Thursday, March 28, 2024
EditorialWrestleMania 1: Where It All Began...And Could Have Ended

WrestleMania 1: Where It All Began…And Could Have Ended

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Match 2: King Kong Bundy (with Jimmy Hart) vs SD Jones

SD Jones is all smiles at WrestleMania and says he’s ready to get down with Bundy and Hart. Most of his promo seems to consist of saying he’s going to get down with everyone.

Bundy and Hart come up next and Bundy says that it’s only fitting that the biggest card in professional wrestling has the biggest man on it. Bundy says he wants SD Jones to think about what’s about to happen in this match, including the infamous five count.

There’s not a whole lot to say about this match. It’s infamous for being the shortest match in history (until Diesel vs Bob Backlund a decade later) at 00:09 seconds, though that is disputed a little. Either way, this was the textbook definition of a squash match, literally and figuratively.

Winner: King Kong Bundy with the Big Splash.

Comments: This match was purely to build up King Kong Bundy.  The introductions and prelims took longer than the match. One big problem was that it killed the crowd a little because of how quick fan favorite Jones was beaten.

Match 3: Ricky Steamboat vs Matt Borne

Matt Borne (better known to 90s wrestling fans as Doink the Clown) says he sees this as an opportunity to beat someone as well-known as Ricky Steamboat and says that while Steamboat is talented, he’s too nice while he (Borne) is there to beat Steamboat up.

Steamboat is next, and he looks very…inflated (not fat, but he looks like someone’s been inflating him with a bike pump) compared to how he would look later in his career. He says that WrestleMania is test for everyone who is on the card because the WrestleMania card is the biggest in history. He warns Borne (aka, Mister Maniac) that while he lacks meanness, he’s come to WWF to learn how to be mean, starting with Matt Borne.

This match was very good for only being about four and a half minutes long. Both guys were able to get in their offense and both looked really good. Steamboat had his usual bag of martial arts moves and some impressive aerial moves for as big as he was then. That said, there was really no doubt that Steamboat was going over Borne. Borne just seemed to be missing something.

Winner: Ricky Steamboat with a flying crossbody into a pinfall.

Thoughts: If you only knew Matt Borne as Doink the Clown, you would be astonished to see how talented he was during his career. My biggest complaint about this match is that it could’ve gone a little longer to give both guys more time to show their skills.