The WWE Championship match that went into the Mississippi river.

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel which can be found here: https://youtu.be/nIsLQJurbMU

The Hardcore championship had come to exist as a gift from Vince McMahon to Mankind in November 1998,  as a way of keeping Mankind happy to do the corporations dirty work. It was really just the old winged eagle version of the WWE championship given a trashy late 90's makeover, but Mankind loved it dearly for the month he had it. Following Vince's turn on Mankind at Survivor Series, Mankind would lose the title to Vince's new corporate enforcer, the Big Bossman, and so the championship became a regular title.

Starting in early 1999, hardcore title matches began leaving not just ringside, but the arena completely. On the January 4th edition of Raw champion Road Dogg defended the title against Al Snow in a match the left the building resulting in the two men brawling in a blizzard. Road Dogg would retain his championship on this night, but would fail to defend the title in February, and would be stripped of it. Therefore a new champion would be crowned at St. Valentines Day Massacre from Memphis Tennessee, but Snow would have to fight his former ally.

The man formerly known as Herman 'Sparky' Plug, Bob Holly was not yet ready to take his 'Hardcore' moniker yet, but he had spent the previous year as a member of the Job Squad with Al Snow, along with Too Cold Scorpio. The whole idea of the Job Squad being an inside joke on the term jobber, now more respectfully known as enhancement talent. Now looking for a new direction, Holly would have many battles with Snow over the Hardcore title, including two other fun ones being at Wrestlemania 15 and Backlash the following month.

On this night, Snow and Holly would battle to the outside of the building as had happened before. The two would brawl across the street. As it was mid-February the production team had a hard time keeping the action lit, but they did a decent enough job of it. The two battled into the woodlands, before eventually making it onto the bank of the Mississippi river. Both men end up taking a fall into the river, which at that time of year had to be freezing cold and no fun. Holly chases Snow away from the river, braying him with a tree branch. He then see a roll of chain link fencing, and wraps Snow in it to pin him and win the championship. Poor Al Snow is seemingly left out in the cold, soaking wet and still wrapped up in the fencing, as Bob Holly jogs all the way back to ringside to claim his decaying prize, the WWF Hardcore Championship.

Holly would go on to win the championship again at Wrestlemania 15 in a triple threat match with Snow and then champion Billy Gunn. After many failed attempts, Al Snow would finally win the title from Holly at Backlash in April, and would dominate the division until the 24/7 rule was created the following year.

The night Sting wrestled two matches on Raw, and a look at his entire WWE run

This is a script for my YouTube channel, the video version can be found here: https://youtu.be/qksFUuZ5ePE

On September 14th 2015 WWE presented Raw from Memphis Tennessee. On this night, Sting would wrestle his first and last match on WWE's flagship show, something even I an avid Sting fan, had completely forgotten about. But first, a brief history of how the Icon came to join WWE after many years of doubt and speculation.

Throughout Stings entire run with TNA, which started in 2005 on a full time basis and ended in 2014, he had been signed to one year contracts that expired around December time. Because of this every December there would be speculation that Sting might not renew his contract, and would go to WWE and have his much wanted clash with the Undertaker. Behind the scenes Sting was very concerned about how WWE would treat him, for reasons I explained in an early video on this channel (https://youtu.be/nr7Xx62f6jE), and put it off for many years. In 2014, Sting left the now renamed Impact Wrestling having lost a title vs career match to then champion EC3. This was likely due to Impact trying to cut their costs, as AJ Styles also left around this time due to being offered a new contract with insultingly less money on the page.

Throughout 2014 Sting began appearing in WWE through, but not directly. He appeared in a documentary about the recently passed Ultimate Warrior, who Sting was a tag team partner with in their early careers. In September WWE released a DVD called 'The Best of Sting.' Before the WWE Network best of and documentary DVD's were monthly releases, but they became irrelevant as the library on the network gradually grew. In October, 2K released WWE 2K15, in which Sting was a pre-order bonus. Despite all of this interaction between Sting and WWE, it still didn't feel like we would ever see the Icon in a live WWE setting, but that would change at Survivor Series.

In the main of Survivor Series 2014, a group of heroes aligned to face the evil Authority, led by Triple H and Stephanie McMahon. That feels like a weird thing to say aloud in 2022. If the good guys won the Authority would lose their power having terrorised Raw for over a year at this point.By the end all that remained was Dolph Ziggler against the Authorities chosen one, Seth Rollins. Dolph got so close to winning that Triple H who wasn't in the match got involved, hitting Ziggler with a Pedigree. Just then the lights went out, and after a few tense seconds we hear a crow, and see the familiar pained face of the the man called Sting.

As much as I love the way Sting made his WWE debut, I don't like to complain but there is one thing that has always bugged me about this moment. Stings appearance was supposed to be a complete surprise, and Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler on commentary do a good job of presenting this, but everyones best mate JBL launches into a long list of Stings World championships, reeling it off as if reading a script. Sadly this kind of hurts the shock of this moment for me, despite everything else working so well. Triple H sells his surprise extremely well also, despite behind the scenes having been a key figure in bringing Sting in.

Alas, the Icon enters the ring to a deafening pop from the crowd, and stand up to the Game. Triple H attempts to strike first, but falls victim to the Scorpion Death Drop. Sting then pulls the apparently dead Dolph Zigglers arm over the apparently deader Seth Rollins, and a referee enters to count the three. On his way out of the ring, Sting gives a fallen and soon to re-employed Triple H a glare, and takes his leave. Over the following weeks Sting would be rebranded with a new nickname, "the vigilante", playing off his history of being the man who turned the tide for WCW against the nWo back in the 90's,

Stings debut eventually leads to a match at Wrestlemania 31, where Triple H would defeat Sting. At the time I loved this match purely because I was thrilled to see Sting at Wrestlemania, but looking back I can't abide it. The seeds were planted when promotion for the match kept harkening back to Stings WCW days a bit too much. They put a little too much effort into turning the story into WWE vs WCW, 14 years after that company folded. You could argue that they did this because Sting was the last of all the main event wrestlers associated with WCW to join WWE, with most arriving throughout the early 2000's to very mixed results. Some fit in perfectly like Booker T and Rey Mysterio, and some were dealt a raw deal like DDP and Scott Steiner. The match between Triple H and Sting became the final nail in the coffin for WCW. Part way through the match as soon as Sting locked in the Scorpion Deathlock, D-Generation X's music hit, and Road Dogg, Billy Gunn and X-Pac hit the ring. Soon after the nWo's music plays, and Hogan, Hall and Nash run in to help Sting. Any long time WCW fan would point out that while Sting did have a run in the red and black version of the nWo, it was the original version led by Hogan, Hall and Nash that Sting rebelled against, so it felt jarring that the nWo were even involved. Once Triple H had won it seemed like Sting might be done, until he made a surprising return.

