My 10 Favorite Wrestlemania Matches

Bret Hart vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin (Wrestlemania 13)

I think this is my very favorite Wrestlemania match ever.

It is an “I Quit” match, which means it can only end when one of the wrestlers submits and says those words. Bret and Austin had a violent blood feud going into this, and that fury carries itself into the match. They fight into the bleachers, up the stairs and back down, destroying each other the whole way. They get back into the ring, and though they don’t put on a very scientific wrestling match, they engage in such physical and psychological warfare that the crowd is whipped into a frenzy, more so than they could have ever expected.

At a certain point, Austin is thrown into the barricade and his head his busted open. Secretly, Austin had cut himself with a hidden razorblade. Though this had been common practice in pro wrestling for decades, wrestlers in WWE had been told to stop this in order to clean up the product for the kids. But before the match, Bret told Austin that the only way the finish of their match would be believable would be if Austin bled. Like a true professional, Austin concurred.

After the two men exchange strangulations and chair shots and ring bell shots, Bret eventually gets his dreaded Sharpshooter submission hold on Austin. Against his better judgment, Austin refuses to say “I Quit.” Instead he stays in the hold and fights and screams and bleeds buckets, until he passes out from the pain. Bret wins, but his actions after the match make him repellant to the crowd.

This match is so beloved for me because it accomplishes something that almost no match I’ve ever seen has accomplished: by the end, both Bret Hart and Steve Austin have reversed their roles. Bret is no longer the hero, he is a bully and a coward. Austin is no longer the bully, he is the brave son of a bitch who would never, ever quit. The fighting spirit he showed in this match is what made the crowd love him, and it’s what allowed him to become the biggest star in the business since Hulk Hogan.

The image of Stone Cold Steve Austin screaming, with his eyes closed and blood streaming down his face, is an image that will be seared into my brain forever, and also should hold the title of Most Iconic Image From a Wrestlemania. Nothing else comes close.

The Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels (Wrestlemania 25)

I just told you how Bret vs. Austin is my favorite Mania match, and then I watched this one again, and…good lord. I might go back and forth between that one and this one for the rest of my life.

The buildup going into this showed us two giants of the art form finally meeting at the biggest stage possible. Shawn Michaels represented the God-fearing light, and The Undertaker represented the…Satan-loving darkness? I don’t know, it was never clear as to whether Undertaker was a Satanist. Anyway, when WWE put this match on third-to-last at Wrestlemania 25, they had no idea that it would set a figurative bomb off inside Houston’s Reliant Stadium, making everything for the rest of the night irrelevant, as well as possibly every other Wrestlemania match that has followed it.

The match starts off with great ring psychology from both men, trading submission holds and body blows. But 15 minutes into it, something happens.

I didn’t watch this show live. I was at a concert. So was my friend Michael Watson, with whom I’ve now watched countless hours of wrestling. Michael’s friend sent him a GIF of this match as it was occurring: The Undertaker leaped out of the ring, landed on no one, and as far as Michael and I could tell, had broken his neck and died. I literally thought he had broken his neck and would never walk again. It looked so gruesome. Michael and I just had to take a breath and hope for the best.

It turns out that The Undertaker not only got up, but proceeded to wrestle 15 more minutes and tear the goddamn roof off the place.

In pro wrestling, there are “false finishes,” shorthand for the moment when you’re sure the 3-count is about to happen and the match will be done, but the guy gets his shoulder up and the match continues. You’ll get maybe one of these during a great match, two if you’re lucky. Well, this match has six of those. I said earlier that the crowd during Bret vs. Austin was crazy, but it really doesn’t come close to this one. Everyone in that arena believes Undertaker has the match won six times, and when he doesn’t, they completely lose their minds. Everyone in the first few rows looks like they are about to pass out. It’s bedlam, and even now while watching this match for the umpteenth time, it makes me so giddy.

