Wrestling History

December 16th – On This Day In Wrestling History

December 16th - On This Day In Wrestling History

Our full On This Day In Wrestling History section can be found here.

1917 – Wrestling legend Frank Gotch passed away as a result of uremic poisoning in his hometown of Humboldt, Iowa at the age of 39.

1990 – WCW and the NWA jointly presented ‘Starrcade ’90: Collision Course’. One of the major draws for the event was the Pat O’Connor Memorial International Cup Tag Team Tournament, made up of teams representing eight countries. In the finals, Team USA (Rick and Scott Steiner) defeated Team Japan (Mr. Saito and The Great Muta).

This event also saw the culmination of the infamous Black Scorpion angle that saw a mystery masked man challenge Sting for the World Title. Despite various red herrings, the Scorpion was eventually revealed as Ric Flair. This was a huge letdown for fans as Flair had been challenging Sting for the title for months. The Scorpion angle was supposed to be a way to get away from that, but with the inability to hit upon a satisfying reveal to the angle, they simply went back to Flair.

2000 – Blue Demon, one of the biggest icons in Mexican Lucha Libre, died of a heart attack at the age of 78.

2007 – WWE ‘Armageddon’ took place at the Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The main event saw Edge defeat both Batista and The Undertaker in a triple-threat match to win the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.

2008 – During a TNA Impact taping, Jay Lethal and Consequences Creed (now better known as Xavier Woods) defeated James Storm and Robert Roode (Beer Money Inc.) to win the TNA World Tag Team Championship.

2009 – Long-time TNA Knockout and winner of the first WWE Diva Search, Christy Hemme announced her in-ring retirement due to concerns over a longstanding neck injury.

2012 – WWE’s ‘TLC: Tables, Ladders And Chairs’ PPV took place at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. The event marked the in-ring WWE debut of The Shield (Roman Reigns, Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose) in a six-man TLC match against Daniel Bryan, Kane and Ryback. The Shield were victorious. The main event saw Dolph Ziggler win a ladder match with the Money In The Bank briefcase at stake when A.J Lee turned on John Cena to side with Ziggler.

2012 – Ring Of Honor’s ‘Final Battle’ event from the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City saw the final ROH appearance from El Generico (Sami Zayn). He competed in a losing effort to long-time rival Kevin Steen in a Ladder Match for Steen’s ROH World Championship. Also on the card, Jay and Mark Briscoe captured the ROH Tag Team Championship in a three-way match against S.C.U.M (Jimmy Jacobs and Steve Corino) and Cedric Alexander and Caprice Coleman.

2013 – After a long contract impasse, AJ Styles left TNA Wrestling after 11 years. He had been with the company since its inception in 2002.

2014 – The 800th episode of WWE SmackDown took place in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The main event saw Dolph Ziggler retain the Intercontinental Championship against Seth Rollins.

2015 – For the first time, NXT TakeOver happened outside of the USA when NXT TakeOver: London took place at the SSE Wembley Arena in London, England. The main event saw Finn Balor defeat Samoa Joe to retain his NXT World Championship. Balor wrestled in his ‘Demon’ persona and came to the ring in gear inspired by notorious Victorian London serial killer Jack The Ripper.

2018 – WWE presented their ‘TLC: Tables, Ladders And Chairs’ PPV from the SAP Center in San Jose, California. The main event saw the first-ever women’s triple-threat TLC match with Asuka winning the SmackDown Women’s Title against incumbent champion Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair. This marked the first time the belt was defended in a PPV main event. Earlier on the card, Dean Ambrose captured the Intercontinental Championship against Seth Rollins.

2020 – On an episode of NXT, Kyle O’Reilly defeated Pete Dunne to earn a match with NXT Champion Finn Balor at New Year’s Evil. In the main event of the show, Toni Storm defeated Rhea Ripley.

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