On the August 24th 2015 Raw, The Authorities chosen champion Seth Rollins demanded a statue be made of him similar to the ones to honour Andre the Giant and Dusty Rhodes among others. That statue was due to be unveiled on this night, celebrating his victory over John Cena at Summerslam on the previous night. When the curtain was raised however, the statue wasn't there. Sting was. Triple H and Stephanie acted like they had seen a ghost while Sting went after Rollins, and then raised up the WWE championship belt. This led many to question what had happened to the statue, which WWE eventually addressed on the September 7th Raw, when Sting destroyed the statue by pushing it into a trash compactor. This would lead to Stings final WWE match against Rollins for the WWE title at Night of Champions, but before that Sting would wrestle on Raw, remember what this video was originally about...

On the September 14th Raw Sting was due to face the Authorities hired gun, the Big Show. This felt like a fitting pairing, as Sting and Big Show would have known each other since Shows early days in WCW as the Giant in the mid 90's. The match would last about a minute though, as Seth would run in to attack the Vigilante. Technically Stings Raw in ring debut would last just over a minute, and he would win by DQ, before John Cena would run in to save Sting. Not content with this development, Triple H would book a tag team match with Sting and Cena facing Show and Rollins right now.  Most of this fairly short TV main event is John Cena playing good guy in peril, trying to make the tag to Sting. This match was the final build before the Night of Champions pay per view, where Rollins was due to defend his US title against Cena, then the World title against Sting later on. At the time WWE caught a little bit of flask for this, as this was the exact same storyline that Ring of Honor was doing its World and Television champion Jay Lethal, although the details of both stories were slightly different. The Big Show would make a crucial error in this match, going for his Vader Bomb and missing, allowing Cena to tag in Sting, who runs wild. He quickly runs through his trademark moves, before making Seth tap out to the Scorpion Deathlock.

Sadly Stings WWE career would begin with a bang and end with a whimper, as during the match with Rollins, he took a powerbomb into the turnbuckle that would injure the Icon, so much so it looked like he would never wrestle again. That would last until December of 2020, when Sting would make his surprising debut in All Elite Wrestling. By February Sting along with his new protege Darby Allin would be taking part in cinematic matches, and would later take part in live in ring matches, always teaming with Darby to take the pressure off him a bit. At the time of writing this, Sting last competed at All Out 2022, and there seems to be no clear end in sight for the Icon that has transcended generations.

TNA/Impact wrestling's only ever five star match.

On September 11th 2005 TNA Wrestling presented Unbreakable from Orlando Florida. TNA now known as Impact had a rough year in 2005, losing their TV deal with Fox Sports Net in Spring, they ran their Impact show online for months until a deal was eventually made with Spike TV. Impact would imminently debut on Spike on October 1st, and big changes for the company would come along with it, but TNA still had to produce its monthly pay per views to stay alive. On this night, TNA earned its to date one and only five star rated match by Dave Meltzer, a triple threat match for the X Division championship, between three of TNA's greatest wrestlers ever.

During the Summer of 2005 as I've covered on this channel before in more detail, Impact had no TV deal,  and was airing on TNA's own website. At this time TNA decided to book a champion that the online fans liked, and they went with Raven, who would lose the title title back to Jeff Jarrett right before Impact reached its new home on Spike TV in October. Ravens title reign didn't exactly set the world on fire, but it wasn't there to. It was there to give the fans a fresh champion to tune into tnawrestling.com to see. As a result, the world title scene often had some unusual matches for a while. At Unbreakable, Raven would defend the NWA world title against Rhino in the semi main event. Rhino had entered TNA in July by attacking Raven following another hardcore battle over the World title, defeating Abyss. By October Rhino would luck into a short NWA title reign himself when Jeff Jarrett's original opponent Kevin Nash was not medically cleared. In the main event on this night Christopher Daniels would defend the X division championship against two men he had a lot of history with, Samoa Joe and AJ Styles.

At various points in TNA's history the X division had main evented their weekly pay per views. Some of the early Ultimate X matches were main events, as well as entire pay per views were themed around X division tournaments like the World X cup. In fact on TNA's second ever show, AJ Styles became the first ever X Division champion in the main event slot.

AJ Styles participated in NWA TNA's first ever televised match, in a losing effort teaming with Jerry Lynn and Low-Ki against the Flying Elvis's. I will take any opportunity given to me to remind you that TNA had a trio of Elvis impersonators... Styles would soon after become the first ever X Division champion, and went to to pioneer the style, the same way WCW had with the cruiserweight division in the 90's. Styles had already been world champion, but the move from weekly pay per view to television in 2004 had Styles re-inserted in the X-Division. At that time especially the X-Division is what set TNA apart  from WWE, and so Styles became one of the figureheads of that distinction. He wasn't like anyone you would see in WWE at the time, and that was played to TNA's advantage, but Styles wasn't alone in being an alternative trend setter.

