Empire's Look Back at Wrestlemania

**KINGOFOOTBALL** · 03-24-2011, 03:48 AM

Just watched history of Wrestlemania on Netflix. Good watch IMO.

Makes me want to read this thread. Was WWF the biggest CCTV seller then ?
Ive heard several times from old boxing fans and from venues who say alot of big boxing cards were CCTV back before PPV.

**Warner2BruceTD** · 03-24-2011, 09:16 AM

Boxing was on CC first, and most of the early CC wrestling shows bombed (Muhammad Ali vs Antonio Inoki being the most famous example. That show had an early Hogan/Andre match on the undercard).

There some some regional CC shows that did well (a few NWA/Charlotte shows for example) but CC was not a huge boon for wrestling on a national level until WrestleMania, but by WrestleMania III ppv was well established and CC was dead.

**Senser81** · 03-24-2011, 09:48 AM

I only watched the first three Wrestlemanias, and it definitely was more about the "show" than the actual wrestling back then. I do remember Andre the Giant bodyslamming Big John Studd and tossing money to people in the crowd. That blew my mind as a kid. I was a big British Bulldogs fan, and it was big news when they finally beat Valentine/Beefcake after losing to them so many times before.

Gorilla Monsoon was a great announcer. A white Gus Johnson.

**FedEx227** · 03-24-2011, 10:46 AM

Gorilla said HOLY MACREL! at least 67 times during Wrestlemania 1.

**Warner2BruceTD** · 03-24-2011, 11:20 AM

Can you blame him? I mean, did you see that Tito Santana vs. The Executioner match?

ACTION PERSONIFIED

**EmpireWF** · 03-24-2011, 11:25 AM

THIS PLACE IS GOING BANANAS!

**FedEx227** · 03-24-2011, 11:26 AM

RIGHT IN THE BREAD BASKET!

Gorilla Monsoon sucked honestly. His best stuff was with Heenan and that was about 90% Heenan's doing.

**Senser81** · 03-24-2011, 12:01 PM

Originally posted by FedEx227

Gorilla Monsoon sucked honestly. His best stuff was with Heenan and that was about 90% Heenan's doing.

Eat Shit!

DIE! MOTHERFUCKER!!

**FedEx227** · 03-24-2011, 12:09 PM

WOULD YOU STOP!?

**KINGOFOOTBALL** · 03-24-2011, 01:48 PM

This thread is Pandemonium !

Originally posted by Senser81

I only watched the first three Wrestlemanias, and it definitely was more about the "show" than the actual wrestling back then. I do remember Andre the Giant bodyslamming Big John Studd and tossing money to people in the crowd. That blew my mind as a kid. I was a big British Bulldogs fan, and it was big news when they finally beat Valentine/Beefcake after losing to them so many times before.

Gorilla Monsoon was a great announcer. A white Gus Johnson.

Gorilla Monsoon was THE best announcer.

Whether it was Bobby Heenan or Jesse the Body it really made things great to watch as a kid. I couldnt tolerate WCW/NWA souther twang announcers in comparison.

Mountain of Misinformation is still my favorite Monsoonism.

Boxing was on CC first, and most of the early CC wrestling shows bombed (Muhammad Ali vs Antonio Inoki being the most famous example. That show had an early Hogan/Andre match on the undercard).

There some some regional CC shows that did well (a few NWA/Charlotte shows for example) but CC was not a huge boon for wrestling on a national level until WrestleMania, but by WrestleMania III ppv was well established and CC was dead.

I recall watching wrestlemania 2 on some weird big screen replay. This place was a night club or something on weekends but had a replay of the event a few days later. I remember wondering why there was no ring when i walked in. Until they dropped the screen I was convinced they were gonna wrestle in front of me.

**EmpireWF** · 03-28-2011, 12:19 AM

There's about two weeks before Wrestlemania 27 and I have some free time so in an effort to get hyped for the show and whatever else, I'll be writing whatever I can about each Wrestlemania. Well, at least as many as I can do before April 3rd.

Some will be more drawn out than others because let's face it, there were some boring ass shows early on. So, without further ado.

Empire's History of Wrestlemania

Wrestlemania - 1985
Madison Square Garden
New York, NY

*The only WM show anyone in my immediate family attended as my dad went to the show (apparently, without my mom and older brother...who would have been about two at the time lol)*

Vince McMahon (don't call me Junior) purchased the then-World Wrestling Federation from his father Vince Sr. in 1982. He began raiding territories nationwide nearly immediately and ended up signing tons of talent in an effort to begin his ascent to a national promotion. His father passed away in the spring of 1984 and by that time, the WWF was already in full blown national expansion mode. The ROCK n WRESTLING marketing campaign kicked off around 1983 when Captain Lou Albano appeared in Cyndi Lauper's music video for Girls Just Want to Have Fun. Lauper ended up getting involved with WWF along with her manager David Wolff.

WWF ended up doing two major shows on MTV to reach a new audience. The first was the 'Brawl to End It All' and featured the leading female babyface Wendi Richter (with Lauper) being the woman to end Fabulous Moolah's (with Albano) ridiculous near-three decade long title run. This took place in the summer of '84 at the Garden. At the end of 1984 at a house show at MSG, with Dick Clark present, Lauper was given an award by the WWF for her charitable efforts and Albano was also recognized (he turned face some time before). Hogan was given a gold record in the ceremony, too. Roddy Piper and Bob Orton Jr. crashed the party, attacking Albano and pushing Lauper down while also attacking Wolff. Piper ran away when Hogan chased him. (It was backstage during this show that Doctor D. slapped "reporter" John Stossel for asking if wrestling was fake. Stossel suffered some hearing loss due to the assault and he later sued WWE...)

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjElegmShYY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjElegmShYY[/ame]

This led to the 'War to Settle the Score' in February 1985 on MTV at the Garden built around a main event between Hogan and Piper. Earlier that night, Richter lost the title due to interference from Moolah to Leilani Kai. In the main event, Paul Orndorff ran in and helped Piper beat down Hogan as the match finished in a DQ. Mr. T ran out of the crowd to help Hogan and they had a stare down with Piper and Orndorff.

One of those MTV shows ended up doing the biggest rating in MTV history which is still a record to this day (a 9 something I believe).

Amazingly, they were doing anywhere from 15,000 to 20,000+ on a monthly basis at the Garden.

Wrestlemania 1 was a big risk for the McMahons as they invested much of their wealth at the time in making it work. Unless you were in NYC to attend the show, the only other way to see it was via closed circuit television. The gamble paid off as it ended up being the biggest closed circuit audience ever at the time.

The show itself in terms of actual wrestling was the shits. Of the nine match card, only two went more than eight minutes. The main matches on the card included the Iron Sheik & Volkoff beating Rotundo & Windham to win the tag team titles, Andre body slamming John Studd and tossing cash around ringside, Wendi Richter pinning Leilani Kai to win back the title and of course the main event.

They brought in Muhammad Ali to participate and after originally planning for him to be the actual referee, they realized he was not in the condition to do so and made him a ringside "enforcer" of sorts. Ali was so excited at one point, he went into the ring and threw a punch at Orndorff or Piper, I forgot which. The referee of the match, Pat Patterson did his damnedest to get Ali back out of the ring.

Hogan and Mr. T beat Piper and Orndorff (Mr. Wonderful took the pinfall).

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxiqxLrLxYo"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxiqxLrLxYo[/ame]

----------------------

Wrestlemania 2 - 1986
Nassau Coliseum / Long Island, New York
Rosemont Horizon / Rosemont, Illinois
L.A. Sports Arena / Los Angeles, California

The sequel is the first and only WM to take place in more than one city. The total card consisted of 12 matches with each location hosting four. The main event in New York saw the conclusion of the Piper/Mr. T rivalry in a boxing match. In the fourth round, Piper bodyslammed Mr. T.

In Illinois, Moolah retained the title against Velvet McIntyre. Months earlier in 1985, as the masked spider lady pinned Richter in a shoot. Apparently, Richter became a bit of a diva and Vince did not want to keep her around. So he sent Richter in there to forcibly pin Richter and she was gone soon after (which essentially happened a decade later minus the shoot aspect with Sable and Chyna). In a 20-man battle royal featuring such NFL players as Ed Jones, Bill Fralic, Ernie Holmes, Harvey Martin, Jim Covert, Russ Francis and The Fridge, Andre the Giant won by eliminating Bret Hart. Then in the main event, the British Bulldogs beat Greg Valentine & Brutus Beefcake (who were actually a pretty damn good team) to win the tag titles.

The L.A. main event saw Hulk Hogan retain the world title by beating King Kong Bundy in a steel cage.

Once again, the show from a wrestling standpoint was the shits. Six matches went about five minutes or less. The best match was definitely the tag title match. This show was best remembered for the battle royal and the boxing match.

Wrestlemania 2 holds two distinctions: A) It was the latest date of any WM = April 7th and B) It is the only WM to take place on a MONDAY :smug2:

--------------------

Wrestlemania 3 - 1987
Pontiac Silverdome
Pontiac, Michigan

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLsO9LxT7lE"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLsO9LxT7lE[/ame]

The first real BIG show and it was all about marketing. Despite the fact that Andre had lost many times (although never on WWF television) and been bodyslammed (never on WWF television) in the past, they built him as having been undefeated for 15 years. And although the match itself was horrible from an in-ring standpoint, you cannot argue with the fact that it's perhaps the most memorable feud in the promotions history. The scene of Andre turning heel by demanding a title shot and ripping Hogan's cross off is replayed many times around this time of year. Although he was barely able to move around the ring, the scene of Hogan slamming him inside the packed Silverdome is an awesome sight.

Speaking of marketing, this is the show they claim did 93,173 people to claim the indoor attendance record. The legit number is said to be closer to 65,000, but who's counting. As for the record, it now belongs to Cowboys Stadium for last year's NBA All Star Game.

This was suppose to be Roddy Piper's "retirement" match when he beat Adrian Adonis (the fat version, although he could still work) in a hair match. Piper turned face months earlier and had been one of the top babyfaces but he left for Hollywood (They Live is a legit awesome film, btw). As for Adonis, he ended up leaving WWF for the AWA and by the summer of 1988 was dead due to an automobile accident.

The first classic match in WM history is the famed IC title bout between Randy Savage and Ricky Steamboat. The two had the longest match on the show at nearly 15 minutes and put on a clinic in a match that's regarded by some as the best ever, still. Steamboat has told the story of how Savage had practically every detail of the match, every hold, etc. planned out and written in a notebook that the two went over until they memorized it.

Back to Hogan/Andre, on the newest Legends Roundtable (24/7 FTW), Pat Patterson spoke of how Hogan was legit worried going into the match about whether Andre was going to lose. Apparently, Andre was having some fun and ribbing Hogan or whatever the hell he was doing because Bret Hart said when he spoke with Andre, he was happy to lose. Either way, Hogan didn't know for sure. At least, according to Pat.

WM 3 was also the first show to feature the ring carts to drive the guys down the long ass aisle way which was always fun to see when I was a kid.

Although WM 1 and 2 were available in some markets on PPV, this is the first show to be widely available and did monster business.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ2NVncV8Zo"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZ2NVncV8Zo[/ame]

Here's clips of a match between the two in New Japan in 1982

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-BJhXsw1vM"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-BJhXsw1vM[/ame]

------------------

Wrestlemania 4 - 1988
Trump Plaza
Atlantic City, New Jersey

According to the "True Story of WM" DVD, Donald Trump badly wanted Wrestlemania and no doubt paid a hefty price to host it. Despite the tournament format, which was unique, it was a bad show. I watched it back the other week on 24/7 and damn.

