May 9th – On This Day In Wrestling History

1971 – Wrestling legend Tatsumi Fujinami makes his debut at the age of 17, wrestling for the Japanese Wrestling Association.

1975 – The WWWF Championship is defended in Japan for the first time as Bruno Sammartino and Giant Baba, the Pacific Wrestling Federation Champion, fight to a no-contest in Tokyo.

1988 – Jerry ‘The King’ Lawler becomes the new AWA World Heavyweight Champion with a win over Curt Hennig in a career vs. title match in Memphis, Tennessee.

1994 – An extremely rare non-televised Royal Rumble match was held on a WWE house show in Osaka, Japan. The Undertaker won the bout after last eliminating Bam Bam Bigelow.

1999 – Over 20,000 people attended WCW’s annual Slamboree PPV held at the Trans World Dome in St. Louis, Missouri. Three titles changed hands on the card. The main event saw Kevin Nash defeat Diamond Dallas Page to win the World Heavyweight Championship. On the undercard, Rick Steiner won the World Television Championship from Booker T and the team of Raven and Perry Saturn won the World Tag Team Championship in a triangle match against the teams of Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko and Rey Misterio, Jr. & Billy Kidman. In an intergender match, referee Charles Robinson (Dressed and acting exactly like Ric Flair) defeated Randy Savage’s valet Gorgrous George.

2000 – Crash Holly won the WWF Hardcore Championship from The British Bulldog at a SmackDown taping in New Haven, Connecticut.

Notable Wrestling Birthdays:

• A-Kid (1996)
• Air Paris (1977)
• Mike Shaw (1957)