Did anyone ever figure out why this happened? I've been getting back into wrestling and I'm trying to make sense of things looking backwards. Here's my take.
My assumption is this was Paul Heyman reasserting himself in the influence sphere of the locker room. He never forgave Vince for destroying the ECW brand image, and he's been trying to take over WWE since. Vince knows this, and it's why he positioned Stephanie against him, to train her (and HHH) against him. Randy is an eternal HHH guy, Evolution was Hunter's way of having a close guy in Hollywood, and in the locker room, as he continually shifted away from the ring to the writer's room. So if Randy is exerting influence on the locker room, Heyman needed a guy to push back in terms of physicality. (Arguably, CM Punk is Heyman's no steroids guy & Brock is Heyman's uses Steroids guy.) This was the moment Paul chose to strike. Make his guy physically assert himself on Randy, in front of everyone. I don't think anyone knew this was how it was going to go down. Imagine the conversation between Heyman and Hunter afterwards. But Heyman is allowed to influence the show, he has Brock's ear as well as several others.