WWE has a track record for distasteful storylines, but bringing Eddie Guerrero's death into proceedings is among the company's worst offences. Less than a year after he'd died, Randy Orton taunted Rey Mysterio about his friend's demise, and on an episode of SmackDown, The Viper said: "Eddie ain't in heaven, Eddie's down there, in hell."
It was the very definition of cheap heat, and during a recent edition of The Kurt Angle Show, Orton opened up on how he felt to be part of that controversial storyline.
"100% not comfortable with it," Orton told Angle when he was asked for his feeling on the angle. "Rey assured me that it’s something that Eddie would have wanted. Even still, Rey and myself went to Vickie, and Vickie gave us her blessing. She said the same thing, ‘Eddie would have wanted to help you guys in this manner. If he could have used his death in some way to help the business, as morbid as that sounds, he would have wanted us to do it, especially with Rey being involved.’"
"So, although it was a horrible tragedy, and we all lost a friend, it was something that helped me along the way in my career. As a bad guy talking about that, that’s heat. It worked and it helped with the angle between me and Rey," he continued. "But, looking back, it will always be something that was a little, there’s a lot of things I’ve done in my career that made me uncomfortable. I think we can all agree on that. But, that, in particular, was something that I put at the top of that list."
Whether it really helped Orton's career is up for debate, and it definitely wasn't a high point in the former WWE Champion's career.
Eddie probably would have been on board with it, but the fact WWE thought it was a good idea points to a larger problem within the company that's even the case to this very day.