Every year the draft lottery has been held, 2002, 2004, and now 2005, it has taken on a different structure. There was a lot of debate as to which structure is the best, and it appears to be, now, that the general consensus is that the latest draft was the most successful. For those of you who haven't been watching, take a look at the draft results on the front page. To sum it up, John Cena, Kurt Angle, Carlito, Big Show, Rob Van Dam have defected to RAW, while Chris Benoit, Randy Orton, Muhammad Hassan, Christian, and Batista have joined SmackDown!. Now, the Draft unfolded in the structure that over four weeks, each side would receive five picks, one each week, two on the last week. In 2004, it was a six person trade from each side, all done in one show, randomly. Similarly, in 2002, every wrestler was put into a pool, which each owner could then choose wrestlers from the pool to make up their roster, all done in one show as well.

The element that made this years' draft cool and what REALLY boosted ratings was the fact that the suspense factor is kept up every week. Nobody would have guessed every week a huge pick would have been made, as the case with this weeks' draft. When I tuned into the first RAW edition of the Draft Lottery, I was completely amazed to see such a daring move: John Cena was on RAW. This sent a message to the fans; this draft had absolutely no limits whatsoever, unlike last year. I could tell you, if SmackDown! was live and no one had any spoilers to read, EVERYONE would have clamoured to turn on the TV to see SmackDown!, and how it would react to its Champion being lost. Alas, spoilers were posted across the internet, and it soon became common knowledge that SmackDown! had selected Chris Benoit. Compare that to last years' draft, I sure as heck wasn't excited when people like Nidia were switching sides, followed with mid-carders at bests, like Jindrak and Dupree. The Triple H stunt was very obvious that it was a swerve. The draft BEFORE that, the 2002 one, wasn't obvious, but as it unfolded, the picks made absolutely no sense, in addition to being unrealistic, and as soon as they said Triple H and Stone Cold were not available for draft, it was obvious that they were both going to RAW, as it was the flagship.

Now, further in review, how did the draft do" Did it really help the WWE" Well, RAW, at least. I think it was a great move to switch the titles around, because any wrestling fan with brains will say that the WWE Championship is more prestigious than the World Championship, as RAW is kind of like the old WWF now, and SmackDown! has been made to be like WCW (the shape of the old WCW belt, the US title, and the Cruiserweight title).

Personally, I think Chris Benoit going to SmackDown! was awesome, as he really didn't have a place on RAW anymore and was getting lost in the shuffle, and being on SmackDown should help that. Same with Kurt Angle and Big Show going to RAW, they had hit a dead end on SmackDown, both of them and had no one more to feud with, but the very likely danger is that Angle will be buried by Triple H as the top heel, and Angle maybe will basically have his title hopes diminished by Trips. A long Michaels vs. Angle feud would be very welcome by most, I would think, but those same people know that Angle deserves another title run. I thought it was kind of obvious Carlito was going to beat Benjamin as soon as his music hit. The final week, Big Show and Rob Van Dam were sent to RAW, and unfortunately, it's quite obvious neither of them will make a huge impact, as Big show may be shoved to the mid-card, and RVD will probably not be wrestling for a while, let alone be in the main-event. Randy Orton going to SmackDown! is the best possible thing for him to do, as I think Orton's destiny is to become the top heel in the business next to Triple H. I hope at Summerslam there will be an Orton vs. Taker match, maybe some sort of gimmick match, where Taker will put over Orton, because it sure as hell would make no sense to make Taker win.

The other significant move was sending Muhammad Hassan to SmackDown!. In my opinion I don't see a huge point to this, as either moving one person to another show opened up new feuds and more possibilities for their character, but Hassan was doing great on RAW, and I don't see how this would be beneficial at all to either Hassan or SmackDown!. I'll be honest, I'm not a huge Hassan fan, mostly because of his gimmick, granted his mic skills are very good, though his in-ring work his not fantastic. I believe making Hassan challenge for the US title would be a great thing, but the thing that kind of makes me believe Hassan is being pushed too hard is that he already got a title shot, and now is facing Taker for another one. Something tells me Hassan will actually win that title shot, seeing as how I don't see Taker winning it, because it would make no sense because he should be in a feud with Orton. There is also the looming and inevitable return of Brock Lesnar, who has already signed a deal with the WWE. So I don't think that Hassan winning a title shot is a great thing to do, they should have him waste the title shot on a regular show, and challenge Chris Benoit, who will hopefully take the US title off of Orlando Jordan.

These are basically my views on the draft, and the generic view of a lot of people. I think in a large part, the draft was a success, as the WWE product will be better, especially RAW.

by Bruce C. ..