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Wrestling the Undertaker IS the main event, Punk!
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00:00As the latest row to WrestleMania begins to pick up a bit of steam, it'd probably be
00:05wise for Papa H to take a minute in between his father-in-law booking big meaty men slapping
00:09meat on the grandest stage, and largely dropping the ball when it comes to his women's division
00:13to remind himself what can happen when things don't go exactly according to plan at the
00:18show of shows.
00:19Or rather they do, but that plan just suuuuucked.
00:23So I am Gareth from WhatCultureWrestling and these are 10 times that WWE botched WrestleMania.
00:2910.
00:30Roman's reign is booed into existence, WrestleMania 32
00:33When it comes to the 32nd show of shows, it's hard to mention that 2016 WrestleMania without
00:38feeling a little bit underwhelmed.
00:40Despite boasting one hell of a women's showcase over a newly rechristened belt, the majority
00:45of the card just felt like a bit of a letdown really.
00:48So it strangely felt a little bit appropriate that this all-round, underwhelming, lackluster
00:52show went out on one hell of a sour note.
00:54This wasn't a case of the company just getting completely caught off-guide either, they knew
00:58what was going to happen, they had Roman Reigns, the person who was getting booed in every
01:01single arena that he walked into, up against Triple H, who was literally just anybody but
01:06Roman Reigns.
01:07There was a chance here though before this event just to pivot ever so slightly and put
01:10Dean Ambrose into the mix, maybe in a three-way or just have him vs Roman for the WWE Championship.
01:16But did they take this lifeline that would have helped alleviate all the negativity that
01:19was no doubt going to be present in the stadium?
01:21Of course they didn't.
01:22Instead, Reigns' WWE World Championship reign was crammed down folks' throats and they
01:27more than let WWE know about it.
01:28Hey, but at least all involved learned from their mistakes a year later though, right?
01:32Number 9.
01:33Not letting the Deadman rest in peace WrestleMania 33
01:36Now it was evident on the road to WrestleMania 33 that the Deadman, the Undertaker, was not
01:41at his absolute best, was he?
01:43Because just taking one look at the way he entered that Royal Rumble showed you that this
01:46man had a dodgy hip and should have been nowhere near a wrestling ring.
01:49That and the fact that he was tasked with trying to get over a person who again had been booed
01:53for an entire year made any real hope of a critically acclaimed show-in like the ones
01:57that he'd had all the way through WrestleMania 23 to WrestleMania 30 pretty non-existent.
02:03But WWE saw this man at the Royal Rumble and was still only all too happy to throw him into
02:07the show of shows and, well, the end results were as painful to watch as they likely were
02:11to produce.
02:12Taker struggled throughout and Romans did much of the literal and physical heavy lifting and
02:16it was just really excruciating, wasn't it?
02:18And making matters that a little bit worse, Roman Reigns himself said that he didn't want
02:22to win this match, he even requested to lose it, but WWE weren't having any of it, they
02:25wanted Roman to win, so he did.
02:27So the Undertaker lost in what was looking like his final match and it was all just a
02:30bit depressing.
02:31And it also kickstart Mark Calloway's three year mission just to try and go out on one
02:35hell of a high and we all remember what happened at Super Showdown, so I'm gonna blame this.
02:40This is what started that.
02:41Number eight, Hulkamania foolishly runs wild at WrestleMania 9.
02:44Has there ever been a more disappointing conclusion to the show of shows than what went down at
02:49WrestleMania 9?
02:50The answer is no or maybe not because there is a lot more entries on this list.
02:54After shockingly overcoming the babyface hero Bret Hart in the main events of WrestleMania
02:589, Yokozuna was your new champion.
03:01And this was a pretty bold move because you had this big titanic heel beating the babyface
03:05at the end of WrestleMania and people were like, not happy ending, what a move.
03:09And this felt like it could have been a fresh new era for WWE going forward, only until it
03:14quickly became known that it wasn't gonna be this because Hulkamania was gonna run wild,
03:19brother.
03:20Yep, that's right, WWE reverted right back to good old tried and tested Hulkster over
03:23here.
03:24And things just all got very strange, didn't they?
03:27Because yes, Hogan had issued a challenge earlier that night to the winner of Bret Hart vs Yokozuna
03:31for the WWE Championship, but nobody in their right mind thought that was gonna happen straight
03:35after Bret Hart had salt thrown in his eyes and he got pinned.
