My History Of Wrestlemania
MY HISTORY OF WRESTLEMANIA
As many of you may know from reading my previous columns, I have a preference for the Royal Rumble as it was that that got me into wrestling but the greatest spectacle of professional wrestling is without a doubt Wrestlemania.
The first Wrestlemania I saw was I believe a historic one in Wrestlemania 6. This was famous for having the world champion Hulk Hogan versus the Intercontinental champion Ultimate Warrior as the main event in a title versus title match. What made it historic was the fact that the Ultimate Warrior won the match clean in the middle of the ring in Vince McMahon’s attempt to create an alternative to Hogan as the main draw and top of the card. Why I believe this didn’t work is apparent if you read Gary Hart’s book and he said that Warrior wasn’t interested in being a good wrestler but just wanted to know what to do to get himself over. In my opinion, if he had learnt more about how the business worked, people would have wanted to continue to work with him and he would have lasted longer as an active wrestler than he did.
Other memories for me from that first Wrestlemania are Bobby Heenan slapping Andre The Giant. Andre and Haku had just lost the tag team titles to Demolition and Andre got tied up in the ropes so Demolition used that to finish off Haku. Heenan berated him afterwards and was poking him in the chest and actually swore at him at one point. I found that really shocking as a 7 year old kid because at that point it was family friendly and you didn’t hear that on WWF wrestling at that point. Thinking about it years afterwards, it was probably that Heenan forgot the cameras were there and was making sure it looked real enough for the first few rows. The Rockers and the Orient Express had a great tag match although it was a pity they used salt in the eyes of Marty Janetty as part of the finish. Pat Tanaka was with Sato at the time. Sato left and Paul Diamond came in under a mask as Kato. Tanaka and Diamond had great chemistry as partners in the AWA together and so the matches got even better with the Rockers in the times afterwards and they were good to begin with.
Bearing in mind what I said about the Ultimate Warrior, he did have a great match the year after at Wrestlemania 7 against Macho Man Randy Savage. Apart from those two matches though, it is a real struggle to think of another good match that Warrior had.
A good thing about those first two Wrestlemania’s I saw was seeing Bobby Heenan as a manager even if this was right at the end of his incredible career. He was so animated at ringside, took incredible looking bumps and was brilliant on the microphone. Also at Wrestlemania 7 when he wasn’t managing, he was the colour commentator and was so good at it. He was naturally hilarious and I used to love how he would refer to himself as a broadcast journalist and yet display the most incredible bias in favour of the heels. I think seeing a heel who was so incredible at their craft like that made me enjoy watching heels.
Randy Savage had a number of great Wrestlemania matches. The first one that comes to mind is the obvious one that is still talked about to this day against Ricky Steamboat at Wrestlemania 3. Two of the all time greats who were at the peak of their game giving it their all is why this match continues to be talked about. Another one that I’ve already mentioned is the match with Ultimate Warrior at Wrestlemania 7 plus at Wrestlemania 8 he had a good match with Ric Flair.
You can’t talk about Wrestlemania without mentioning the undefeated streak of The Undertaker. The fact that the Undertaker had so many good matches at Wrestlemania show how amazingly talented he was. The two matches he had with Shawn Michaels are up there in the greatest of all time at the event. I disagreed with who ended the streak and thought it should have been the late Bray Wyatt, To me it made the most sense. Bret Hart had the most incredible match with Steve Austin and kept the attention of fans for a full hour.
Yes, I know I haven’t mentioned some of the later Wrestlemania’s but it would make this like War and Peace. I will revisit this at a later date.
Until next time
Features: From Stockport, England. Wrestling fan since late 1989. Would always like to have been involved in the business in some way but in his own words “I look like an obese Jim Cornette and have not much in the way of athletic ability.” Regularly attends FutureShock Wrestling shows and is a huge fan of American territory wrestling which may explain his take on some aspects of modern wrestling.
