20 Must See Moments From The 100 New RAW Episodes Added To WWE Network

2. The WWF Draft - 25/03/2002

vince mcmahon draft
WWE Network

In 2002, WWF officially began the brand extension by splitting up its roster between its two shoes, RAW and SmackDown. Ric Flair was revealed as a 50% owner of the company, but he lost his share after losing to The Undertaker at WrestleMania. Despite this, both Flair and Vince McMahon took control of a show (Vince took SmackDown, Flair RAW) as the promotion split into two.

The draft took place on the March 25th 2002 episode of RAW, and still fascinates to this very day. There had never been anything like it up until this point, and there was genuine intrigue as to where it would go. A number of stars were exempt from the draft (Jericho, Triple H and Austin, to name them) but that didn't matter from a viewers perspective.

Looking back, the entire episode of RAW is intriguing. The night is full of meaningless throwaway matches, but the draft picks and segments produced from it more than make up for that. 

The brand extension was rumoured to be returning this year, but talk of such things has quietened down since WrestleMania. To see why some want it to return, head to the archives and find yourself this episode to see the first time it was done.

Contributor
Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.