Lex Luger has reflected on one of his most memorable moments in wrestling.

The retired wrestling star recently had an interview with Chris Van Vliet. He talked about things such as working on his recovery with DDP, being responsible for the death of Ms. Elizabeth, potential Hall of Fame induction, and more.

During the interview, the former WCW World Champion also discussed potentially his most famous moment in wrestling – the time when he body slammed Yokozuna. Lex Luger revealed that he was actually really nervous before the spot and it was Yoko who calmed him down:

“We’re supposed to be trash-talking, but I’m telling Yoko we can’t do it. I was panicking. I got no footing. Yoko actually was a cool as ice Samoan. We call him the dancing bear. He was so agile for a guy at 600 pounds. He looks at me and goes ‘No problem, brother. Just get a wide stance, I’ll do the rest.’”

• Update On Giulia Heading Into NXT Roadblock

Basically Slammed Himself: Lex Luger

Widely considered Lex’s star-making moment in wrestling, the spot happened in 1993 after the departure of Hulk Hogan. WWE was looking to replace Hulk with Lex and they tried to recreate the famous Hogan slamming Andre The Giant moment from WrestleMania III.

The whole thing took place aboard USS Intrepid where the nearly 600-pound Yokozuna challenged people to body slam him. After a number of WWF wrestlers as well as athletes from NBA and NFL failed to do so, The All American arrived on the deck by helicopter and finally did the impossible.

The Total Package revealed that they had done a walkthrough before but not practiced the actual spot. At the time of the actual performance however, Yokozuna took care of things:

“We did a walk through, but I’ve never slammed him. They didn’t want me in the walk through to hurt Yoko. I go hurt Yoko? What about me? I’m going to get double hernia trying to slam the guy. But we did it live first time in that ring, so I was really nervous. With no footing. Yoko just pushed himself around me.

I had to help turn him and that ain’t easy, so I played a part. I go, Yoko basically slammed himself. He was that agile. He flipped himself off of me by getting a wide stance. Unbelievable athlete. One of the best big men ever. He doesn’t get credit for one of the best.”

Apart from this, Lex Luger also talked about other memorable moments from his wrestling career including becoming the co-winner of the 1994 Royal Rumble with Bret Hart and much more.

• Drew McIntyre Reveals Unsaid Comeback to CM Punk’s Vince McMahon Jab

New footage has come out of the WWE debut of Rodney ‘Yokozuna’ Aanoa’i, who worked under a much different name from the one fans would come to know for years.

The WWE Vault Youtube channel has shared new footage of an interview with Yokozuna, working under the name ‘The Great Kokina’ and his uncle Afa Sr. of the Wild Samoans. The name was also a nod to the superheavyweight’s time in the AWA in the late 1980s, where he worked as ‘Kokina Maximus.’

The Great Kokina’s debut match came in an untelevised match on September 1, 1992, at a WWF Superstars taping in Hershey, Pennsylvania. The match saw Kokina make short work of Ron Neal and would mark the only time he wrestled under the gimmick.

Yokozuna debuted on the Halloween edition of WWF Superstars with the sumo wrestler fans would come to fear, as well as Mr. Fuji as his manager.

Yokozuna’s brief time as The Great Kokina reflect how a wrestler may work under a variety of names or gimmicks before landing on one that works. Seth Rollins even worked as ‘God’ and Gixx early into his career before settling on the Tyler Black name he used pre-WWE. Whether it was as Yokozuna, The Great Kokina, or Kokina Maximus, Rodney Anoa’i forged a legacy in wrestling that won’t be forgotten by fans new and old anytime soon.

The Bloodline’s Solo Sikoa took to Twitter to wish WWE Hall of Famer a happy birthday Yokozuna today.

Yokozuna captured the WWF Championship twice in his career. He also won the WWF Tag Team Championships two times with Owen Hart. He passed away at just 34 years old on October 23, 2000.

