The 411 Wrestling Top 5 3.14.12: Week 165 – Best WrestleMania Non-Main Event Matches

Hello everyone and welcome to 411 Wrestling’s Top 5 List. What we are going to is take a topic each week and all the writers here on 411 wrestling will have the ability to give us their Top 5 on said topic, plus up to three honorable mentions. Most of our topics will be based on recent events in the Wrestling World, looking at those events that make us think of times past.

So, on to this week’s topic…

TOP 5 BEST WRESTLEMANIA NON-MAIN EVENT MATCHES

For purposes of the column, main event = last match on the show

Chad Nevett
HM: The Rock vs. Hulk Hogan (WrestleMania X8) – Two icons clashing and the crowd was so into this match that it elevated it.
HM: Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Jericho (WrestleMania XIX) – The ‘rebirth of Mr. WrestleMania’ as Jericho proved that he could more than keep up with Michaels and Michaels began almost a decade of classic WrestleMania performances.
HM: The Undertaker vs. Triple H (WrestleMania XXVII) – They went all out from the start of the match, giving it a different feel from most matches like this. It was two guys trying to put the other down and it was damn entertaining.

5. Randy Savage vs. Ricky Steamboat (WrestleMania III) – The ‘first great WrestleMania match’ holds up still, because it’s genuinely a great match. It featured a talented heel that frustrated because he was so good that he didn’t need to cheat… and did anyway, and a face so good at playing a face that no one can imagine him as a heel. Throw in Miss Elizabeth as a secondary concern and it was a constant mix of impressive in-ring action and engaging melodrama. What I love is the sense that what made Savage lose was his heel tactics and jealousy: he was so distracted by everything outside of fighting Steamboat that he brought the loss on himself.

4. Shawn Michaels vs. Kurt Angle (WrestleMania 21) – What I love most about this match is the storytelling involved. Kurt Angle was the best mat-based wrestler at the time, while Michaels was the ‘catch as catch can’ guy who adapted well to other styles. So well that the first ten minutes are nothing but Michaels keeping Angle on the ground in a headlock and frustrating the hell out of him. From there, both men go all out as Angle goes overboard in proving that he can hang with Mr. WrestleMania, while Michaels changes things up enough to frustrate him more. Angle wins in the end, because he’s so determined and skilled, but Michaels comes out looking like a million bucks.

3. Bret Hart vs. “Stone Cold” Steve Austin (WrestleMania 13) – The match that pretty much transitioned between two era in the WWE as Bret Hart turned heel (in the US) and Austin turned face. We have never seen Hart so brutal before; he seemingly went down to Austin’s level, while Austin rose to his. Hart matched Austin’s brutality and Austin matched Hart’s excellent ringwork. More than that, Austin hung in there the entire time and proved that Bret Hart couldn’t beat him. He lost by passing out, but that’s almost like losing on a technicality. He didn’t submit and that’s what counts. Rewatching this match a few weeks ago with Austin and Jim Ross doing commentary, it was also interesting to see how few attempts at submissions occurred. This was a submissions match, but both men hated one another so much that the ultimate goal of winning almost took a backseat to just inflicting damage and pain. Every time I watch this, I see something new that adds to it.

2. Shawn Michaels vs. The Undertaker (WrestleMania XV) – Watching this match was probably the most fun I’ve ever had watching wrestling. At the time, I was watching WWE PPVs in a local bar and had been for a bit over a year. I’d grown to know them as tame affairs where, maybe, a dozen people showed up every three weeks to watch. For ‘Mania, a lot more people showed up, particularly as the night wore on. Most were casual fans that didn’t pay close attention — until this match. Over the course of the first five minutes or so, everyone in the bar, whether there to watch wrestling or not, became utterly transfixed by the show that Michaels and the Undertaker were putting on. I haven’t been in an atmosphere like that outside of live events and that made this special. Everyone was into every single move. Every near fall. Every finisher. There were audible gasps and sighs of relief… it was great. I can’t think of many other matches that could do that. And every time I rewatch it, it does the same thing to me.

1. Bret Hart vs. Owen Hart (WrestleMania X) – Two brothers battling to prove who’s the best. On one side, you have a former world champion who everyone assumes is better because they love him so much; on the other, his whiny younger brother who seemingly turned on his brother for no good reason. This was the first match of WrestleMania X and pretty much the biggest thing that could happen to a young Canadian Bret Hart fan. The two brothers put on a clinic in the ring and, on a night where Bret would go on to win the WWF Championship again, Owen pinned him. That’s almost mind-boggling in how counterintuitive it is. It’s such a surprising moment, one that retroactively made this match better. But, really, this was two wrestlers out-wrestling almost everyone else I’ve ever seen in the ring.

