Today In Pro Wrestling History: August 19th

Another solid day with a couple SummerSlams, but we did have to find one independent show to round things out. Let’s see what went on for today’s history!

• WWF SummerSlam (2001)

The show saw the culmination of the detested DDP Stalker angle. Kanyon and DDP were the WWF Tag Title holders, the Brothers of Destruction had the WCW, and this was a winner takes all match. The Brothers completely decimated DDP and Kanyon, it was a total burial, which just made WCW more irate at how they used one of WCW’s most beloved wrestlers after the monopoly. The Rock also faced Booker T for the WCW World Heavyweight title. Since Rock was coming off of Scorpion King, it made complete sense for Rock to go over. As for the best match of the night, it was also very memorable in regards to the level of desperation it came to. Angle’s determination couldn’t be broken, so Austin saw no other recourse to protect his title reign than to try for a disqualification. He dolled out stunners to all WWF referees that came in to replace the previous one he attacked. It wasn’t until Nick Patrick entered that he refused to count Angle’s pinfall and instead just disqualified Austin. A clever screw job.

• ROH Death Before Dishonor XIV: ROH World Title: Jay Lethal (c) vs Adam Cole (2016)

This was during Jay Lethal’s 427 day reign, and also the end of it. Cole recently joined the Bullet Club, and began his psychological war against Lethal. Pacing for the match was quick, they started aggressive in lieu of the usual slow tie up start. This also saw a fair amount of interference from The Elite and a ref bump. Cole won the title after a Last Shot and Shining Wizard which solidified two bits of history. Lethal’s reign went down as the 4th longest at the time (6th as of today) and Adam Cole became only the third man after Austin Aries & Jay Briscoe to hold the World title more than once.

• NXT TakeOver Brooklyn III (2017)

This had a few big moments. Asuka defeated Ember Moon to retain the Women’s title in the best of match of the night. Drew McIntyre also managed to pry the NXT Championship from Bobby Roode, being the first person to actually defeat Roode in a singles contest, on a televised event since his NXT debut. We also got the beginning of an era that many fans consider the peak of NXT. Adam Cole, Kyle O’Reilly and Bobby Fish debuted at this event as the Undisputed Era.

• WWE SummerSlam (2018)

Another show with a few major moments. Lets start with the launchpad of “The Man”. When Charlotte Flair defeated Becky Lynch and Carmella (c) for the SmackDown Women’s title, Becky snapped. This gave her the momentum to go from the “Lass Kicker” to “The Man” using the old Ric Flair adage against his own daughter of “to be the man, you got to beat the man”. The Raw Women’s title also carried historical weight as Rhonda Rousey defeated Alexa Bliss (c) for her first title in WWE. Then we had something that was somehow good and bad, both at the same time. Brock Lesnar had an on-going 504 day Universal Championship reign, but it was hated by many since he was on a part-time schedule and only appeared for marquee events, so the title wasn’t defended or visible enough for many people’s liking. Roman Reigns however, was still not the Tribal Chief, so it was one of those typical subculture concepts of “anyone else – no not you”. Roman defeated Brock and snapped the longest Universal title reign at the time, but the match wasn’t very good and as I already said, Roman wasn’t really “over” as a face. Oddly, this was serendipitous because this was the reign where Roman came out, discussed his battle with Leukemia and why he had to vacate the title just 2 months later. After returning from his battle with cancer and then going onto the Bloodline, it’s a little ironic to think such a critically panned match and angle, was the exact vehicle to finally get Roman over.

• DWW Destiny Summer Heat (2023)

Another indy SuperShow to round out a day that was a little light in the events. This caught my attention because of some of the names involved. There was a Hardcore War between The Calling (AKIRA & Ricky Shane Page) faced off with The Second Gear Crew (1 Called Manders & Mance Warner). There was some cross promotional aspects here since The Calling had been making waves on MLW for a while but the whole situation was a weapon laden brawl with chairs, doors and everything that wasn’t nailed down. The Calling ended up victorious and the crowd was happy really into the match. As the main event went, it was pretty stacked as well. The Destiny World Title was vacated because Steve Maclin was the champion, but it was during the time when he sustained a groin injury during a TNA tour. So we had a four way Alex Kane (from MLW), Lance Archer, Trent Seven and Big Damo fought for the vacant title. Trent navigated the match masterfully letting the beasts tire themselves out, before he saw his moment. When Kane and Damo took each other out, Trent went after Lance. His Spinning Backfist into a Burning Hammer gave Trent Seven a big victory as the biggest underdog in the title match.

A small thread of Adam Cole being relevant in two events, so somewhere Greg DeMarco is giddy. I wonder if August 19th is a special day in the DeMarco household. Aside from needing one Supershow to round out the list, it was at least a fairly memorable day. Always fun when events have multiple moments to look back on.