Rikishi and Undisputed WWE Tag Team ChampionsThe Usos inducted Yokozuna into the Hall of Fame in 2012. Solo Sikoa posted “Happy Birthday Legend” on Twitter with a couple of pictures of of the legend and Owen Hart from back in the day.

Velvet Sky, Iron Shiek, and many wrestling fans have reacted to the message and wished Yokozuna a happy birthday.

WWE’s official Twitter account sent out a tweet remembering Yokozuna earlier today.

Solo Sikoa & Sami Zayn Form A Bond In The Bloodline

During the main event, Solo Sikoa made his main roster debut at WWE Clash at the Castle. Roman Reigns put the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship on the line against Drew McIntyre at Premium Live Event in Cardiff, Wales.

It appeared that McIntyre was on the verge of winning the title but Solo Sikoa hopped over the barricade. The distraction allowed Roman to connect with his third Spear of the match for the pinfall victory.

Sikoa recently captured the NXT North American Championship from Carmelo Hayes, only to have it stripped away a couple of weeks later. On a recent edition of WWE SmackDown, Roman Reigns informed Solo that he answers to him now and Sikoa acknowledged The Tribal Chief.

After Roman presented Sami with his official Honorary Uce shirt, Solo has been protecting him. Madcap Moss and Ricochet tried to convince Sami that he wasn’t actually a part of The Bloodline and Solo attacked them.

Sami and Solo defeated Moss and Ricochet on this past Friday’s episode of the blue brand. After the match, Sikoa kept beating them down to prove that he is the enforcer of The Bloodline.

The main event of WrestleMania 9 was Yokozuna vs Bret Hart yet somehow, Hulk Hogan ended up the winner. Jim Ross recently addressed arguably the most confusing WrestleMania main of all time on an episode of his Grilling JR podcast.

“I knew that the plans were for Hogan to leave the show as the champion,” JR said on the podcast. “But he wasn’t even in a match. So, to tell you I knew what was going to happen would be a lie. I didn’t know what was going to happen.”

JR continued, I knew in general terms that by the end of the night when the sunset on WrestleMania 9 that Hogan would be leaving as the champion but I didn’t know the fortuitous route that we were going to take to get there.”

Hogan came out at the end of Hart vs Yokozuna and challenged the new champion. According to JR, Hart and Yokozuna’s match on the show was better than what was expected.

“Thanks to Bret and Yoko, they made chicken salad out of some chicksh*t,” JR said about their match. “It was a respite that we needed and I give credit to Bret Hart and Yokozuna for that. They always had amazing chemistry. I could watch them work all day long. Bret knew exactly how to work with Yoko to amplify and eventuate Yoko’s size and strength advantage.”

• Jim Ross Addresses AEW’s Recent Ratings Drop

JR’s comments can be heard in the player below:

With all the things you can criticize WWE for these days, the company should be commended on doing an excellent job in elevating their secondary championships.

If you flashback to around this time last year, the WWE World Heavyweight Championship was virtually ‘on ice,’ only being defended on major pay-per-view events due to the champion at the time — Brock Lesnar — working under a special, limited-date contract.

Now, at the time, you could make sense of it, and even Vince McMahon himself did when asked about the topic during his interview on the short-lived “Steve Austin Show” live WWE Network podcast, as he pointed to the fact that having Lesnar defend the biggest title in the company on an infrequent basis made World Title matches feel that much more important.

Fast forward to the present day, and when it comes to championships in WWE — all systems are “go.”

First and foremost, we finally have a fighting WWE World Heavyweight Champion. Sure, the storyline surrounding Seth Rollins, the current world champion, is that he chickens away from ‘the big fight.’ At the end of the day, however, the bell eventually rings, the referee raises the golden belt up high, and two or more competitors end up vying for the richest prize in all of sports entertainment.

Now, move down one level to the two secondary championships. For the longest time, the WWE United States Championship and the WWE Intercontinental Championship, for all intents and purposes, were viewed as a total joke by the WWE Universe — and rightfully so.

Not anymore.

