On the April 4, 2008 episode of "SmackDown", Kozlov made his official WWE debut as a villain, with the unique quirk of having no entrance music and no TitanTron video – his "entrance" consisted of complete darkness except for a spotlight following him to the ring. He defeated Matt Bentley in his first match, and over the following weeks, Kozlov would win a series of matches. On the July 11, 2008 airing of "SmackDown", Kozlov debuted an entrance theme and TitanTron video as he defeated Stevie Richards.