Today In Pro Wrestling History: May 22nd

There does really seem to be a consistent pattern this week, with a lot of articles ending up primarily WCW and WWE. Eventually all of the Japanese tours that are just on a random multi-person tag day will come to a head, and everyone will probably hate that article. But until that fortuitous day, let’s see how much everyone remembers!

• WCW Slamboree (1994)

This is often seen as the final swan song of WCW’s southern “wrasslin” roots. With Hulk Hogan about to debut in WCW in a few weeks, this was the closest thing we’d see to southern territory wrestling until the NWA Powerrr era. But this show had a lot of intriguing matches. Terry Funk vs Tully Blanchard ended in a Double DQ. Ric Flair retained the World title over Barry Windham, and Sting beat Vader for the vacant International World title after Rick Rude was stripped of it because of his injury. Often cited as the highlight match though, the Nasty Boys lost their tag titles to Cactus Jack and Kevin Sullivan. The fact the Nasty Boys are included in positive memories during this event, is prodigious enough to count as historic.

• WCW Nitro: Cruiserweight Championship: Crowbar (c) vs Daffney (c) (2000)

That’s right, even though this was a comedy match, it was more mature than whatever was happening in the World title scene with their game of moronic hot potato. They were both considered co-champions because the title changed hands in a mixed tag against Chris Candido and Tammy Sytch. They argued over who was rightful champion so Daffney called out Crowbar to settle it. They had thumb wrestling, rock, paper, scissors, Daffney gave Crowbar and Atomic Wedgie…Crowbar gave Daffney and Indian Rug Burn (anyone that went to school in the 90s knows that is EXACTLY the name of the move). Things broke down when Candido and Tammy attacked during the match, Candido hits the Reverse Piledriver on Crowbar, and in the midst of Daffney checking on Crowbar, the referee counts it as a pinfall, and Daffney becomes the undisputed Cruiserweight Champion!

• WWE Judgment Day: WWE Undisputed Championship: JBL vs John Cena (c) (2005)

The I Quit match that saw John Cena cement himself and invent one of the most contentious titles at the time. This is on here because it was a really good match that solidified Cena as a new major player, but also because, it was the last time we saw a normal belt for a while. After this match, Cena introduced the Toys R’ Us staple item, WWE Undisputed Spinner Belt. While the US title was the first, it doesn’t hold the same aura as the main title. So people lost their minds over the premiere title becoming a mere child’s plaything. And yes, I did paraphrase Vegeta from Dragon Ball Z when he was talking about Super Saiyan.

• WWE Over the Limit: World Heavyweight Championship: Randy Orton (c) vs Christian (2011)

A fairly gimmicky show was saved by the rivalry between Christian and Randy. Motivated with a pre-match speech from the recently retired Edge, Christian came out to prove himself. He went to TNA to prove he could be a main event guy, and the sentiment in WWE was starting to shift to agree, this was Christian’s final real hurdle. After getting embarrassed by Randy, losing his first WWE championship in 5 days, this was a palpable rivalry. A wonderfully wrestled match only held back by the fact WWE was in the more sanitized PG era. This proved Christian could completely hang in the WWE upper card, and the match stole the show.

• WWE Extreme Rules (2016)

If it wasn’t for Seth Rollins’ return after the Roman Reigns versus AJ Styles match, I would’ve put the focus on the Intercontinental 4-Way. But Rollins and Reigns have fed a generation, so it can’t really be footnoted. The 4-Way between Cesaro, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn and The Miz was very much the ROH workhorse style versus Miz’s WWE safe entertainment style. The match was a whirlwind of pinfalls, massive shots and Miz utilizing Maryse as a timely distraction to avoid being seen tapping out. Kevin and Sami’s history came back to bite them when Sami knocked out Cesaro with the Helluva Kick but Kevin pulled him out, not wanting Sami to win. Which allowed Miz the chance to sneak in and steal the pinfall to retain.

• NOAH Star Navigation ~ One Night Dream 2 ~ (2024)

In a fun tie in to the TNA iMPACT! episode from yesterday, Starboy Charlie teamed with Titus Alexander against recently dethroned Open the Twin Gate Champions Alejandro and current GHC Heavyweight Champion Kaito Kiyomiya. Tomohiro Ishii barely survived against Masa Kitamiya in a match for people who love brutal hoss battles. The main event was Kenoh versus our favorite murder grandpa Minoru Suzuki. Kenoh still held a grudge from the Suzuki-Gun era of NOAH which is considered the darkest period and nearly led to the company closing. Kenoh played the Champion of NOAH well, and ended up beating Suzuki in a 25+ minute match.

This was an entire article of statement events or matches. Now some statements were stupid (looking at you Nitro), but everyone ain’t a poet. I was just happy I managed to wedge in one thing that was WCW or WWE. As I’ve said before, wrestling has been around for 200 years and there’s multitudes of countries, distilling it down to the last 40-60 years of one or two companies is just a disservice to fandom.

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!