WWE came up with a great idea heading into WrestleMania 31 this year — put more significance behind their secondary titles. First, slap the U.S. title belt around John Cena’s waist. In a bit of irony, it was Cena who really launched his career off of his first U.S. title run, so in a story-telling fashion, his story comes full circle.

So, basically, WWE decided that now that they want to elevate some new blood into the top spots in the company, they decided to put one of their secondary titles — in this case the U.S. title — on arguably the biggest star in the company today.

On the flip side of the coin, when it comes to the WWE Intercontinental Championship, WWE decided to put that belt on the most popular wrestler in terms of the fans — the leader of the “Yes! Movement,” Daniel Bryan.

And that brings us to Monday’s WWE Payback ‘go-home’ edition of RAW.

After being unable to defend his WWE Intercontinental Championship against Bad News Barrett at the recent WWE Extreme Rules pay-per-view as originally scheduled, WWE played the waiting game to find out how the latest round of the Daniel Bryan injury-bug would work out. As it turns out, whatever Bryan is going through is serious enough that WWE felt they had no choice but to have him surrender the Intercontinental Title on live television, much like they had him do shortly after he won the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania XXX last year.

The idea behind his forefitting of the title last night was where the plan regarding secondary titles in WWE remains in tact. The reason given by Bryan, delivered in a passionate way I should add, was that the WWE Universe deserves a fighting champion. A top contender who deserves the right to bust his ass day-in and day-out, city-to-city, state-to-state, country-to-country and even continent-to-continent, all for the right to try and earn what is now once again slowly being viewed as a title of importance. One of value. One worth fighting to obtain.

Where WWE goes next with the Intercontinental Championship in particular remains to be seen in terms of how far they are willing to go to try and elevate the perceived importance of the title.

Basically put, the company can go one of two ways, as I see it. You can follow the mandate that they have been following since this year’s WrestleMania, which is find the most over performer with the fans, give him the I-C title, and try and get the belt over that way, so that in the future, the belt can make the man, as opposed to the current formula, where the man makes the belt.

Their second option is to try and do the opposite. Put the title on an up-and-comer who has the goods to deliver, but just needs something to put him over the edge so he is viewed as a bigger deal than he already is. Names like Neville and Sami Zayn come to mind.

Zayn, depending on his injury, would make a great impact on the main roster by giving U.S. Champion John Cena all he could handle — with an injury no-less, in his first high-profile match on RAW since having his run as NXT Champion in WWE’s developmental system, and then go on to win the next high-profile match he is in and become the brand new WWE Intercontinental Champion.

Keep reading on Page 2 …

When I was a kid, I had a trampoline. My friends and I were all huge pro wrestling fans and long before the explosion of “backyard trampoline wrestling federations,” we would watch the matches together, go out on the trampoline and try and reenact what we saw on television.

Of course if you’re this enthused about professional wrestling as a youngster, you’re going to take your trampoline matches seriously and treat them as if they were part of a legitimate organization — for kids. Were we looking to become millionaires or television stars? Of course not. Did we fantasize and treat it like we were right in the middle of a WWE ring on a WWE Superstars or Saturday Night’s Main Event broadcast?

We sure did.

So the next logical step, seeing is how we were taking this so seriously was to purchase replica WWE Championship belts so that when we won “the big matches,” we could crown ourselves the champion.

What was the first replica belt we bought? Well, obviously it was the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, right?

Wrong.

This was during the early-1990s and mid-1990s, when if you were a kid, the best wrestlers and your favorite wrestlers were generally the guys who held the WWE Intercontinental Championship. We thought the belt itself looked cooler than the “Eagle” championship that the main champions wore and we — even as kids — recognized that guys like Bret Hart, Mr. Perfect and Shawn Michaels were much better wrestlers than Diesel or Yokozuna.

Fast-forward to today.

I can’t recall a time when the secondary titles in WWE have meant less. If you’re an Intercontinental Champion or United States Champion in WWE these days, you basically aren’t a champion at all. I can’t even count how many times a pay-per-view would come and go without an I-C or U.S. title match even taking place on the card. If they were on the card, they certainly didn’t come off as anything important or relevant.