Here's the deal. Earlier in the year at the Main Event special on NBC, Hogan and Andre had their rematch for the title. Andre won the match thanks to having a crooked referee (which was the introduction of Earl Hebner, Dave's twin brother). With Hogan's three-year plus reign over, Andre immediately sold the belt to Ted Dibiase. However, WWF President Jack Tunney ruled they could not do that and the title was vacated. It was to be decided in a 14 man tournament at Wrestlemania. The show was promoted on featuring the next match between Hogan and Andre, which was to be a second round match with each receiving first round byes.

The opener was notable for being the second battle royal in WM history and featured Bret Hart's face turn as he got revenge on Bad News Brown for turning on him late in the match.

Look back at the participants in the tournament and here's who you get: Hogan, Andre, Savage, Steamboat, Dibiase, Rude, Jake Roberts, Bigelow (who was working with an injured knee), One Man Gang, Valentine, Dino Bravo, Muraco, Duggan and Butch Reed.

Hogan and Andre fought to a double disqualification courtesy of a chair (yes, both men used a chair on the other back in 1988). Before that, both Rude and Roberts fought to a draw with neither advancing. So it was obvious the finals would be between Savage and Dibiase. The match itself was okay but consisted mostly of Andre interfering, then Elizabeth getting Hogan to even the odds. Hogan helps Savage win the belt and boom, the build to the following WM begins right away.

The best match on the show was the tag title match that saw Demolition win the belts against Strikeforce (Martel and Santana).

If you like watching Bobby Heenan goof around by being scared of perhaps the nicest bulldog in the world, Matilda, then there's that for you. This was also the WM that featured the classic backstage "interview" where Andre choked Bob Uecker (making his second consecutive WM appearance) and then laughing as he walked out of the camera shot.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMFqdMNbMSo"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMFqdMNbMSo[/ame]

If I remember right, WM 4 did not do all that well on PPV in some part because the NWA decided to fight fire with fire (Vince created the Survivor Series in 1987 to run opposite Starrcade) by creating the Clash of the Champions series and having the first one on the same night as WM 4. The main event of the first Clash saw champion Ric Flair and Sting fight to a 45-minute draw in a performance that MADE Sting.
--------------

Wrestlemania 5 - 1989
Trump Plaza
Atlantic City, New Jersey

Trump must have paid a nice amount of money to get WM for two consecutive years.

This show is not all that memorable beyond the main event but it featured the WM debuts of the following guys: Big Bossman, Shawn Michaels, Owen Hart, Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard.

I don't remember much but I imagine three of the five tag matches were good (Akeem/Bossman vs. Rockers, Arn/Tully vs. Strikeforce, Hart Foundation vs. Honky/Valentine). Imagine that, tag team wrestling.

Rick Rude defeated the Ultimate Warrior to win the IC title.

The main event was built around heel champion Savage defending against Hogan. In one of my favorite angles that literally began in the final moments of Wrestlemania 4...Savage grew jealous believing Hogan wanted to get with Elizabeth. The two tagged for a bit but they ended up breaking up on SNME when Savage accidentally ran into Elizabeth at ringside. Hogan carried her to the back for help as Savage got his ass beat. Hogan went back to ringside to save Savage but afterwards, Randy went ballistic and kicked his ass for wanting Elizabeth.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEDhg0ECYdk"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEDhg0ECYdk[/ame]

Without a doubt, it was the first great Wrestlemania main event because Hogan was able to work a longer match with Savage. It went just under 20 minutes and of course ended with Hogan regaining the belt (for my money, until Michaels went on his run, Savage was the early Mr. Wrestlemania).

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkNiMC5hdY8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkNiMC5hdY8[/ame]

----------------------

Wrestlemania 6 - 1990
Skydome
Toronto, Ontario, Canada

This show saw Andre finally turn face after being slapped by Bobby Heenan.

Mr. Perfect's first live television loss happened here when he lost to Brutus Beefcake of all people.

A half white-half black Roddy Piper returned for his first WM match since 1987 where he went to a double countout with Bad News Brown. The shortest WM match also took place here as the Hart Foundation beat Volkoff and Boris Zhukov in under 20 seconds.

This was a pretty bad show until the main event, in other words. They wanted to make a new star and the Ultimate Warrior was dat dude. To their credit, both men busted their asses for over 20 minutes and had arguably the best match of both their careers.

-----------------

Wrestlemania 7 - 1991
L.A. Sports Arena
Los Angeles, California

Much like the majority of the first decade in WM history, this show was a mixed bag.

First, the venue controversy lol. They originally intended to run the huge LA Coliseum but ticket sales were the shits so they ended up moving it to the Sports Arena. The PR reason they gave for the switch was for safety reasons because of "bomb threats." Oh that crazy Vince.

This was the first Wrestlemania without Jesse Ventura on commentary as Bobby Heenan took over when he left. The theme of the show was PATRIOTISM as the Gulf War ended about a month earlier (America would return for a rematch twelve years later, but that's a story for the deep end) and Vince McMahon

as much as anybody when he could "exploit" the war for his gain. He called Sgt. Slaughter and recruited him to be Hulk Hogan's villain, believing turning Slaughter heel as an Iraqi sympathizer would make for big bucks. He was wrong. Slaughter returned in 1990 and turned heel during the summer and went on to beat the Ultimate Warrior at the Rumble to become champion (the Warrior experiment was a flop and instead of doing the rematch for Hogan to get his win back, McMahon went with this story).

Slaughter cut some hysterical promos about Hogan, America, Saddam Hussein, etc. and even burned a Hulkamania tee-shirt (I recall a story where someone wanted him to burn the American flag but thankfully for obvious reasons, that never happened). They worked for months at house shows before and after and the two actually had decent chemistry. It wasn't a classic by any means but it was a solid main event with a pretty hot crowd all things considered. Hogan bled a gusher and defeated Slaughter in the main event to win his third WWF championship. They feuded through Summer Slam but shortly after, Slaughter turned face and was gone by the following year (he wouldn't return until 1997).

Virgil fought Ted Dibiase and won by countout. He finally turned on the Million Dollar Man at the Rumble and this was their first match. It's still amazing that this feud was slowly built for nearly four years before they pulled the trigger. Granted it went nowhere but Virgil was a solid mid-card act for the next year.

The Road Warriors as the Legion of Doom made their Wrestlemania debut (they came to WWF for the first time in the middle of 1990) and squashed Power and Glory (Roma and Hercules...who had one of the best tag team finishers ever btw) in under a minute. They would go on to win the tag titles at Summer Slam.

Speaking of tag straps, this was the last Wrestlemania featuring the Hart Foundation because after this event, they began Bret's push as a singles guy. He and Neidhart lost the tag straps to the Nasty Boys...who lost the straps to LOD a few months later.

In a double dipper of roided up monsters, Kerry Von Erich made his final Wrestlemania appearance defeating Dino Bravo...who also made his final Wrestlemania appearance (both would die due to gun shot wounds in 1993...Kerry a suicide when he was facing jail time on drug charges and Bravo a murder, believed to be an organized crime hit in Canada). Then a gigantic British Bulldog beat an even bigger Warlord.

Four more worthy notes...

Jake Roberts and Rick Martel had the first ever blindfold match in WWE. It consisted of each man wearing a hood where they supposedly could not see, having to fight. It was a silly match, 'nuff said.

Tenryu and Koji Kitao beat Demolition (who were on their way out by this time) in a tag match...the Japanese team were on loan from the Super World of Sports promotion. Kitao would go on to half a brief MMA career including a fight in the UFC and on the first PRIDE card.

This was the Wrestlemania debut of THE UNDERTAKER. He debuted at Survivor Series about four months earlier and squashed Jimmy Snuka here. Absolutely nobody could have guessed what kind of career he would go on to have.

With all that out of the way, this show is most memorable for the AWESOME retirement match between the Ultimate Warrior and Randy Savage (with Sensational Sherri). After Wrestlemania 5, Savage and Elizabeth were done on camera as Sherri became his manager. They remained separate for over a year and half until this show. At the Rumble, it was Savage who cost Warrior the title against Slaughter when he hit him with the sceptre. Warrior was furious and their Wrestlemania match was set with the added retirement stipulation.

It was arguably the greatest match of Warrior's career (only comparable matches were with Hogan and Rick Rude) as the two went back and forth for twenty minutes. The finish saw Savage land SEVERAL top rope elbow drops but still could not pin Warrior. Eventually, it was Warrior who pinned Savage after a few shoulder blocks. Warrior celebrated and left the ring.

Sensational Sherri was PISSED at Savage for losing and began kicking him. All of a sudden, Elizabeth (who was shown in the audience, sitting by the aisle way during the match) jumped the rail, ran into the ring and knocked down Sherri as the crowd popped BIG TIME. With Sherri gone, Elizabeth tried to get Savage's attention and when he finally realized what happened, the two embraced and the place erupted. They even showed several women in the crowd crying their eyes out, it was hilarious.

<object width="480" height="360"><param name="movie" value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x80s30"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x80s30" width="480" height="360" wmode="direct" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed></object> <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x80s30_wwe-wrestlemania-vii-macho-man-vs-u_sport" target="_blank">WWE-WrestleMania VII - Macho Man vs Ultimate...</a> by <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/M-Gronjol" target="_blank">M-Gronjol</a>

Post Script: Warrior became a bigger pain in Vince's ass and he was fired after Summer Slam mainly for no showing dates and who knows what else (money no doubt, too). Savage turned face at the end of the match and held up the stip, turning into a color commentator. On TV, Savage proposed to Elizabeth (the two were married in real life for years by this point) and they had their ceremony at the Summer Slam 1991 PPV. On TV afterwards, they aired the "wedding party" where a bunch of other wrestlers were present. Jake Roberts' wedding gift was a snake that scared Elizabeth...Taker attacked Savage and both were chased away. Savage wanted to be reinstated to get revenge. This went on for several months until the infamous snake bite incident on an October episode of Superstars (Savage was goated by Jake, and ran into the ring to finally fight back. Jake attacked Savage with a real life snake that was apparently venemous to a degree because it died a short time afterwards (Savage was okay). Finally, Jack Tunney reinstated Savage and the two would have a match at Tuesday in Texas on PPV (it was a one-time Tuesday PPV in November 1991).....Savage won but afterward, Jake got the upper hand and berated Elizabeth leading up to the point when he actually SLAPPED her. The feud continued into 1992 and culminated at Saturday Night's Main Event in February when Savage again won. After the match, Undertaker turned face by stopping Roberts from attacking Savage and Elizabeth when they came through the curtain.

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Wrestlemania 8 - 1992
Hoosier Dome
Indianapolis, Indiana

Back to a HUGE building here, the production and appearance of the building was phenomenal. From a wrestling standpoint, it seems this is judged differently by everyone. While the majority of the show featured your routine WM meaningless bouts, two great matches and a pretty good opener were fun for me.

This was the first Wrestlemania for a heel Shawn Michaels as he turned on Marty Janetty months earlier on the barbershop. This also marked the third time Shawn was involved in a WM opener (5, 7, 8). His singles push continued here with a win over Tito Santana as the Matador.

Undertaker's face turn was in full effect here as he went to 2-0 at WM with a win over Jake Roberts.