03:38And then Hogan won the whole thing in like next to no time at all and even dodged the
03:41salt that somehow felled Bret Hart, making Bret look even more foolish, his entire thing was
03:46silly, stupid, it didn't help anyone.
03:48And making matters that little bit worse, instead of doing the favours back to Hart like
03:51he said he would apparently further down the road, he chose to drop the belt back to
03:55Yokozuna at King of the Ring, rendering this entire thing pointless, what a pointless waste
03:59of time.
04:00Number seven, trying to follow The Undertaker vs Shawn Michaels, WrestleMania 25.
04:05Some incoming clashes have instant classic written all over them.
04:08So rather than trying to follow something like, I dunno, Hulk Hogan vs The Rock at WrestleMania
04:1318, the smart move would have probably been just to end WrestleMania with something that
04:16was always gonna be as huge as this.
04:18But of course, WWE foolishly decided to do the complete opposite to that, they put him
04:22on like third to last, then you had a women's match and a world championship match and they
04:25both didn't feel anywhere near as special, the crowd was that, because they just had
04:29Hulk Hogan vs The Rock.
04:30And did WWE learn from their mistakes?
04:32A whopping, what, seven years later?
04:34No, they did not, because you've been watching this video, they do not learn.
04:37And on this occasion, we have The Undertaker vs Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 25 and they
04:41put on an absolute masterpiece, a clinic, a masterclass if you will, and they're always
04:46going to because look who these people are, look who's involved in the match, but WWE didn't
04:51have the foresight to see this was gonna happen, so what did they do again?
04:54They put two matches on after this classic.
04:56They put two, you had the world championship and the WWE championship, and of course, they
05:00both just sank.
05:01They did not do anywhere near as well as they should have done, Triple H himself even sat
05:05backstage, looked at Randy Orton and went, you know what, I think we're in trouble.
05:08Yes they are, yes they were, it's all moulding into one because my mind is melting again.
05:12Thankfully, the penny did finally drop a year later because they put these two bad boys on
05:15last, because who is going to follow this?
05:17Number 6, The Ref Counts Ronda's Shoulders After a Never-Ending Show, WrestleMania 35.
05:22After having to sit through what was shaping up to be the longest pay-per-view in all of WWE
05:26history, it's safe to say that many of the fans inside of MetLife Stadium were rather
05:30exhausted at the thought of having to sit through yet another match.
05:33But of course, the stars involved in that first ever all-women's main event were so
05:37damn talented that they somehow managed to get everybody back on board because Ronda
05:40Rousey, Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair know what they're doing.
05:42One person who sadly did not know what they were doing though when it came to this closing
05:45stretch of this epic main event for the ages was the referee because he had one hell of
05:49a botch, didn't he?
05:50As the match reached its final stages, we had Ronda Rousey with Becky Lynch on her shoulders
05:54for the Piper's Pit, and then as she went for the move, Becky reversed it.
05:57And as she went to pin her shoulders to the mat, Ronda's shoulders clearly were off the
06:01mat.
06:02They weren't there for a minute, but the refs started counting anyway.
06:04So like for the first one and a half, her shoulders were nowhere near the mat, and then
06:07she got them to the mat.
06:08It was all a bit clunky, and even the commentators were like, does that count?
06:11We're doing that?
06:12Okay, let's go with it.
06:13Now, of course, everyone knew coming into this event that Becky was going to come
06:15out with all the belts, the winner takes all, the title, everything else.
06:18We just knew that because that's where the story was going.
06:20But the nature of just the all-round botched finish has led to WWE pretty much no-selling
06:24the nature of what actually went down.
06:26They just don't really talk about it.
06:27They go, yeah, Becky won at WrestleMania.
06:29People say, how?
06:29And they go, no, no, no, no, it's not important.
06:31And just as another little detail, referee Rod Zapata was also fine because he meant to
06:34call these matches as a shoot, and he did not in this moment, and Vince McMahon was
06:38not impressed.
06:39Number five, CM Punk still doesn't get his main event, WrestleMania 29.
06:43In another case of WWE's refusal to book the obvious, coming back to bite them squarely
06:48on the ass, the decision to not give CM Punk the WrestleMania main event he so desired
06:53definitely ranks as one of the biggest botches in company history.
