Video: The Undertaker attacks Tommaso Ciampa during a Smackdown segment from 2005

Years before signing a contract with WWE, Tommaso Ciampa appeared as an extra for the company on the July 14th 2005 edition of Smackdown. Ciampa, with hair on his head and no beard, appeared as a “lawyer” for Muhammad Hassan but ended up getting chokeslammed and tombstoned by The Undertaker.

In a 2019 interview with CBS Sports, Ciampa explained how he got the role…

“I was 20 at the time. They happened to be in town and at that time I was close by in Boston, Mass. I believe that show was in Worcester, so it wasn’t far from me. And I was training at Killer Kowalski’s old place, which then at that time was Chaotic Training Center. It’s now the New England Pro Wrestling Academy. They were kind of the feeding ground, any time WWE was in the Northeast area, that’s who they’d call. They’d call them for talent, for extra talent. And it was the weirdest call in the sense that usually, especially at that time, that was probably 2005 maybe, or 2006. At that time, size mattered quite a bit. They really wanted guys 6’2″ and above, and 220 and above. Then on that particular day, we got a call, we being that promotion, Chaotic Training Center got a call, saying ‘Hey, we need guys who are below six feet tall, who have darker features and who can speak.’ That’s never the call you get.” (quote courtesy of 411Mania.com)

Here is video footage of the segment…