2004 WWE draft lottery

rdf:langString 2004 WWE draft lottery

rdf:langString Triple H, who was drafted to SmackDown! and traded back to Raw in the draft lottery.

rdf:langString The 2004 World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) draft lottery, the second WWE draft, took place at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, Michigan on March 22. The draft took place live for two hours on WWE's television program, Raw on Spike TV. Post-draft trades were announced on WWE's official website, WWE.com, until midnight on March 22. There were twelve draft picks, with nineteen wrestlers overall switching between the promotion's two brands: Raw and SmackDown!. During the draft lottery, the General manager of Raw, Eric Bischoff, and the General manager of SmackDown!, Paul Heyman, stood on opposite ends of the stage on the Raw set, where they drafted six wrestlers randomly via two machines. At the conclusion of the draft, the two GMs would then be allowed to trade anyone on the roster until Midnight EST, which was later extended until Tuesday night after Heyman resigned. Every WWE star was eligible to be drafted, including injured wrestlers, commentators, champions, and general managers. The main event was a SmackDown! exclusive match, in which Eddie Guerrero defeated Triple H to retain the WWE Championship by disqualification after Christian attacked Guerrero resulting in a brawl between SmackDown! and Raw wrestlers.