Memorable moments that perhaps weren't so memorable

[TheOneTheyCallOn]

We are all here because of one thing, we are all fans of wrestling, and as such I know we all have our favorite memorable moments from throughout the years. Moments such as HBK wining his first WWE Title, or seeing Snuka dive off the steel cage. But what about those moments that have come and gone and have been largely forgotten about. Moments that, while important, significant or great as they may have been at one time have for one reason or another have faded off into obscurity.

These moments helped to define my wrestling fan experience just as much as those that stand the test of time and to me will never be forgotten.

Moments like:

Barry Horrowitz wining for the first time in WWF - Horrowitz was a jobber back when jobber was a divisinon all it's own, his losing streak is the stuff of legend, and while having some pretty decent in ring talent was relegated to putting superstars over night in and night out. Until one night. When Horrowitz got his win I was watching it on tv and it made you believe that perhaps he can start winning. For weeks after the crowd and myslef (hell even my grandmother) was chanting his name, hoping he would get one more victory, but alas it was not to be. This could not be done today, the losing streak story-line is one thing but there simply aren't any real jobber anymore. At least not those on the same area as Barry Horrowitz.

Bobby Heenan being 'attacked' by Matilda - To be quite honest I am a bit fuzzy on the details but I seem to remember the British Bulldogs having a feud with the Heenan family. At one point Bobby Heenan came out to the ring dressed in a dog trainers suit and was subsequently 'attacked' by the Bulldogs mascot Matilda the English bulldog. This moment stands out to me because it was the first time I remember seeing one of the animals actually 'get involved' in a match. If this was done today I believe it could still work using animals to further story-lines isn't necessarily a bad idea as long as its handled tactfully. Sort of like Tera using her taranchula to scare the crap out of her opponents.

These are the main two I can think of right now but I will post more as I remember them provided this thread survives that long, so here are my questions to the community.

What moments do you remember that helped define the wrestling experience for you that perhaps others may have forgotten about?

Looking back on them now do you think they would have the same effect?

 

[AmerikanWolves619]

For me, it would have to be furing the Jake the Snake Roberts/MachoMan Randy Savage fued where Jake trapped MachoMan on the ropes and brought out his pet King Cobra. At that point, the snake would bite MachoMan on the arm. God that was an intense moment that is rarely ever brought up. This was such an intense fued between the two during the early 90s.

Of course, now with PETA on the loose for any type of mistreatment towards animals, this is hardly the type of moment that could be created. Not to mention, there would have to be a trainer on hand to attend to the animal/pet and training for the wrestler to conduct them selves appropriately especially in a crowd. As you can see, some children were visably upset/traumatized by what happened that this would not suit the PG era/Reallity era that most wrestling companies will but this into play.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yC58TAVprS4

 

[THTRobtaylor]

Horrowitz got a few wins against Chris Candido/Skip, including one at Summerslam 95...

I got several...

Rick Rude & Cheryl Roberts:- I remember seeing the event where Rude had Mrs Jake The Snake's face on his tights and Jake going crazy beating him up. It was one of the early shows I saw and stayed with me as a great example of when guys REALLY hate each other and would do anything to wind each other up. Rude won out in the feud and was IC champ pretty soon and other than his feud with Savage it's the one that really stood out for Jake.

Marty Jannetty/Shawn - Everyone remembers the turn...and Diesel's debut... but Marty's first return and the blow off match at the Rumble were equally important but get forgotten. Shawn was preening in the mirror when Jannetty came out from the crowd and Shawn saw him, panicked and grabbed Sherri in front of the mirror. At the time it was shocking for a woman to take such a shot. The match at the Rumble was the first time I really saw an injury mid match change the booking, it was clear midway through that Jannetty had dislocated his shoulder, even Bobby Heenan commented on it. Thus the original Jannetty win got deferred to a botch from Sherri... Jannetty still got his title reign, but it was several months later... How different could things have been?

Virgil turning on Ted DiBiase: At 1991's Rumble, Dusty and Dustin Rhodes teamed and lost to Ted DiBiase and Virgil...After the match DiBiase berated Virgil for his "poor performance" and tried to humilate him, Virgil turned on his boss and began a brief but relatively successful singles run. I remember this cos it was the only real time I saw DiBiase get his ass handed to him in a segment, he was always made to look solid or Virgil took the hit even from guys like Hogan and Savage... when Virgil knocked him cold with the belt, it was a huge moment.

 

[justtxyank]

The Cat "calling out" Scott Norton.

This kept me glued to Nitro and laughing hysterically. The Cat would be in the ring running his mouth and we'd see a backstage skit where Norton would walk into a room or something and the nWo would lie to him and say The Cat called him out. This would go on for multiple weeks with Norton beating the crap out of Cat each time until Cat finally really did call him out and I think actually beat him.