In the early 2000's wrestlers would occasionally find an opponent that they had amazing chemistry with. In the early days of the internet these matches wouldn't be as widely available as they would be today, so these wrestlers would sometimes tour their match, sometimes even internationally. Feuds would sometimes transcend the promotions they began in. As a result some pairings would be as much of an attraction as the individual wrestlers themselves, as everyone wanted to see the hot match they had heard about come to their town. This became known as the 'touring indie match'. The concept still works a little today, with promoters wanting to book their version of Will Ospreay vs Ricochet for example, but not like it used to. One of the most famous touring indie matches in the early 2000's was the feud between CM Punk vs Raven. The feud originally began in Ring of Honor, but would heat up in TNA and MLW, even continuing in the FWA based in England. This doesn't even include all the smaller indies they worked together at. Rumour has it that Raven would often get annoyed at Punk for not listening to his advice. Imagine that, CM Punk not taking advice from a veteran...

Another famous touring match around this time was AJ Styles vs Christopher Daniels. Unlike Punk and Raven, Styles and Daniels were said to be close friends, with Daniels naming one of his children after AJ. Styles and Daniels wrestled all over the United States, but would also wrestle in Canada, Italy, England, Ireland, Australia and even South Korea. Cagematch lists 37 singles matches between the two, and again that might not be an exhaustive list, just the indies that are documented on that site.

Christopher Daniels at the time had vastly more experience than either of his opponents. Styles made his in ring debut in 1998, and Joe did in 99, but Daniels had been wrestling since 1993. Comparatively though it took Daniels a lit longer to find his feet, maybe due to the indie scene of the 90's not being what it would eventually become. Daniels did wrestle for ECW several times, and much like Styles, was wrestling for WCW at the time that it closed its doors, but both men were very low on the card at that point. He had also done several tours with New Japan as Curry Man, a colourful character that he would eventually bring to TNA, and likely couldn't be done in 2022.

At face value, one of the three X Division wrestlers at Unbreakable was not like the others. Samoa Joe had arrived in TNA at Slammiversary, TNA's three year anniversary show. He remained dominant over every opponent, going into Unbreakable undefeated. He would remain unbeaten for another 14 months, where he would be defeated by the debuting Kurt Angle. TNA's tag line for the X Division was that it wasn't about weight limits, but no limits, meaning anyone would be part of it. Occasionally TNA would remind us of that by booking a larger wrestler in the division to mixed results. The man known today as PCO had a brief X Division run in 2003 as the masked man known only as 'X'. Joe would be the latest of these wrestlers, and maybe the best of all the X Division big men. His in ring style seemed to mesh with the smaller guys, maybe because of his Ring of Honor roots.

Just because Joe was undefeated himself, that didn't mean he hadn't lost, just that he hadn't been pinned or submitted. On this night AJ Styles would recapture the X Division championship for the fifth time. A running pattern for TNA at this time was that during any major change for the company Jeff Jarrett would usually be the NWA world champion, and Styles would claim the X Division prize. On this night AJ would win in a 23 minute classic that would earn TNA its first ever, and to date only ever five star rating from Dave Meltzer.

There are several moments from this match that are still etched in my mind to this day, with my favourite being the springboard shooting star press AJ performs on his two opponents. The reason this match is so famous though is how the three came up with intricate three man spots. Three way matches of the time and since have developed a reputation, perhaps unfairly, of just being a series of singles spots with one man sitting out until another is ready to leave the ring. Styles, Daniels and Joe clearly tried to avoid this, leading to it being one of the fondest held matches in TNA or Impact's history.

The three would go on to have rematches in TNA, eventually culminating in an ultimate X match between the three, but that is not as well loved, as the story became more about could Samoa Joe scale the above the ring cables like the smaller wrestlers can. Of all the three way matches these three had, their match at Unbreakable still holds a special place for all TNA fans of the time.

Looking back at the first ever WCW Nitro - September 4th 1995

On September 4th 1995 WCW presented the first ever episode of Nitro, from the Mall of America in Bloomington Minnesota. In November of 1998 Jim Crocket Promotions was bought out by media mogul Ted Turner. I won't go into details here as that deserves a whole video another day. In 1993 after a series of failed leaders, Turner promoted Eric Bischoff from his on air role as an announcer to be an executive producer. By 1997 he would be the president of the company. The way Eric tells the story, he was summoned to a meeting at CNN centre, and expected a brow beating as WCW had been a consistent money loser even before Turner bought it. In the meeting Turner asked what they could do to compete with Vince, whose flagship show Raw had begun two years earlier. According to Eric, he pitched the idea of going head to head with Raw, but airing live as opposed to Raw which was pre-taped at the time, coning up with the idea on the fly, which Turner went for. According to Wrestling Observer's of the time the meeting took place on June 5th, not at that time no details were available. In the July 24th edition Dave Meltzer reported that TNT would air a show called "something like Wrestling Nitro" starting on September 4th. Nitros lead in was scheduled to be reruns of Thunder in Paradise, an action-adventure show from the creators of Baywatch starring Hulk Hogan as Randolph J "Hurricane" Spencer. Being an early 90's kid I saw this before I even knew what pro wrestling was.

In the first ever WCW Nitro match, Flyin' Brian defeated Jushin Liger. How fitting that Nitro would begin by featuring two future legends. According to edition of the Wrestling Observer from as early as July, WCW had plans to start Nitro every week with a strong wrestling match, inspired by Raw having wrestlers like Bret Hart putting on good matches. This was not actually the first time that Pillman and Liger had met in the ring. In 1991 when Liger first came to WCW, he defeated Pillman for the WCW light heavyweight title, a championship that was only active for just shy of a year. Brian would win it back from Liger two months later. In 1992 the two would actually team up in an NWA tag team championship tournament where they would make it to the second round and lose to Nikita Koloff and Ricky Steamboat at the 92 Great American Bash. Here in 95, the two would meet in the Mall of America, in a really fun match that holds up even today. Post match the two shake hands and show respect to each other.

Heres a trivia note for you, despite Liger and Brians reputations as being legendary cruiserweight wrestlers, neither actually held the WCW cruiserweight championship, which wasn't introduced until 1996. However if you look at the titles history on WWE.com you'll find that the first two champions are Pillman then Liger. Thats because WWE recognises the Light Heavyweight title I mentioned earlier as part of the cruiserweight titles lineage, so Pillman is retroactively the first cruiserweight champion, and Liger the second.

