Today In Pro Wrestling History: May 27th

Alrighty then! We have real events today that don’t require extensive digging or mental gymnastics! Surprisingly, a lot of normal TV episode history, which you can probably tell by the feature image. So unlike Scott, I know why you’re here, let’s check out some history!

• AAA Triplemania II-C: 2 out of 3 Falls Hair vs Hair: Jake Roberts vs Konnan (1994)

A culmination of the 3 part Triplemania event, which took some inspiration from WrestleMania II with the multiple events gimmick. It was also the last stage of the Konnan and Jake the Snake feud that started at Triplemania I when Jake costs Konnan the retirement match against Cien Caras. In dramatic fashion, Konnan defeated Jake in two straight falls. The crowd was white hot against Jake, so this was a hell of a memory for those who witnessed it.

• WCW Nitro: Scott Hall Arrives (1996)

Billionaire Ted worked his magic to pry Razor Ramon away from the WWF. This was a crazy moment to watch on TV because he was just of WWF TV, there was no introduction graphic…it felt real. Scott’s words were ominous, throwing out a declaration of war. Little did we know it was going to be the nWo at the time, it felt like WWF arrived to swallow WCW (about 5 years too early). This moment changed the direction of televised pro wrestling for the rest of the 90s.

• WWE Monday Night Raw (2002)

This had a little bit of everything. Terri Runnels held the Hardcore Championship for half a sandwich until Stevie Richards won it back. Chris Benoit made his homecoming and return to WWE after a year away due to a career threatening neck injury, the pop was Hogan levels. Brock was still on his “Next Big Thing” push and the main event was historic. RVD defeated Eddie Guerrero, for the IC title in a Ladder Match. This match is easily entrenched in the Top 50 greatest WWE matches of all time.

• AJPW 40th Anniversary Year Rise Up: AJPW World Junior Heavyweight Championship: Kenny Omega (c) vs KAI (2012)

This was seen as the culmination of the DDT invader angle. Kenny was representing DDT the entire time, defeating KAI in October of 2011. Much like in AEW, Michael Nakazawa followed Kenny during this era as well, and for anyone unfamiliar, go check out the old Kenny gimmick. His match graphic pose was effectively a magical girl pose, so his invasion and subsequent referencing to himself as “cool”, was an affront to AJPW and most traditional puro fans. He played his part well, and KAI defeating Kenny closed the chapter on his embarrassment of losing the company for 217 days.

• STARDOM Flashing Champions: Winner Takes All Wonder & World Of Stardom Championships: Mina Shirakawa (c) vs Tam Nakano (c) (2023)

Only the second winner takes all match in Stardom history. Tam was the World Champion and Mina was the Wonder Champion. This had other threads since both were a part of Tam’s stable Cosmic Angels, but Mina was getting sick of being in Tam’s shadow. So she created Club Venus to become her own faction leader. The bad blood was still there and once Mina got the Wonder, she wanted to take out Tam to fully eclipse the “Cutest in the Universe”. Mina had one of her better matches of her entire career, but Tam was on a different level in 2023. Mina lost and became the wrestler with the shortest Wonder reign in the history of the belt, up to that point, at 34 days. Tam joined Mayu Iwatani as the only two women in Stardom to hold the Red and White belts simultaneously.

• NXT (2025)

Battleground fallout show had a lot of action. Mike Santana made his NXT debut as he was chasing Trick’s newly won TNA World Championship. Ethan Page ends up beating Ricky Saints for the North American championship and then gets surrounded by Je’Von Evans, Laredo Kid and Rey Fenix, setting the groundwork for World’s Collide. Jacy Jayne got a fairly surprising victory over Stephanie Vaquer to win the NXT Women’s Championship for the first time, utilizing her Fatal Influence stablemates. Two title changes and partnership wrestlers popping up make for regular NXT tv to be a pretty big deal at this time!

Well this was a nice variety if I do say so myself. Also nice to see some more recent events and everything isn’t like 5+ years old. Even snuck in tangential references to DDT and TNA in the events chosen. This may be one of the most well rounded articles in regards to representation.

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!