With Brock Lesnar as the WWE World Heavyweight Champion and with the main title in WWE being unified, meaning there’s only one “main” champion these days, and due to the fact that Lesnar has such a limited schedule in WWE, why doesn’t WWE take this opportunity to try and make their secondary titles mean more?

WWE Superstars need to cut promos and make the I-C and U.S. titles seem like a goal that is really worth achieving. They need to act like those titles are the be-all, end-all, if for no other reason than the fact that they are the only consistently active titles in the company right now.

There has been a lot of talk about unifying the I-C and U.S. titles and while I have always been in favor of that idea, I’m not so sure if that should be happening anytime soon. While unifying the I-C and U.S. titles would, in theory, make the one secondary title seem stronger, it would also take away even more from WWE live events having title matches.

Right now, the I-C and U.S. titles are the only men’s singles championships that are on the line at non-televised events. For that matter, they’re the only titles that are defended on television. Hell, they’re the only two men’s singles titles that are defended on pay-per-views more often than not.

WWE needs to raise the value of their secondary championships and make those I-C and U.S. titles mean as much as humanly possible. The good part is, when Lesnar does eventually drop the title and the WWE World Heavyweight Championship becomes active again, the I-C and U.S. titles, if they play their cards right, will at that point mean more and all of a sudden you have three titles of value, something WWE hasn’t had in years.

Basically, it won’t seem odd for a big-name Superstar to explain how important it is to win the I-C title at that point, whereas if Roman Reigns or John Cena said in a promo today, “I won’t sleep until I get the WWE United States Championship around my waist!” you would probably look at them like they have four heads. Although with Cena’s current program against U.S. Champion Rusev, we might actually hear a version of that, if WWE decides to make the title an important part of their feud, which of course is doubtful.

Regardless, WWE needs to work on getting these secondary championships to regain the luster that they had when I was a little kid jumping on a trampoline and pretending like my dreams just came true because I won a match and got to hold the — PRESTIGIOUS — WWE Intercontinental Championship high over my head.

What are your thoughts on WWE’s secondary singles titles? Leave your feedback in the “Comments” section below. You can also follow me on social media for continued news and views at Facebook.com/MattBooneWZR and/or on Twitter @MBoone420.

Thousands of fans stood bewildered following last night’s main event, as the WWE’s resident hero John Cena laid battered and beaten after his match with Brock Lesnar. Cena didn’t grab a microphone to offer up an excuse, nor did he attempt any sort of retaliation while both Lesnar and Heyman laughed in his face after seizing the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.

Instead, he simply walked away with the help of officials, with the crowd booing the face of the company while serenading him on his way out the door. Last night’s event felt like a transitional pay-per-view, and not simply because every title that was contested changed hands.

Lesnar was congratulated by Triple H after simply destroying John Cena last night.

The massacre fans witnessed last night for only $9.99 was perhaps the end of the PG era. The evil villain prevailed, the kids’ hero took the beating of a lifetime, and the company seems to finally be looking toward the future instead of the past. Fans have likely noticed in recent weeks that the product has become a bit edgier. Curse words are more frequent, men have assaulted women, and the next generation of superstars has dominated the old guard.

Last night’s event reminded me a bit of the 1993 King of the Ring, during which fans witnessed the death of Hulkamania. After years as the top superstar in the company, Hogan finally met his match in the form of Yokozuna. Hogan lost the title that night (with a little help from a camera man) and didn’t make any excuses. He simply faded away and left the company a few weeks later, not returning to a WWE ring for roughly a decade. This event was followed by a transition period that saw the company stray away from guys like Hogan, Savage, and Warrior in favor of the next generation in the form of Hart, Michaels, and Diesel.

That’s not to say that John Cena is bolting from the company any time soon, because that certainly isn’t the case, but his time as the top guy in the company is likely over. Otherwise, he probably wouldn’t have put Lesnar over in such convincing fashion, as Cena barely landed any offensive maneuvers throughout the over 15-minute main event.

