February 17th – On This Day In Wrestling History
Our full On This Day In Wrestling History section can be found here.
1996 – Raven retained the ECW World Heavyweight Title against The Sandman in the main event of ECW Cyberslam ’96 from Philadephia.
1996 – In Baltimore, Maryland, Lex Luger defeated Johnny B. Badd to win the WCW Television Championship.
1997 – On WCW Monday Nitro from Tampa, Lord Steven Regal lost the WCW World TV Title to Prince Iaueka.
1997 – Sycho Sid won his second WWF World Title by defeating Bret Hart with outside interference from ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin on WWF Raw from Nashville. The outcome of this match set up the eventual WWF Title match between Sid and The Undertaker, and Austin against Hart, which would have the “submission” stipulation added a few weeks later which Austin legitimately discovered whilst watching Raw at home in Texas. This match marked the first time ever that the WWE Championship changed hands on Monday Night Raw.
1998 – The Headbangers beat The Rock N’ Roll Express for the NWA Tag Team Titles at a WWF Monday Night Raw taping in Waco, Teaxs.
2002 – WWF No Way Out in Milwaukee marked the return of (Hollywood) Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash to the WWF after being away from the promotion for nine years (Hogan) and six years for Hall and Nash. The trio came in collectively as the New World Order which Jim Ross acknowledged on commentary that “they built the old WCW, but did more to destroy that entity and brand”.
Hogan, Hall and Nash interfered in the main event Undisputed Championship match which saw Chris Jericho retain the title over ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin. Also, The Rock defeated The Undertaker in a grudge-match with outside interference from the kayfabe co-owner of the company Ric Flair. Triple H lost his Undisputed Title shot at WrestleMania to Kurt Angle.
2007 – Mike Awesome passed away aged 42 in Tampa, Florida. He was best known from his appearances in ECW, WCW, WWE, TNA and with Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling and All Japan Pro Wrestling as The Gladiator.
2008 – At WWE No Way Out in Las Vegas Floyd ‘Money’ Mayweather was in the front row to support his friend Rey Mysterio who unsuccessfully challenged Edge for the World Heavyweight Championship. At the conclusion of the match The Big Show came down to ringside and goaded Mayweather into the ring where he legitimated broke Show’s nose. The Big Show told Sportsbible that “I told Floyd to break my nose. If he didn’t do something huge that night, our angle was dead in the water”. Also on the card, Triple H and The Undertaker won their brand’s respective Elimination Chamber matches to set up the WWE and World Heavyweight Championship bouts for WrestleMania XXIV.
2012 – The Briscoes defeated Team Ambition to retain the ROH World Tag Team Championship in the main event of ROH Rise & Prove from Cincinnati, Ohio.
2013 – The Rock retained the WWE Championship against CM Punk in the main event WWE Elimination Chamber in New Orleans. Also, Jack Swagger won the Elimination Chamber match setting up the World Heavyweight Title match at WrestleMania against Albert Del Rio, who retained the title against The Big Show in the opening pay-per-view match of the evening.
2013 – At DDT ‘Into The Fight’ in Tokyo, Kenny Omega retained the KO-D Openweight Title in the main event against Harashima.
2016 – Will Ospreay defeated Marty Scrull and Pete Dunne in the main event triple-threat match at ‘RevPro Live’ in Portsmouth.
2019 – Two title changes took place at WWE Elimination Chamber in Houston, Texas. Shane McMahon & The Miz lost the Smackdown Tag Team Championship to The Usos. Following the match, McMahon turned heel by attacking his partner. Also, Finn Balor won the WWE Intercontinental Championship in a handicap yag match against Bobby Lashley and Lio Rush. Also, Bayley & Sasha Banks became the first WWE Women’s Tag Team Champion, winning the belts in one of the two featured Chamber matches. Elsewhere, Daniel Bryan retained the WWE World Championship in the main event Chamber match against AJ Styles, Jeff Hardy, Kofi Kingston, Randy Orton and Samoa Joe.
2021 – Cody and Brandi Rhodes did the gender reveal for their first child live on Dynamite. It was a girl! It was also announced that Jon Moxley and Kenny Omega would face off in an exploding ring, barbed wire deathmatch at Revolution…
2021 – WWE Women’s Champions Nia Jax and Shayna Baszler made a surprise appearance on NXT to confront Dusty Classic winners, Raquel Gonzalez and Dakota Kai. Also on the same episode, Zoey Stark made an impressive debut.
Notable Wrestling Birthdays:
- Ricardo Rodriguez (1986)
- Jimmy Jacobs (1984)