Shot of Nostalgia: The SmackDown Six Era rolls on with your host Acefield Retro, and this week we're diving into one of the most transformative stretches of the entire project. Episode 6: The New Standard covers August through December 2003 — the moment when SmackDown didn't just outperform Raw, it redefined what WWE television could be. The original SmackDown Six formula sharpens into something faster, more ambitious, and more confident, and the blue brand starts carrying itself like the true flagship.

We open with the match that shattered expectations for what a TV main event could look like: the 60-minute Iron Man Match between Brock Lesnar and Kurt Angle on September 18, 2003. With no September PPV, WWE hands them an entire hour on network TV, and they deliver a masterpiece of strategy, pacing, and physical storytelling. Lesnar wrestles like a cold, calculating monster, even sacrificing a fall early to inflict damage he cashes in later, while Angle brings textbook precision and furious comebacks. It's chaotic, logical, brutal, and brilliant. Brock's 5–4 win establishes him as SmackDown's apex predator and cements the match as one of the greatest in TV wrestling history.

From there, we hit the Parking Lot Brawl between Eddie Guerrero and John Cena on August 28, and this week's episode is paired with a full Shot of Nostalgia watch-along of that match. Eddie weaponizes an entire parking lot with the same creativity he brings to a wrestling ring — seatbelts, hoods, roofs, doors — while Cena bumps and sells like a young star fighting to earn his stripes. Eddie bleeds, Cena crashes through a windshield, and the Frog Splash off one car onto another remains one of the defining images of the Guerrero legacy. It's gritty, stylish, violent, pure SmackDown identity — and being able to watch it back together in real time adds a whole new layer to how we talk about its impact.

We also revisit Rey Mysterio vs. Tajiri from No Mercy 2003, a match that captures exactly why SmackDown's in-ring output was blowing Raw out of the water. Tajiri's heel turn, complete with red and black mist plus the arrival of Akio and Sakoda, gives the Cruiserweight division the villain it had been missing. Rey brings the explosiveness, Tajiri brings the strikes and swagger, and together they deliver a crisp, high-velocity title match that resets the entire division going into 2004.

The rest of this episode is about how the entire brand evolves beneath the surface. Injuries pile up, Heyman's creative voice gets quieter, Goldberg's Raw run exposes WWE's stylistic confusion, and Evolution stumbles behind the scenes. Yet SmackDown stays true to itself — athletic realism, character-driven drama, and a match quality that feels years ahead of the WWE main-event formula. Even as the original SmackDown Six pairings splinter and reform in new combinations, their philosophy — built by Eddie, Edge, Benoit, Angle, Rey, and Chavo — pulses through every show. By December 2003, SmackDown isn't the "other" brand anymore. SmackDown is the new standard.

Shot of Nostalgia: The SmackDown Six Era — Episode 6: The New Standard premieres Friday, December 13, 2025, wherever you listen. Like, subscribe, and leave a review to help the show grow. Visit TurnbuckleTavern.com for merch, archives, and the full network schedule, subscribe to the Shot of Nostalgia newsletter for bonus writeups and deep-dive extras, and support the project at Patreon.com/TheTurnbuckleTavern for just $2.99 a month to keep these deep dives alive.

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