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Gavin Napier
HM: Razor Ramon vs. Shawn Michaels – Ladder Match – Somewhat tame by today’s standards, but 20 years ago, this was mind blowing stuff.
HM: Chris Benoit vs. Kurt Angle vs. Chris Jericho – European/Intercontinental Title Match – Three great workers given time to do what they do best.
HM: The Rock vs. Hulk Hogan – Great wrestling match? Not really. Great sports entertainment? Absolutely.

5. “Macho Man” Randy Savage vs. “The Nature Boy” Ric Flair – The fact that this went to the middle of the show just so Hogan vs. Sid, complete with Papa Shango antics, could be the main event is damned ludicrous. This match didn’t get the attention it deserved, and I feel like it still gets overlooked. The WWF World Heavyweight Title was on the line, and presumably so was Elizabeth. Flair was in Savage’s head leading into this, and both men were in rare form once they got to the ring. A highly underrated match is almost a hidden classic between these two, and worth watching again if you’ve forgotten how good it was.

4. Edge and Christian vs. The Hardys vs. The Dudley Boyz – TLC – This delightful train wreck set the standard for gimmick matches. With an influx of veteran ECW talent and young daredevils, WWE had the perfect recipe to make magic happen by letting them bounce all over and above the arena with the tag team titles at stake. It was a ballet of organized chaos, and one breathtaking moment after another. The fact that all six men survived and went on to have successful careers after the fact is amazing. Looking back at that match, there are 3 multiple time world champions involved, more tag team titles than I care to count, and Matt Hardy. Nothing’s perfect, right? I kid. Every ladder match, TLC match, and high-risk gimmick match from Wrestlemania X-7 forward has had this to live up to. Good luck.

3. “The Nature Boy” Ric Flair vs. “The Heartbreak Kid” Shawn Michaels – I could watch Ric Flair matches all day every day. He’s my favorite wrestler by a long shot and I don’t apologize for being a Ric Flair mark. Shawn Michaels is as close as we have or will see to Ric Flair again, I think, and that’s the highest compliment I know how to pay to someone inside the wrestling business. Two of the all time greatest performers came together at a point where both probably should have been well past the age of putting on a high quality match to prove that there’s more to wrestling than workrate and high spots and spectacle. The most important aspect of what goes on in the ring is the ability to tell a story, and no two people have ever done it better than The Nature Boy and The Heartbreak Kid. Michaels apologizing for putting Flair down for what was supposed to be the last time while Flair invited the ending was hard to watch for somebody that started watching Flair on TBS in 1985. This match, though, is my first line of defense in why Ric Flair is the greatest wrestler of all time. Ric was 59 when this match happened. 59. FIFTY DAMN NINE. He turned in a five star classic at age 59. Nobody else has, nobody else can, nobody else will. Period. This match is great on it’s own, and better as a testament to the two men involved.

2. Bret “The Hitman” Hart vs. “Stone Cold” Steve Austin – I think Bret Hart is one of the most overrated wrestlers in history. Bret Hart was great when he had another great worker to play off of – Curt Hennig, Shawn Michaels, Owen Hart, The British Bulldogs, Roddy Piper, Bob Backlund, Chris Benoit, Steve Austin – but his stuff against Lex Luger, Yokozuna, Diesel, Sid was solidly average. This, however, is a Bret moment that I can’t deny. This feud played perfectly and boiled over at Wrestlemania. Bret picked up the win, but did as much to cement Austin’s role as “Stone Cold” as the King of the Ring moment that launched him. This match pulled off the very tricky “double turn” and made Bret a certified villain and Austin the coolest anti-hero since…ever.

1. “Macho Man” Randy Savage vs. Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat – When a match is in the discussion for “greatest match of all time” it kind of erases the doubt about whether or not it’s the greatest undercard match of all time. In right at 15 minutes of action, Steamboat and Savage put on a clinic that should be required viewing by anyone involved with wrestling in any way. It’s one thing to put on a 30, 45, or 60-minute classic match. To take 15 minutes and put on one of the most memorable, action packed, classic matches of all time is something that’s borderline impossible to do. Two of the greatest of all time in their absolute professional peaks were absolutely electric. There’s not enough superlatives to describe what these two did in the Silverdome. They didn’t do it with clever chants like “Fruity Pebbles”, or by crossing over from the Real World, or by driving a car to the ring with CM Punk hanging off the side. This was a blood feud that happened to have the Intercontinental title in the balance. How good was this match? Good enough to overcome what I felt was unnecessary overbooking towards the end of the match. Nothing else comes close to this.

