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November 13th, 2005 is a day that wrestling fans will never forget as it was the day that “Latino Heat†Eddie Guerrero passed away. We all know about Eddie’s history with drugs and alcohol. We all know about his amazing recovery and road to eventually winning the WWE Title. In this column, I want to take a look at how the WWE has been using Eddie Guerrero's name since his untimely passing.
The day of Eddie Guerrero’s passing, the WWE changed the format for the Raw/Smackdown tapings to a double shot of Eddie Guerrero Tribute Shows. Just about every wrestler on the roster appeared during Vince McMahon’s speech and the ten bell salute following, with tears flooding their eyes. The tribute shows featured talent like Chris Benoit, Triple H, Rey Mysterio, Trish Stratus, Shawn Michaels, Chavo Guerrero and others competing in honor of Eddie Guerrero.
Rey Mysterio began getting his push for the WWE World Title started, dedicating just about everything he did to Eddie Guerrero. The tributes started taking their run to the bad side during the Tuesday Night Smackdown live special when Rey Mysterio fought the Big Show. During his entrance to the ring, Rey Mysterio drove a low rider to the ring in honor of Eddie Guerrero, there was nothing wrong with that...until the match neared its conclusion.
Towards the end of the match, Randy Orton, The Undertaker and Kane interfered in various times to cost Rey Mysterio the match. In The Undertakers case, he came to the ring to confront his brother Kane and face off for revenge with Randy Orton. After the match was thrown out, Randy Orton KO’d The Undertaker in the low rider and Randy Orton drove the low rider (with The Undertaker in it) through the Smackdown set.
Rey Mysterio entered the Royal Rumble Match and dedicated his performance to Eddie Guerrero, a classy thing to do. Rey Mysterio went onto win the match by eliminating both Randy Orton and Triple H, Michael Cole went ecstatic about the dedication of the match to Eddie Guerrero while Rey Mysterio was celebrating his win.
Rey Mysterio went into a feud with Randy Orton, who took it upon himself to blast the dead Eddie Guerrero with a ton of derogatory statements. Randy Orton and the WWE find it greatly entertaining to demean a fallen hero by dragging his name through the mud in order to add a few more buys to their WWE No Way Out PPV, which is truly disgraceful.
WWE made one of their final positive moves in honoring Eddie Guerrero by inducting him into the WWE Hall Of Fame Class Of 2006. Chris Benoit, Chavo Guerrero and Rey Mysterio introduced Eddie Guerrero into the hall of fame, while Eddie’s widow Vickie Guerrero gave a very heartfelt speech about Eddie’s passing and the effect its had on the family. This was truly a classy moment by the WWE, which they even followed up the following night at WWE Wrestlemania 23 when after Rey Mysterio won the WWE World Title, celebrated his victory with Chavo & Vickie Guerrero.
The proverbial crap hit the fan when Chavo Guerrero turned heel and cost Rey Mysterio his title at WWE Great American Bash. Chavo Guerrero went on rants about how Rey Mysterio is living off the legacy of Eddie Guerrero, then to further destroy the fallen Eddie Guerrero’s legacy…the WWE brought in Vickie Guerrero as a heel.
Vickie & Chavo Guerrero then took Rey Mysterio out of action by destroying his knee with chair shots during the “I Quit Match†on Smackdown. According to Chavo Guerrero & Vickie Guerrero, they did it all in the honor of the fallen Eddie Guerrero, who has been gone for almost a year.
As I tune into WWE Smackdown every Friday Night, I see the tarnishing of Eddie Guerrero’s legacy continues as Chris Benoit is feuding with Chavo Guerrero over the “estate†of the late Eddie Guerrero.
If you want to know how to honor a fallen hero like Eddie Guerrero, just order Ring Of Honor’s “Night Of Tributeâ€ÂÂÂ, which was an ROH show dedicated to Eddie Guerrero. It is headlined by a great match that saw “American Dragon†Bryan Danielson defeat “The Fallen Angel†Christopher Daniels in a ROH World Title Match.
The only thing the WWE had to do to honor Eddie Guerrero, in my opinion, was to let the fans remember Eddie Guerrero for who he was and became, not for the image they want the fans to remember him as.
Contact David Tees at thejobbersjournal@yahoo.com. David also writes for www.kocosports.com.
