Batista‘s Evolution run wouldn’t start the way he’d hoped. Shortly after joining, he suffered a torn right bicep and would be forced to miss time to heal. Right when he was getting close to returning, Batista would painfully re-tear the bicep and miss even more time. He finally returned to the ring in October of 2003, 9 months after initially joining Evolution. He would immediately be thrust into the action though. At Armageddon 2003, Batista would get his first taste of championship gold in WWE. After losing to Shawn Michaels one-on-one earlier in the night, Batista would compete in tag team turmoil with his partner Ric Flair, and win the World Tag Team Championships. By the end of the show, Evolution would be in possession of every male title on Raw. Triple H was World Champion, Randy Orton Intercontinental Champion, and Batista & Flair were Tag Team Champions. It was pure dominance on their part. As good as Evolution was, every stable in WWE has to eventually break up. Randy Orton was the first to go, getting kicked out for winning the World Championship. The memorable moment from this came when Orton was on top of Batista‘s shoulders celebrating a successful title defense against Chris Benoit. Triple H would pretend to be happy for him and give him a thumbs up to show his approval. The thumbs up would be turned into a thumbs down and Batista would slam Orton into the canvass, effectively kicking him out of the group. The thumbs up spot would make another appearance when Evolution lost its next member the following year.
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