Today In Pro Wrestling History: September 19th

We get another article with a decent smattering of different companies, countries and older gimmick names that while not forgotten, do still spark nostalgic joy. So let’s see what we have to work with!

• WCW Fall Brawl (1993)

WCW Fall Brawl was packed with massive title shifts and chaotic brawls, starting with Rick Rude capturing the WCW International World Heavyweight Championship from Ric Flair. The Nasty Boys won the tag titles off of Paul Roma & Arn Anderson, and the icon Sting pulled off a huge win by making Lord Steven Regal submit to retain his United States Championship. In the main event, our staple WarGames match delivered total chaos as the team of Sting, Dustin Rhodes, The Shockmaster and Davey Boy Smith defeated Harlem Heat (using the Kane and Kole gimmick names), Big Van Vader and Sid Vicious.

• ROH Driven: ROH Tag Team Titles: Age of the Fall (Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black) (c) vs Kevin Steen & El Generico (2008)

The main event is a huge milestone in independent wrestling history because it served as the absolute emotional peak of a year-long chase. For months, the beloved underdog duo of Kevin Steen and El Generico had scratched and clawed for the ROH World Tag Team Championship, only to be repeatedly cheated out of the gold by the chaotic, manipulative heel faction known as The Age of the Fall. When things came to a head and our babyface underdog challengers defeated the heel champions, the arena exploded, capping off one of the most defining tag team rivalries of the era. As we all know, three of the four participants were integral in the continued success of ROH and eventual WWE accolades that keep them at the top of the business today.

• WWE Night of Champions (2010)

Let’s kick off with lame history, this was the Lumberjill Match that effectively retired the original Women’s Championship since the winner unified the Women’s and Divas under the Divas banner, which was Michelle McCool defeating Melina. Daniel Bryan won his first WWE title after defeating his old NXT Mentor The Miz for the United States Championship. Randy Orton won the WWE Championship to begin his 7th reign as Chris Jericho had a stipulation where if he lost he would leave the company. So that sent Jericho into a hiatus for around 15 months. The last thing people may remember is that Kane defeated The Undertaker to retain the World Heavyweight title, and it was clean. Kane countered the Tombstone with one of his own, to get a surprisingly decisive victory over his “big brother”.

• AJPW 4th Royal Road Tournament: Finals: Zeus vs SUWAMA (2016)

This was SUWAMA’s first victory of the Oudou/Royal Road/King’s Road tournament (translations are fun since not everything is direct). SUWAMA was coming off being sidelined for a while with an Achilles’ injury, so this tournament was a way to prove he was back in form. The protege of Keiji Mutoh who stuck around even after Mutoh left. He was a foundational pillar of modern AJPW and this helped to cement him and his dominance in the current landscaping. Setting up for SUWAMA to be the first and only back to back winner when he won next year and also currently the most decorated Triple Crown Champion in AJPW with 8 reigns.

• CMLL 92nd Anniversary Show: Mask vs Title CMLL World Light Heavyweight Title: MJF (c) vs Mistico (2025)

This was the first English Live Stream for CMLL since it was broadcast on TrillerTV with official English commentary. MJF started this feud a few months prior when he cheated to draw a disqualification against Mistico, and then proceeded to beat on him and steal his mask. The mind games continued when MJF won the World Light Heavyweight title off Averno and used it to goad Mistico as the one title that eluded him in 20 years. Frustrated Mistico challenged him to a Mask vs Hair match, but MJF didn’t like that, so they agreed on Mask vs Title, which was very rare for Mistico to wager his identity against a belt. MJF came out wearing full Homelander gear and hamming up the heel persona. In a bloody sold-out affair, Mistico ended up winning via his La Mistica move, so the crowd exploded and went home happy, while also receiving high critical praise across different outlets.

Title wins, cross promotional wars and a chase that kept the independent wrestling world engaged for nearly a year. Lots of fun memories, a few ones you can laugh at in hindsight (Divas era), but history isn’t always good!