Wrestling History

February 11th – On This Day In Wrestling History

February 11th - On This Day In Wrestling History

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

1969 – Dory Funk Jr. defeated Gene Kinski in Tampa, Florida to win the NWA World Heavyweight Championship. Funk’s title run would last for around four years from this date.

1983 – In an excursion to the USA, Giant Baba defeated Harley Race to win the Pacific Wrestling Federation Heavyweight Championship.

1984 – Tito Santana became the WWF Intercontinental Champion in Boston with a win over Don Muraco.

1996 – An action-packed WCW SuperBrawl VI took place at the Bayfront Center, St. Petersburg, Florida. Maybe the most memorable moment on this card was an ‘I Respect You’ strap match between Kevin Sullivan and Brian Pillman. After just 59 seconds, Pillman grabbed the mic and said “I respect you, Booker man”, giving Sullivan the win. The utterance was a reference to Sullivan’s position as head booker of the company at the time and was supposed to be part of Pillman’s insider ‘Loose Cannon’ angle.

Not long after he was given his very real release in an effort to make the storyline look even more legit. He promptly used this real release and jumped ship to WWE, never to return. WCW managed to work themselves into being worked. Also on the card, Ric Flair defeated ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage to win the WCW World Heavyweight Championship, and in the main event Hulk Hogan defeated The Giant in a steel cage match.

2007 – TNA Wrestling’s ‘Against All Odds’ PPV took place at the Impact Zone at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida. In the main event, Christian Cage retained the NWA World Heavyweight Championship against Kurt Angle.

2010 – During a quarterly investor call, Vince McMahon made the announcement that WWE would be dropping the Survivor Series PPV name. The decision was reversed and the PPV brand never missed a single year.

2014 – NJPW presented their ‘New Beginnings’ event in Osaka, Japan. The only title change saw Tomohiro Ishii beat Tetsuya Naito to win the NEVER Openweight Championship. In the main event, Kazuchika Okada retained the IWGP Heavyweight Championship against Hirooki Goto.

2015 – NXT presented TakeOver: Rival from Full Sail University in Florida. In the main event, Kevin Owens defeated Sami Zayn to end his brief NXT Championship run. The semi-main event saw a historically significant moment that brought together the ‘Four Horsewomen’ of NXT in a fatal four-way match. Sasha Banks won the match against Charlotte Flair, Becky Lynch and Bayley to win the NXT Women’s Championship.

2015 – NJPW held their ‘New Beginnings In Osaka’ event in Osaka Japan with a number of huge title changes taking place. In the main event, AJ Styles famously won the IWGP Heavyweight Championship against Hiroshi Tanahashi. In the match before that, Bullet Club (Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson) won the IWGP Tag Team Championships from Hirooki Goto and Katsuyori Shibata. The third title change of the night (actually the first in terms of card positioning) saw The Young Bucks win a triple-threat match to win the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championships. Their opponents were ReDragon (Kyle O’Reilly and Bobby Fish) and The Time Splitters (Alex Shelley and KUSHIDA).

2016 – Two title changes took place at NJPW’s ‘New Beginnings In Osaka’ event in Osaka Japan. The NEVER Openweight Six Man Tag Team Championship changed hands when Bullet Club (Bad Luck Fale, Tama Tonga, and Yujiro Takahashi) defeated Jay Briscoe, Mark Briscoe and Toru Yano. In the main event, Kazuchika Okada retained his IWGP Heavyweight Championship against Hirooki Goto.

2017 – NJPW’s ‘New Beginnings In Osaka’ event took place at the Edion Arena in Osaka, Japan. In the main event, Tetsuya Naito retained the IWGP Intercontinental Championship against Michael Elgin. The only title change saw BUSHI, SANADA and EVIL win the NEVER Openweight Six Man Tag Team Championship from Hiroshi Tanahashi, Manabu Nakanishi and Ryusuke Taguchi.

2017 – Chavo Guerrero Sr. passed away after fighting a battle with cancer at the age of 68.

2018 – At ‘PROGRESS Chapter 63: Take Me Underground’ from the O2 Ritz in Manchester, Mark Haskins and Jimmy Havoc defeated James Drake and Zack Gibson to win the Progress Tag Team Titles.

2019 – In the Edion Arena in Osaka, Japan, NJPW presented their annual ‘New Beginnings In Osaka’ event. In the main event, Jay White caused something of a shock by defeating Hiroshi Tanahashi to win the IWGP Heavyweight Championship.

2019 – On an episode of Raw from Grand Rapids, Michigan, The Revival (Dash Wilder and Scott Dawson) defeated Bobby Roode and Chad Gable to win the WWE Raw Tag Team Championships.

2021 – Meiko Satomura made her NXT UK debut, defeating Isla Dawn.

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