Twenty years after WWE SummerSlam 2006 on 20 August 2006, the event’s harsh booking decisions still sting — none more than Rey Mysterio’s rapid fall from world champion to SummerSlam opener.
What happened to Rey Mysterio at SummerSlam 2006
Rey Mysterio entered SummerSlam 2006 as the reigning World Heavyweight Champion. Just one month earlier he had dethroned Kurt Angle at WrestleMania 22 to claim the title. Yet instead of headlining WWE’s marquee summer show, Mysterio was shoved into the opening match. His opponent was Chavo Guerrero, a cruiserweight never booked as a top star on RAW or SmackDown. The match lasted under ten minutes. Mysterio lost. The optics were brutal: a world champion reduced to jobbing in the curtain-raiser.
Why the booking was a disaster for Mysterio’s legacy
Mysterio’s reign as World Heavyweight Champion was already a mess. WWE treated him as one of the weakest champions in memory. The company pushed him into forgettable programs and buried his momentum. By SummerSlam, the damage was visible. Dropping the title to Booker T on SmackDown in July 2006 capped the decline. Then came the SummerSlam opener loss to Chavo. It underscored how fast a top performer could be sidelined in the Ruthless Aggression Era. The moment still stings fans who remember Mysterio’s WrestleMania magic.
How the result contrasted with Mysterio’s peak
Mysterio’s rise had been meteoric. He won the 2005 Royal Rumble as a cruiserweight, shocking the locker room. At WrestleMania 22 he defeated Angle in a classic to become World Heavyweight Champion. That run felt like the start of something bigger. Instead, WWE’s creative team fumbled the follow-through. Mysterio’s SummerSlam opener loss wasn’t just a bad match — it was a statement about how quickly a champion’s value could evaporate in WWE’s eyes.
What the SummerSlam 2006 booking says about the era
SummerSlam 2006 fell in the Ruthless Aggression Era, when WWE prioritized shock value over storytelling. Mysterio’s fall wasn’t an outlier. The show also featured Hulk Hogan’s final WWE match against Randy Orton, a mismatch that aged poorly. ECW’s debut on the PPV platform ended with Sabu getting crushed by The Big Show in eight minutes. The event’s booking reflected a company chasing heat over coherence. For Mysterio, it meant losing twice in one night — first the title, then the opener — and watching his momentum vanish.