The first time it happened was a moment for me whereas most people probably don't care. Someone call my mama, I'm about to whoop somebody! Oh wait...wait...not you big fella!

 

[Shakin' Abe]

Any of the over hyped Hogan cage matches in WCW. Either with Flair or Piper. The age factor was already taking place and none of them could sell a decent cage match if they wanted! I, like the true fan that I am, payed for every PPV WCW had and regretted most of them, vowing to never buy another.

 

[Diet Soda]

The right honourable TheOneTheyCallOn mentioned Snuka diving off the cage, but Rikishi diving off the cage on to Val Venis at Fully Loaded 2000 really sticks in my mind as a defining experience.
No way would they let a super-heavyweight midcarder get away with that now, and the crazy thing is, Rikishi lost the match!

 

[dwith]

I would have to say that HHH banging the dead corpse in the casket would have to be my top one that I could have done without seeing.

Also the robocop skit that happened in WCW was just bad.

Kurt Angle skit that had him coming out with the milk truck, and spraying everyone in the ring in WWE. It really had no meaning to it. At least when STONECOLD did it it was beer, and he loved beer... the milk was just lame.

VINCE MCMAHON faking his death in the limo explosion. He could have wrote himself off a million other ways than suicide, especially probably at the exact same time BENOIT was probably committing suicide for real, and then VINCE MCMAHON had to come back on television because of the BENOIT tragedy making himself look like a asshole.

My last one I can think of right now would be the STONECOLD and BRIAN PILLMAN skit in WWF when PILLMAN pulled the gone and a shot was fired. Not a great segment to air in hind sight.

 

[Dr. Mantis Toboggan, M.D.]

I'm going with something I know people remember but I never ever hear them talk about, and if they do it's very rarely anymore. So I hope this fits the criteria.

[YOUTUBE]lMFyeoVmqcg[/YOUTUBE]

Chris Jericho "winning" the WWF Championship in 2000. This was awesome I remember watching this with my best friend in anticipation. We wanted Jericho to win, then again who didn't? I love how the crowd was for this match. It's electric and very fun to watch even now. I still think Jericho should have won it that night.

 

[TheOneTheyCallOn]

I'm going with something I know people remember but I never ever hear them talk about, and if they do it's very rarely anymore. So I hope this fits the criteria.

Absolutely, here is another one, the Million Doller Man attempts to buy the WWF championship

DiBiase’s only claim to a "world" title resulted not from an in-ring victory but an angle that saw the Million Dollar Man arrange to "buy" the WWF Championship from Andre the Giant after Andre defeated Hulk Hogan on network TV following the famous "evil twin referee" incident. Of course, DiBiase’s "reign" was short lived as the belt was "held up" by President Jack Tunney and put up for grabs in a tournament at Wrestlemania IV in 1988

I have heard a lot of people talk about the Tournament at WM IV but not much about the actions leading up to it. Which still ended up featuring DiBiase in the finals only to be beaten by Savage for the vacant title. It seems looking back a lot of the time the end result of the story-lines are remembered more than the actual series of events leading up to them, or perhaps that is just my observations.

 

[WRESTLING_GENIUS]

Mine has to be when Jaquelines tittys came out at the Insurection PPV, I was twelve when it came out and i remember when i seen that i was on instant Boner mode but thats why i remeber that, what the hell was she doing on the refs shoulders nway seriously yo.

Also i remeber when HHH was the WWE champion and in the same week faced the current WCW champion Chris Benoit on RAW, and then that same Thursday on Smackdown faced the ECW champion TAZZ and beat both. People dont rembember this but i do and in my mind i still believe HHH is the REAL first Undisputed champion seeing he beat all three company's champions in one week legitly and all companys were still battling at this time even though it was near the end....

 

[Rowdy Robby Piper]

This one comes from WCW's dying days...

During Ernest "The Cat" Miller's dancing days/using James Brown's "Funk On Ah Roll" music for his theme, he would always claim he's the best at it (or something like that). But when James Brown showed up on PPV (I forget which one) to have a dance-off, my friend and I literally had to pickup our jaws off the floor after seeing him actually show up. Granted, I knew he was coming due to the internet...but I wasn't going to spoil it for my friend. Oh how I miss those days....

 

[justtxyank]

Mine has to be when Jaquelines tittys came out at the Insurection PPV, I was twelve when it came out and i remember when i seen that i was on instant Boner mode but thats why i remeber that, what the hell was she doing on the refs shoulders nway seriously yo.

Also i remeber when HHH was the WWE champion and in the same week faced the current WCW champion Chris Benoit on RAW, and then that same Thursday on Smackdown faced the ECW champion TAZZ and beat both. People dont rembember this but i do and in my mind i still believe HHH is the REAL first Undisputed champion seeing he beat all three company's champions in one week legitly and all companys were still battling at this time even though it was near the end....

