Today In Pro Wrestling History: May 11th

Well today felt a little easier to find interesting events to cover. Which may not be saying a whole heck of a lot, but when I can slap the easy button and not have to dig like I’m looking for treasure, I consider that a substantial win. Now let’s see what was found!

• WWWF MSG Show: World Heavyweight Title: Bruno Sammartino (c) vs Gorilla Monsoon (1964)

Now I know most hardcore fans remember that Gorilla was more than just a commentator, but this is on here because it’s interesting AND to serve as a reminder. This is historic as one of the longest matches in company history. This was a 70 minute match, that had to be ended because it hit the New York City curfew of 11pm. Bruno broke a rib during the match, and they still went 70 minutes to an inconclusive finish. Over 16,000 fans watched Bruno and Gorilla fight forever.

• ECW A Matter Of Respect (1996)

While the show was named after the RVD and Sabu feud, I didn’t focus on the match because the show had a few memorable wrinkles. To address the selling point, RVD ended up defeating Sabu, but showing him no respect. Their tenuous rivalry/friendship would continue to play into their dynamic for as long as they were still in ECW. A smaller wrinkle is this is the show where D-Von started getting sick of the comedic Dudley crap and attacked the referee and Buh-Buh. So you could say this is the harbinger of the Dudleyz that most of us grew to love or respect. Shane Douglas and Scorpio also had a crazy good match for the Television title. This match not only changed Shane’s perspective on the title, it was the jump off for the Television title being considered the “workhorse” title of ECW.

• Toryumon Dragonmania III: Vacant UWA World Tag Team Championship: Hell Warriors (Power Warrior & Animal Warrior) vs Damian 666 & Damian El Terrible (2008)

While the UWA Tag Title are mired in missing information, this is significant for the weight of the match and not so much the title. In the 90s while Animal was injured, Hawk went around Japan and started a Road Warriors clone team with Kensuke Sasaki as Power Warrior, and they were known as the Hell Raisers, and when Animal recovered all three were referred to as the Hell Warriors. After Hawk’s passing in 2003, it took a few years, but Kensuke and Animal got the remain Hell Warriors back together in Ultimo Dragon’s promotion. They won the vacant UWA World Tag titles, and Animal dedicated the victory to Hawk.

• Pro Wrestling NOAH Burning Navigation: Kenta Kobashi Homecoming (2008)

While Kobashi was already back from his battle with cancer for around 6 months, this was his first match in his home town of Fukuchiyama (in Kyoto). The entire Burning Navigation was in honor of Kobashi and his Burning stable, Burning Hammer, Burning Lariat…the whole Burning thing is synonymous with Kobashi. The show was electric, the noise rivaled that of larger venues and the emotion was at an all time high. This was an entire city celebrating the return of a beloved legend.

• ROH Dragon’s Reign (2013)

This was the ROH show where Tommaso Ciampa returned from an ACL injury that had him sidelined for a year. This was also a good show to strength the year of S.C.U.M. when Jimmy Jacobs beat Jay Lethal in their NoDQ grudge match. The main event was reDragon were defending their titles against The Briscoes. Two of the most lauded teams in ROH history faced off with reDragon retaining in a classic ROH tag bout.

• MLW Azteca Lucha (2024)

This show broke all of MLW’s box office records. Cesar Duran and Salina de la Renta had their ongoing rivalry, which was told very much in  away similar to Lucha Underground. Plenty of title activity in this show with Bad Dude Tito beating Ricky Shane Page for the National Openweight Title and CozyMAX won the vacant tag titles. The main event of Bárbaro Cavernario and Mistico for the MLW World Middleweight Championship was match of the night. Great lucha action, a spiritual successor to Lucha Underground and a good show to remind people that MLW has quality matches and a fairly reasonable option outside of AEW & WWE.

A tie in of respect and some classic moments. 60 years between the first event and the last event might be the largest gap of actual events (birthdays don’t count). Some interesting events popped, didn’t expect Toryumon, but there’s a decent amount of Lucha influence.

Did I miss anything? How far did I stretch the events today? Which one is your favorite? Let us know in the comments. And if you don’t do anything else today, remember, Always Use Your Head!