that it may have been an accident, he then shows her footage of Hunter and Chyna hugging from Raw and questions “was that an accident too?” thinking it’s a disgrace that a married man would behave like that.  Stephanie gets upset on seeing it as Angle continues to shit stir, claiming that he thought she knew about it and that her husband “talked it over” with her.  Chyna is out next and explains that nothing happened between herself and Hunter on Raw and that “this idiot” is manipulating things.  Kurt’s response to that is to play some more footage from Raw, carefully edited to show Chyna tending to Triple H rather than Eddy Guerrero after he’d KO’d them both with a steel chair (which he blamed on his concussion!).  Stephanie doesn’t like what she sees and is pointing and ranting at Chyna, when Kurt from behind hits the ‘Olympic slam’ on her.  Eddy rushes out to her aid while Steph and Kurt leave together.

HHH arrives in the building and Michael Cole speculates that he has no idea what just went down between Stephanie and Chyna.  He enters his dressing room to find Stephanie in there chatting with Kurt and is instantly hot.  Angle skedaddles as Steph then confronts her husband over what happened with Chyna on Monday.  Hunter pleads his case that it was a friendly hug which meant nothing, but with Steph still in his face and not believing him, kicks over a table and storms out of there.

Chyna pays a visit to our favourite Commissioner, demanding a match with Kurt Angle.  He refuses to give it her thinking that would be rewarding Kurt for his bad behaviour.  Eddy then steps up to the plate demanding the match and with Triple H/Angle already scheduled, he adds him to the equation making it a three way.

As Stephanie is walking backstage she’s met by Kurt, although flinches when he puts his arm around her.  He tries to smooth things over between them claiming the kiss was just the kind of kiss a friend would give a friend, however it looks like the penny is finally starting to drop with her as she’s all confused and tells him that she needs some space.

We’re in the dressing room with Stephanie and Triple H and he’s calmed down from earlier.  Hunter says that all Chyna was doing was trying to give him some advice on relationships and they hugged at the end.  He knows he should’ve told her, but knows how sensitive she is and didn’t want to upset her.  When she says that the reason it hurt was because of their past relationship together, HHH brings up Kurt and she, thinking it’s not that different.  Stephanie claims that it is because they’ve never been in a relationship and are just friends.  That sets Hunter off again who loses it and starts trashing the room.  Just Joe is eavesdropping outside, hears the banging, Steph’s screaming and you just know where he’s off to next.

Joe snitches to Kurt about all the noise he heard from outside the McMahon-Helmsley dressing room.  When he questions him as to whether Triple H hit her again, Joe responds that he might have and Angle takes off.

Stephanie’s making a coffee when she’s approached by Kurt.  She calms his fears explaining that they only had a fight and he didn’t hit her as Hunter never would.  Repetitive Kurt tells her for the hundred millionth time that he’ll always be there for her.

Eddy’s getting changed for his match and wonders if it will bother Chyna when he pounds Triple H’s head in?  She says that what she and Hunter had was business while what they have is special, telling him to do what he has to do.

Back once more with Stephanie and HHH and Hunter’s once again apologizing.  He says that he loves her more than anything and when Kurt Angle sticks his nose into their business he just wants to ring his neck.  From now on though he’ll try his hardest to control his temper, respect her and if she’s friends with Kurt, while he’s not okay with it, he understands.  As they kiss and make up, the police arrive and arrest Hunter for spousal abuse.   Despite Stephanie’s protestations that he didn’t do anything, they take him away, while she insists that she has nothing to do with this and didn’t make the complaint.  ‘Sticky beak’ Foley is there but is more concerned about his main event being in tatters and as Chyna will be in Eddy’s corner informs Stephanie that she will be in Kurt’s.

Stephanie doesn’t look too happy at all as she seconds Kurt for this match.  Leg lariat by Eddy who then clotheslines Angle over the top rope and to the outside.  He lands next to Chyna who’s in no mood to just stand by, forearming him across the face.  Suplex come brain buster, dropping Kurt on his head for a two.  Angle ducks under the clothesline, snatches Eddy around the waist and launches him with a belly to back suplex.  He throws him to the floor and is about to wallop him with a steel chair when Chyna grabs it to prevent him from doing so.  As they play tug of war over the chair, Kurt is nailed from behind by Eddy.  Chyna then passes him the chair and as he swings, Kurt pulls Chyna in front of him, Eddy stopping himself from clocking her just in time.  They return to the ring and Eddy with a couple of nice uppercuts.  Somewhere in amongst this Angle has been cut open hardway.  Top rope frankensteiner.  Eddy rushes Kurt who backdrops him over the top rope.  Although he lands on the apron, Angle slugs him and he falls from there and into Stephanie who then slaps him.  Michael Cole and ‘the King’ all of a sudden start talking about HHH’s night and both are of the belief that Stephanie didn’t file that complaint but don’t know who did.  Really lads?  Belly to back and Kurt makes the cover, however Hebner is distracted by the women who are on opposite sides of the apron shouting at each other.  As Earl has words with Chyna, Steph runs around and grabs her by the ankles.  Kurt then shoves Eddy into Chyna, who falls to the floor, before clocking him with the I-C title belt for the win.  Chyna attacks Kurt after the match, clotheslining him from the ring and leaving her all alone with Stephanie.  Steph starts prodding her in the chest which was clearly not the brightest idea she’s ever had as Chyna responds by DDT’ing her to the mat.  The show finishes with Kurt carrying her off to the back and out of harms way.

I was starting to tire of this Hunter/Kurt/Steph storyline, but the arrest of HHH has saved things for the time being.