06:56Had Vince McMahon and co. just found a way to squeeze Punk into that main event of WrestleMania
07:0029 alongside The Rock and John Cena, then maybe there's a world where Punk would have
07:05just stayed put.
07:06He would have got his main event.
07:07He'd think, you know what?
07:08I'm happy with this.
07:09I've done the thing I wanted to do.
07:10I'll stay here.
07:11I'll earn some money and earn WWE loads of money too.
07:13But rather than just injecting some best in the world into this weird twice-in-a-lifetime
07:18lie, the call was instead made to just chuck good old Phil into a match with The Undertaker
07:22that was classed as a quote-unquote main event by Triple H and Vince McMahon.
07:26And then we got The Rock vs. John Cena again, but this time for the WWE title because that
07:30promised an even better match than we got the first time around.
07:32Spoiler, it did not.
07:33Now, Taker and a chip magnet most definitely put on a show-stealing performance because
07:38of course they did.
07:39Look at these two people.
07:40But there's still no getting around the fact that Punk had once again seen his WrestleMania
07:43dreams evaporate before his very eyes.
07:45And this all definitely played into his decision to leave WWE at the start of 2014.
07:50That and the fact that Vince McMahon thought, you know what?
07:52I did that to him last year.
07:53This year, I'll put him in a match with Triple H.
07:55What could go wrong?
07:56Number four, The Wrong Women Walk Out On Top, WrestleMania 36.
08:00An entirely bizarre set of evenings for more than a few reasons.
08:03The Performance Center show-off shows, aka WrestleMania 36, did at least come with a fair amount
08:08of fun and that was really needed at the time because remember, global pandemic, crying
08:13in my pyjamas every single day and eating way too much ice cream at 9 o'clock in the
08:16morning.
08:16However, it did still come with a few painful reminders that Vince McMahon simply did not
08:20care no matter what was going on in the world at this moment in time.
08:22He did not care what you wanted.
08:24He was still going to do whatever the hell he wanted because Vince is going to Vince.
08:27Heading into that year's showcase of the Immortals, NXT darling Shayna Baszler and Rhea
08:31Ripley would definitely be in position as two people who could be the future of the company
08:34and they were two people that everyone was very much behind because they were fresh, they were sparkly.
08:38We'd see them in NXT and we thought, you know what?
08:40These two ladies can fly.
08:42And as they were both set to take on horsewomen at the show of shows, it definitely felt like
08:45a passing of the torch moment was about to go down.
08:47But oh, how wrong we were.
08:49The two black and gold sensations were both defeated across the two nights with Becky
08:52Lynch winning yet again with a roll-up because that's just what she does at WrestleMania.
08:56Now at least Ripley did find a way to get herself back on track after having her momentum
08:59completely derailed by whatever the hell that was when she lost to Charlotte Flair and lost
09:03her NXT championship.
09:04Whereas Shayna Baszler is yet to really fully recover from being rolled up on the grandest stage of
09:08them all and having a WrestleMania moment stolen away by the men.
09:11Number three, Too Many McMahons.
09:14What initially seemed like a fairly straightforward main event at WrestleMania 2000, very quickly
09:18turned into one of the most overbooked pieces of foolishness ever to grace the show of shows.
09:23After winning that year's Royal Rumble, albeit a little bit controversially, The Rock looked
09:27set to go one-on-one with his longtime rival Triple H on the grandest stage of them all.
09:31And at this moment in time, Triple H was arguably the biggest heel in the company, Rock was the
09:35biggest face, it just made sense.
09:37But that would have been a bit too easy, wouldn't it?
09:39The attention was ultimately pulled away from this twosome and The Big Show was thrown in
09:42there and Mick Foley too because we just need more people and more stars and more star power
09:48because that's how Vince's brain works.
09:50And in addition to just overloading the actual in-ring action that was going down in between
09:54the ropes, they put a McMahon in every corner because nothing sells a WrestleMania like four
10:00McMahons.
10:01Now, admittedly, giving Mick Foley the WrestleMania main event spot that he definitely deserved
10:05after putting his body on the line and putting it through hell for years and years and years
10:08was a nice touch.
10:10We all love that.
10:10It's just a shame that he got thrown into such an overstuffed and just sour taste contest.
10:16And this was all complete with a typical headline-stealing Vince McMahon swerve because of course it
10:19was and Triple H won the thing so he had a heel coming out on top in WrestleMania and the
10:24main event for the first time ever just to really sour slash sweeten the deal whatever way
10:28you want to put it.