– The official WWE website has a new poll up for a future episode of the WWE Network show “WWE Countdown,” which asks fans to vote on which big-man wrestler was the most imposing in history. The options are Bam Bam Bigelow, Big Show, Undertaker, Sid Vicious, Andre The Giant, Vader, Yokozuna, Earthquake, King Kong Bundy and Kevin Nash. You can vote right now at WWE.com.

– WWE Hall Of Famer Mick Foley recently commented on WWE’s tribute video to Connor Michalek on his official Twitter account. Foley posted the following tweets:

The @WWE tribute video to Connor "The Crusher" Michalek is one of the greatest things I've ever seen. Please watch. http://t.co/o0EfLoNHP3

— Mick Foley (@realmickfoley) May 7, 2014

Thanks to everyone who watched Connor's video. It's beautiful. The next time I bother @WWE, it will be about the #Chrusher4WWEHOF15 campaign

— Mick Foley (@realmickfoley) May 8, 2014

When the Shield debuted over a year ago, Roman Reigns was like the shadowy muscle of the group. He was the least featured member of the trio. He was given few lines during their promos. Yet he was always there to deliver a devastating spear or triple powerbomb when needed.

With the rich indy wrestling history of both Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose, it is no surprise that they were expected to carry most of the load during the early days of the stable. After all, Roman Reigns was a former football player and started wrestling in 2010, whereas both Ambrose and Rollins had been wrestling since the early 2000’s.

Reigns does have a rich family history though, as he is a member of the famous Anoa’i family that includes past superstars such as Yokozuna, Rikishi, and The Rock, so it is not like he was a complete stranger to the world of wrestling.

After his dominating performance at last year’s Survivor Series, it seemed obvious that there were big plans for Roman Reigns.

A little over a year ago, it appeared that Dean Ambrose was the member being groomed for a breakout solo career. He was considered the de facto of the group and is the only member of the group to win a solo title while Rollins and Reigns shared the Tag Team Championships.

Something changed last fall, however, and it appeared that Reigns was the one gaining momentum in the Shield after Ambrose seemed enter a lull. Coincidentally enough, it was as soon as Rollins and Reigns lost their championships that his push began. The first hint that he was going to be a breakout star was at last year’s Survivor Series, where he was the sole survivor and dominated the competition, eliminating four opponents during the contest.

Reigns later eliminated the most competitors in Royal Rumble history during the 2014 contest and he has not looked back since. With the Shield now entering into a program with the newly reformed Evolution, there are reports that the ultimate goal of the feud is to set up a matchup between Triple H and Roman Reigns at this year’s SummerSlam. The reports make one wonder: is Roman Reigns ready for a massive solo push?

Since the launch of the WWE Network, over 600,000 fans have subscribed to the service. While it’s a bit below the one million subscribers they were hoping for, it’s still an admirable number for a service that is still only available in the United States.

With live access to every pay-per-view and a vault containing every special event in WWE, WCW, and ECW history, it is safe to assume that most fans signed up in order to gain access to the special events, and at the reduced price of only $9.99 per month, who can blame them?

There is a lot more to the WWE Network than just a vault of old events and live access to each month’s pay-per-view, however. There is also a boatload of original content. Here is a list of some of the must-see original content on the Network.

5. Legends of Wrestling: Families – Watching a bunch of old-timers talk about the good old days is usually about as exciting as watching paint dry, but some of these are actually pretty entertaining. One of the best round-table discussions includes a panel consisting of Sergeant Slaughter, Jim Ross, Ted DiBiase, and James J. Dillon. The group discusses the importance and prevalence of families in the WWE. It is interesting to hear DiBiase discuss how having a father in the business influenced him to become a professional wrestler.

Daniel Bryan’s journey to WrestleMania is something most fans will be able to enjoy.

4. Journey to WrestleMania: Daniel Bryan – This is obviously one of the newest pieces of original content on the Network. It follows Daniel Bryan on his week leading up to this year’s WrestleMania and provides a number of exclusive interviews leading up to the event. It also discusses his rise to the top after initially being terminated from the company, with commentary from William Regal and Pat Patterson discussing how the company made a mistake in his firing. The most interesting parts of this documentary are the backstage scenes and hearing his fellow wrestlers praise him for his accomplishments.

