The man behind the Muhammad Hassan character in WWE was concerned about network television restrictions when the character was moved to WWE SmackDown following the 2005 WWE Draft.
Muhammad Hassan's time on the WWE SmackDown roster was short but featured a rivalry with The Undertaker. Prior to the character's demise at the 2005 WWE Great American Bash during a match with Undertaker, Hassan says he was vocal about being concerned that the move to SmackDown would hurt him.
Reflecting on his career during a discussion with Maven, Hassan says he vocalized his concerns about the restrictions of network television compared to the freedom the WWE Raw brand provided on Spike TV, a cable network.
“Shawn [Daivari] and I were moved from Raw to SmackDown and I remember being vocal about it. I’ve said this before anything ever happened to Stephanie McMahon, that [SmackDown] was on network and [Raw] was on cable. I just felt like my character was getting more and more edgy and I remember expressing my concern that moving that character to a network show was ultimately going to be bad for the character. Either we got to tone it down or that character is not going to fly.”
The character would not even last through the summer, being written off of television after a controversial segment aired the same day as a tragic bombing in London in 2005. Read more about that segment here.
Read what Muhammed Hassan had to say about working with Vince McMahon here.
If you use any of the above quotes, please credit Maven's YouTube channel in addition to linking back to this article and giving Fightful credit for transcription.