In 2019, 24 years later during Ligers retirement tour that lasted almost a year, he would share the ring with current AEW wrestler, and Flyin Brians son, Brian Pillman Jr. On March 7th 2019 Liger in a press conference announced that at the following years Wrestle Kingdom he would retire from in ring competition what would end up being a 36 year career. The following day Pillman Jr tweeted about how it would have been an honour to share the ring just once with one of his Dads famous rivals. Thanks to Defy Wrestling, this would happen as part of a six man tag on August 23rd 2019.

In my research for this topic I couldn't find in any definitive reason why the first Nitro emanated from the Mall of America, but the gaudy video package on the show for Hulk Hogans 'Pastamania' restaurant in Mall might have had something to do with it. If you're curious, Hogans pasta venture opened in June of 95 and wouldn't last one year in business. This isn't the only culinary failure in Hogans past. If you lived through the 90's like I did, you will likely remember the George Foreman Grill, which launched in 1994 and was promoted by the boxer, earning him an estimated two hundred million dollars over its lifetime. Legend has is that the endorsement of the grill was originally offered to Hulk Hogan, who turned it down in favour of a meatball maker that failed to reach the same success. This story did come from Hogan himself though, who also claims that he was almost in Metallica.

Next on Nitro we would see history play out, as Ric Flair would wrestle Sting. By this point the two had been rivals for years, with their first famous match taking place at the Clash of the Champions 1 in 1988. That match would end in a 45 minute time limit draw, something we clearly weren't going to see on this one hour edition of Nitro. In 96 Nitro would be extended to two hours, then to three in 1998. By 2000 they went back down to two, who knew a weekly three hour show might not do as well in ratings? At the final ever Nitro on March 26th 2001, WCW saw no better way choice for WCW's final ever match than to harken back to one of their hottest feuds, as Sting and Flair would wrestle one last time. They would actually wrestle once more for TNA in 2011 but we don't talk about that one so shush...

There is another reason for this match being famous though, as on the opening bell, the WWF's Lex Luger would enter ringside. Flair and Sting reacted like they had seen a ghost, and with good reason. Twenty four hours earlier Lex had been in New Brunswick Canada wrestling on a WWE house show. he would team with Shawn Michaels in a winning effort against Owen Hart and Yokozuna, but a day later had shown up on the rivals new show. Very few people knew Luger would be making an appearance, and what better way to do it than have him walk into such a public place like a mall. For all anyone knew he might be there to get his shopping done.

Given the constraints Flair and Sting faced here that they didn't in their world title matches, this was never going to be the a classic like they had before. They wrestle a very enjoyable abridged version of their previous matches until Arn Anderson, who has split up with Flair at this point, comes down the aisle. The dynamic of Sting vs Flair matches usually was that Sting completely outmatched Flair physically to the point of no-selling Flair at some points, but Flair would find sneaky ways to get back in control, while often cowering away from Sting. They wrestle for about 10 minutes, until Flair cheats by locking in the figure four and pulling on the ropes for leverage. This causes Arn to enter the ring and the referee calls for the bell. The official decision is a no contest as Arn and Ric brawl to the backstage area, or whatever you would call that in a mall.

Before this segment can end there is a commotion at ringside. Scott Norton returns to WCW, fresh off a tour with New Japan. Norton has a heated argument with Eric Bischoff which Mongo tries to cool down, eventually Randy Savage runs in and challenges Norton to a match, which would take place on next weeks Nitro. During the commotion Eric Bischoff is referred to on air as the 'GM'. I'm not sure if it was public knowlege or not that Bischoff was WCW's president at the time, much like how Vince McMahon would lead commentary while not publicly being presented as the owner until some miscommunication that might have happened in Canada once.

Next we see a highlight video for Sabu. I knew he had a brief run in WCW, but seeing him in that ring is still a bizarre thing to me. He would have three Nitro matches with two being victories over Mr. JL, later known as Jerry Lynn, and his final WCW match would be a win over Dicso Inferno. In April of 1995, Sabu had double booked himself for ECW and New Japan and chose the latter. Given that Sabu was booked for a big tag team three way dance that had been built to, Paul Heyman got in the ring and fired Sabu publicly, and cut a firey promo about how Sabu had let the fans down. This is likely why Sabu had his short WCW run, but he and Heyman apparently made up as Sabu returned to ECW by the November to Remember event, and shortly after left for another New Japan tour. His entire WCW tenure lasted about 9 weeks.

At this point in the show they are showing the crowd while the commentators plug upcoming

events, and I spotted his monstrocity. He is known as Wildcat Willie, and he was served as a mascot for WCW on both Nitro and WCW Saturday Night. According to the internet the man in the costume is a man named Gary Hedrick, who also played Jeeves, the butler of the Blue Bloods. On his 83 weeks podcast in 2019, Eric Bischoff explained that Wildcat Willie was created to hype the crowd up during dark segments, but occasionally would be seen on television. He was an invention of a man names Bob Due, who head of love events when Eric when he joined the company. The inspiration was based on sports team mascots, the greatest of all time being Kingsley, the Partick Thistle mascot. Google image him please. Eric also notes that the idea behind Wildcat Willie was similar in concept to that of the Nitro Girls who came around in 1997. Similar in concept, but galaxies apart in presentation...

Mascots in wrestling come around every now and then. In 2007 TNA brought in a Kangaroo called Stomper, for reasons that I cannot find anywhere in the internet. Stomper looked a bit like a Crash Bandicoot ripoff, and didn't last all that long. In the early years of Raw they would have ring girls similar to boxing and later UFC, but that felt out of place as there were no rounds to hold the cards up for. I can't talk about mascots without mentioning perhaps the most famous one of all, the Gobbeldy Gooker. The man sized Turkey hatched from a giant egg at Survivor Series 1990, the same night the Undertaker debuted. The original plan for the Gooker was that he would be a mascot, but would also wrestle, so they needed a trained wrestler in the suit. As a result Hector Guerrero, brother of Eddie danced with Mean Gene, once and only once.

