WWE Moved Female Star To RAW For Being “Too Hot For SmackDown”
A former WWE Women’s Champion recalls being moved from SmackDown to Raw because she was “too hot” for the blue brand.
There was a time in WWE during the 2000s when the product was TV-14, and Raw featured more raunchier content compared to SmackDown. The main reason for this is that Raw was on cable TV in the US (USA Network/Spike TV), while SmackDown was on broadcast TV like UPN, so they had different rules about what could be shown.
In an era when women’s wrestling matches sometimes resulted in women losing clothes during a match, it meant Raw was more associated with that kind of content than SmackDown.
Candice Michelle was a former Diva Search contestant who went on to have a successful career in the 2000s and even held the Women’s Title.
While speaking with Insight’s Chris Van Vliet, Michelle recalled the moment she was moved from SmackDown to Raw because of her character.
“Yes, that is true… SmackDown was rated PG and my character was not really very PG.”
“I was too hot for SmackDown and I got shipped back to Raw.”
Candice Michelle Had A Great Payday In Playboy During WWE Run
After leaving the pro wrestling business several years ago to start a family with her husband, Candice Michelle is back in TNA, working behind the scenes and also planning to wrestle again.
During her WWE career, the gorgeous brunette was one of several women who posed in Playboy magazine since WWE had a deal with them at the time. Candice told Van Vliet about how the Playboy deal happened.
“That’s a really great story. Well, you know, Playboy worked with WWE for a while, so they had some cover girls before me, but I had a dream of being in Playboy before WWE. I don’t really know how it came about, but for me, it was like a symbol of the 12 most beautiful women are displayed in this in a year. One centerfold a month.
I don’t even know how I saw these or knew about this, but I know I had that dream. When I was in LA doing modeling, I auditioned for Playboy. I got their special editions magazines, which is like college girls, which I really didn’t go to college, and a Wet ‘ n ‘ Wild magazine, and I was sitting in the makeup chair with the makeup artist, and I told her my dream is Playboy. She looked at me and she goes, ‘That will never happen. If you do this special edition you’ll never do the main magazine.’ She crushed my dreams, and she was the one who did the makeup.
I had no idea of the rules. So for WWE to get me that gig as the cover girl, which, by the way, at the time, the centerfold made like $5,000 and the cover girl made over six figures.”
From there, Candice explained that she was approached to do Playboy, and she was all for it.
“There are people that kind of come up to you. I don’t know, they came up to me, said, ‘Hey, you want to do it?’ It was just totally a yes, and shocking, I am doing this, and on a level so much higher than my dream.
Don’t put an expectation on your dream, because sometimes God’s plan is bigger than your plan, and so when that came into fruition, it was just a big learning lesson for me that reach for the stars.”