10:29So what could have been one of the strongest show-of-show closers of all time turned out
10:32to be a little more than a McMahon-obsessed mess.
10:35Number two, Austin's deal with the devil ends an all-timer on a sour note.
10:39WrestleMania X7.
10:41Despite quite possibly sitting as the greatest WrestleMania of all time, the way that WrestleMania
10:46X7 ended still has many fans scratching their heads to this day.
10:49So in the main event, you had Stone Cold Steve Austin versus The Rock.
10:53This was the second time they were going at it at WrestleMania.
10:55They were long-time rivals.
10:56They were the biggest stars in the company, but the plan going into this was to somehow
11:00turn Stone Cold Steve Austin heel in his home state.
11:04Stone Cold Steve Austin.
11:05Biggest baby face of all time.
11:07The hero.
11:07The face of the company.
11:09Turn him heel in his own backyard.
11:11Stone Cold could have punched a baby in the face and give the middle finger to the American
11:14flag inside of the Astrodome and he still would not have been booed.
11:19This was Stone Cold Steve Austin.
11:20But did that stop WWE from insisting on going through with one of the worst decisions in
11:24WWE history and turning the bionic redneck on the WrestleMania stage in the main event?
11:29No, it did not.
11:30Not even the sight of Austin sharing a beer with his long-time mortal enemy Vince McMahon,
11:34the boss, the devil himself, could get people to boo him because they loved him because
11:38it's Stone Cold.
11:39I don't know how many times I've got to say it.
11:40This was Stone Cold.
11:42Even Austin himself has admitted in years gone by that if he could go back, if he could jump
11:45into a time machine now, he would change things.
11:48He would call an audible because you could hear the noise in that stadium, that arena,
11:51that moment.
11:52They were not booing Stone Cold.
11:54They did not hate him.
11:55So why not just lean into it and make an incredible WrestleMania moment?
11:57That's just what you do.
11:59And hell, if you did jump into that time machine, you might have been saved from the absolute
12:02failed experiment that was the Stone Cold Steve Austin heel turn in general too.
12:06Number one, All of It WrestleMania 27.
12:10It may have come with quits with the return of the People's Champion and one hell of a war
12:13between The Undertaker and Triple H.
12:15But outside of those few occasional highlights, WrestleMania 27, when you think about it,
12:19when those words get thrown into a conversation, you get chills, I get chills, I get shivers,
12:23I'm shivering right now.
12:24Stuffing the biggest event on the calendar with a frankly disturbing amount of nothing matches.
12:29And these range from Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler doing whatever the hell that was, to
12:34the weird Snooki nonsense when they had that six-person tag match with Snooki from, you
12:38know, Jersey Shore.
12:39Snooki was there.
12:40The stage was then well and truly set for a truly horrific main event that everyone remembers
12:45for all the wrong reasons.
12:46Because despite walking out of the show of shows with the WWE Championship in a match
12:50that involved him and John Cena, a disturbing concussion and the fact that The Rock got
12:54involved with the match late on completely overshadowed The Miz's massive win.
12:58With the attention then swiftly turning to The Rock vs. John Cena at next year's WrestleMania.
13:03Yep, that's right, the most important main event of the year was little more than
13:06an angle to set up the following year's WrestleMania.
13:10A waste of time, talent and energy from pretty much start to finish.
13:14To class this as the greatest botch of them all would be a bit of an understatement, wouldn't
13:18it?
13:19So that has been our list.
13:20Know of any other times that WWE botched the grandest stage of them all, the show of shows,
13:24the showcase of the immortals?
13:25Then let us know all about them in the comments section right down below and don't forget to
13:29like this video, share it and subscribe to all things WhatCulture Wrestling and follow
13:33myself on Twitter at GMorgan04 and follow everyone here at WhatCultureWB at WhatCultureWB because
13:39that's what we're called on Twitter, WhatCultureWB, go and find us.
13:42And be sure to enjoy all of the other WrestleMania content that we have dropping around my lovely
13:46face at this point.
13:47If you've not already voted on the Ultimate WrestleMania card, go and do that if it's not
13:51already been decided and never know when these videos are going to drop.
13:53In the meantime, just be good to yourself and let us enjoy this road to WrestleMania because
13:57I want to see my brocks smash into an almost and I'm going to smile and pop a beard just
14:01for that.
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