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James Wright
(My honourable mentions are all matches that took place before I started watching wrestling, while I have seen these matches in retrospect I don’t think I could judge them the same without experiencing the build and the feeling at the time the matches took place)

HM: Ricky Steamboat vs. Randy Savage (WM 3) – As pretty close to ‘pure wrestling’ as you can get.
HM: Razor Ramon vs. Shawn Michaels (WM 10) – Innovative for its time and is the match that put Michaels on his way to being the ‘Show Stopper’.
HM: Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin (WM 13) – Proof again that to the victor do not always go the spoils, and who doesn’t love a great double-turn?

5. The Rock vs. Hulk Hogan (WM 18) – Ten years after this match the Rock finds himself in exactly the same position but on the other side as the returning legend who is perhaps being booked as the more heelish of the two, but tell that to the crowd. This match proved that the crowd in general are suckers for nostalgia and no amount of booking is going to prove otherwise. Maybe things could have gone down better but then again with big matches like this it is hard to get things exactly right.

4. Shawn Michaels vs. Ric Flair (WM 24) – Two years before Michaels would fall victim to the retirement stipulation himself, he was standing on the other side of the ring from the Dirtiest Player in the Game uttering the immortal words: ‘I’m sorry, I love you.’ As far as memorable and evocative moments in wrestling go, this was pretty much the pinnacle. Perhaps the Nature Boy waited a little late to pass the torch but when he finally did it, it was certainly a memorable moment at least.

3. Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Jericho (WM 19) – This one was great because of just how personal it was. While being overshadowed by Rock vs. Austin and Angle vs. Lesnar these two showed how a story driven rivalry should be done. The match was full of near falls and it was always in doubt who the eventual winner was going to be. The best part though had to be after the match when the two embraced and you got to see real emotion between the two before Jericho went back to his old heel ways and delivered a shot right to Michaels’ never-regions.

2. Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels (WM 21) – I saw this as two of the industry’s best going at it in what was to be one of the greatest wrestling matches ever, starting a best-of-three series that had a really momentous feel to it. The build for this match started at the Royal Rumble and ran all the way to the match itself, never once faltering. It was an inter-promotion match when that still actually meant something and the two had never really gone against each other until that point. Angle’s attempts to ‘out-do’ Michael’s past accomplishments were often hilarious and even his rendition of ‘Sexy-Kurt’ was a joy to watch.

1. The Rock vs. Steve Austin (WM 19) – Looking at all the matches on this card, with a couple of exceptions, I would go as far as to say that in terms of build this was the best Wrestlemania of the past ten years. But no match was built better, in my opinion, than the Rock vs. Stone Cold, of all the ‘scores to settle’ this meant the most to me since it was the two biggest wrestlers of the last ten years rounding off their careers by facing off for a third and final time. This could be compared to Taker vs. Triple H this year, although the Rock and Austin didn’t need stipulations to garner interest or make who was going to win come into question. The Rock had come back in Hollywood mode and managed to make an ass out of himself night in and night out before the match. The match itself had some great spots and ended with the Rock finally beating Stone Cold after delivering three Rock Bottoms, raising the bar for exactly what it could take to finish off an opponent on the Grandest Stage of them all.

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TJ Hawke
HM: The Rock vs. Hulk Hogan from Wrestlemania 18 – This match doesn’t belong in the top 5, but it’s still one of the most entertaining matches in Wrestlemania history and it absolutely deserves a mention for this topic.
HM: Ricky Steamboat vs. Randy Savage from Wrestlemania 3 – I wasn’t even born when this match happened, but the styles of these two men arguably age the best of anyone from the eighties. While this was clearly the best match of the first 9 Wrestlemanias, I think this match has been topped several times since then.
HM: Edge vs. Chris Benoit vs. Shelton Benjamin vs. Chris Jericho vs. Christian vs. Kane from Wrestlemania 21 – This match is hard to rewatch because of Benoit, but it will always be a favorite of mine. While it’s missing the emotional context of the early TLC matches, this is easily the best Money in the Bank match in my mind.