In a GREAT match for the IC title, Bret Hart beat Roddy Piper to win it back. Bret was the champion in late 1991, but they had Mountie beat him with the storyline that Bret was ill with the flu. Then Piper beat the Mountie at the Rumble to win his first ever singles WWF title. Here, it was a face vs. face match and the two put on a classic for 14 minutes. Also at this time in WWF, Vince had a rule of no blading, he wanted no gushers. Bret prided himself here because during the match, he in fact bladed, but did it in a way that everyone assumed it was an accident during the course of the match. Vince wasn't the wiser and Bret didn't get in trouble (later on, Flair bladed, bled a gusher and ended up getting a talking to from Vince and he was fined). This really helped push Bret even more because Piper rarely, if ever, lost by pinfall in singles matches. Not even Hogan had beaten him on TV in a singles match by pinfall by that point.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFPhoPtAF3k"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFPhoPtAF3k[/ame]

For many guys, this would end up being their last Wrestlemania for a while or forever: Bossman, Virgil, Slaughter, Duggan, Nasty Boys, Repo Man, Rick Martel, Typhoon, Skinner, Roberts, Santana. Times were changing.

Owen Hart returned for his next WM match, this time without the Blue Blazer gimmick and beat Skinner in a squash. In tag team action, Earthquake and Typhoon beat Money Inc. to win the tag belts. Plus, Tatanka's singles push continued with a win over Martel.

The two big matches on the show were Ric Flair defending the world title against Randy Savage and then Hulk Hogan vs. Sid.

Flair had made the jump to the WWF in the fall of 1991 as NWA champion, with the belt and all. I can only imagine the excitement for fans at the time. Well, they began doing Flair/Hogan matches at house shows in late 1991 and for whatever reason, the feedback was not great. Although the original plan was for Flair/Hogan at Wrestlemania, Vince changed his mind in early 1992 (they were even promoting a Flair/Hogan WM) and went with the new card.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qfIk-e9iWY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qfIk-e9iWY[/ame]

Flair began doing promos about how he and Elizabeth had been together and produced doctored photos of the two eating together, hanging out by the pool, etc. He promised he would reveal nude photos of her at Wrestlemania (or something to that effect lol). Savage and Flair had a great near-20 minute match resulting in Savage's second title run.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GTW7O6tr5I"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GTW7O6tr5I[/ame]

The main event saw Hogan beat Sid by DQ.

Originally, Vince figured Sid could be his next HUGE (literal and figurative) babyface but things changed and he was turned in 1992 (despite being cheered during the Rumble...Hogan was bood but they altered the soundtrack when replaying the footage on WWF TV). By this point in 1992, Sid had either already failed a drug test or something else was a problem because he was on his way out after WM. The planned finish was going to be after Hogan hit the leg drop, Papa Shango would interefere for the DQ. Well, Shango missed his cue and Sid had to kick out of the leg drop (which was a funny sight) and after the ref called a silly looking DQ, then Shango ran down to attack Hogan.

The big conclusion was the return of the Ultimate Warrior. He had been gone since the summer of 1991 and came back with short hair (some people believed it was a new Warrior, it wasn't). Warrior saved Hogan and the two posed as the show went off the air.

Post-Script
Flair would defeat Savage to win his 2nd WWF title in September, who then lost it to Bret Hart (who lost the IC title to Bulldog at Summer Slam) in October. It was Bret's first run with the belt. As for Flair, he was unhappy and was allowed to get out of his contract. His final two WWF dates were the 1993 Rumble and then the night after when he lost a loser leaves town match to Mr. Perfect on RAW. Flair would not return to WWF until November 2001.

Warrior didn't last long...again. He lost a WWF title match to Savage at Summer Slam and was planned for a tag match with Savage against Flair and Razor Ramon at Survivor Series. Then he was fired, believed to be due to the steroid issue (by this time, Vince was fully embroiled in a steroid trial and was forced to clean up...hence putting the belt on Bret)....Bulldog was also fired. Taking Warrior's place was Mr. Perfect who turned face and returned to the ring for the first time since being forced into retirement in 1991 due to a back injury.

In real life, Savage and Elizabeth separated and divorced in 1992 and she never returned to WWF TV past an appearance on Prime Time around August or September that year.

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Wrestlemania 9 - 1993
Caesars Palace
Las Vegas, Nevada

The first Wrestlemania to take place outdoors in a custom built arena. According to the new True Story of WM DVD, they shot documentary footage backstage the weekend of this Wrestlemania and they even showed some of the footage (Vince discussing thinks with Shawn and Luger....Hogan and Giant Gonzalez playing around, Yokozuna with his son, Bret goofing off).

This is widely considered one of the worst Wrestlemania's of all-time.

Jim Ross made his WWF debut at this event while this would prove to be Heenan's last WM until he returned for the gimmick battle royal in 2001.

Shawn Michaels opened up another Wrestlemania as he lost via count out to Tatanka in a pretty good match until the stupid ending. Then the Steiner Brothers beat the Headshrinkers in another pretty good match. Then the show fell off a cliff.

Doink (Matt Borne....this version of the character was actually fucking awesome as he was a heel) beat Crush, Razor Ramon beat a returning Bob Backlund, Lex Luger beat Mr. Perfect and the Undertaker beat Giant Gonzalez in a horrible match.

Money Inc. retained the tag titles by beating Hogan and Beefcake by DQ (should have been a sign). Hogan had a black eye which rumor had it, he received courtesy of Macho Man in real life because he did something with Elizabeth. In reality, he had a boating accident and that's how he got the black eye. Beefcake's face was legit fucked up because of a different boating accident which forced him to work with a mask.

The main event saw Bret Hart headline his first WM as champion defending against Yokozuna who run the rumble to get the shot (the first time the rumble winner earned an automatic WM main event spot). The short match was pretty solid all things considered but it ended with Yokozuna pinning Bret after interference from Mr. Fuji. Then the shit hit the fan lol.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkIXKsymZVU"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkIXKsymZVU[/ame]

Hogan came out and with Bret's approval, fought Yokozuna in an impromptu match, winning his fifth WWF title in twenty-one seconds. It would mark Hogan's last WM appearance until his return in 2002.

Originally, it seemed that the obvious road was to have Hogan and Bret fight at Summer Slam for the belt. It did not happen as instead, Hogan lost at the show to Yokozuna and was out of the company a short time thereafter. Bret has since held some sort of grudge against Hogan for believing he refused to drop the belt to him.

-----------------

Wrestlemania 10 - 1994
Madison Square Garden
New York, NY

I went to the Fan Fest at the Garden before this event and it was pretty sweet (remember getting autographs from Michaels, Vince, Blassie, the Bushwackers and seeing Bam Bam and Sean Waltman walking around and at least in Bigelow's case, standing out like a sore thumb.

This was a downtime in business as Hogan was gone and they tried to make new stars in Luger and Bret. Luger didn't pan out, but here was Bret.

Vince was acquitted of all the steroid charges in 1994 (I think it was during the summer that he was actually acquitted).

The show opened with the BEST opener in Wrestlemania history and arguably a top 10 match all-time in the show's history. Owen Hart turned heel at Survivor Series the previous year and then attacked his brother at the Rumble. Finally, Bret accepted the challenge and the two met. They put on a crisp clinic for twenty minutes ending with Owen scoring the upset pin. Great match.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A216xpgIQ_k"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A216xpgIQ_k[/ame]

Randy Savage wrestled in his final WM match ever as he defeated Crush in a silly falls count anywhere match. By the end of the year, Savage was gone and had signed with WCW. McMahon thanked him on air after he left, but he has never been brought back for unknown reasons.

Men on a Mission (Mabel & Mo) won the tag titles by beating the Quebecers in a forgettable match.

The main event was a series of two matches because Luger and Bret had both been eliminated at the same time at the rumble and both were considered #1 contenders. After a coin flip on RAW, it was decided Luger would get first crack at the champion, Yokozuna with the winner defending against Bret in the main event. This show was pretty much the end of Luger's time as a #2 babyface. Despite being pushed to the moon during the spring and summer of 1993, they did not give him the title at Summerslam for unknown reasons. All of the momentum was murdered and he just floated along. Here, he lost to Yokozuna by DQ with some funny business from the returning Mr. Perfect who was the special referee.

In the main event, Bret Hart beat Yokozuna after the latter fell off the ropes and Bret pinned him. Seriously. After winning his second WWF title, the babyfaces came out to hoist Bret on their shoulders and celebrate as the new generation had emerged.

The match that stole the show and has been talked about ad nauseum is the ladder match. It wasn't the first ladder match ever, or even the first ladder match in WWF history. However, it was the first ladder match to be promoted on national TV. What happened was Shawn Michaels was the IC champion in 1993. I forget which but it was either a drug issue or a contract issue and I want to say it was a contract issue. They took the belt off Shawn (claiming the 30-day rule) and held it up in a battle royal. After being the final two men, Razor beat Martel to win the title for the first time. When Shawn finally worked out his contract issue and returned to TV, he still carried around his IC title and claimed to be the real champion. So they decided to put both belts up in the ladder match.

Looking back, it is probably the best ladder match in WWF history in some part because it's the first and it set the bar so high. There weren't any really insane moves with the ladder besides using it as a weapon here and there. Shawn bumped around like his usual self and they stole the show. Razor won the match and became the undisputed IC champion as Shawn emerged as a legit player in the new "smaller" WWF.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHzJ4H298u8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHzJ4H298u8[/ame]

-----------
*Forgot to mention Undertaker in my WM 10 write-up. He didn't appear on the show because for the first time since debuting in 1990, he took time off to heal up some nagging injuries and just chill.

Wrestlemania 11 - 1995
Hartford Civic Center
Hartford, Connecticut

This edition of WM holds the distinction of being the worst attended Wrestlemania of all-time, as long as you consider Wrestlemania 2's separate figures as one.

In my glorious opinion, this year was the hands down worst Wrestlemania ever. The original show in 1985 kind of gets a pass from me because it was the first and it was what it was. Wrestlemania 2 may actually be the worst depending on the day, but any which way you slice it....1995 sucked.

It was an odd and a bad time in WWF because the product in every conceivable way was just not good. They took the belt off Bret for reasons I'm still not entirely sure of at Survivor Series and put it on Bob Backlund who became a serious heel when he attacked Bret on Superstars. Backlund then dropped it in December in mere seconds to Diesel who had turned face at Survivor Series, going after Shawn Michaels. At this show, Bret fought Backlund in an "I Quit" match which is not one of Bret's most favorite matches. It wasn't good, to put it mildly.

Lex Luger made his final Wrestlemania appearance as part of a tag team with the British Bulldog as they defeated the Blu Brothers (the Harris Twins). Jeff Jarrett had made his way to WWE months earlier and started feuding with Razor Ramon for the IC title. Although they had good chemistry, this match was nothing to write home about. Meanwhile, Undertaker had been feuding with Ted Dibiase's Corporation and beat King Kong Bundy here in a forgettable match.

Owen Hart revealed his mystery tag team partner to be Yokozuna as they beat Billy & Bart, the Smoking Gunns to win the tag titles. This would begin a stretch where for the most part, Owen was a great tag worker with the likes of Yokozuna, the British Bulldog and Jeff Jarrett until his untimely passing.

The title match saw champion Diesel defend against Shawn Michaels in his first Wrestlemania main event. Shawn won the 1995 Rumble (being the first #1 entrant to win) to earn the title shot. Shawn's new bodyguard in the build to this match was the returning Sid. To add some flair for the show, they brought in Playboy model and Baywatch star Pam Anderson (before she became what she is today...pre-Tommy sex video too) to be in Diesel's corner and then fellow Playboy model and new MTV star (Singled Out was awesome, btw) Jenny McCarthy to be in Shawn's corner. They did nothing but look fucking hot, which is always welcome.