The official YouTube account of WWE 2K14 has released clips previewing the entrances and finishing maneuvers of Cody Rhodes, David Otunga and Yokozuna.

Cody Rhodes

David Otunga

Yokozuna

The video game will be released on Oct. 29 in North America and Nov. 1 in Europe.

– Tomorrow night’s episode of SmackDown on Syfy will be preempted since networks under the NBC Universal umbrella will be simulcasting an all-star concert to raise money for those affected by Hurricane Sandy. The new time slot has not been revealed.

– In this week’s edition of “Outside the Ring,” WWE Champion CM Punk takes fans behind the scenes of the WWE ’13 television commercial.

– WWE Hall of Famer Yokozuna is featured in today’s “Superstar Spotlight” on WWE.com.

Asistencia Asesoría y Administración matchmaker Konnan and Major League Wrestling President/former WWE creative writer Court Bauer joined Mister Saint Laurent on MLW Radio. The roundtable discussion covered a variety of topics, with all three speaking candidly about their time in the professional wrestling industry.

Konnan discussed his relationship with Yokozuna: “Yoko was gangster. I went to L.A. with him once and he was like the godfather of South Central. He was telling me stories about him sneaking drugs through airport security. He was well connected. He was a gangster. I looked up to him a lot. He loved my character in the nWo and we were actually going to get him to come in as a Samoan gangster and have my back.”

Konnan then explains why the former WWF Champion ultimately never joined World Championship Wrestling.

“One time Scott [Hall] was with (Eric) Bischoff and he [said to Yokozuna], ‘Man Bischoff is right here. Let’s make this happen.’ Yoko said, ‘I don’t roll like that. You don’t just put someone on the phone and tell me to sign.’ He got offended and he never came in,” he said.

Other topics include what wrestlers they’ve seen yell at Vince McMahon and how the WWE Chairman reacted, why McMahon is afraid to compete with UFC, navigating politics in the top wrestling companies, McMahon being angry at the Samoans for almost jumping to WCW and taking it out on Rikishi, Rey Mysterio’s current standing in WWE, WCW drama, how to be blackballed from wrestling and more. The free podcast is available at MLW.com.

Following the announcement that Yokozuna will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame next weekend, the WWE Youtube channel has published the following videos looking back at some of his career highlights:

It’s official – the late Rodney Anoa’i, former WWE champion Yokokuna, will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in less than two weeks. The official announcement on the WWE website states:

“One of the largest and most imposing WWE Champions of all time, the mighty Yokozuna will be posthumously inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame the night before WrestleMania XXVIII.”

WWE released the following video package highlighting the career of Yokozuna, one of the greatest big men to ever step inside a WWE ring:

— Yokozuna is expected to be announced for induction into the WWE Hall of Fame tonight on Raw SuperShow. Though Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was originally slated to induct the two-time WWE Champion into the Hall, it was rumored over the weekend that Bret Hart will instead do the honors. The wrestling legends contested in championship matches at WrestleMania IX and WrestleMania X.

Yokozuna, whose real name is Rodney Anoa’i, died from Pulmonary edema on October 23, 2000.

— The Miz will be chatting live on USANetwork.com during the East Coast airing of Psych Wednesday at 10:00 p.m.

— Former WWE Superstar Carlito wrote of his recent encounter with Bret Hart at an independent show, “I think he was surprised I was still alive or just looks at me like I’m a waste of talent. Lol, hes a real good dude though!”

source: PWInsider.com

– Former WWF champion Yokozuna will be announced for the 2012 WWE Hall of Fame class, according to a report on Wrestlezone.com. Yokozuna, who passed away back in 2000 at age 34, was related to WrestleMania main eventer The Rock.

– There continues to be a lot of talk about WWE holding WrestleMania 29 at Cowboys Stadium in Dallas, Texas.