This match doesn’t have the blistering intensity of Bret vs. Austin, but it has everything else, and maybe more: perfect match-making, heart-pounding drama, and 72,000 people united in disbelief.

Bret Hart vs. Owen Hart (Wrestlemania 10)

The storyline behind this match is integral to what happens in the ring. Little brother Owen had always lived in his brother Bret’s shadow. Rather than try his best and let his brother do his thing, Owen let jealousy ruin his mind. Bret didn’t want to wrestle his brother, but when Owen attacked his injured leg at the Royal Rumble that year, Bret’s hand was forced.

This match opened Wrestlemania 10, and it set the bar so high that only one match even came close to it that night (which you’ll hear about later). Bret and Owen wrestled an intricate match where the action hardly ever spilled to the outside, instead staying in the ring where the real big work is done. Not one single move is blown or shaky. Every second is perfect. It’s really neat knowing how much they both were rooting for each other and were doing their absolute best to make each other look amazing. That might be an unfair advantage over other matches where the guys aren’t so invested in the success of their opponent, but oh well. Maybe they should be. If everyone appreciated their opponent as much as they do here, we might get total classics every single night.

In the end, Owen wins in sudden and surprising fashion. Even Owen appears amazed that he won, but he shouldn’t be, because he won by executing a brilliant counter to a brilliant move, something that happens countless times in this one. Stewart from my beloved New Generation Project Podcast says, “If this match isn’t in your Top 10 of all time, your list is factually wrong.” I won’t argue with that.

Daniel Bryan vs. Triple H (Wrestlemania 30)

Going into this, Daniel Bryan was the ultimate underdog, having been kept down by “The Authority.” Onscreen, this was Triple H and his wife Stephanie McMahon, who ran the show and repeatedly told Bryan he would never get the top spot. Offscreen, Vince McMahon and the decision-makers certainly never thought Bryan would be their top guy. But because WWE audiences got so fervently behind him, their hand was forced and they had to do the right thing.

If Bryan won this match, he would be heading into the main event that night in a Triple Threat match for the WWE Championship. All signs pointed to him winning this match and the one later on, because why would they not let us have that emotional victory? Why would they do that to us?

Even with the finish of this match almost a fait accompli, Bryan and Triple H did wonders to take the crowd on a ride and play their feelings like a violin. Control goes back and forth between the two at more points than usual. Bryan conducts himself with quiet fury, but lets himself get tricked a couple times, and his injured shoulder is compromised. There even comes a point when Triple H hits him with his finishing move, the Pedigree, and it looks like the whole thing is going to come crashing down. But Bryan kicks out, and in a finishing sequence that’s beautifully done and comes out of nowhere, Bryan gets the win.

This match carries even greater weight now that Bryan has been forced to retire due to injuries. Wrestlemania 30 was the culmination of his many years in the wrestling business, being told that he wasn’t big or tall enough, or charismatic enough, and then going and proving everyone wrong. He won the WWE Championship later that night in a fantastic match, but I like this match better because when Bryan beat Triple H, it felt like the Gatekeeper had been vanquished and the sun would shine forever. It didn’t work out for him the way we wanted it to, but this match is a reminder that for one night, Daniel Bryan was okay.

Ultimate Warrior vs. Hulk Hogan (Wrestlemania 6)

There might never be another match that matters more to little kids. As a 7-year old watching it for the first time, it certainly felt like a life-changing event. The two most popular, beloved wrestlers on the planet were pitted against each other, and how could this match possibly end in anything other than an actual explosion?

Seeing this through my adult eyes, it’s quite clearly not the best match ever. A scientifically wrestled affair, it is not. Hogan and Warrior were never the best wrestlers to begin with, each guy always needing someone to lead them to a great contest, so putting them together was risky. Incredibly, both guys were assisted by backstage agents in creating a match that played to their strengths and created drama out of blank space. Moves like bearhugs and chinlocks, normally designed to bring the crowd’s energy down, were instead placed smartly within the course of the match and got the 66,000 in attendance on the edge of their seats. It helped that the crowd was almost evenly divided: those who craved the insane new regime of the Ultimate Warrior, and those who didn’t want to live in a world where Hulk Hogan wasn’t champion.

