Wrestling History

January 15th – On This Day In Wrestling History

January 15th - On This Day In Wrestling History

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

1989 – The first ever Royal Rumble PPV took place in Houston, Texas. In the main event, Big John Studd won the titular 30-man Rumble match. During a ‘Super Posedown’ contest between ‘Ravishing’ Rick Rude and The Ultimate Warrior, Rude attacked Warrior, jump starting their feud for most of the year over the WWE Intercontinental Championship.

1998 – Rey Mysterio Jr defeated Juventud Guerrera for the WCW Cruiserweight Championship at the WCW Thunder taping from Lakeland, Florida.

2005 – Austin Aries retained the ROH World Heavyweight Title against Colt Cabana in the main event of ROH ‘It All Begins’ from Cambridge, Massachusetts.

2006 – TNA Final Resolution took place in Orlando, Florida. In the main event, Christian Cage and Sting defeated Monty Brown and Jeff Jarrett.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQarLNvD1vE

2012 – At a house show event in Oakland, California, Primo and Epico Colon defeated Air Boom (Kofi Kingston and Evan Bourne) to win the WWE Tag Team Championship.

2017 – At Progress Chapter 42: Life, The Universe & Wrestling in Birmingham, Matt Riddle defeated Rampage Brown for the Progress Atlas Title in the main event.

2017 – The second night of the WWE UK Championship tournament took place at the Empress Ballroom in Blackpool, England. In the final, Tyler Bate defeated Pete Dunne to become the inaugural champion. Elsewhere on the card, Tommy End (The future Aleister/Malakai Black) made his WWE debut.

2017 – WWE Hall of Famer Jimmy ‘Superfly’ Snuka passed away surrounded by family and friends in Pompano Beach, Florida. He competed in several wrestling promotions over the years, but he was best known for his time in the WWE. Snuka was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 1996, and competed at the Survivor Series the following night. He continued to make sporadic appearances for the next 20 years, participating in matches such as the Royal Rumble, and he teamed up with Roddy Piper and Ricky Steamboat against Chris Jericho at WrestleMania 25 in Houston. Snuka received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the WWE on Raw the night after SummerSlam in 2002.

2020 – AEW presented their ‘Bash At The Beach’ special edition of Dynamite from Coral Gables, Florida. PAC beat Darby Allin in the main event, whilst DDP also made a return to the ring.

2020 – Rocky Johnson, father of Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, passed away at the age of 75. He was a cultural inspiration and barrier-breaker to many in the world of wrestling, and amongst many of this NWA titles he was the first black Georgia Heavyweight Champion. He was also the first black champion in the WWF, winning the World Tag Team Championship with his partner Tony Atlas in 1983 from The Wild Samoans.

Johnson initially trained to be a boxer and sparred with the likes of Muhammad Ali and George Foreman. When Johnson retired from wrestling in the early 90s, he trained his son Dwayne (alongside Pat Patterson) to become a wrestler. Johnson was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2008 by his son.

2021 – Kevin Owens returned on WWE SmackDown, and was announced as Roman Reigns’ challenger for the Universal Championship at the Royal Rumble. Reigns was scheduled to face Adam Pearce, who he had orchestrated winning a gauntlet match the week before. However, with the contract signed, an old knee injury caused the WWE official to withdraw from the match and choose Owens as the new opponent.

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