The match itself was actually pretty damn good considering Diesel was, well, he was Diesel after all. This would be Shawn's first legit sign of delivering on the big stage, work wise. They went back and forth with Shawn using his speed, Diesel using his power, some brawling, etc. until the the end sequence. Shawn hit Diesel with the superkick and went for the pin but Sid accidentally distracted the ref. The delay allowed Diesel to time to recover and he ended up powerbombing Shawn for the win.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHcRlNCcRTU"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHcRlNCcRTU[/ame]

The next night on RAW, Shawn essentially fired Sid feeling he cost him the title. Sid didn't take this too well and powerbombed him about five times until Diesel ran in for the save. And boom, Shawn turned face and was pretty much the #2 babyface, behind Diesel but ahead of Bret (because Bret was mired in mid-card feuds until the end of the year).

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh6hXIfexlg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh6hXIfexlg[/ame]

With all that, Wrestlemania 11 is really all about one man. The greatest defensive football player to ever step on a field....LAWRENCE TAYLOR. It all started at the Rumble where Taylor was sitting ringside. Bam Bam Bigelow lost a match and didn't take too kindly to LT laughing at him. So Bam Bam and LT had a few words until Bam Bam shoved him and it was on. This was their first time involving a celebrity in a wrestling match at WM since 1986 and Mr. T. So the match was set for Wrestlemania. The story goes that Vince chose Bam Bam for the spot because of his great look and the fact that he was a good worker and could take LT to a good match. For the most part, it worked out well. They got a ton of press for LT's involvement and even though they had Taylor beat Bam Bam with a jumping punch off the middle rope, I liked it. Sure, it may have been a bit goofy to have a one-time appearing guy beat one of your main heels, but so what. It's LT and it's Wrestlemania. Also, depending on who you want to believe, Bam Bam was promised a run as one of the top guys after WM but he ended up leaving a few months later. Hearing him talk about it in the years before his death, let's just say he was not a big fan of the Kliq.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGLY2lInZ_8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGLY2lInZ_8[/ame]

-----------------

Wrestlemania 12 - 1996
Arrowhead Pond
Anaheim, California

This Wrestlemania is a mixed bag. Depending on your thoughts of the main event, it was either an above average Wrestlemania or it was average at best. Me? The iron man match wasn't my favorite match and I feel they could have done the whole match without having an iron man setting. The story goes according to Pat Patterson that he wanted to see Bret and Shawn wrestle an iron man match for years but Vince was never sold on doing it on PPV because of the one-hour time. Well, they needed a main event here and Vince decided to use it. Bret won the title at Survivor Series from Diesel who had been a tweener by that point, playing up a heel while keeping some face characteristics. He was fun to watch at that point but it didn't last long...well, not in WWF.

First, :vader: made his Wrestlemania debut here after making his WWF debut at the Rumble. He immediately feuded with Yokozuna (who turned face) and in a six-man, :vader:, Owen and Bulldog beat Yokozuna, Jake Roberts (who returned some time before) and rookie Ahmed Johnson.

Steve Austin made his Wrestlemania debut as the Ringmaster, a protege of Ted Dibiase as he beat Savio Vega in a pretty good ten minute match. Who knew that by the following year, he'd be the most exciting guy in the company?

Speaking of who the fuck knew? The Ultimate Warrior returned and squashed Hunter Hearst Helmsley in about 90 seconds. HHH has told the story of how earlier that day in the locker room, Warrior went up to him and asked him what his finisher was. Hunter told him and Warrior replied he'll kick out and then they'll do their finish. Needless to say, Hunter is not Warrior's biggest fan. Ironically, Warrior was gone within a few months which set up the face turn of Sid (who filled in as a partner for Shawn and Ahmed at an In Your House PPV).

The Undertaker and Diesel had a pretty damn good match that saw Taker beat him with the tombstone. Razor was not on the card and both he and Nash left for WCW in May.

There was a "backlot brawl" between Roddy Piper and Goldust that was done mostly in the parking lot. They popped in some footage of the O.J. chase scene and it ended up with Piper beating Goldust in the ring.

The main event was an hour-long iron man match where the winner would be determined by who got the most falls or submissions at the end of the time period. Well, Bret and Shawn were not hated rivals at this point but they were not close friends either. They worked an hour long without a single fall or submission and WWF President Gorilla Monsoon said there must be a winner and installed a sudden death time. Shawn pretty quickly hit him with the superkick and won his first title.

The plan was for Shawn to have his run and then return the favor to Bret the following year...but shit happens.

------------------

Since Shawn wasn't champion, let me cover his run for a bit. Shawn's first run with the title from a quality standpoint was obviously good. He worked with an assortment of guys and almost always had very good to great matches. His first PPV as champion, he wrestled Diesel (who was a full on heel by then) in his last WWF PPV match until his return after WCW died. It's my second favorite Diesel match (behind only the Survivor Series 1995 match with Bret). He also had some great matches with Vader, Mankind and Bulldog, but business wasn't great. I'm not so sure he should get a lot of the blame (although he does for being champ) because anyone in that spot, it would not have mattered. WCW had struck gold with the nWo angle in May and began kicking WWF's ass in the TV ratings battle. RAW was for the most part shit at this point while WCW had tons of top guys (Hogan, Sting, Hall, Nash, Flair, Giant) along with underneath guys who could work up a storm (the luchas, Benoit, Guerrero, Regal, etc.). Shawn buckled a bit under the pressure as he was known to be difficult to work with and would get visibly pissed off at times in matches. His sulking attitude and political style did not make him many friends but I guess that wasn't his job.

Here's video of Shawn's "lost smile" speech...notice the "We Want Sid" chants lol. Also notice Vince stroking him with all the compliments.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVlC2eqdopA"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVlC2eqdopA[/ame]

At the end, they decided to pull an audible and switch things up by having Shawn lose the belt at MSG to Sid (if you ever watch this match, Sid was working as a full fledged babyface and the crowd treating Shawn like the heel). He regained the belt at the Alamo Dome at the Rumble (a heavily papered attendance....Shawn was not a big draw, even in his hometown) and all was well in the world as he was on pace to go to WM and lose to Bret.

Nope.

On a February special RAW on a Thursday, Shawn announced he was forfeiting the title because he "lost his smile" and alluded that we saw the last of him because of a serious knee injury. Looking back at it now as Vince acted like a teenage girl who found out Justin Bieber was forced to stop singing, it's half comical and half just plain ol STUPID AS FUCK. Despite what he claimed, when Shawn went to Dr. James Andrews, there was no surgery done and if he was more banged up than usual, well, he got the rest he needed.

With Shawn out of the picture, they called an audible. Bret won the vacant title at the February PPV but lost it the next night on RAW to Sid because of intereference from Steve Austin. They went with Sid and Undertaker and Bret and Austin underneath. Apparently, they panicked and went with the "big guys" on top.

Wrestlemania 13 - 1997
Rosemont Horizon
Rosemont, Illinois

This was the last Wrestlemania I did not see live...because I got in trouble

Thankfully, the show was the shits for hte most part and is the prototypical ONE MATCH show. It just so happens that that one match is considered by many as the greatest match in Wrestlemania history. Go figure.

This marked the first WM appearance for The Rock as Rocky Maivia (he debuted at the 1996 Survivor Series) when he was still a face and being shoved down our throats. He defended the IC title against The Sultan (Rikishi/Fatu). Triple H had gotten out of the dog house, stemming from the May 1996 Kliq Curtain call (instead of winning that years king of the ring, he was being thrown around in slop) and along with Chyna, beat Goldust.

Owen & Bulldog retained the tag titles against Vader and Mankind in a heels vs. heels match that ended in a double count out.

In the main event, the Undertaker beat Sid to win his second world title. I remember next to nothing about this match other than Taker wore his vintage grey colored gloves and boots (I think). Shawn did color commentary for the match which saw Bret come down and try and fight with him.

The bread and butter here was a submission match with KEN SHAMROCK as special ref. Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin.

By this point, Stone Cold had won the King of the Ring and his catchphrases were popular and so was he. His first substantial break after winning the KOTR was being chosen by Bret to wrestle him in his first TV match after Wrestlemania 12. In storyline, Austin began calling Bret out and eventually, he accepted. Bret returned at Survivor Series in 1996 and they had a great match that established Austin as a legit guy in the WWE scheme of things. At the Rumble, Bret eliminated Austin but the refs didn't see it so Austin got back in and eliminated Bret to win. After Shawn dropped the title, in a final 4 match (eliminations) it was Bret vs. Vader vs. Austin vs. Undertaker and Bret won. The next night on RAW, Austin hit Bret with a chair, costing him the title.

The RAW before Wrestlemania saw Sid defend the title against Bret in a cage match. Both Taker and Austin interferred trying to help their particular WM opponent win. It was Sid who retained with help of Taker. After the match, Bret shoved Vince and cut an obscenity laced tirade about how he had been screwed and "if you don't like, tough shit!" Essentially, a heel move as they planned the big double turn for Mania. Great stuff, especially because such swearing was almost never done on WWF TV at the time (tons of kids in the crowd...I'm sure their parents were thrilled lol). By the way, watch for Shawn Michaels getting involved in the show ending shmozz for no apparent reason...what a jackass he was back then.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuBE9xkhth8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuBE9xkhth8[/ame]

In the match itself at WM, Austin was very much a crowd favorite and Bret had received a smattering of boos. They brawled and after twenty minutes, Bret put Austin in the sharpshooter in the middle of the ring as Austin tried to get out of the hold. The close-up shot of his agony filled face was priceless as blood poured down his face and he ultimately passed out. Bret refused to let go of the hold and had to be pulled off by Shamrock. Bret attacked Austin even more and when Shamrock threw him off again and challenged him, Bret ducked away cementing his heel turn. Meanwhile, Austin regained his consciousness, got rid of any refs trying to help and left under his own power to cheers. $$$$$$$$$$

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Awesome match that essentially set up the one character who would take the WWF on his back and make it a billion dollar company before he was done.

Unfortunately for Bret's WWF career, it was his last Wrestlemania match until he returned last year to fight Vince. He made up with his brother Owen and they reformed the Hart Foundation in March and the amazing Canada vs. U.S. angle kicked off. Bret eventually won the title from Taker at Summer Slam and the whole fiasco with Shawn was taking place over this period....leading to the Montreal Screwjob at Survivor Series. You all know the story by now...

-----------------

Wrestlemania 14 - 1998
Fleet Center
Boston, Massachusetts

Depending on your POV, this was the first Wrestlemania to take place during the 'Attitude Era' and about two weeks later, Monday Night RAW finally ended Monday Nitro's ratings dominance that lasted for over 70 consecutive weeks.

Part of the reason of the business success was due to the participation of Mike Tyson. Vince took a gamble and figured they needed something to get more eyeballs on the product and so he reached out to Tyson who was all over it. Tyson was a big wrestling fan and of course, the $3 million paycheck no doubt made it an easy decision. Whatever happened before and after Tyson's RAW debut is meaningless because they got cute by having him join DX only for it to be a swerve at Wrestlemania. Whatever...