This is the only spot on this list that I’ll give to Hulk Hogan. He has been revealed to be a racist weirdo, and I don’t want to give him much more attention. But one reason why this is on my list is to talk about the end of the match. After he loses, by all rights he should roll out of the ring and walk to the back, allowing the Ultimate Warrior to have his celebratory moment to himself. What Hogan does instead is grab the belt before Warrior can get it, walk back into the ring with sad puppy dog eyes, and make everything about himself. That’s quintessential Hogan: the guy who preached humility, and never practiced it. The guy who claimed to like everybody, yet plainly stated behind closed doors that he hates black people. Seeing him lose this match and being forced to shift the spotlight over to someone else is what warms my heart the most.

Razor Ramon vs. Shawn Michaels (Wrestlemania 10)

Months earlier, Razor Ramon won the vacant Intercontinental Championship, vacated by Shawn Michaels after a drug-related suspension. When Shawn came back to work, he brought out a new Intercontinental belt and proclaimed himself to be the real champion. Razor was just a fraud, he claimed. So the matter needed to be settled with a Ladder Match, in which both belts would be hung above the ring and the only way to win would be to get up the ladder first and grab both belts.

The WWF had never done a Ladder Match on such a big scale, so that fact alone lends this match a ton of importance. Tasked with working in such a new concept, Shawn and Razor could not have done a better job. They start out small with the ladder usage, with some lower-impact spots where someone took a ladder to the stomach or to the face. I know, that sounds high-impact, but trust me, it gets crazier. By the last few minutes of the match, Shawn has dove off the top of the ladder onto Razor, and then rode the ladder all the way down onto Razor. Through all of this craziness, Shawn manages to crotch himself on the ropes and get stuck in them, giving Razor the opportunity to grab the belts and become the undisputed Intercontinental Champion.

I frequently come back to this match because it feels like an essential turning point in the way mainstream pro wrestling was presented. It had always been predicated on violence, to be sure, but now there was a gigantic weapon involved, and guys were using it to do mind-blowing things that the audience had never even thought possible. There are several moments throughout this match where the crowd audibly gasps and has to catch its breath. That’s the magic that keeps me watching this stuff.

“Macho Man Randy Savage” vs. The Ultimate Warrior (Wrestlemania 7)

What do you get when you pair up two of the biggest weirdos in the history of wrestling? Is one of those weirdos a superb wrestler who can guide the other weirdo, a not-so-good-wrestler, into having the best match of his life? Will there be a romantic storyline after the match that will make people cry? If the answers are yes, then you’ve got a match for the ages.

Because Randy Savage and the Ultimate Warrior hated each other so much, this match was made into a “Career vs. Career” match. Whoever lost had to retire. For over 20 minutes, Savage and Warrior battle it out with unique moves and creative spots that most certainly were made by Savage, who was known for meticulously plotting out every step of his big matches. This helped Warrior, who never was the best wrestler, into putting on a performance that made him look deserving of being the man to end Savage’s career, which he did.

The post-match stuff still makes me weep. You see, Randy Savage and his real-life wife Elizabeth had been on-screen partners up until two years earlier, when Savage became a bad guy and left her. After this match ends, as Savage is being beaten by his current manager, Sensational Sherri, Miss Elizabeth runs into the ring and saves him. Savage gets up and looks as if he’s seen a ghost. He has no idea what to do. But he looks to the crowd, and the crowd is telling him, “She’s giving you another chance, you idiot! Take it!” Savage and Elizabeth embrace, Elizabeth cries her eyes off, and Savage holds her on his shoulder and later holds the ring ropes open for her. It’s actually a beautiful segment where, without any words, Savage tells us that he has been a terrible person for the last two years, and he’s insanely lucky that this woman has seen enough good in him to take his sorry ass back.

