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On October 3, WWE Friday Night Smackdown will be moving from The CW to MyNetwork, and WWE is hoping they won’t need the help of moving services to get the message out to their fans.

Of course, only the biggest markets in the nation have MyNetwork affiliates in their area, though satellite subscribers usually won’t have to worry about that hurdle. The important thing to keep in mind is that there will be a channel change for Smackdown fans a week from Friday.

The UK Sun is reporting that once Mick Foley’s WWE contract expires at the end of this month, he will make the jump to NWA-TNA, WWE’s only potential competitor, and will become a part-time wrestler with a schedule similar to Sting’s. The article charges that Foley is not content being in an announcing or non-wrestling role at WWE.

But hold your horses! On his blog, good ol’ JR, Jim Ross, claims all of this speculation is a lot of hooey, and he plans to talk to Foley soon to “see how things are going.” That’s WWE-speak for trying to talk him into staying with WWE, of course.

Just like some Web sites that sell auto insurance compare rates from other companies before you buy, I’d hope Mick thinks long and hard about moving to TNA. At this stage in his career, it’s a move that cannot be undone in the eyes of the McMahon family, who would almost certainly lock him out of the WWE Hall of Fame or any potential return to WWE later on.

The UK Sun report claims Foley wants to help put TNA on the map; however, if WWE converts like Christian Cage, Jeff Hardy (before he came back) and Kurt Angle haven’t been able to pull that off, what could a broken-down Foley do for them?

Bad career move, Mick. Hope you don’t opt that direction.

Apparently, working as an announcer for Vince McMahon is an avocation that could lead you straight into needing a pulse oximeter, if Mick Foley is to be believed. Despite being only a few months into being Smackdown’s color commentator, Mrs. Foley’s baby boy has announced on his own Web site that, through mutual agreement, he will not be renewing his contract with WWE in a few weeks, when it expires on September 1.

“Creatively, the announcing job wasn’t working out too well,” Foley said.

Behind the scenes, it is believed Foley didn’t care for Vince’s treatment of him; the elder McMahon is apparently known to be very demanding with announcing talent within the company.

So Mick Foley takes a hike, and Mike Adamle gets promoted to Raw GM? Something smells rotten, and it’s in the vicinity of Vinnie-Mac’s trousers.

As new proof of the roster remix making both Raw and Smackdown must-see TV again, one need look no further than last week’s Smackdown and this week’s Raw. With both world titles around the waist of Smackdown wrestlers after the WWE Draft, it came as a pleasant surprise when C.M. Punk showed up on Smackdown to win out of nowhere and take the World Heavyweight Championship off of Edge and bring it over to Raw, while Triple H stays on Smackdown with the WWE Title.

It’s especially poetic because, both times Edge won the strap as a Money In the Bank winner, he won it in ambush fashion, just as Punk did to him. And to prove it was no trick of indoor lighting, Punk showed up on Raw with the world title around his waist and ready to take on all comers.

The result is that sometthing really important and can’t-miss happened last week on Smackdown, which makes the show essential viewing once again; and the other result is that Raw has a new title, a new champ, and a whole new set of rivalries and fueds to work with.

What could be better, for ratings, in the long term? I mean, what more could they do, give away a million dollars per episode? That’d never happen! Ha!

Last year, MVP was diagnosed with a potentially-fatal heart condition that was unearthed in testing conducted via the WWE Wellness Program. MVP credits that test with saving his life and says the condition has been corrected and he is back to 100-percent health.

Although MVP is hoping to land a spot or two in upcoming WWE Films movies, he’s not looking to pull a Dwayne Johnson and leave WWE for films any time soon. “WWE is my passion, so leaving the WWE to become a full-time actor, that’s not something I’m looking at right now,” MVP said in a press release.

Sure is good to see MVP praising WWE for catching a heart condition rather than the program catching a WWE superstar perusing a list of best diet pills.

It was like looking at the first version of WWE SmackDown on PS2 instead of PS3; it’s been that long since Triple H has been on the SmackDown roster and on Friday when he made his appearance on the show, it became obvious immediately why WWE chose to move Triple H over to the Friday show.

Simply put: it’s a move to save SmackDown as an entity, as it moves from CW to MyNetworkTV at the end of the summer. SmackDown has become a morose show over the past couple years, becoming a breeding ground for two potential breakout stars in MVP and Mr. Kennedy, but all too often filled with second- and third-tier talent.

That’s where this Triple H move comes in; he immediately adds watchable talent to the SmackDown broadcast and helps lead the rebalancing of the brands. Seeing Triple H opposite MVP, even if it was just for an in-ring interview, was something no one’s seen yet; certainly that has to appeal to Triple H, now the mentor of the entire SmackDown roster, far more than staying on Raw another year and reworking the same old feuds again and again and again.

People washing their hands in a glass sink shouldn’t throw… stones? Whatever; the point is that there are some big changes on the way for ECW that could conceivably improve that show’s standing in the ratings.

Traditionally, ECW tapings have been the “warm-up act” for Smackdown shows, ever since the WWE brought ECW back a couple years ago. However, the company recently unveiled a plan to move ECW tapings from Tuesday nights with the Smackdown brand to Monday nights with the Raw brand.

There are some natural fallouts of this strategy, of course. First, it means curtains for WWE Heat. Second, it means more cameos on ECW tapings by Raw-branded WWE superstars, and fewer by Smackdown-branded superstars.

This is a huge hit against the Smackdown brand; not only is it moving from The CW this fall to MyNetworkTV, a huge step down, but it is losing the extra draw the ECW brand brought to its tapings. While details like two ECW superstars currently holding the Smackdown-branded WWE tag team titles are sure to be worked out before the switch is made, one can only hope that the switch will also means Raw and ECW won’t brand-blend to the extent that Smackdown and ECW did.