One of the greatest segments in RAW history took place the night after the Royal Rumble (which Austin win). Vince brought Tyson and his seemingly million man posse out to the ring to announce Tyson as the special guest ring enforcer for the main event between Austin and Shawn Michaels. Stone Cold came out, stood face to face with Tyson (who was still considered one of the most dangerous boxers...well, at least he still had his don't fuck with me aura), talked shit and flipped him off which followed with a melee. Tyson shoved Austin and the two nearly went at it as all the ringside officials and Tyson's posse tried to get in between the two. It was awesome television.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3Mq6UCkwa8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3Mq6UCkwa8[/ame]

This was a two match show because beside them, we had HHH beating Owen (talk about dropping the ball...after Survivor Series, Vince refused to let him out of his contract. He did not return to TV until the December PPV when he attacked Shawn Michaels after jumping out of the crowd. He was the hottest babyface they had at that moment. Then they flushed it down the toilet with poor booking and ultimately, they kept him as a midcarder for the rest of his career. The Rock had turned heel in the fall of 1997 and as a member of the Nation of Domination, retained his IC title over Ken Shamrock. In tag title action, Cactus Jack and Terry Funk beat the New Age Outlaws in a dumpster match to win the gold.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdGjxHdYn_s"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdGjxHdYn_s[/ame]

The co-main event was a battle between Undertaker and his brother Kane. Kane had debuted in October at the end of the Hell in a Cell match, leading to Taker losing to Shawn. They did the old storyline where the younger brother wants to fight his brother but he won't have it. So after losing the Royal Rumble casket match to Shawn, Kane set the casket on fire. The convuluted storyline to my 10-year old brain was fucking awesome at the time (it went a little something like this: As kids, their parents, Taker and Kane lived in Death Valley or some shit and worked in the funeral business I think. One day, Undertaker accidentally set fire to the home and their parents were killed while Kane was scarred. So Paul Bearer took Kane and kept him while Undertaker believed he had been dead, too.

They added a lot more shit to it over the next few years leading to it's absolute hysterical nature).

So Taker finally accepted the challenge and they fought. Before the match, Pete Rose came out and needled the Boston crowd until Kane came out and tombstoned him, receiving his first cheers as Kane. They had a fun match that included Taker giving him 3 or 4 tombstones before being able to pin him for the win.

The main event saw a broken Shawn Michaels make what was believed to be the final WM appearance of his career when he defended the belt against Stone Cold. During the casket match at the Rumble, Shawn landed badly on the casket for a bump, nailing his lower back on the corner of the casket. He was fucked. He was in so much pain, he more or less lasted the rest of this run because he was all pilled up. HHH had talked about it once and said he basically had to take care of Shawn because he was all drugged up the majority of the time just so he didn't have to live in agony every waking second. So they knew this was going to be Shawn's last hurrah. With a broken back, it was figured to be the end of his in-ring career. After undergoing surgery, he ended up starting his own school down in Texas and actually began working lightly there a few years later before returning to WWE in 2002 or 2003 (that period is a mess for me).

A side story which has been confirmed over the years by Undertaker and Austin themselves (I believe Shawn denied it in his book), there was some doubt in the locker room as to whether Shawn was willing to lose to Austin that night. The story goes that Undertaker stood by the gorilla position by the curtain, wrapping his hands with tape or something of the sort, making sure Shawn understood he better do business or there would be trouble.

<object width="480" height="270"><param name="movie" value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/xbr799"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/xbr799" width="480" height="270" wmode="direct" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed></object> <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xbr799_stone-cold-vs-shawn-michaels-wrestl_sport" target="_blank">Stone Cold vs Shawn Michaels (Wrestlemania 14) 3/3</a> by <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/DLWHITE783" target="_blank">DLWHITE783</a>

This was Austin's crowning moment as the two brawled for twenty minutes. Give Shawn credit because despite his health by this point, they had a pretty good match all things considered. Austin hit the stunner and Tyson counted the three. After the match, Tyson landed a beautiful "punch" that knocked out Shawn and that was it.

THE AUSTIN ERA HAS BEGUN!

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Wrestlemania 15 - 1999
First Union Center
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiWQ0UI-7fY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiWQ0UI-7fY[/ame]

A one match show.

This was Owen's last Wrestlemania as he and Jarrett retained the tag titles against Test and D'Lo Brown.

In the culmination of the horribly epic fail of a brawl for all series, the WWF winner Bart Gunn fought Butterbean in a legit boxing match. By fought, I mean, he got knocked the fuck out in about twenty seconds. Bart's future in WWF was pretty much dead with this performance.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mxf-BuzB44A"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mxf-BuzB44A[/ame]

THE BIG SHOW made his Wrestlemania debut following his WWF debut the month before. Unfortunately, he was treated like your average guy right out of the gate because he did not know the WWF style and didn't pay his dues.

Triple H and Chyna turned heel on the show by turning on X-Pac and helping Shane McMahon (in his WM wrestling debut) retain the European title. They joined Vince's Corporation.

The Undertaker defeated the Big Bossman in perhaps the most forgettable hell a cell ever. It ended with Taker literally hanging Bossman with a noose from the top of the cage. Bossman was on RAW the next night.

The main event saw Rock, the top heel (aligned with Vince) defend the title against Austin. Rock won it in a vacant tournament at Survivor Series 1998 by turning heel and being aided by the McMahons to screw over Foley. Austin won the title and the series was off and running.

Jim Ross was afflicted with his second case of Bells Palsy in the months before which led to Michael Cole becoming the lead play by play guy (he was a legit journalist before he came to WWF). For this match only, Ross returned to call it because both Austin and Rock requested him. Ross literally ahd to hold his face up because of the illness while calling the match...and he still did a great job.

The rest of the year featured a bunch of title changes... to Undertaker, to Austin, to Foley, to HHH, to Big Show. Austin was written out of storylines in November (he was "hit by a car" in the parking lot....which was revealed to be Rikishi in an epic fail storyline) so he could finally undergo neck surgery to repair the damage suffered at Summer Slam in 1997. He would miss several months including the next years Wrestlemania.

--------------

Wrestlemania 16 - 2000
Arrowhead Pond
Anaheim, California

The year 2000 came and all was well in the world. By now, WCW had gone down the shitter and would be in business for less than twelve more months. WWE meanwhile was chugging along despite missing Stone Cold who was out following neck surgery. It was okay because The Rock had become the #1 babyface and Triple H became the #1 heel after Stephanie McMahon became a full time character and turned heel a few months earlier. Helmsleyh became champion in the second half of 1999 and feuded with Vince who hated him for stealing Steph.

WWF celebrated Wrestlemania IN THE YEAR 2000 by having an All-Day PPV special documentary covering the first 15 Wrestlemanis with exclusive interviews and show highlights. In total, WWF was on television for about 12 hours that day and night. I remember my brother and I getting a few VHS tapes and recording the special as best we could. It would later be released as a second disc on the Wrestlemania DVD (FYI, the first Wrestlemania to be released on DVD was Wrestlemania 15).

As for WM 16, it was forgettable and overall a meh show. Trivia note...the only WM show to not feature a singles match (besides the one quick womens match).

This WM marked the WM debuts for busty Trish Stratus (managed T & A, Test/Albert), Edge/Christian, the Dudley Boys, the Hardy Boyz, Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit, Perry Saturn, Dean Malenko, Chris Jericho and Kurt Angle. So yeah, the roster was beginning to grow into the deepest roster in WWF history by this point.

In a continuation of the tag team ladder match in late-1999 between E/C and the Hardys, this show featured a triangle ladder match between them and the Dudleys. Edge and Christian won their first tag titles here. The great feud between the three teams would continue to Summer Slam where I believe they had another ladder match. I don't remember much about this ladder match but I gather it was fun and spot-filled.

Eddie, Benoit, Malenko and Saturn jumped to WWF in January and were treated like second class citizens pretty much from the beginning (Eddie suffered an elbow injury early on and missed some time, too). Here, Guerrero/Malenko/Saturn lost to Too Cool and Chyna. Seriously.

In a match that didn't live up to the big expectations, Kurt Angle was both the IC and Euro champions. He had a two-fall triple threat match with Jericho and Benoit where the first fall was for the IC belt and the second was for the European strap. Benoit won the IC belt and Jericho won the European belt. They only had about 13 minutes.

The main event became the first Wrestlemania main event to be a multiperson singles match as it was a four way elimination match featuring champion HHH, The Rock, Big Show and Foley (who returned after losing a career ending match at No Way out two months earlier to HHH). The build for this match was centered around the McMahons as each were in the corner of a competitor (Steph/HHH, Vince/Rock, Shane/Big Show, Linda/Foley). It came down to Hunter and Rock and wouldn't you know, Vince turned on Rocky and helped HHH win. He became the first and to date, the ONLY heel to win in the main event.

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Wrestlemania 17 - 2001
Astrodome
Houston, Texas

Widely considered the best Wrestlemania of all-time because it was stacked and most matches delivered. This took place on April 1st, about two weeks after Vince purchased WCW. They also owned ECW at this point IIRC after buying the assets in bankruptcy court.

Jerry Lawler was not with them at this time because he left months earlier after his then-girlfriend Stacy Carter was fired for political reasons (supposedly, she had an attitude problem and/or Chyna hated her). Replacing him on color commentary was Paul Heyman. Heyman and Jim Ross had fun chemistry as they would needle each other but as far as I can recall, it neve took away from selling the product.

The Astrodome was packed with about 68,000 people and it looked tremendous on television.

The opener saw Jericho retain the IC title against Regal in a solid albeit short match. In a match that was surprisingly fun, Kane became the new hardcore champion beating Raven and Big Show in a triple threat match that saw the three battle all over the building.

Guerreo beat Test to win the European championship and in a good 14 minute match, Kurt Angle beat Chris Benoit.

Chyna returned to squash Ivory to win back the womens title and she would be gone within a matter of months (due in no small part because she had a huge diva attitude and by this point, Hunter and Stephanie became a real life couple).

In a match that was more fun than it had any right to be, Shane McMahon beat Vince in a street fight. These two saps beat the shit out of each other because well, they were enjoying punching each other apparently lol. The great angle here was that Linda had gone into a catatonic state in the weeks before. So Vince began acting like a fool with Trish, kissing her in front of Linda and shit like that. At one point, he embarrased Trish by making her bark like a dog in garbage. So during the match, Trish rolls Linda (she was in a wheel chair) down to ringside. Trish and Steph (who was in Vince's corner) had a cat fight and left ringside. Vince was kicking Shane's ass and decided to bring Linda into the ring. He was about to crack Shane in the head with a garbage can when Linda finally stood up (the crowd popped big time) and kicked him square in the nuts. Shane hit the Van Daminator (the rope to rope leg drop, which he took) and won. Good stuff.

<object width="480" height="360"><param name="movie" value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/xldye"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/xldye" width="480" height="360" wmode="direct" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed></object> <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xldye_shane-mcmahon-vs-vince-mcmahon_sport" target="_blank">Shane McMahon vs. Vince McMahon</a> by <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/therock38" target="_blank">therock38</a>

Almost forgot (pun intended)...they did the stupid fucking angle where Shane "stole" WCW out from under Vince. The biggest presence of WCW on this show? A bunch of the WCW guys had seats in the upperdeck and they showed them. Seriously, they watched the show from shitty seats and when they were on camera, they looked bored as shit. The story goes that they originally planned for some of them to interfere in the McMahons match until Shawn Stasiak let the cat out of the bag on some radio station, so they changed it.

