La Familia (professional wrestling)

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Stable
La Familia
$A picture of {{{current_name}}}.$ (left to right) Zack Ryder, Edge and Curt Hawkins make up one half of La Familia
Members	Edge Vickie Guerrero Curt Hawkins Zack Ryder Chavo Guerrero Bam Neely
Name(s)	La Familia
Debut	November 2007
Promotions	WWE

La Familia^[1] is an active heel professional wrestling stable in World Wrestling Entertainment on their SmackDown! and ECW brands. Edge is the current World Heavyweight Champion.

1 History
- 1.1 Enemies
2 Gimmick
3 Championships and accomplishments
4 References
5 External links

[edit] History

The seeds for what became La Familia began to take hold as soon as former World Heavyweight Champion Edge returned to the WWE Friday Night SmackDown! brand at Survivor Series 2007, costing The Undertaker the World Championship against then-reigning champion Batista. The immediate SmackDown after would see Edge reveal a kayfabe romantic relationship with General Manager Vickie Guerrero, who gave Edge a world title shot against Batista and took a Tombstone piledriver from the Undertaker the same night. As a Triple Threat match was soon made for the Armageddon pay-per-view, it was clear that Vickie was there to manipulate the scene and make Edge's road back to the World Title that much easier.

La Familia as a stable initially began informally in that triple threat no-disqualification match between Edge, Undertaker, and Batista for the championship. Toward the final minutes of the match, Edge apparently took both a spear from Batista and a chokeslam from Undertaker, both of whom were led to believe that they'd taken him out; however, the truth seemed to be that there were three Edges to confuse Batista and The Undertaker. With this distraction, Edge waited in the wings, took his opportunity, and gained his second World Heavyweight Title, pinning Batista after hitting Undertaker with a steel chair just after Undertaker had given Batista a Tombstone piledriver.^[2] On the next SmackDown!, Edge and Vickie outed Edge's doppelgangers as the Major Brothers, who had pretended to be brothers but were in fact Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder (later identified by themselves as the Rated-R Entourage), fans and protégés of Edge who formed the nucleus of the group.^[3]

When first hearing of this new group, Chavo Guerrero had misgivings, as he initially voiced his opposition of Edge and Vickie's relationship, thinking it disrespected the Guerrero name. But after an assist from Edge in winning the ECW Championship from CM Punk, and a combined beatdown on common enemy Rey Mysterio, Chavo cemented his allegiance to the group, and said that he, Edge, Vickie (who would soon become Edge's fiancée), and Hawkins & Ryder were now "one big happy family", marking the genesis of the "La Familia" name.^[4]

La Familia then had control of two of WWE's World Titles until WrestleMania XXIV, where Chavo and Edge lost the ECW and World Heavyweight Championships to the Brothers of Destruction, Kane and The Undertaker, respectively. Shortly after this, Edge and Chavo both received rematches for their titles, and Chavo brought Bam Neely (whose background was explained as Bam being a former border guard who became a bodyguard^[5]) into the fold as an enforcer to help combat the brothers and bring the ECW and World Titles back to the familia. However, they both failed in their rematches at Backlash. On the May 16, 2008 edition of SmackDown!, Chavo and Neely walked out on La Familia prior to their scheduled 6-on-1 Handicap Match against The Undertaker, with Chavo stating earlier in the night that he was sick of being used as a pawn as in the Battle Royal the week before where Edge made his "miraculous recovery" and won the match. The next week however, things were smoothed over as La Familia accompanied Chavo during his match with the Undertaker and assisted him from outside the ring until being ejected by the referee. At One Night Stand La Familia interfered in Edge's Tables, Ladders and Chairs match for the World Heavweight Championship against The Undertaker.^[6] This interference helped Edge to win the match and his third World Heavyweight Championship.^[6]

[edit] Enemies

Batista
CM Punk
Rey Mysterio
Brothers of Destruction (The Undertaker & Kane)

[edit] Gimmick

The stable gimmick derives from the roots of the Guerrero wrestling family. Much like JBL's Cabinet each stable member role is taken on in a more literal meaning of a family. The following symbolic roles in La Familia were stated by Edge on the April 15, 2008 edition of ECW.