This is impossible. Chris Benoit won the World Title in WCW at Souled Out on January 16th, 2000. The title was immediately vacated. Benoit was never the WCW champion in the WWF. Even if he was, Tazz didn't debut with the WWF until the Royal Rumble and he wasn't the ECW world champion. He didn't win the ECW title again until April of 2000. By that time WCW obviously had a new champion (probably a few by then) and Benoit was deep in the middle of his story lines.

Sorry pal.

 

[Kaeden]

This is impossible. Chris Benoit won the World Title in WCW at Souled Out on January 16th, 2000. The title was immediately vacated. Benoit was never the WCW champion in the WWF. Even if he was, Tazz didn't debut with the WWF until the Royal Rumble and he wasn't the ECW world champion. He didn't win the ECW title again until April of 2000. By that time WCW obviously had a new champion (probably a few by then) and Benoit was deep in the middle of his story lines.

Sorry pal.

I know the latter half is accurate. After the Mike Awesome debacle, Vince "loaned" Tazz back to ECW for like a week, to win the title off Awesome, and job it at the next event. However, becasue he's Vince McMahon....he jobbed Tazz (and Dreamer) out to Haitch in the interim.

Because he could.

 

[GrandSword]

One that sticks in my mind, and it was so quick most people might have missed it...

Was when Triple H won the Royal Rumble on his big return, Kurt Angle was able to get a match against Trips at the ppv between RR and WM (probably was No Way Out) for the title shot on Raw or SD (not sure which one it was.)

The thing about this was, that HHH was this mighty retruning all-conquering face, and Angle was the (cowardly) heel. I remember Angle being so smug, and talking to HHH backstage and so happy with himself and really confident that he was going to face the RR winner and take his title shot.

It was a real turn on it's head thing for me personally at the time, because Angle had been saying he was the best because of his Gold medal win, but his title reign had so much cowardly stuff in it, like tricking Undertaker with his brother and running under rings to retain his title, that he came off as the typical cowardly heel.

But he was right up in Trips' face happy to take on the super-face and go onto WM, that it was soo different and it made me look at heels ina different light (and Kurt) for years to come.

I think that was the first time I realised Angle was a superstar.... and that storylines and heels and faces don't have to be black and white

 

[The Brain]

WrestleMania XIX does get some love here (mostly from me) and is considered by many to be one of the better manias. When discussing the show people always mention the two classic matches of Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Jericho and Brock Lesnar vs. Kurt Angle. People also discuss the finale of the Steve Austin vs. Rock rivalry in Austin’s last match. The showdown that was twenty years in the making between Hulk Hogan and Vince McMahon is also remembered. There is however one specific part of that match that seems to be overlooked.

[YOUTUBE]k5_D7REnZYU[/YOUTUBE]

How awesome was that? A main part of the build to this match was a debate about who was responsible for creating WrestleMania. Vince as the promoter said he was responsible for its success. Hogan as the star said he was. For nearly twenty years Roddy Piper said he should be given more credit for his role in making WrestleMania a success. He claimed if the fans didn’t hate Piper so much they wouldn’t have loved Hogan as much as they did. Piper always resented not getting credit for making mania a success. While we were watching Hogan vs. McMahon my friends and I were discussing Piper and wondering what he thought of this angle. We joked that it would be awesome if he did a run in. A few minutes later he did and we all marked out. The only way it would have been better is if Piper hit both Hogan and McMahon before walking out. Still it was a great moment that doesn’t seem to be remembered as one.

 

[Raptor93]

Christian vs swaggar for the ecw title, very good singles match probs one of the best in 2010 and got no notice. I stress the 2010 time frame, it wasn't the greatest of all time but it was very good and worth remembering look it up

 

[Its_A_Snake!]

There's so many, but one that really stands out to me is,

Randy Savage & Elizabeth reuniting at WrestleMania 7

Savage had just carried & put over The Ultimate Warrior through his greatest match ever and thus losing his career through the stipulation.

Then Sensational Sherri.. Sensationally.. attacked Savage after losing her "meal ticket" (as Gorilla Moonson would say) only to be grabbed by the hair & thrown out of the ring by Miss Elizabeth who had been watching Savage's then potential last match from the audience. She then tried to tend to The Macho Man, only to be shunned as he was face down & thought he was still being attacked. Only to nearly hit Liz when he got up, and realised she infact.. Helped him by getting rid of Sherri.

After slight consideration, the two embraced.. thus being reunited and together again. Turning Savage face in the process. the two would celebrate as EVERYBODY in the audience started crying with streams of water running down their faces.

Liz then went to hold open the ropes, only for Savage to do it instead to ride of together in the sunset.

