On this day in wrestling history, April 28, 1996, the WWE’s first unofficial hardcore match took place between Shawn Michaels and Diesel (Kevin Nash).
Over the years, the hardcore match has become common place, often every other week and under different catchy names like street fight or various stipulations like falls count anywhere. But the first hardcore match in WWE history was billed as a No Holds Barred Match
Originally made famous in ECW (Extreme Championship Wrestling) where there were literally no rules and anything was legal.
Pre-Attitude Era
The timing of it is why this match may be lost in the conversations, and it makes sense. We’re used to the brutal chair shots to the head and other antics of the Attitude Era where safety was seemingly secondary to the exploits.
Before then, there wasn’t anything hardcore aside from the occasional foreign object (cane, chair, ring bell, etc). Nothing as extreme as fighting all over the arena unless someone was jumped.
Into this walked two of the biggest stars of the time with the WWF World Heavyweight Championship on the line at WWF In Your House 7. Good Friends, Better Enemies pay-per-view.
This put Shawn Michaels against his former bodyguard Diesel.
The prosthetic leg idea
(Special thanks to @awrestlinghistorian for the excerpt)
“Kevin and I squared off at the Good Friends, Better Enemies Pay-Per-View in Omaha. It turned out to be our best match and maybe the best match of Kevin’s career. Kevin had turned heel and we wanted to make it a No Holds Barred match. We asked Vince whether Kevin could throw me through a table. We weren’t doing any “hardcore” spots like that at this point in time. “No, I don’t think we need that,” Vince said. “Please. We have to do a little something. We are not talking about doing something crazy like they do in ECW. It’s No Holds Barred.” I just don’t want to go there.
“Please, we’ll keep it special.” Vince finally agreed. Then Pat chimed in with an idea. “Mad Dog” Vachon, an old-time wrestler who had made his name in the AWA, was going to be at the match. He had a prosthetic leg and Pat wanted one us of to pull it off and hit the other guy with it. He thought that would be hilarious and knew Mad Dog would go along with it. I turned to Kevin and said, “I’m not touching that! You’re doing it!
“The entire match came off perfectly. Kevin attacked Mad Dog, who was sitting in the stands, and ripped his leg off. He whacked me with it and then powerbombed me through the announcer’s table. The crowd went nuts. I eventually recovered and made my comeback, spraying him with a fire extinguisher before nailing him with the superkick. Kevin and I had pulled off the company’s first “hardcore” match. It’s a shame that this style of wrestling would become so commonplace. When used sparingly it’s very effective, but like many things in this business, they saw something that worked and ran it into the ground.” – Shawn Michaels, Heartbreak & Triumph book
I’m in agreement with Shawn on this, and sadly, it’s part of the reason roaming and hardcore don’t appeal to me much. Still, there’s always a new classic waiting for the right mix.
Plus, you never know when an idea will spark something, and any doubt Vince McMahon had about this vanished when WCW (with Kevin Nash, ironically) were whipping them in the Monday Night Wars.
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