Eric Bischoff throws to the introduction of another returning wrestler, Michael Wallstreet formerly known in WWE as Irwin R Shyster, IRS. Wallstreet was Mike Rotundo, who had previously in WCW as a member of the Varsity Club led by Kevin Sullivan. He returned looking like a clone of his former tag team partner the Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase, and even referenced the IRS in his promo.

We now come to the main event,  a match between Big Bubba Rogers and WCW world champion Hulk Hogan. Bubba was Ray Traylor, known to WWE fans as the Big Bossman. Hogan had a reputation for bringing opponents he liked and friends of his to the company he was with at the time, so we saw the likes of Jimmy Hart, the Nasty Boys and many others follow him to WCW. Traylor had many main events with Hogan, including a famous cage match in Madison Square Garden in 1989. One of the ways WCW was able to lure Hogan to sign with them was to offer him creative control of his matches and storylines, effectively allowing him the power to veto anything he didn't like, but also giving him a say in who he wrestled. This would come back to bite WCW many times, such as in 1994 when their biggest event on the calendar Starrcade was main evented by Hogan vs Brutus Beefcake of all people.

Early in the match Eric Bischoff notes that Hogan spent a lot of time in Minnesota and so has the fans support. This is a reference to Hogans time in the AWA, where he started to make waves before joining WWE. Hogan leaving the AWA is regarded as one of its promoter Verne Gagne's greatest mistakes, as legend has it that Verne didn't want see the benefit in Hogan appearing in Rocky 3 as Thunderlips. Let me run that back, Verne didn't see the benefit in Hogan appearing in the world famous $270 million dollar grossing Rocky 3. Give me one more try. Verne didn't see the benefit in Hogan being associated with Sylvester Stallone and Mr. T... I could go on but you get the point by now.

Can you tell I don't to talk about this match? Its fine and all but after Pillman, Liger, Flair and Sting this feels like a massive gear change. It's a typical Hogan TV match, with him winning using his moves of doom sequence John Cena style. Post match Hogan is attacked by the Dungeon of Doom, who he has been feuding with. Lex Luger comes out to help Hogan, but the two back into each other leading to a confrontation between the two. This is interesting historically, as when Hogan left the WWE in 1993 Luger was the man chosen to take his place. Actually Sid was, but for some bizarre reason he turned down the chance to be the next Hulk Hogan. Luger got his chance at Summerslam 1993, following the now infamous Lex Express bus tour, so its interesting to see the two share the ring here. Luger would eventually defeat Hogan for the WCW title in 1997, in a match famous for how popular Luger was on that night.

Randy Savage and Sting come back out to try and cool things down to no avail. After an ad break Mean Gene comes out to interview both men, building to a match next week between the two, which in true WCW fashion would end in a DQ.

You likely don't need me to tell you this, but despite its legendary fall from grace WCW Nitro was a net positive for the entire wrestling business. It may have taken a while, but it eventually caused WWE to up their game, leading to the most lucrative era in pro wrestling history, when wrestling found a new attitude.

A brief history of Terry Funk's retirements on the 38th anniversary of his first one.

On August 31^st 1983 in Tokyo Japan, Terry Funk announced his retirement from professional wrestling for the first of many, many times. On this night, he and his brother Dory Funk jr. competed in an All Japan ring against Stan Hansen and Terry Gordy, in what he intended to be his retirement match.

To put this into some kind of context, in the same year Return of the Jedi was the highest grossing film, Thriller by Michael Jackson was the top album of that year, and one week after Funk retired, Braun Strowman was born. Despite this retirement match, Funk would continue to control his narrative for the next 34 years. Terry’s first documented match was in 1965, so he had been going for 18 years, but with any more matches seeming unlikely due to his health, his eventual last match would occur in 2017 making his career 52 years long.

The best source I could find lists 7 official retirement matches, not including his actual last match as it wasn’t advertised as such. This also doesn’t include the many times Funk would cut a promo announcing he would be stepping away but not mention retirement, one such being at WWF Fully Loaded 1998, when he announced pre his tag team match with partner Blackjack Bradshaw that he would be stepping away, apparently not informing Bradshaw who was angered and turned on Funk as a result.

Retirement number one would occur in All Japan in 1983, but would last about 14 months, as he would again team with Dory, this time going to a double DQ with the Road Warriors for the AWA tag team titles.

Number two would happen in at WCW’s Clash of the Champions 9 event in November 1989. This time was an “I Quit” match against Ric Flair in a match rated 5 stars by the Wrestling Observer. Following this match Funk would return 10 months later in an independent match against Jerry Lawler that would go to a no contest.

Number three would take place in September 1997, at an independent event named 50 years of Funk in his famed hometown of Amarillo Texas. This event featured talent from many various promotions held together by the respect Terry had earned throughout his time in the business. In the main event Bret Hart who was WWF Champion at the time defeated Terry in a four star rated match. The only reason I mention this is that his last one was five stars if you keep track of that kind of thing…. The card featured many WWF and ECW stars, notably Mankind defeating ECW’s Sabu and Dory Funk Jr defeating Rob Van Dam. Post Terry’s match he stated that this would be the last time he would perform in Amarillo, but not even this would be true, as in 2000 he would wrestle Lance Storm in the same city on a WCW house show. Retirement number three would last just 11 days, as Funk would go on a tour with FMW in Japan and return to the WWE by the end of the year. Funk had a decent run in WWE teaming first with Cactus Jack as Chainsaw Charlie, then later teaming with Bradshaw as mentioned earlier.

It’s worth noting also that between 1989 and 1997, Terry would build his reputation as a death match wrestler. He was known for hardcore brawls before this, but these years included the FMW matches with a young Cactus Jack, as well as his famed ECW tenure, not to mention his famous exploding barbed wire death match with Onita in May of 1993, the clear inspiration for the Kenny Omega vs Jon Moxley match in 2021. As crazy as this is to say, Funk probably did more damage to his body in these years than any other period of his career.

Following a return to ECW Terrys fourth retirement would occur in June 1999 at an event called AWF One last Dance. His opponent on this night would be Sabu, and Funk won the match. By November Terry would be back in the ring, this time teaming with Dory again for the FMW tenth anniversary event. 

