The Rock made a surprise return on a June episode of "Raw" before going to his assigned brand of SmackDown!. There, he was named the number one contender for the WWE Undisputed Championship, which he won for a record-setting seventh time at Vengeance, on July 21, by defeating Kurt Angle and then-champion The Undertaker in a Triple Threat match. The Rock successfully defended the title at the event in Melbourne, Australia, against Triple H and Brock Lesnar after pinning Triple H. On August 25, at SummerSlam, after interference from Lesnar's manager Paul Heyman, the Rock lost the WWE Undisputed Championship to Lesnar along with the record for the youngest WWE Champion, which he had set in 1998. In 2018, writing for "ESPN.com", Sean Coyle noted in a retrospective review of the event, that following his victory over Hulk Hogan at WrestleMania X8, the Rock "started to see a dip in fan support" and "that dip turned into a plunge" by the time Rock had his match with Lesnar at SummerSlam because fans knew he was leaving WWE to pursue an acting career. This was evident by the fact that he was met with a negative crowd response during his match against Lesnar. After the event ended, the Rock was visibly angry at the crowd reaction. When he tried to do a post-show speech for the crowd, the fans attending the Nassau Coliseum would still boo him. The Rock then took time off to kickstart his acting career.