What ever happened to the Lion's Den match?

[Savion83]

I'm not trying to bring up the atittude era or anything like that!

But remember back in the summer of 1998 when Ken Shamrock and the late, great Owen Hart were feuding in a wrestling ring and even in the infamous Hart dugeon in Calgary. They ended there feud at Summerslam that in the first ever Lion's Den match. The Lion's Den is of course a influnce of Ken Shamrocks old UFC stomping ground where the WWE is still to this day trying to compete against the world that is MMA.

Ken Shamrock won the first lion's den match against Owen Hart via submission. While the second time former UFC fighter and Shamrock's MMA rival Dan "The Beast" Severn interfered as the special ref for the rematch. And a whole year later deja vu in the form of former WWF/E star Steve Blackman. Where the two faced off in a "no holds barred" lion's den match. The only other time we've seen a lion's den match is when Shamrock challenged Mr. McMahon to a match on RAW, but Jeff Jarrett cause for Shamrock to lose with a steel chair shot to the head.

Now my question is, what ever happened to the match?? This match disaperred way before the "PG rating" ever came about! So that's not the cause.

I think the WWE missed out on bringing the match back in september/october 2002 on Smackdown during the feud between Kurt Angle and the late Chris Benoit. The two are/were both submission specialist and a match like that could have been not only one of the greatest match on Smackdown, but one of the greastest matches in WWE history! Can you image what kind of match that could have been?

But with now less wrestlers in the WWE who use submission moves. It's less than likely that the match will ever return. Or could it? What if in the future we saw a lion's den match with Chris Jericho Vs. Danial Bryan? That would be a great match!

Now that the WWE is in this "PG era". I don't expect to see it anytime soon.

 

[Via Armbar]

It was pretty much introduced only because it fit the gimmick of one of the more popular wrestlers at the time. It fit with Shamrock and Severn and to a degree Blackman, but what would they do with it now? There are no superstars that I know of who have an mma type gimmick. Maybe Lashley, but he's pretty much done. Punk has some muay thai background but he doesn't have that kind of gimmick. So the reason it was done in the first place was to aid one of the wrestlers at the time who had a fitting gimmick. No one has that now, so there's little to no point.

 

[Big Nick Dudley]

Since when did it become a bad thing to bring up the Attitude Era? That's like conservative's making fun of intellectuals...when did it become a bad thing to be considered intelligent? haha

Anyway, the Lions Den match died...with Ken Shamrocks wrestling career. Shamrock was a decent performer in the WWF. I liked his wrestling style, his psychotic character, and his mic skills were decent-to above average. But after his departure, there wasn't really a need to keep it around. The Lions Den was his deal, or his camp if you will. Plus, with the explosion in popularity in MMA, it would look cheap and tacky to use the thing now-a-days.

 

[Wolfdemon]

Besides being the worst match in WWE it was used for Ken Shamrock and him alone. I despise everything about this match. They probably got rid of the concept because it was so awful and it's harder to sell a knockout than a pin or submission.