Up next was the awesome TLC match (tables/ladders/chairs) between Edge/Christian, the Dudleys and the Hardyz. The match included run ins at various points by Little Spike Dudley (for his brothers), Lita (for the Hardys) and Rhyno (for E/C). It was a great match with some sick bumps.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1qWBfy1T8g"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1qWBfy1T8g[/ame]

This was the year they did the gimmick battle royal which was a fun nostalgia match featuring The Iron Sheik, Sgt. Slaughter, the Bushwackers, Duke the Garbage Man, Doink, Volkoff, Tugboat, The Goon, John Tenta, the Gooker, Brother Love, Michael Hayes, One Man Gang, Kamala, Jim Cornette, Repo Man, Kim Chee, Hilbilly Jim.....plus the return of both Bobby Heenan and Gene Okerlund who did commentary for the match (it was awesome hearing them in WWF again). Iron Sheik won because he couldn't take the bump over the top rope.

Undertaker pinned Triple H (although today, this match doesn't "exist") in a good match. Not much more needs to be said here.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4tIFmj9oNA"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4tIFmj9oNA[/ame]

The main event was EPIC with the best hype video (above) of the period set to the theme song, "My Way" by Limp Bizkit. Both men were at the top of their games. The Rock was defending champion and for reasons not totally clear to me, they decided to turn Steve Austin here....in Texas. As I understand it, they thought he was getting stale and wanted to switch things up...but it failed horribly because the fans didn't want to hate him. For nearly a half hour, they had a great match that ended when Vince helped Austin win and for the time being, the Austin/McMahon feud was over. Despite the bad ending, it was a great match and a great show.

The Rock was on RAW the next night and was beaten up by the new duo of Austin and HHH (the two man power trip). Rock left for Hollywood and his days as a full-time worker were essentially over as was the attitude era.

--------

Wrestlemania 18 - 2002
Sky Dome
Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Following Wrestlemania 17, the ill-fated INVASION angle kicked off around May and came to an end at Survivor Series. During the whole angle, the biggest WCW stars involved included DDP and Booker T. Everyone else had a guaranteed Turner contract and sat home, collecting paychecks until they ran out. Pretty much on the RAW after Survivor Series, Ric Flair made his WWF return after over 9 years as he began a feud with Vince McMahon over control of RAW (it would become the reason for the original draft and separating RAW and Smackdown as separate entities in 2003). Fast forward to 2002 and Vince had been driven to such insanity that he said he'd bring in the nWo to kill his creation (instead of allowing Flair have it). So at the February No Way Out PPV, HULK HOGAN, Kevin Nash and Scott Hall made their respective WWF returns together.

Clearly, common sense would have led everyone to believe the biggest possible match of all-time was Hogan vs. Stone Cold (who turned face after the invasion angle IIRC). The problem? Austin did not (and does not) like Hogan. He doesn't trust him, didn't want to help make him money and overall was against the idea. Besides, he also felt the match would suck balls because their styles didn't mesh. So that match was never a sincere possibility. At the February PPV, they began the build for Hogan and Rock. It was awesome.

They built the feud on RAW and unsurprisingly, live crowds wherever they went treated Hogan like a babyface. They do what they usually do in the build to a main event match at WM by doing something just plain stupid. Here, it was have Hogan drive a big rig into a car that contained Rock or some shit like that. It was pointless.

The other main event was for the UNDISPUTED CHAMPIONSHIP. In the summer of 2001, they had Booker T defend the WCW title against Rock and he lost it. At the December PPV, Jericho beat Rock for the WCW title and then beat Austin for the WWE title, uniting both straps (as Jericho talked about in his second book, he had to lug both huge belts with him while travelling and had to deal with airport workers stupid questions every time lol). Jericho was a heel at this point when he aligned himself with Stephanie. As for Triple H, he tore his first quad muscle in the summer of 2001 on RAW in a tag match with Austin vs. Jericho and Benoit. After finishing the match, he was out of action until January 2002 when he returned to a thunderous ovation. He won the Rumble and got the title shot. The stupid angle thrown into the mix here was Jericho accidentally driving over Lucy the Dog...Stephanie's dog. So fucking stupid.

As for Austin, he was relegated to a mid-card match with Scott Hall. Hall was okay but he lost a lot of luster over the years due to his alcohol problems.

The Undertaker (as a heel) feuded with Ric Flair in the build up to this match. Because of Flair's confidence issues from his WCW days, he worked out with Lance Storm to prepare for this match. Taker and Flair went on to have a tremendous near-20 minute match. It even included a run in and classic spinebuster from Arn Anderson. Taker beat Flair and it was a big confidence boost for Flair as it was obvious he could still go with the best of them.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqIZBhl45GQ"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqIZBhl45GQ[/ame]

As a sign of how stupid Vince can be....Edge and Booker T had a WM match because they had beef stemming from a shampoo commercial.

Austin beat Scott Hall in less than ten minutes and stunned both he and Kevin Nash if I recall correctly. Probably, Austin's worst Wrestlemania match. Essentially, a month after bringing them in, they were already killing the nWo gimmick. Not Vince's creation? FUCK OFF!

Billy and Chuck (actually an underrated team) won a four way to retain the tag titles. This match is probably best known for showcasing Stacy Keibler's amazing ass during the Dudleys entrance.

Despite realizing Hogan would get an ENORMOUS reaction from the Canadian fans, they ultimately decided that the title should go on last. So, we had Rock vs. Hogan before. Hollywood Hogan came out and was IMMEDIATELY SHOWERED with the loudest ovation of the night from the crazy Canucks. The Rock came out and despite being a face at this time, was boo'd out of the building because he was going against Hogan. Despite the fact that the match was slow and plodding, the crowd reactions turned this match into one of the most memorable of all-time. Everything Hogan did in the ring, they went nuts for. Everything Rock did against Hogan, they boo'd the fuck out of him. Eventually, Rock beat Hogan. Hall and Nash came out to beat up Hogan but Rock helped him kick their ass and the nWo was done.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVIKMQFr6uw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVIKMQFr6uw[/ame]

You can even point out Dustin Diamond in the crowd among the other Hulkamaniacs going nuts during the match.

In one of the most forgettable main events (only because of the Rock/Hogan match), Triple H beat Jericho to become the undisputed champion.

After Wrestlemania, they began the infamous brand extension which was meant to create their own competition between RAW and Smackdown. Vince controlled SD and Flair was with RAW. The draft results are WWE Brand Extension - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and keep in mind they didn't tell anyone so they had to wait until they saw their name on TV or WWE.com before knowing where they had to fly to the next night.

The night after WM 18, Brock Lesnar debuted on TV with Paul Heyman as his manager.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOlxvPtaQ7s"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOlxvPtaQ7s[/ame]

Hogan turned full fledged face afterward and the night after WM, he received a 10-minute plus standing ovation from the Canadian crowd. The reactions he got led to Vince changing plans where Hogan beat HHH at the next PPV to win his 6th WWF championship.

For the record, I believe the only match (well, TV at least) Hogan and Austin worked in WWF was a tag match on RAW.

-----------------

Wrestlemania 19 - 2003
Safeco Field
Seattle, Washington

The first Wrestlemania under the WWE name. Late in 2002, the World Wildlife Fund took them to court in Britain for violating their agreement. Long story short, when they changed the name to WWF and intended to become an international presence, Vince had to cut a deal with the Wildlife group. The agreement was something along the lines of limiting their exposure in Europe. Obviously, that was silly and they finally took Vince to court. Despite the obvious laugher it was, the British judge sided with the Wildlife people. So instead of paying them, Vince decided to change the name and say FUCK OFF. So they ran with the 'Get The F Out' campaign and became WWE.

This is actually a damn good show with several good to great matches. This show marked the WM debut of Rey Mysterio as he lost to Matt Hardy. The Undertaker continued his streak by beating Big Show and A-Train (Albert) in a handicap match. Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas retained the tag belts over Eddie & Chavo Guerrero and Benoit & Rhyno.

The best match of the show was between Shawn Michaels and Chris Jericho as they stole the show. Shawn returned to WWF as a wrestler at Summer Slam 2002 feuding with HHH. I believe the feud with Jericho started at the 2003 Rumble. Shawn was a boyhood idol of Jericho's so the match meant a lot to thim. This is really the match that kickstarted Shawn's modern day title of "Mr. Wrestlemania" although he used it beforehand. In the end, Shawn beat Jericho although Chris gave him a cheap shot afterwards. Great match.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5JTD5Hk30Y"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5JTD5Hk30Y[/ame]

Heel Triple H beat face Booker T to retain the RAW title in a decent albeit predictable match. This was the period when HHH was having mostly boring matches and squashing the majority of the RAW roster (namely Booker, RVD, Buh Buh Ray Dudley, Kane). The highlight was Booker breaking out the Harlem Hangover maneuver for the first and last time in WWE (a moonsaul leg drop-type move). By the way, after the Undisputed title was drafted to Smackdown, Eric Bischoff created the world heavyweight title and awarded it to HHH. Oh yeah, Eric Bischoff made his WWF debut in 2002 as he was brought in by Vince to be the new RAW GM.

In another of the four-main events, Hogan beat Vince in a street fight. The brawl included the return of Roddy Piper as they played up the original Wrestlemania history of the two. Vince bled a lot here.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJnDtP6dpmk"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJnDtP6dpmk[/ame]

In the next match which would prove to be the end of an era, The Rock finally beat Stone Cold. Rock stuck around for a bit in between films to finish up with Austin. Stone Cold by this point was in horrible physical shape and was told by doctor's if he took one bad bump, he could be paralyzed. So unknown to pretty much all except Jim Ross, this was his final match (and it was). It was a damn good match. What we didn't know at the time but have since found out....the night before, Austin was a nervous wreck and thanks to a dangerous mix of coffee and energy drinks, his heartrate skyrocketed and he believed he was having a heart attack. So JR and Vince spent much of the night before Wrestlemania 19 at the hospital with Austin. They cleared him on Sunday and he went to the arena and was able to work.

The main event saw Kurt Angle defend the WWE Championship against 2002 King of the Ring and 2003 Rumble winner Brock Lesnar. Another story I believe had spread in the days before the match was the condition of Angle. Angle had put off neck surgery for years following his Olympic days but it finally caught up to him. However, instead of going under the knife for the same surgery that guys like Austin, Benoit, Edge, Rhyno got...he decided to go with a more experimental surgery that promised a shorter recovery period. So this was his last night too because he got the surgery afterwards. Much like Austin, if Angle had taken one bad bump, it would've been bad.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2t-biK9cGc"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2t-biK9cGc[/ame]

The two went out and had a great match with the most cringeworthy finishes in Wrestlemania history. Here's the deal. Brock's finisher was the F-5. When he was in OVW, he did the shooting star press sparingly but never did it on WWE TV. I saw a few videos of him doing it in OVW so I knew he could. I believe it went like this: Brock hit the first F5 on Angle, went for the pin and Angle kicked out. So Brock looked to the heavens and began going to the top rope. I immediately popped knowing what he was about to try. The problem.....Angle was too far away. Brock stood on the top rope for what seemed like weeks until he launched himself and must have misjudged it because it didn't look clean. He didn't get enough air and when he landed in the ring, he did so DIRECTLY ON HIS HEAD. Much like anyone else who saw it, I figured he was done. Amazingly, he only received a concussion. Angle got back up and realized that Brock was out on his feet. So Angle told him what to do and Brock gave him a HUGE F5 and pinned him.

