Wrestling History

September 27th – On This Day In Wrestling History

September 27th - On This Day In Wrestling History

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

1965 – In the main event of the Madison Square Garden show, Bruno Sammartino defeated and retained the WWWF Championship against Tarzan Tyler. After the event, Sammartino went to a restaurant in Manhattan and locked the WWWF championship title belt in his car. Following his meal he discovered that his car had broken into and the belt had been stolen.

In 2011 a former wrestler by the name of ‘Handsome’ Johnny Barend passed and so his widow decided to move back home to Hawaii. When emptying the attic she came across the WWWF title belt wrapped up in a towel which was deemed to be the original one used when the WWWF split away from the National Wrestling Alliance. The title was bought by Dave Millican, who makes belts for WWE.

1987 – Shawn Michaels and Marty Jannetty (The Midnight Rockers) defeated Boris Zukhov & Soldat Ustinov to win the AWA World Tag Team Championships but had the decision overturned when it was discovered the Rockers pinned the wrong man.

1993 – On an episode of Monday Night Raw it was made official that Shawn Michaels had been stripped of the Intercontinental Championship. The official line was that he had the belt taken away from him due to having not defended the title for more than 30 days. (Although he HAD defended it on August 30th at SummerSlam, 28 days earlier.) The real reason was that Michaels had failed a drug test (which he disputed) and walked out on the company.

1998 – In Hamilton, Ontario, WWF presented In Your House: Breakdown. Edge would make his PPV singles debut against Owen Hart, which would end with Hart getting the pin after a ‘mysterious blonde-haired guy came from the crowd and distracted Edge.’ (He’d later be named as Christian.) Elsewhere on the cards The Rock pinned Ken Shamrock in a triple-threat cage match which also featured Mick Foley as Mankind.

The main event was also a triple threat match (in name) with the WWF champion facing off against the Undertaker and Kane (who had been told that they weren’t allowed to beat each other for the belt, it would only count if one of them beat Austin.) The match ended when both Brothers of Destruction pinned Stone Cold at the same time, leaving everyone wondering who was the official champion. Afterwards, Vince McMahon came to the ring, took the Smoking Skull belt, and rode off in a limousine with no clear winner announced.

1999 – The highest-rated segment in Raw history (In terms of audience size) aired featuring Mankind (Mick Foley) presenting a ‘This is your Life’ presentation to the Rock. It would feature guests such as the Rock’s home economics teacher, gym teacher, and old high school girlfriend and he would insult them all in wonderful Rock fashion. The segment had an 8.2 audience rating.

2012 – In the IMPACT zone in Orlando Florida Samoa Joe defeated Mr. Anderson by pinfall to win the vacant TNA Television Championship. It was assumed at the time that the former champion Devon was leaving the company due to contract disputes so the title was taken off of him a few weeks before, but he would return just two weeks later at Bound For Glory.

2019 – ROH held their Death Before Dishonour XVII event in Las Vegas. The main event of the show saw Rush defeat Matt Taven to win the ROH Championship.

2020 – WWE presented Clash Of Champions from the ThunderDome in Orlando, Florida. Sami Zayn won the Intercontinental Championship in a ladder match also featuring Jeff Hardy and AJ Styles, whilst Roman Reigns retained his Universal Title against Jey Uso in what was essentially a referee stoppage.

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