In real life, they divorced a year later. They are now both no longer with us. That makes this extra sad, yet all the more timeless. I like this because they both look so happy.

The Undertaker vs. CM Punk (Wrestlemania 29)

This one is partially great because of what we now know about it: CM Punk was pissed that he once again wasn’t in the main event of Wrestlemania, so he wanted to have the best possible match on the show just so he could stick it to his bosses. And he did that, by a country mile.

The Undertaker had won 20 matches in a row at the big show, and even though I went into this believing that they would never allow CM Punk to be the one to end The Streak, this match was so effective that in a couple moments it felt like Punk had a real chance. When Paul Heyman handed Punk the symbolic urn and he smashed The Undertaker in his head with it, you could see and hear the entire crowd thinking, “OH MY GOD IT’S HAPPENING.” And then it didn’t. The Undertaker survived, he hit CM Punk with a second Tombstone Piledriver, and it was over.

This was CM Punk’s last Wrestlemania match, and even though he was still bitter that he wasn’t in the main event and that everyone else in the top spot got paid more than him, he should be able to hold his head high knowing that he went all out for us, and we appreciated it.

Edge and Christian vs. The Dudley Boyz vs. The Hardy Boyz

This was a “Tables, Ladders and Chairs” match, and if you need more explanation than that, well, there were a whole bunch of tables, ladders and chairs all around the ring, specifically there so people could destroy each other with them. It was also a Ladder Match, just like the one discussed earlier between Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon. But make it six people instead of two, and add all the props and weapons, and the whole thing becomes an uncontrollable rollercoaster ride of craziness.

There are almost too many mind-boggling spots to list here, so I’m just going to talk about one: Edge spearing Jeff Hardy from 15 feet in the air. Jeff is dangling from the hook holding the belts, and Edge jumps from a ladder and drives him to the mat. If you think the ring is an easy thing to land on, you’re just wrong. It’s a glorified piece of plywood, and I just can’t imagine how painful it was for both Edge and Jeff to land like that. But they did it, purely for the sake of making themselves into stars and creating a moment that goofballs like me will still talk about 15 years later.

As embarrassed as I can sometimes be to admit to people that I like pro wrestling, this is one of those matches that I’d feel confident showing to anyone I know with the knowledge that as much as they wanted to make fun of it, there would be at least a couple moments where their eyes would bug out of their head, and just for a second, they might admit that pro wrestling doesn’t suck.

Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat vs. “Macho Man” Randy Savage (Wrestlemania 3)

During the biggest Wrestlemania in history in terms of attendance (93,000, though that number is likely inflated), at a show where the bulk of the crowd was there to see Hulk Hogan bodyslam Andre the Giant, Ricky Steamboat and Randy Savage went out and put on a goddamn wrestling clinic that stood out like a sore thumb in 1987, and still looks amazing today.

Many nerds like me cite this as the best Wrestlemania match of all time. I can’t give it that distinction because it doesn’t make me go insane like some of the matches I discussed earlier, but I love watching it because it feels like the first time The Ramones stepped on stage at CBGB’s, or the first time Little Richard screamed into a microphone. Considering all of its surroundings and context, this thing is so different and new. No one thought mainstream pro wrestling could be this nuanced and scientific and thoughtful.

Again, that is partially due to Randy Savage being an obsessive freak who planned out his matches and knew exactly how they would go, rather than going the old school route and improvising most of it in the ring. But I don’t care one bit about the supposed integrity of doing that. After all of these words I’ve written about pro wrestling, I ultimately admit that what I’m watching is a show. There is a script, there are predetermined outcomes, and it’s all played up for maximum drama. Why would I be offended if someone put some extra behind-the-scenes effort into making it as good as it could be?

I watch this stuff because I’m always chasing the thrill. In this match, and in all the others I’ve discussed, the thrill is still there.