After the match, Kurt Angle went into shock in the locker room from his health issues. Brock meanwhile was going nuts in the back because of the concussion and had to be controlled by Gerry Brisco before he hurt someone. On the 'Mania of Wrestlemania' documentary they shot at the event, Ric Flair believes if it weren't for his gigantic neck, Brock could have been paralyzed or killed on the botched shooting star press.

After WM, John Cena became the number one contender to Brock's title and lost at the next PPV. As for Angle, he had the surgery and was back a short time later although it was as if they put a bandaid on a serious wound. His health would deteriorate over the next few years in WWE.

Hogan became Mr. America as the feud with Vince continued and by the summer, Hogan was gone because he felt he was underpaid for Wrestlemania.

GOLDBERG made his WWE debut in the weeks after, feuding with a heel Rock.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWjDIZuI24I"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWjDIZuI24I[/ame]

---------------

Wrestlemania 20 - 2004
Madison Square Garden
New York, NY

This year's Wrestlemania took place the earliest out of every single Wrestlemania, with a date of March 14th. With it being the 20th edition, they returned to Madison Square Garden (hopefully they will maintain this tradition in three years because Vince and company have said they want big arenas/stadiums).

The opener consisted of John Cena's first BIG push as a face since debuting in WWE. He beat Big Show in the opener and FU'd him to get the pin and become the U.S. Champion. By this point, Cena was the rapper character and had saved his job. The story goes that prior, management wasn't happy with him and couldn't come up with anything for him to the point that Stephanie was considering letting him go. That changed when on a plane or a bus or some shit, Steph heard Cena rapping and thus his job was saved.

Evolution was in full blast here featuring Triple H, Batista, Randy Orton and Ric Flair. The three (minus HHH) took on The Rock and Foley in a handicap match. It ended up being Rock's last wrestling match ever as he left WWE and went full time into acting. Don't remember much about the match itself other than Evolution win.

In a multi-man cruiserweight title match, Chavo Jr. retained the belt over Ultimo Dragon, Shannon Moore, Jamie Noble, Funaki, Nunzio, Kidman, Tajiri, Akio and Mysterio.

Rikishi & Scotty 2 Hotty retained the tag belts in a four way.

Womens champion Victoria beat Molly Holly who had her head shaved.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSu8LrNhVjA"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSu8LrNhVjA[/ame]

Let's talk about Goldberg vs. Brock Lesnar. Goldberg debuted the previous year and began feuding with Rock (who personally recruited him to WWF). After that, he worked with HHH and sort of just wavered along. His one-year contract expired in the days after Wrestlemania 20. As for Brock Lesnar, despite being a main eventer, he was not happy. He hated being on the road as much as he was and was seemingly burned out. The story goes that he did not want to end up like the older guys (Taker, HHH, Angle, etc.) whose bodies were ravaged because of the business. They began the build for this match at the Rumble when Brock won the title again or retained it, it's all the same. After talking trash to each other, Brock interefered in the rumble and eliminated Goldberg. So at the No Way Out PPV the next month, Goldberg interfered in Brock's match and cost him the belt against Eddie Guerrero. The match was on. Behind the scenes, Brock had asked out of his contract and was willing to retire because he wanted to try out with the Minnesota Vikings. There wasn't much Vince could say to keep him so he had him sign a 10-year no compete contract and let him walk.

News of both men's planned leaving spread the week of the show courtesy of the interwebz. By the time of the show that night, practically everyone in MSG knew neither man was sticking around so they shat on the match BIG TIME. The special ref was Stone Cold and thank god because that was the only saving grace. The match lasted under 15 minutes and it seemed like an hour. The men were immediately boo'd from the start of the match. They stalled for several minutes without touching as the crowd chanting such things as "You Sold Out!" (which made no sense, but hey) "Go Away!" "BORING!" and the goodbye song. It was the most entertaining part of the match. Eventually, they had some semblance of a match and it ended with a Goldberg jackhammer as he won. Afte the match, Brock flipped off MSG and then ate a stunner. Goldberg got stunned too and Austin had a beer celebration to please the people. Neither Goldberg or Brock have ever returned to WWE.

(As for Brock, he tried out at the Vikings training camp. He was cut late in camp and was told if he was serious, he should go to NFL Europe because they liked him but he was too raw. He wasn't going to Canada to make chump change and declined. So he broke the deal with Vince and signed with New Japan. Vince sued him and eventually a judge/mediator/whateverthefuck said enforcing the 10-year no compete clause was not gonna happen. So they settled the case. Vince invited him back but Brock decided to begin his MMA career in late 2005. Goldberg returned to Hollywood and even became an MMA commentator for Elite-XC on Showtime.)

One of the main events was the bajillionth match in the series between Taker and Kane. The only redeemable part of this segment was the return of Paul Bearer for the night.

The best parts of the show were the two main event title matches and both delivered BIG TIME. In fact, one would be remembered as one of the best matches in WWE history...but that went out the window in 2007.

First, Eddie vs. Kurt. Guerrero made history by winning the WWE title at No Way Out by beating Brock. It was a tremendous achievement although in hindsight, you have to ask yourself whether it was worth it because he was jacked up with so much juice, his torso was HUGE. Guerrero and Angle had great chemistry and put on a terrific bout. Guerrero retained the title.

The main event featured heel Triple H defending the world title against Shawn Michaels and Chris Benoit in a triple threat match. Benoit won the rumble and became the first man to go from #1 to winning since Shawn did it nine years earlier. ECW has the original three way dance classic between Shane Douglas, Sabu and Terry Funk. WWE has this match. It was tremendous and is the be all and end all of WWE triple threats. Although everyone expected it, there was still doubt in my mind as to whether HHH would lose to him. So I was ecstatic when Benoit won by forcing HHH to tap out.

The iconic scene as the show went off the air had both Eddie and Benoit celebrating in the ring with their titles as confetti littered the arena. It was one of the best moments in WWE history.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqol-IbFr9Q"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqol-IbFr9Q[/ame]

Post Script:
Unfortunately, neither man had a big run as champion. Eddie couldn't handle the pressure and dropped the belt in the spring to JBL. He feuded with JBL and Kurt Angle for the majority of the rest of the year. As for Benoit, he was champion until Summer Slam when he lost it to newly turned face Randy Orton (what a mistake that turned out to be) and Orton became the youngest WWE champion in the company's history (Brock was before him). Benoit was never a real main eventer again as he would move to Smackdown and feud with an assortment of guys, then ECW came along and he was a steady mid-carder to upper mid-carder until his end.

-------------------------

Wrestlemania 21 - 2005
Staples Center
Los Angeles, California

Before it became the host of a number of Summer Slams, the Staples Center was the home of this Wrestlemania with the tagline "WM goes Hollywood."

Right off the top, this WM is notable for these factors: 1. The AWESOME job HHH and Batista did in the build to their main event match, 2. The hilarious parody videos they produced starring WWE guys of famous scenes in cinema history and 3. The debut of the MONEY IN THE BANK match.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-79cGh5w18"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-79cGh5w18[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX_BbIwvfLY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX_BbIwvfLY[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2QK2x37YOM"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2QK2x37YOM[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJNnDCOK_gw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJNnDCOK_gw[/ame]

Undertaker was back to having better matches although this one with a young Randy Orton was forgetful in the grand scheme. This at least a year before Orton would be punished for his attitude and behavior and frankly, Orton after his aborted face turn the summer prior, was just plain boring (much like he is now...go figure). Taker obviously won.

The opener of the show was an underwhelming match between Mysterio and Guerrero that only had about 13 minutes. This was part of their long feud that year that later included the introduction of Rey's son Dominic and other family members.

Japanese sumo star Akebono participated in a "sumo" match against Big Show who had the whole sumo dress on. My goodness. I remember next to nothing about Akebono's WWE stay besides Big Show's ass so thanks for that.

For the WWE Championship, it was champion JBL defending against John Cena who would emerge from this show as a main eventer...a spot he has continuously held to this very day (6 Years minus the time away due to injury/filming movies). Cena beat him with the FU and won his first world championship.

The debut of the MONEY IN THE BANK concept began at this show. The idea took six mid-card to upper mid-card guys and put them in a match with a ladder stipulation. Guaranteed greatness. The winner would retrieve the briefcase and be guaranteed a world title match (either belt) at any point over the course of the next 365 days. Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Edge, Christian, Shelton Benjamin and Kane competed with the star of the match being Shelton Benjamin. He would go on to compete in others over the years and it was pretty much his one shining moment of the entire year because he would do some insane move or bump on the big stage. Edge as a face won this match and would eventually be forced to turn heel because of the real life tryst with Lita (who was dating Matt Hardy at the time).

WWE fired Matt Hardy for doing shit on the net after he broke up with Lita. Think this was the summer of 2005....crowds began booing Edge who started using the 'Rated R' type of gimmick without the catchy name. Edge and Lita became an on-screen pairing while crowds chanted for Matt Hardy. Without telling anyone, they brought back Hardy who ran out of the crowd on RAW one day and attacked Edge and shouted about "Ring of Honor" on the mic before security stopped him. That would be the most fun for the angle however as Hardy mumbled his way through his first big promo and was essentially buried in every match they had afterward. Oh well.

In the best match on the show, no surprise, Kurt Angle beat Shawn Michaels. Another classic WM match for HBK.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g7Ae19Owmg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g7Ae19Owmg[/ame]

The main event of the show was heel Triple H defending the world championship against #1 face Batista. It all began when they were teasing Batista's face turn (he was still in Evolution with Flair and Hunter). Batista won the Rumble match....a rumble match that featured the biggest fuck up ending in the show's history. If I remember correctly, Batista was suppose to win the whole time, but the last two guys were Batista and Cena and they did the Bret/Luger finish with both going out at the same time. So Vince does his powerwalk to the ring and in the process of jumping in, tears not one but BOTH quad muscles. He shits in the ring, literally sits, and barks orders to the two. So they restart the rumble and Batista eliminated Cena to win. Hilarious stuff.

So HHH was worried about Batista's intentions and they did weeks of awesome build up to the eventual turn. Batista faked signing the Smackdown contract, gave the "thumbs up" to HHH and Flair (as they all had done to Orton before kicking him out), then did the thumbs down deal and kicked their ass to a megapop.

Batista beat HHH at WM to win his first world heavyweight title and was also a main eventer from that day forward.

Eventually, later int he year, Batista was moved to Smackdown and Cena moved to RAW where they would stick for the majority of the rest of their careers (Batista ended up on RAW in his final year).

-----------

Wrestlemania 22 - 2006
Allstate Arena
Rosemont, Illinois

*The third time Rosemont hosted a Wrestlemania, the most out of any location (hopefully, NYC will tie it in 2014)

The second ever Money in the Bank ladder match took place here with RVD beating Benjamin, Ric Flair, Finlay, Matt Hardy and Bobby Lashley. Of course, RVD would announce in May his plans to cash in the shot at the SECOND One Night Stand PPV as the launching point for the recreation of ECW.

Mick Foley returned some time before to feud with Edge who at the time was still pretty much the "pretty boy" heel. This feud would change that as Edge brawled with Foley in various matches. This match featured a spot where Edge speared Foley threw a flaming table en route to victory. Eventually, Foley would turn "heel" to join Edge against Tommy Dreamer and Terry Funk at the ONS PPV that summer.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4V6fmIzBii8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4V6fmIzBii8[/ame]

One of the best storylines heading into Wrestlemania was that between champion Trish Stratus and Mickie James. Alexis Laree, as she was known before WWE, joined some months before as a fan who was stalking Trish. It was an excellent job by both as eventually, Mickie attacked Trish and the match was set. Even though the finish was botched (the jumping DDT), it was and is the best womens match in Wrestlemania history.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUohgkNFb2o"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUohgkNFb2o[/ame]

Undertaker beat Mark Henry in a casket match.