Brilliant WrestleMania moment that has been forgotten thanks to WWE refusing to acknowledge Savage.
By far the most emotional Mania moment ever

 

[Philly88]

My last one I can think of right now would be the STONECOLD and BRIAN PILLMAN skit in WWF when PILLMAN pulled the gone and a shot was fired. Not a great segment to air in hind sight.

Man I loved that I thought it was great. One of those times where it sort of felt real and you were like holy crap.

 

[Police Penis Sucking Goat Fucker]

It makes me laugh how someone metioned Jaqueline's boobs

The first thing that came to my mind was The Big Bossman showing up at Big Show's dad's funeral and he drove away with his casket. People don't talk about that moment... I wonder why

They also never seem to mention how Mark Henry's Hand child is doing

or there is always this moment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h76xpVU0rXM

you just don't see people oozing black goo in WWE anymore

 

[Suq Madeeq]

1. HBK vs. Chris Jerico promo segment when Jericho stiff punched Shawn Michael's wife in the face and left her a huge bump on her cheek. If I remember right, she agreed to take the actual hit to add to the realism instead of a fake pulled punch. I saw it and was like, "Awww, S$#$t!!!"

2. WCW Nitro when there was the huge chunk of "ice" and at the end of the show, it broke apart and they announced it was the "Yeti". What made it all the more ridiculous was that the Yeti was in fact a "mummy". After that, it was never shown again and quickly forgotten.

 

[bxbigshow]

This is impossible. Chris Benoit won the World Title in WCW at Souled Out on January 16th, 2000. The title was immediately vacated. Benoit was never the WCW champion in the WWF. Even if he was, Tazz didn't debut with the WWF until the Royal Rumble and he wasn't the ECW world champion. He didn't win the ECW title again until April of 2000. By that time WCW obviously had a new champion (probably a few by then) and Benoit was deep in the middle of his story lines.

Sorry pal.

I think the fact that the WCW title was vacated as oppose to anyone actually beating Benoit allows to speculation that Chris Benoit was the REAL WCW champion...no one pinned him.

This being the belief when Trips beat him clean, and then to follow up and beat Taz, who was the current ECW champion makes the argument that Triple H beat both company's 'champ' at the time.

Just my opinion...

As to the topic, when Randy Savage destroyed Ricky Steamboat's throat with the ring bell. As a kid I was screaming for Savage to stop....

 

[pr1celess]

For me, anything to do with Trish Stratus. I was about 14 during her peak, and I think sales of tissues must have gone up 200% at the time.

Also, the night Al Snow had a match against himself on Raw (and we complain about the booking now) Gillberg's first win, and the emergence of Bluedust!

Some of my favourite memories though, were of Edge & Christian when they had the Kazoos (sp?) and were just generally funny heels.

 

[shooter_mcgavin]

Tyson's right hand on Shawn Michaels. There are a lot of replays regarding that and many called it a WM moment. Unfortunately Michaels no sold the punch and, for a guy who is known to be really good at selling, it kind of killed the moment.

 

[WRESTLING_GENIUS]

This is impossible. Chris Benoit won the World Title in WCW at Souled Out on January 16th, 2000. The title was immediately vacated. Benoit was never the WCW champion in the WWF. Even if he was, Tazz didn't debut with the WWF until the Royal Rumble and he wasn't the ECW world champion. He didn't win the ECW title again until April of 2000. By that time WCW obviously had a new champion (probably a few by then) and Benoit was deep in the middle of his story lines.

Sorry pal.

Actually this event occured the week after the royal rumble and one day after Benoit won the WCW championship, He was still recognized as champion this night because the title didnt vacate until Nitro went off the Air, and TAZZ defeated Mike Awesome for the ECW championship this same week because AWesome left for WCW and Tazz came on smackdown that same week with the ECW championship and faced Triple H, I remember because this is around the same time Mick Foley was trying to get HHH in the Hell in A Cell match at No Way Out, Tazz dropped the title to Tommy Dreamer one week later and Dreamer lost the belt to Justin Credible 15 minutes later, i remember cuz i have this distinct ECW on TNN episode on tape and it was in late JanuARY MAYBE EARLY FEBUARY WHEN THIS HAPPENED. DONT TRY TO PROVE A WRESTLING GENIUS WRONG SIR YOU SHOULD KNOW BETTER.....

 

[TheOneTheyCallOn]

Let's not get off track please, if you wish to continue the debate I think the wrestling spam section is a better fit.

Yes RavensEdge your right but that's only one dvd out of many.

One moment I liked, though not a classic, is when Orton and Taker were feuding. The belt I believe was in a case on smackdown, when Orton approached it was "struck by lightning" this made me jump cause I wasn't really paying attention lol.