5. Edge & Christian vs. The Hardys vs. The Dudleys from Wrestlemania 17 – Are these matches stunt shows? Yes, but these three teams always managed to make their crazy matches seem much more than that. This 18-month rivalry saw some of the craziest matches in WWE history and this may have been the craziest of all them. Some don’t like the interference from Rhyno, Spike Dudley, and Lita, but I thought they added to the match. These 6 men set the standard for these types of matches, and I don’t think anyone since has been able to create the same magic since.

4. Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin from Wrestlemania 13 – It’s a somewhat popular opinion that is one of the greatest matches in WWE history and it’s hard to argue with that. These two were arguably, along with Shawn Michaels, the best performers of their generation and they certainly delivered one of the best matches in Wrestlemania history. The double turn at the end of the match also makes this one of the most significant matches in WWE history.

3. Bret Hart vs. Owen Hart from Wrestlemania 10 – This is one of those matches that I can just watch over and over again. Their roles were so well defined, and their in-ring work were so perfectly smooth and crisp. This match was seemingly overshadowed by the ladder match on that show, but I’m glad to see that history and time has sided with this match.

2. Shawn Michaels vs. Kurt Angle from Wrestlemania 21 – These two were arguably the two best wrestlers of the 2000’s, so it was no surprise that they had one of the best WWE matches of all time. This was an incredibly emotional match that will stay with me for the rest of my life.

1. Shawn Michaels vs. The Undertaker from Wrestlemania 25 – Every once in a while, I watch a match and think, “That was perfect.” This is one of those matches. In fact, after recently rewatching this match, I’ve decided that this is my favorite WWE match of all time. These two went out and absolutely saved Wrestlemania 25. They took the live fans and the fans at home, on a wild, emotional roller coaster that reached heights that few matches in WWE history have ever been able to match. To me, this match is the definitive answer to this question.

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Robert S. Leighty Jr
HM: WWF Title: Randy Savage vs. Ric Flair (WrestleMania VIII) – These two men were made to feud with each other and deliver classic matches like this one.
HM: TLC II (WrestleMania X-7) – I know Razor/Shawn was the innovator, but the crazy ass shit everyone involved in this match did deserves an honorable mention.
HM: The Rock vs. Hulk Hogan (WrestleMania X-8) – Why this wasn’t the Main Event I will never know, but gives me a chance to say this match ruled and I still get goosebumps when Hogan hulks up in front of a rabid crowd in Toronto.

5. Career vs. Career: Randy Savage vs. The Ultimate Warrior (WrestleMania VII) – One of my favorite matches of all time and the Greatest match in the career of The Warrior. Nobody expected a lot out of this match, but they seemed determine to make their match the show stealer and they did that it spades. The stipulation added such drama and Warrior turned in the performance of his career. What puts this match over the top is the amazing heat from the crowd and the layers of story that had built for years in respect to Savage and Liz. The post match angle still brings a smile to my face though it is bittersweet not considering only one left alive from this match/angle is The Warrior.

4. Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels (WrestleMania 21) – I remember watching this match and jumping off my couch screaming with excitement as they built towards one of the best matches you’ll ever see. The expectations for this match were off the chart and most of that came from the WWE itself as they basically guaranteed an all time classic and major credit to Shawn and Kurt for delivering above and beyond.

3. Submission Match: Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin (WrestleMania 13) – The match that made Steve Austin into arguably the biggest star the business has ever seen and the match that lead to Bret’s career rebirth as a heel (and indirectly led to his tragic exit from the WWF). These two men pulled off the greatest double switch in history and the scary part is that they made it look easy. The ending with Austin bleeding like a stuck pig while struggling to escape the sharpshooter is one of the most iconic images ever and sometimes overshadows the greatness of everything that happened earlier in the match.

2. Shawn Michaels vs. The Undertaker (WrestleMania XXV) – I am proud to say I was there to see this one live and it easily goes down as the greatest match I have ever seen in person. This match and the ones I have 3rd and 4th are all interchangeable as I am torn on which of the 3 I like the best, so I will just give this one the nod since I was there to see it. I can’t put into words what the experience was like, but the fact that I saw guys high fiving and even hugging each other out of pure joy when the match was over shows how insanely awesome this match was.

1. IC Title: Randy Savage vs. Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat (WrestleMania III) – This is my favorite match of all time and always gets my vote for greatest match of all time. These men stole the show from Hogan vs. Andre. Just think about that for a second. Just a perfect match even with the Animal interference that people bitch about, and one that I enjoy as much now as I did 25 years ago.

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