In a feud that began on the final RAW of 2005 (and would last for the remainder of 2006 thanks to DX), Shawn Michaels beat Vince McMahon. The start of the feud on that RAW was peculiar as fuck as Vince started talking about Montreal out of the blue and the feud was on. The match itself was what you would expect, tons of brawling and lots of toys. The big spot of the match was Shawn setting Vince up on a table with a garbage can over his torso and head. Shawn climbed up a GIGANTIC ladder and did the elbow drop. He also used one of the stiffest superkicks I can remember seeing. Fun match that stole the show in my mind.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SGz1xBpUFQ"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SGz1xBpUFQ[/ame]

Here's the story about the World Heavyweight Championship. Eddie Guerrero passed away in November 2005, about five or six months before. It was Pat Patterson who pushed Vince to do a big main event angle with Rey Mysterio, figuring it would make for a great story (him winning the belt in Eddie's honor). So they had Rey win the Rumble and he earned the WM main event spot. Not so fast. Vince shat on the angle as much as he could, beginning with inserting Orton into the mix by having him pin Rey at the February PPV. Kurt Angle was the champion and they had a triple threat match. Unfortunately, other matches went long so they cut this match and it lasted just 9 fucking minutes. Despite that, the three actually had a damn good match. Mysterio pinned Orton to win the title and make history by being the smallest wrestler to ever win a WWE championship. Sadly, Vince never warmed up to the angle because after all, he

to muscle bound dudes who are at least six foot three. So Rey more or less lost weekly on television and on PPV until he eventually lost the belt to JBL. It was Rey's only time with the title and it was shit because Vince McMahon can be a dip shit.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wM1jBqxXhg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wM1jBqxXhg[/ame]

By now, John Cena had been on top for about a year and was already being shoved down the fans throats. Back in January, they pulled off a surprise change in plans and had Edge cash in his original MITB title shot after Cena won an elimination chamber match. Edge won the title and had a pretty great three week run with the title before losing it at the Rumble back to Cena. The Cena effect had adult men boo him while women and kids would cheer for him. Well....at Wrestlemania, he defended the belt against a heel Triple H. So naturally, Cena was booed vociferously while Hunter was cheered. They had a fun match all things considering and it ended with Cena submitting Hunter with the STFU.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipDIiyROhtw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipDIiyROhtw[/ame]

**EmpireWF** · 03-28-2011, 12:19 AM

Wrestlemania 21 - 2005
Staples Center
Los Angeles, California

Before it became the host of a number of Summer Slams, the Staples Center was the home of this Wrestlemania with the tagline "WM goes Hollywood."

Right off the top, this WM is notable for these factors: 1. The AWESOME job HHH and Batista did in the build to their main event match, 2. The hilarious parody videos they produced starring WWE guys of famous scenes in cinema history and 3. The debut of the MONEY IN THE BANK match.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-79cGh5w18"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-79cGh5w18[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX_BbIwvfLY"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX_BbIwvfLY[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2QK2x37YOM"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2QK2x37YOM[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJNnDCOK_gw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJNnDCOK_gw[/ame]

Undertaker was back to having better matches although this one with a young Randy Orton was forgetful in the grand scheme. This at least a year before Orton would be punished for his attitude and behavior and frankly, Orton after his aborted face turn the summer prior, was just plain boring (much like he is now...go figure). Taker obviously won.

The opener of the show was an underwhelming match between Mysterio and Guerrero that only had about 13 minutes. This was part of their long feud that year that later included the introduction of Rey's son Dominic and other family members.

Japanese sumo star Akebono participated in a "sumo" match against Big Show who had the whole sumo dress on. My goodness. I remember next to nothing about Akebono's WWE stay besides Big Show's ass so thanks for that.

For the WWE Championship, it was champion JBL defending against John Cena who would emerge from this show as a main eventer...a spot he has continuously held to this very day (6 Years minus the time away due to injury/filming movies). Cena beat him with the FU and won his first world championship.

The debut of the MONEY IN THE BANK concept began at this show. The idea took six mid-card to upper mid-card guys and put them in a match with a ladder stipulation. Guaranteed greatness. The winner would retrieve the briefcase and be guaranteed a world title match (either belt) at any point over the course of the next 365 days. Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Edge, Christian, Shelton Benjamin and Kane competed with the star of the match being Shelton Benjamin. He would go on to compete in others over the years and it was pretty much his one shining moment of the entire year because he would do some insane move or bump on the big stage. Edge as a face won this match and would eventually be forced to turn heel because of the real life tryst with Lita (who was dating Matt Hardy at the time).

WWE fired Matt Hardy for doing shit on the net after he broke up with Lita. Think this was the summer of 2005....crowds began booing Edge who started using the 'Rated R' type of gimmick without the catchy name. Edge and Lita became an on-screen pairing while crowds chanted for Matt Hardy. Without telling anyone, they brought back Hardy who ran out of the crowd on RAW one day and attacked Edge and shouted about "Ring of Honor" on the mic before security stopped him. That would be the most fun for the angle however as Hardy mumbled his way through his first big promo and was essentially buried in every match they had afterward. Oh well.

In the best match on the show, no surprise, Kurt Angle beat Shawn Michaels. Another classic WM match for HBK.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g7Ae19Owmg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g7Ae19Owmg[/ame]

The main event of the show was heel Triple H defending the world championship against #1 face Batista. It all began when they were teasing Batista's face turn (he was still in Evolution with Flair and Hunter). Batista won the Rumble match....a rumble match that featured the biggest fuck up ending in the show's history. If I remember correctly, Batista was suppose to win the whole time, but the last two guys were Batista and Cena and they did the Bret/Luger finish with both going out at the same time. So Vince does his powerwalk to the ring and in the process of jumping in, tears not one but BOTH quad muscles. He shits in the ring, literally sits, and barks orders to the two. So they restart the rumble and Batista eliminated Cena to win. Hilarious stuff.

So HHH was worried about Batista's intentions and they did weeks of awesome build up to the eventual turn. Batista faked signing the Smackdown contract, gave the "thumbs up" to HHH and Flair (as they all had done to Orton before kicking him out), then did the thumbs down deal and kicked their ass to a megapop.

Batista beat HHH at WM to win his first world heavyweight title and was also a main eventer from that day forward.

Eventually, later int he year, Batista was moved to Smackdown and Cena moved to RAW where they would stick for the majority of the rest of their careers (Batista ended up on RAW in his final year).

-----------

Wrestlemania 22 - 2006
Allstate Arena
Rosemont, Illinois

*The third time Rosemont hosted a Wrestlemania, the most out of any location (hopefully, NYC will tie it in 2014)

The second ever Money in the Bank ladder match took place here with RVD beating Benjamin, Ric Flair, Finlay, Matt Hardy and Bobby Lashley. Of course, RVD would announce in May his plans to cash in the shot at the SECOND One Night Stand PPV as the launching point for the recreation of ECW.

Mick Foley returned some time before to feud with Edge who at the time was still pretty much the "pretty boy" heel. This feud would change that as Edge brawled with Foley in various matches. This match featured a spot where Edge speared Foley threw a flaming table en route to victory. Eventually, Foley would turn "heel" to join Edge against Tommy Dreamer and Terry Funk at the ONS PPV that summer.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4V6fmIzBii8"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4V6fmIzBii8[/ame]

One of the best storylines heading into Wrestlemania was that between champion Trish Stratus and Mickie James. Alexis Laree, as she was known before WWE, joined some months before as a fan who was stalking Trish. It was an excellent job by both as eventually, Mickie attacked Trish and the match was set. Even though the finish was botched (the jumping DDT), it was and is the best womens match in Wrestlemania history.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUohgkNFb2o"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUohgkNFb2o[/ame]

Undertaker beat Mark Henry in a casket match.

In a feud that began on the final RAW of 2005 (and would last for the remainder of 2006 thanks to DX), Shawn Michaels beat Vince McMahon. The start of the feud on that RAW was peculiar as fuck as Vince started talking about Montreal out of the blue and the feud was on. The match itself was what you would expect, tons of brawling and lots of toys. The big spot of the match was Shawn setting Vince up on a table with a garbage can over his torso and head. Shawn climbed up a GIGANTIC ladder and did the elbow drop. He also used one of the stiffest superkicks I can remember seeing. Fun match that stole the show in my mind.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SGz1xBpUFQ"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SGz1xBpUFQ[/ame]

Here's the story about the World Heavyweight Championship. Eddie Guerrero passed away in November 2005, about five or six months before. It was Pat Patterson who pushed Vince to do a big main event angle with Rey Mysterio, figuring it would make for a great story (him winning the belt in Eddie's honor). So they had Rey win the Rumble and he earned the WM main event spot. Not so fast. Vince shat on the angle as much as he could, beginning with inserting Orton into the mix by having him pin Rey at the February PPV. Kurt Angle was the champion and they had a triple threat match. Unfortunately, other matches went long so they cut this match and it lasted just 9 fucking minutes. Despite that, the three actually had a damn good match. Mysterio pinned Orton to win the title and make history by being the smallest wrestler to ever win a WWE championship. Sadly, Vince never warmed up to the angle because after all, he

to muscle bound dudes who are at least six foot three. So Rey more or less lost weekly on television and on PPV until he eventually lost the belt to JBL. It was Rey's only time with the title and it was shit because Vince McMahon can be a dip shit.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wM1jBqxXhg"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wM1jBqxXhg[/ame]

By now, John Cena had been on top for about a year and was already being shoved down the fans throats. Back in January, they pulled off a surprise change in plans and had Edge cash in his original MITB title shot after Cena won an elimination chamber match. Edge won the title and had a pretty great three week run with the title before losing it at the Rumble back to Cena. The Cena effect had adult men boo him while women and kids would cheer for him. Well....at Wrestlemania, he defended the belt against a heel Triple H. So naturally, Cena was booed vociferously while Hunter was cheered. They had a fun match all things considering and it ended with Cena submitting Hunter with the STFU.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipDIiyROhtw"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipDIiyROhtw[/ame]

**shag773** · 03-29-2011, 12:36 PM

Originally posted by Warner2BruceTD

Oh, one other thing.

Bobby Heenan sold better for a fucking dog in those days than most of these lazy m'fers sell for humans today. When Heenan was still relatively young and in his late 40's during the early 80's, he was easily the best bumper in all of wrestling and made the babyfaces look like a million dollars when they would get their hands on him. His facials, the way he begged off, everything picture perfect.

Bobby Heenan is perhaps the most underappreciated personality in the history of wrestling. He consistantly made gold out of shit.

The best example of this is the Rick Rude/Big Bossman feud centered around Big Bossman's mother. Absurd premise, plus Rude left the WWF before the blowoff. Heenan does promos and works matches with Bossman that made the whole thing thouroughly entertaining, and it all holds up today.

I wish I could thank this post 100 times. IMO Bobby Hennan was the single most entertaining figure in wrestling history.

**LiquidLarry2GhostWF** · 03-29-2011, 01:40 PM

Originally posted by Warner2BruceTD

HBK/Bret Ironman Match is the most overrated match in the history of wrestling.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

I've seen the match once...on its first run.

Never had the desire to sit through 60+ minutes again.

That is the problem with Iron Man matches...they are good for one watch.

Empire's Look Back at Wrestlemania

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