– Former WWE/WCW wrestler Diamond Dallas Page says his DDP Yoga program helped Chris Jericho get into the physical shape required for him to make a return to WWE.

DDP told Steven Muehlhausen of The Fight Club Chicago radio show this week:

“Jericho gave a testimony saying, ‘DDP Yoga changed my life,’ after one of our workouts. [Doctors] said Chris Jericho had a herniated L4 and he was done and he came back with my workout… He did not think he was going to be able to come back. Within two weeks, he was already feeling, ‘Wait a minute, I think I’m gonna be able to do this.'”

DDP says Jericho is now “completely pain free” and several other members of the WWE locker room (including Santino) want to try his yoga program. He also mentioned that he recently signed a WWE Legends contract.

Why Is It So Hard To Book Pro Wrestling?

LOOKING BACK AT SUMMERSLAM 18 YEARS AGO TODAY
by The Solomonster (thesolomonster@gmail.com)
Podcast | Twitter | Facebook

Whenever Vince McMahon likens WWE to a movie or TV show rather than sports, some fans tend to get up in arms. After all, are wrestlers not athletes? Do they not put their bodies on the line year-round and suffer serious injuries? Of course they do. But the more you stop and think about it, the man has a point. One key element pro wrestling has over sports like baseball, football and MMA is the ability to book its own finishes. Just like in any Hollywood film, the director (or promoter in this case) can script out a finale that both makes sense and satisfies the audience’s expectations. The “game” can’t be called due to bad weather. The “fight” won’t end on a swift, 10-second knockout. They have the power to give the people their money’s worth.

So why then is it seemingly so difficult for pro wrestling to get it right?

Visit any news site or discussion forum and you’re likely to drown in a sea of negativity. Welcome to the internet, folks. But when it comes to wrestling, this seems especially prevalent. ‘Oh great, so-and-so lost his match so he’s obviously being buried,’ or ‘man, what a crappy show that was. I’m never watching again!’ (as if). We’re all guilty of it in some form or fashion, so let’s just get that out of the way. Got it? Good. Now the flip side. Truth be told, we’ve seen our fair share of bad TV shows in the last couple of years. We’ve seen some horrendous booking decisions and godawful main event finishes that have nearly made our heads explode. But enough about Vince Russo… the fact is this. You can’t ALWAYS give fans what they want to see. Not every match is going to have a perfectly logical conclusion. Often times, injuries and suspensions can spoil whatever long-term plans a promoter may have mapped out, and for that, I sympathize. And while you can argue that CM Punk has cooled off a bit since his title win over John Cena in Chicago, that PPV was a great example of what happens when wrestling gets it right.

Still, why do these people make such dumb decisions? Why must the hometown hero lose in their hometown 95% of the time? Why must someone who is getting over with the crowd be booked on a losing streak, thus killing whatever momentum they may have? I bring all of this up because A) it’s a relevant question to ask, and B) I wanted to use it as a segue to talk about one of the all-time great blunders in PPV finishes that occurred 18 years ago today. A finish, mind you, that Vince McMahon, a man that some people credit as being a genius, actually thought was a good idea.

August 30, 1993. The site was the Palace of Auburn Hills in Auburn Hills, Michigan. It was WWE’s second biggest event of the year, Summerslam, and it boasted an impressive lineup for that time. Shawn Michaels and Mr. Perfect for the Intercontinental title was like a wet dream for fans of technical wrestling. Bret Hart and Jerry “The King” Lawler were set to finally lock horns after Bret had been viciously attacked following his KOTR victory. And in the main event, Yokozuna, the evil foreigner, would defend his championship against the newly-minted All-American hero, Lex Luger. Now before I go any further, I must point out that the original booking plan for the show had Hulk Hogan putting over Bret Hart for the title, which would have cemented Bret as a main event player much sooner. However, Hogan balked at the idea and decided he would rather drop the title to Yokozuna and flee the company than put over teeny-tiny Bret Hart, forcing a change in plans. That said, there’s still no excuse for their Plan B.