Terry would return to WCW in January 2000 originally in an authority figure role, but after a terrible talking segment with the 2000 version of the NWO, (the worst kind of NWO), he would be back in the ring by the end of the month losing his commissionership to Kevin Nash.

From here Funk would become a key player in WCW’s dwindling Hardcore division for a few months. His fifth retirement would occur in 2005, where he and Dory would lose at an independent show to the NWA tag team champions at the time, Americas Most Wanted. Dory has featured in a few matches I’ve mentioned matches so far, so I’ll take this time to mention that he wrestled over 3000 documented matches in his career, starting in 1963 and ending in 2018, meaning his in ring career is 3 years longer than Terry’s. This retirement would last four and a bit months, as he would return to wrestle Sabu and Shane Douglas at Hardcore Homecoming, and ECW tribute event promoted by Douglas to counter WWE’s One Night Stand pay per view, in a barbed wire match no less.

Now we get to retirement number six, as Funk would lose to Tommy Dreamer at AWE’s Night of the Legends pay per view in 2011. Gone are the days of Terry Funk retirement matches being the main event, this one was third on the card, which was main evented by Ricky Morton defeating Kevin Nash, which sounds like an odd pairing. Terry would return to action two years later, teaming with Dory in All Japan. Are you noticing a pattern yet?

Retirement match number 7 occurred in 2015, and was a loss against Jerry Lawler on a show held in tribute to legendary Memphis commentator Lance Russell. The only other notable names on this card were the rock and roll express, and the rest of the card looks like it was built using the NXT name generator.  Funk might have been the main event, but the events were getting smaller by this point.

Terry Funk’s final match ended up being a six man tag with him teaming with the rock and roll express to defeat Jerry Lawler, Brian Christopher and Doug Gilbert, the brother of Southern legend Hot Stuff Eddie Gilbert. It wasn’t officially billed as a retirement match so it’s not technically part of the list, but it is likely the end of Terry Funks legendary in ring career. Despite the trivial tone of this video so far, I want to end with a moment to show respect and wish nothing but the best for a true icon of US and Japanese wrestling.

WWE Summerslam 1992: Bret Hart vs British Bulldog, Savage vs Ultimate Warrior and more.

On August 29th 1992 WWE presented Summerslam from Wembley Stadium. With a live attendance of just over 80,000 fans, at the time of writing this is the largest non-Wrestlemania crowd WWE ever had, and fifth overall. 

In October 1989 WWE promoted their first ever event in the UK at the London Arena. The show was called UK Rampage which aired live on Sky TV, and was an annual event for a few years, with the first one main evented by Randy Savage and Hulk Hogan. That match is part of the WWE networks recent compilation of the best UK matches ever. From there WWE gained in popularity over the years, so much so that Summerslam which was originally planned to come from Washington DC, was moved not just to England, but the giant Wembley Stadium, whose maximum capacity was 82,000.

In a rare change of the format the main event would feature the Intercontinental championship, as the English born Davey Boy Smith would challenge the champion Bret Hart, but I'll talk more about that match later. In the semi main event the WWF champion Randy Savage defended his title against the Ultimate Warrior. This was a rematch from their epic clash at Wrestlemania 7, but wouldn't come close to stealing the show as they did in the first match, thanks in part to the convoluted story going in.

At Wrestlemania 8, Randy Savage had won the WWE championship for the second time defeating Ric Flair. The Nature Boy's strategy going into the match was to play mind games with Savage, presenting fake photographs of himself chilling poolside with Savages wife, Elizabeth. Flair promised once he won at Wrestlemania that he would reveal more pictures of Liz, but Savage put a stop to that by dethroning him. Going into Summerslam Flair and his cohort Mr. Perfect weren't done with the mind games. Over the weeks leading up to Summerslam, Flair claimed that either Savage or Warrior had hired the services of Mr. Perfect to interfere in the match in their favour, but wouldn't reveal which. He claimed we would find out at Summerslam, but both men denied brokering any kind of deal. This served to create more tension between Savage and Warrior, as both believed the other had hired Curt Hennig, when in truth neither had and Flair was turning them against each other. He was doing it out of jealousy for not being announced the number one contender himself. In a pre match interview with Gene Okerlund Flair again refused to say whose side Mr. Perfect would be on.

What followed was a 28 minute clash not quite as good as their Wrestlemania match. Near the end Warrior hits his press slam and goes to hit his finishing splash off the ropes, when Flair hits him in the back with a chair, which Savage doesn't see. All he sees when he gets to his feet is the Warrior down on the mat. Savage climbs the ropes to hit his Elbow drop, but instead decides to leap towards Flair, who clips him in the knee with the chair on the way down. Savage fails to beat the referees count, and therefore loses the match but not the title, but in the process it is clear that Flair and Perfect were on the side of neither man. Flair attempts to finish Savage, but Warrior runs him and Mr. Perfect off. He then presents Macho Man with his championship, and helps him up to his feet as the two heroes show each other respect.

Elsewhere on this show Shawn Michaels and Rick Martel fought in a match with a unique stipulation. Both men were fighting over the affection of Sensational Sherri, who demanded that in the match neither could hit the other in the face. The reason for this was that the Model and the Heartbreak Kid both prided themselves on their looks, and therefore neither could alter the facial features of the other. The match ended in a double count out, with both men fighting over being the one to carry a lifeless Sherri to the back. Let me explain a bit here, after about 8 minutes both men slap each other in the face, and to prevent anymore of this, Sherri who is on the apron fakes fainting, and both men rush to her aid, taking turns in carrying her up the long Wembley walkway. One hilarious detail is that when Martel carries Sherri, he holds her in a respectful manner, whereas when it's Shawn turn he throws her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

Shawn and Sherri had been paired together in February of 1992. The dynamic between this was always that Sherri loved Shawn, but Shawn only really loved Shawn. This was the early version of the Heartbreak Kid persona he would perfect through the 90's following his split with Marty Jannetty. The iconic theme music Shawn Michaels has used to this day now has long had his own voice performing the vocals, but the original version composed by Jimmy Hart has the same lyrics but with Sherri's voice. This was played on years later when Kurt angle was taunting Michaels pre-Wrestlemania, when he invited Sherri back to perform the not legendary parody known as 'Sexy Kurt'. Shawn has said in many interviews and his autobiography that he was hesitant about being put with Sherri in the beginning, but often praises her for the affect she had on his career at the time.

