November 16th – On This Day In Wrestling History
Our full On This Day In Wrestling History section can be found here.
1987 – At the Meadowlands Arena in East Rutherford, New Jersey, WWF holds a ‘Legends Battle Royal’ that was won by 71-year-old Lou Thesz, who eliminated 63-year-old Pat O’Connor to win the match.
1994 – WCW Clash Of Champions XXIX is held in Jacksonville, Florida. The opening match saw Stars and Stripes (Marcus Bagwell and The Patriot) defeat Pretty Wonderful (Paul Orndorff and Paul Roma) to win the WCW World Tag Team belts. Elsewhere on the card ‘Hacksaw’ Jim Duggan retained the United States title against ‘Stunning’ Steve Austin via disqualification less than a minute into the match after Vader interfered. The main event saw Dave Sullivan, Hulk Hogan and Sting defeat The Three Faces Of Fear (Avalanche, Kevin Sullivan and the Butcher) with Mr. T as the special guest referee.
1996 – In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, ECW held their November To Remember event which saw the debut of a trio calling themselves the ‘Blue World Order.’ Later on the show 2 Cold Scorpio won three ‘loser leaves town’ matches back to back in short order (60 seconds, 32 seconds and 75 seconds) before losing the fourth to Louie Spicolli meaning that Scorpio had to leave ECW. (He would show up the next night at WWF Survivor Series, repackaged as Flash Funk.)
This event would also finally see Sabu answer Taz’s numerous challenges, appearing across the ring from the ‘Human Suplex Machine’ for the first time. Before the two could clash, the lights went out and when they came back on, both men had vanished.
1996 – WWF held its Hall Of Fame ceremony (the last one until 2004) in the Marriott Marquis in New York. The inductees were: ‘Baron’ Mikel Scicluna, ‘Captain’ Lou Albano, Jimmy ‘Superfly’ Snuka, Johnny Rodz, Killer Kowalski, Pat Patterson, Vincent J. McMahon, and The Valiant Brothers (Johnny and Jimmy Valiant.)
2000 – WCW held their last ever international PPV in Oberhausen, Germany, called Millennium Final. (The event wasn’t shown to American audiences and is one of a rare few WCW PPVs not available on the WWE Network.) On the show, World Heavyweight Champion Booker T retained against Scott Steiner before the next match saw Sting submit Kevin Nash to win the final of the WCW European Cup tournament.
2003 – WWE’s Survivor Series PPV was held in Dallas, Texas. On the show Kane beat Shane McMahon in an Ambulance match before interfering in the ‘Buried Alive’ match between Vince McMahon and the Undertaker, helping Vince to the victory. This PPV would be the last time the Undertaker is seen in his ‘American Badass’ gimmick, returning at WrestleMania XX in his ‘Deadman’ persona. The main event of the night saw Goldberg pin Triple H to retain the World Heavyweight Championship.
2004 – On SmackDown, John Cena defeated Carlito Caribbean Cool in 25 seconds to win back the WWE United States Championship.
2013 – In Elmhurst, New York, Dragon Gate USA Fearless 2013 is held. The main event saw Harlem and Lance Bravado beat the Young Bucks (Matt and Nick Jackson) to win the Open The United Gate Titles which they would hold for the next 10 months.
2020 – On an episode of Monday Night Raw, Drew McIntyre defeated Randy Orton to reclaim the WWE Championship.
Notable Wrestling Deaths:
- Eric the Red (1978)
- Ali Baba (1981)