For me, that diluted both brands. I’d hate to see RAW dragged down that path. No start-date has been announced just yet.

Mrs. Foley’s baby boy is back in the WWE; this time, he’s not promoting a book or taking chairshots to put some young superstar over. Instead, Mick is the new SmackDown color commentator, filling in a role that has been in turmoil since JBL un-retired and returned to the wrestling ring as an in-ring competitor.

You don’t have to worry about going through laptop rental to get a glimpse of Foley anymore, as he is on-air two hours a week on the WWE Smackdown broadcast. Foley’s role as SmackDown commentator is an unexpected turn; the company has tried out Mike Adamle, among others, in that role, all to mixed reviews.

But Foley is legit on color commentary, and brings with him a fan base that may boost SmackDown’s ratings a notch. He has remained on Raw’s roster of “retired superstars” for the past several years and whenever he’s done a one-week cameo, it has been on that broadcast that he has appeared.

Although I’d hoped Foley would return as an announcer one day, I always kind of expected it would be on Raw; his presence on SmackDown immediately makes that broadcast, despite its under-talented roster, more intriguing.

Could the biggest heel wrestler of the last year or more, Umaga, be moving off WWE Raw to the SmackDown brand? That’s the word on the street; the move is expected to take place sometime within the next month or two, now that WrestleMania is over.

This is a time of year when WWE typically likes to shuffle the deck and freshen up all its brands. With SmackDown apparently set to move from The CW to MyNetworkTV in the fall, a changeup to make the SmackDown brand stronger is long past due.

The makeover started at WrestleMania, with Undertaker winning the World Heavyweight title from Edge. With a new champion, new opponents will be needed and the Umaga character, a primitive, force-of-nature style of heel, would make an ideal foe if ‘Taker’s run is to be an extended one.

Although often portrayed as a beastial, monstrous heel, Umaga has lost most of his meaningful matches in the past year for storyline purposes and has become overused and less of a threat on RAW; by moving the Branson golf-loving heel to SmackDown, the company has a chance to rebuild Umaga’s character from the ground up.

Time will tell if this rumor is accurate, but Umaga’s WrestleMania match against SmackDown’s Batista for brand supremacy, which Umaga lost, would seem to set the stage for a brand-switch move.

With all the top-name wrestlers on the Raw roster these days, it’s no wonder ECW and SmackDown seem like second-rate broadcasts for WWE. While having big names on one roster can make some fans so joyful they’ll toss wedding flowers even at Stephanie McMahon, the power-shift could be hurting the evenness of WWE’s brands.

Consider for a moment all the main-event caliber talent on the Raw roster, including wrestlers who are scheduled to return from injury eventually. We have:

• Randy Orton
• Triple H
• John Cena (injured)
• Bobby Lashley (injured)
• Jeff Hardy
• Umaga
• Shawn Michaels
• Mr. Kennedy
• Chris Jericho

That’s nine headliners on one show. Compare that to ECW:

• CM Punk
• John Morrison

ECW is so talent-dry right now (even Rob Van Dam isn’t listed on WWE.com) that The Miz is probably in the ECW main event mix. That’s sad. And SmackDown isn’t much better off.

• Edge
• MVP
• Batista
• Undertaker
• The Great Khali
• Rey Mysterio

Now, SmackDown has former main eventer Kane, who wore out his welcome long ago, and Matt Hardy, who’s never really taken off like his brother Jeff, primarily because WWE got skittish about truly capitalizing on the real-life heat between Edge and Matt over real-life girlfriend issues. And they’ve tried and failed to transform Chavo Guerrero and Mark Henry into main eventers. And of those names listed above, Batista, Undertaker and Rey Mysterio, for various and different reasons, should all be one rung down below main event status.

Obviously, some roster shuffling needs to happen to rebalance the three brands; and it needs to happen well before next summer, when the annual draft usually mixed things up. Sending Ric Flair to SmackDown, as seems to have happened recently, isn’t enough of a fix.

Mutilchannel News broke the story that NBC-Universal and the WWE have extended their current TV contract by an additional two years, through 2010; the current deal only ran through 2008.

Although no Cartier watches were exchanged, the new contract does call for a higher payout to WWE for programming, above the current level of $31 million per year.

NBC-Universal airs WWE Monday Night Raw on the USA Network, as well as ECW broadcasts on the SciFi Channel; the agreement also means there will be more WWE Saturday Night’s Main Event specials on NBC periodically throughout the year, when Saturday Night Live would normally be broadcasting reruns.

The agreement keeps the lion’s share of WWE-branded programming on NBC-Universal venues; the exception is WWE Friday Night SmackDown, which airs on the CBS-Warner Brothers-owned CW Network.

Who would have thunk it? I’m actually getting excited about Cyber Sunday.

I bopped over to WWE.com to vote tonight, just because I’d been putting it off for too long, and some of the matches actually look fun. I really want to see Orton take on my Mr. Kennedy, though the vote probably won’t go my way there.

And I’m eager to see C.M. Punk face off with a back-from-suspension John Morrison, and the vote MAY go my way there, since the other two choices are a five-time retread (Big Daddy V) and a comic-relief wrestler in The Mizh.

Most of all, if Stone Cold is voted in as the guest referee for the Smackdown title, the bit of nostalgia will be a fun thing, too. I’m actually potentially excited about a SmackDown brand match in this upcoming PPV, even if it’s only about the guest ref!

And we all know my low opinion of the SmackDown brand. This’ll prove interesting!