In a strangely placed match between the WWE championship and the main event, the Undertaker defeated Kamala in a three minute match. The reason this is notable is that if you have ever seen the clip of Undertaker arriving into an arena on the back of a hearse, its from this night. Being an open air show in Summer the venue looks very different as the evening progresses, being daylight at the start and dark once the night sets in. This is likely why this match occurs so late in the card, as Takers entrance might have looked strange in broad daylight. Undertaker at this point was only a couple of years into his legendary WWE run, and now along with his manager Paul Bearer was quickly becoming one of the most popular WWE stars, despite entering as a feared villain.

Given the length of the enormous entrance walkway, and the trademark slowness of the Undertakers entrance, I'm glad they thought of him riding on the back of a hearse as if he had walked to the ring he might not have made it by Wrestlemania 9. Undertaker made short work of the Ugandan Giant, before moving on to his famously terrible Mania match with Giant Gonzales. Given what we know now, I wonder if Undertaker wishes the Kamala feud lasted a few months longer...

By 1992 the British Bulldog Davey Boy Smith was a popular fixture of the WWE's midcard as a solo act following his split from Dynamite Kid. He had also become a main eventer on WWE's UK events, winning the Battle Royal at the Albert Hall in 1991, and defeating IRS to close out another UK Rampage earlier in 92. This time Bulldog would face his biggest test yet, challenging Intercontinental Champion, and his own brother in law, Bret Hart.

By this time Bret Hart was enjoying a second lengthy reign as Intercontinental champion. He had held the title almost continuously since August of 91, losing it to the Mountie due to illness then winning it back from Roddy Piper at Wrestlemania 8. It would soon be time for Bret to ascent from the workhouse title however, as in October of 92 he would defeat Ric Flair for his first of five world championships. There was just the matter of Bret having to drop the IC title first, so he did the honours for the British Bulldog in front of his fellow countrymen.

I mentioned before that Bret and Bulldog were brothers in law. Thats is because at the time Davey was married to Diana Hart, Bret's sister. Right before the match Diana is interviewed by Sean Mooney in the crowd, and is given the lofty task of selling the drama of the match, as she represented a division in the family that this match had created. Throughout the match there are camera cuts to Diana sitting in the crowd watching as a reminder that we were seeing family members battling over a prestigious prize. After the match Diana enters the ring and celebrates with both men, who shake hands, as a way of closing this story with the family is back together. This was of course just a storyline to build up the drama of the match, but more Harts would become involved later when Bret feuded with his brother Owen.

I'd be remiss is I didn't mention the opening video for the event, in which fans were asked to read lines about wrestlers on the show. One young fan said "the British Bulldog is gonna win, whether he wants to or not." Had social media been a thing at the time, this would likely have gone viral. In 2020, 28 years later,  the kid in the clip was found. I won't identify her in case I shouldn't, but she described that day as one of the best in her life, so hopefully she sees the funny side of that clip being remembered.

The Bulldog enters first to his trademark Rule Britannia music, led by London born Boxing champion Lennox Lewis. Across the crowd are Union Jacks and signs of support for the Bulldog. While there were boos upon the champions arrival, Bret had his share of fans too. In the later years of Brets WWE career the idea of him being a hero in Canada and a villain in the US was based on how popular Bret was not just in Canada, but everywhere else WWE went to internationally, especially the UK. By the time the opening bell rings, this intercontinental title main event has a special big fight feel.

One of the more memorable moments in this 25 minute main event was Bret Hart applying the Sharpshooter from his back. Both men are laying on the mat when Bret starts to configure their legs into position, he then rolls over and managed to stand up, locking Bulldog in the hold. Bret might have done this in other matches, but I don't remember ever seeing any other time, and the crowd reaction is amazing when Bret manages to complete the hold. *Editing note: Bret did this same move at Summerslam 1991, and likely more times than that.*

Following Bulldog making to the ropes to break the Sharpshooter, Bret makes a critical mistake. He hits the ropes and attempts a sunset flip, only for Bulldog to catch him in a flash pin, and win the championship as the crowd roars in approval. A flash pin is usually done to remind fans that a pinfall can occur at any time, and in this very evenly wrestled match it was the perfect choice for a finish. I just can't imagine Bulldog winning decisively with his running Powerslam having the same explosive reaction from the crowd. Following Bulldogs win Vince McMahon on commentary calls it one of the greatest wrestling matches ever, meaning that he does in fact know it when he sees it. Bulldog doesn't celebrate and his music doesn't play as Bret sits in the ring looking bitter. Bulldog offers a handshake,  and Bret teases leaving before coming back and celebrating with the new champion. I might be a little biased having seen this match dozens of times over the years, but to me this match is a classic.

Despite mine and many other fans' warm memories of this match, Bret Hart has expressed a different opinion in various interviews. Speaking to Inside the Ropes he recently claimed that by the time he got back to the locker room most everyone had left to get to the hotel, and thus didn't see him and Davey steal the show. He has also on record stated that due to his abuse of certain substances, Bulldog had forgotten the entire plan for the match, so Bret had to lead him through it. There are brief moments where knowing this you can tell Bulldog looks a little lost, but other than that Bulldog doesn't seem to miss a step at all. Bret's WWE career is littered with esteem-able performances, but this night might have been the British Bulldogs finest hour.

Triple H wins the WWE Championship for the first time - WWE Raw August 23rd 1999

This post is the script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the video version here: https://youtu.be/TS4nuY85Mi4

On August 23^rd 1999 WWE presented Raw from Ames Iowa, one night after the the 11^th Summerslam event. On this night Triple H would win the WWE championship for the first of fourteen world title reigns, cementing himself in the main event scene in the process, but there is a month of backstory that got Triple H to this night.