When Hogan left, it left a void at top babyface for the company. They tried Bret Hart in that role already and he didn’t exactly light their business on fire, so he wasn’t the answer. So they decided to turn Luger, who had been a heel since his debut about six months earlier, and transform him into a modern day version of Hogan (only better, you see, because he had a steel plate in his arm!). To their credit, they went all the way with it. The Fourth of July chopper landing on the Intrepid when Luger slammed Yokozuna was a great piece of marketing. Then they had Luger travel cross-country on a bus called “The Lex Express” straight through to Summerslam. I mean, you would have thought the guy was running for political office the way he spent over a month on that bus, shaking hands and kissing babies. To cap it off, Jim Cornette, serving as the champ’s American spokesperson, forced Luger to agree to the stipulation that if he didn’t win the title at the PPV, he would never get another title shot. The stage had been set for an epic championship victory for Luger and the United States, right? Right? Well, not exactly.

Lex Luger would not have been my first choice to lead the company if I had the book. But I didn’t. Hell, I wasn’t even old enough to vote at the time. But you know what? Vince McMahon had a vision and you can tell he was hell-bent on seeing it through. At least he wasn’t half-assing it with the guy. Summerslam arrived and the arena was decked out in red, white and blue. They paraded country singer Aaron Neville out there to sing the national anthem. Out comes Luger to a pretty good response from the crowd (and a new haircut) and we’re off to the races. I’m not going to spend time breaking down this match other than to say it was every American vs. foreigner WWE main event you’ve ever seen, including the dreaded NERVE HOLD OF DOOM. Luger rallies from certain defeat, Cornette tries to interfere, Mr. Fuji tries to interfere, all to no avail. Then comes the big climax – Luger fires off the ropes and clobbers Yokozuna with his loaded forearm, knocking the big guy out to the floor in a heap. The Palace is going crazy. As a fan watching at home on TV, I can recall thinking to myself, ‘boy, he better get Yoko back inside before the referee counts to ten.’ I waited and waited until I saw something rather odd. Luger was making no attempt whatsoever to bring him back inside and seemed perfectly content to leave him laying. In fact, it appeared he was COUNTING ALONG with the referee!

‘Is this guy a moron?’ I wondered. ‘You can’t win the title on a count out. Get him back inside! What’s wrong with you?!’

He never did bring him back inside. The referee counted to ten and called for the bell. And with that, Lex Luger would forever become the poster-child for ignorant, dumb babyfaces. Yet, there was Vince McMahon on commentary going orgasmic over what we had just witnessed. Out came other equally dumb babyfaces like Randy Savage, Tatanka and the Steiner Brothers to celebrate and hoist Luger up onto their shoulders as balloons and confetti rained down from the ceiling. These days, Vince loves to have his announcers throw the term “Bizzaroland” around whenever the Canadian fans cheer for the heels and boo the faces, but back at that very moment, I thought I was living in “Bizzaroland” myself. You spent all of that time and effort to get Luger over to the masses, only to have him fail the fans and make him look stupid? I didn’t get it 18 years ago, and all these years later, it’s just as mind-boggling.

Luger was never the same after that. He was still positioned as the top babyface and got nice reactions, but by the Royal Rumble, it was obvious the fans wanted Bret Hart in that role. Perhaps if they had gone all the way with him at Summerslam, things might have turned out differently. It’s been said the reason for the finish is that at the last minute, Vince McMahon decided that he wanted Luger to win the title at WrestleMania X instead. Of course, that never happened. Instead, at WM11 the following year, Luger was curtain-jerking in a tag match against the Blu Brothers. Talk about a fall from grace.

Pro wrestling shouldn’t be this hard. You control your own destiny. How an intelligent person like Vince McMahon could have thought it was a wise move to book that main event finish, we may never know for sure. But on this day 18 years ago, it wasn’t the first time and damn sure would not be the last time we would see a promoter do such a thing and it begs the question, why is it so hard to book pro wrestling?

The answer is, it’s not. It’s just easier to screw it all up.

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