Ten Years Ago, A Phantom Title Change
When is a title change not a title change? When WWE Never Acknowledges It
Ten years ago tonight, WWE visited The Hampton Coliseum in Hampton, Virginia for a house show. All these years later, the most memorable event of the night was something that did not happen.
The second match on the card was announced as an NXT Championship Match. Unusually the Champion, Bo Dallas, was introduced first for this match. His opponent turned out to be R-Truth.
R-Truth won that match, and at the time we believed that Truth had just won the NXT Championship. However, he was not announced as the Champion and did not leave with the belt. That R-Truth won what was announced as an NXT title match was never mentioned again.
To this day, it is unclear if the match was really scheduled as a title match or if the announcer simply erred.
The other most memorable match on the card was a steel cage match between Bray Wyatt and Daniel Bryan. The presence on the card of this match was somewhat confusing as, in storyline, Bryan was still a member of the Wyatt Family at the time. This was about one week before Bryan left the Wyatts to set up the match with Bray Wyatt at the Royal Rumble. This was far and away the best match on the entire card.
The rest of the card was fine-but-not-great House Show fodder:
Jimmy Uso def. Erick Rowan
The Prime Time Players def. 3MB in a tag match (featuring future WWE Champions Drew McIntyre and Jinder Mahal)
The Miz def. Fandango
Emma and Natalya def. AJ Lee and Tamina Snuka
Bad News Barrett def. Justin Gabriel
Big E successfully defended the Intercontinental Title against Damien Sandow
CM Punk def. The Shield in a 3-on-1 handicap match.
WWE ran a near-identical show with near-identical results the next night at the Patriot Center in Fairfax, Virginia. The only change was the replacement of the Uso/Rowan singles match with an Uso/Wyatt Family tag match.