On the July 25^th episode of Sunday night Heat prior to the Fully Loaded pay per view, Jim Ross conducts a backstage interview with Helmsley. In it Triple H blurs the lines between storyline and reality, when he talks about the infamous Curtain Call from 1996, where he and his kliq friends celebrated in Madison Square Garden on Scott Hall and Kevin Nashs last night in the company. With them both leaving and Shawn Michaels being the WWE champion at the time, Triple H was the one punished. He was due to win the 1996 King of the Ring but didn’t, which ended up changing Steve Austins career for the better, and spent the next year floating in the lower card. Triple H talked about this candidly in the interview in a way fans weren’t used to seeing at the time, telling JR that he is going to shoot about his feelings on the matter. He rants about being punished for that, and rages against management in general before the line that changed his character. “You guys talk about being students of the game? I am the fucking Game JR. There is nobody who eats, sleeps and breathes this business more than me, and now its my time to prove that to the world. Summerslam is my time to take what is mine, and that is becoming the WWF champion” 

Over the following episodes of Raw, there would be various changes in who was the number

one contender set to challenge for Steve Austins WWE Championship. For a few weeks it even looked like Chyna had earned the contendership having defeated Triple H and Undertaker in a three way match, thanks to the interference of Steve Austin and referee Shawn Michaels. She next retained contendership by again beating Triple H again thanks to interference, but was then was defeated by Mankind, who went to a draw with Triple H. This resulted in a three way match being booked, with Austin defending against both Helmsley and Mankind.

This match was also special as it was to be refereed by legendary wrestler turned commentator turned politician, Jesse the Body Ventura. In 1998 Ventura had won his elected role as governor of Minnesota. In an unrelated movie fact, five years later his Predator and Running man co-star Arnold Schwarzenegger would become governator of California. Prior to this Ventura had left WWE on bad terms in the early 90’s. He then later became one of a few people in history to successfully sue the WWE and win, over royalties he believed he was due for his commentary appearing on home video releases. For a time his commentary was edited off so as not to have to pay him as much, but thankfully his commentary is back on the shows he worked.

At Summerslam 99, Steve Austin would lose the WWE championship cleanly to Mankind. For many years the prevailing rumour was that Steve Austin refused to lose to Triple H, not seeing him as championship material. Given that Austin would lose in a title match to Triple H at No Mercy months later, and again to end their feud at No Way Out 2001, and after that go on to team up with him as the two man power trip, I never thought this had much validity, and both Austin and Triple H have denied it also. Another rumour that feels more plausible, is that as an elected official, Jesse Ventura refused to put a heel over, and so counted the pin for Mankind, allowing Triple H to win the next night. This would be Mankinds third and final reign as WWE champion, and his three combined reigns add up to just 28 days.

One thing that is clear about this ending is that Steve Austin was likely supposed to lose the

title whoever was going to beat him. Austin had been dealing with nagging injuries for a long time at this point, and would have two months off from in ring action after this match. In storyline he was written off post match, as Triple H decided to take his frustrations out on him by injuring his leg, repeatedly hitting it with with a chair. Austin would have a few more televised matches until Survivor Series, where he was written out again by a hit and run attack, this time for nearly a year.

Throughout the night segments were shown of Ventura going over the rules of the match with all three men, establishing that he was taking his referee job seriously, and wouldn’t abide rule breaking. Crucially for what happens later, Jesse makes it clear he won’t abide the use of weapons. This led to a moment during the match where Triple H blatantly uses a chair as a weapon in front of Ventura. While this isn’t illegal technically, as triple threat matches traditionally have no disqualifications, its still cheating, so Jesse refuses to count the pin. In the end, Triple H didn’t win at Summerslam as he promised to, because of his own actions, but he would get another shot on Raw the next night, because of his own actions.

The August 23^rd Raw opened with Jim Ross conducting another interview with The Game, this time in the ring, and this time with horrible consequences for JR. On January 4^th 1999, Mankind coaxed the Rock into a title match that he would eventually win by threatening to break the arm of Shane McMahon until he got what he wanted. On this night, Triple H would use the same strategy, with JR being the innocent victim this time. This difference here, is that after Mankind agreed to defend the title against Triple H, he broke JR’s arm anyway, sending him out of the arena in an ambulance. Jim Ross would be replaced for the rest of the night by Michael Cole, and The Rock joins them for the main event.

On this episode of Raw seven matches happened, six of which were less than five five minutes long, and the main event would last nearly 9, typical of wrestling in the attitude era and strange to look back on by todays standards. After the Rock makes his entrance, Shane

McMahon enters, wearing a referee shirt. As soon as the champion Mankind enters the ring the action kicks off, with Triple H desperate to achieve his destiny. The two go at it while the Rock complains about his placement on the card having defeated Billy Gunn at Summerslam the previous night. Much like Jesse Ventura refused to count for Triple H at Summerslam, Shane refuses to count for Mankind, leading him to take Shane out with a Mandible Claw. He then applies the claw on Helmsley, but before a ref can come out, Chyna does, and gets a mandible claw from Mankind also. After hitting Mankind with a sickening looking unprotected chair shot, Triple H turns the chair to The Rock, blasting him out of his seat. With Shane back in the match, Triple H hits the pedigree in the middle of the ring, and Shane counts the three. In another call back to Mankinds WWF title win in January, back then Michael Cole exclaimed that “Mick Foley has achieved his dream, and the dream of every one who has been told, you can’t do it.” On this night, Jerry Lawler shouts that “Triple H has realised his dream, and its all about Triple H.”

The first of many world title reigns for Triple H would only end up lasting 22 days, as he would lose the championship on an early episode of Smackdown to of all people, Vince McMahon, in a storyline for another day. He would regain the championship a week later at Unforgiven in a six pack challenge beating five other contenders. Who was the man who was forced to count the three for this win? Special guest enforcer, Stone Cold Steve Austin, leading to their match at No Mercy the following month. By the end of 1999 Triple H was solidly a main event star, leading the WWE into one of its hottest years ever.