Hi folks! With WWE Survivor Series 2020 only a couple weeks away, I figured it’d be interesting to do some digging and conjure up some stats and records for anyone who may be curious. I will be mostly focused on the unique Survivor Series elimination match type, rather than other things which are not directly affecting those in any way. Please let me know if anything is wrong, and if so I will make corrections. Thank you.
Let’s begin with the amounts. I have counted 86 traditional Survivor Series elimination matches in total, with only nine of these featuring women. Here’s my tally below:
The current WWE Champion Randy Orton sits at the peak of the Survivor Series mountain for several reasons. He has the most eliminations of 16. Other WWE Superstars following him are:
I looked at the most successful women’s eliminators and found the following:
On the men’s side, Roman Reigns & Braun Strowman share the record with Sasha Banks & Aja Kong for most eliminations in one match, which they got in 2013 (Reigns) and 2018 (Strowman). Kong remains the only superstar to eliminate every possible opponent on her team’s behalf.
Sometimes it’s about taking part, even if you don’t win all the time. These superstars featured in more Survivor Series matches than any other. Natalya holds the record in women’s matches with 6, in which she has survived to the end on two occasions:
Just to show how the WWE Champion is so good at surviving, here’s another one proving it. This includes the times a wrestler ‘survived’ the match, and not necessarily when they were eliminated but were still on the winning side:
There has only been one time in the history of Survivor Series where a match hasn’t ended with a decisive winner. In 1996, the match contested between the teams of Diesel, Faarooq, Razor Roman & Vader vs. Flash Funk, Jimmy Snuka, Savio Vega and Yokozuna was ruled a No Contest.
What could be more thrilling than going one-on-one and coming out victorious as the sole survivor? These WWE Superstars have done that, and I included the years as well. No one has yet to achieve this on more than three occasions:
On the women’s side, only three superstars have ever been named a sole survivor; including Beth Pheonix in ’08, Asuka in ’17, and Nia Jax in ’18.
What are some of the shortest and longest elimination matches in the history of Survivor Series? I have those too, with men’s and women’s matches being separated. Beginning with the shortest:
Despite Survivor Series having a special match type since its inception, it has not always been booked as the main event. In fact, it hasn’t done so a staggering 22 times since 1987. On 16 occasions it has been substituted for a WWE World Heavyweight Championship match of some kind.
In 1998, Survivor Series had zero elimination matches. Instead, a tournament was featured to crown a new vacant WWF Champion; which The Rock won by defeating Mankind in the final. Fast forward to 2002, it again had no traditional Survivor Series matches, although it had a tables elimination and the first-ever Elimination Chamber match; which Shawn Michaels won to become World Heavyweight Champion.
In the early days of Survivor Series, it was common for every match on the card to be a traditional elimination. WWE phased this way of booking out over the years, til we were most likely to get 1 or 2 per year. Over the past few years however, especially since the Women’s Revolution and rise of NXT, the average has risen to 2-3 a year.
Before moving on, another factoid I’d like to share is that between the first and second Women’s Survivor Series matches, there was a 21 year gap from 1987 to 2008. All Survivor Series matches between 1988-2007 were contested by men. This year, we will see the 10th Women’s match in 33 years.
Allow me to end this short piece on Survivor Series with a list of teams who performed the ‘clean sweep’. By definition, the team who won had none of their members eliminated. This has happened on 8
occasions since it was first achieved in 1990 by The Visionaries. Only one team has done this in a 5v5 match, making it the most one-sided win in the history of Survivor Series (aside from Big Show’s solo victory).With that said, I’d like to thank you for reading! And I hope you enjoy the gallery of the most dominant teams in Survivor Series history.