July 18th – On This Day In Wrestling History
1980 – Verne Gagne won his tenth and final AWA World Heavyweight Championship against Nick Bockwinkel in Chicago, Illinois.
1989 – The WWF Tag Team Championship changed hands when WWE taped the 22nd edition of Saturday Night’s Main Event in Worcester, Massachusetts. Defending champions Demolition (Ax and Smash) lost a 2 out of 3 falls match to The Brain Busters (Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard).
1993 – WCW Beach Blast 1993 took place at the Gulf Coast Coliseum in Biloxi, Mississippi. This was the final WCW PPV under the NWA banner before they split from the organisation. The biggest news of the show saw Ric Flair win his tenth (And would be final, although only nine are officially recognised) NWA World Heavyweight Championship with a victory over Barry Windham. When the WCW/NWA split was made official the title would be renamed the WCW International Title. In the main event of the show, Sting and Davey Boy Smith defeated Sid Vicious and Big Van Vader.
1999 – ECW presented Heatwave ’99 from the Hara Arena in Dayton, Ohio. It was ECW’s most watched ever PPV with the sole title change seeing Balls Mahoney and Spike Dudley defeating The Dudley Boyz (D-Von Dudley and Buh Buh Ray Dudley) to win the ECW World Tag Team Championship ahead of the losing team leaving for WWE. In the main event Rob Van Dam teamed with his recent rival Jerry Lynn to defeat The Impact Players (Lance Storm and Justin Credible).
2007 – Former ECW World Tag Team Champion (As part of The Eliminators with Perry Saturn) passed away due to heart failure at the age of 38.
2010 – The first ever WWE Money In The Bank PPV took place at the Sprint Center in Kansas City, Missouri. The event saw two Money In The Bank ladder matches held, the first time such a match had been held outside WrestleMania. In the first of the two, Kane secured a World Heavyweight Championship shot with a win over Cody Rhodes, Drew McIntyre, Dolph Ziggler, The Big Show, Matt Hardy, Christian and Kofi Kingston. Kane became the first man to ‘cash in’ on the same night when he challenged and defeated Rey Mysterio for the title just moments after Mysterio had successfully defended against Jack Swagger. Later in the night The Miz won the WWE Championship match contract, defeating Mark Henry, Randy Orton, Evan Bourne, Ted DiBiase Jr., Chris Jericho and John Morrison.
2013 – On a special Destination X themed episode of TNA Impact Wrestling, X-Division Champion Chris Sabin used the rule that allowed the X Champion to cash in their belt at this specific event each year in order to face TNA World Champion Bully Ray. He defeated Ray and walked away as the new World Champion.
2013 – At a TNA Impact Wrestling taping in Orlando, Florida, Manik defeated Greg Marasciulo and Sonjay Dutt in a three way match to win the vacant TNA X-Division Championship.
2018 – At an NXT TV taping at Full Sail University in Orlando, Florida, Tommaso Ciampa became the new NXT Champion after defeating reigning champion Aleister Black.
2020 – At Impact Wrestling Slammiversary XVIII, Eddie Edwards was crowned the new Impact Wrestling World Champion after winning a five way elimination match against Rich Swann, Trey Miguel, Ace Austin and the redebuting Eric Young. Heath Slater, recently released by WWE, made his debut on the show and Chris Bey defeated Willie Mack to win the X-Division Championship.
2021 – WWE held their first PPV in front of fans for 18 months with Money In The Bank at the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas. With a full arena of fans now allowed into the arena for the first time since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the main event saw Roman Reigns defeat Edge to retain the WWE Universal Championship. After the match, John Cena made his first WWE appearance since WrestleMania in April 2020 as he came out to confront Reigns. The only title change of the night saw Charlotte Flair defeat Rhea Ripley for the Raw Women’s Championship. Nikki A.S.H and Big E were the winners of the women’s and men’s Money In The Bank ladder matches respectively.
Notable Wrestling Birthdays:
- Joey Matthews (1979)
- The Great Sasuke (1969)
- Al Snow (1963)
- Carlos Colon (1948)