April 2nd, 1993
Location: Hartford, Connecticut
Venue: Hartford Civic Center
Attendance: 16,305
Out of these 34 reviews, this was the post I was dreading to write. I imagine for a company like the WWF, it may be challenging to run a show as big as WrestleMania every year.
Except what followed on the night of April 2nd couldn't have been justified. Simply put, the WWF had reached their lowest point in history. real-life
Our journey takes us to Hartford, Connecticut, about an hour's drive away from their headquarters in Stamford. With the company growing through a low budget phase, the Civic Center was the location and barely filled the seats.
With a simple stage design and a walkway, the WWF was ready to begin the night. From the moment it started, you knew that this show was set to be a disaster.
Like at WrestleMania 10, the opening video package revisited every show to date and presented "some of the best memories."
The only issue, it was just a montage of the celebrities that appeared at each WrestleMania. The montage had nothing to do with the actual wrestling of the event. The montage concluded with the introductions of Jenny McCarthy, Jonathan Taylor Thomas, Nicholas Turturro, Salt 'n' Peppa, Pamela Anderson, and Lawrence Taylor, who were involved with this WrestleMania.
Once again, the celebrities were the full focus of the show. I haven't brought up celebrities since WrestleMania 5, only because they played such a smaller role in those past events. If the focus was (again) the special guests over their athletes who train all year round, you knew the company wasn't trusting their product.
The show went from the celebrity montage to the crowd in attendance and what seemed like a normal thing to open the show quickly went awry.
McMahon stood in the middle of the ring with a microphone, waving his arm in the air, trying to address the crowd. It turns out issues immediately were present when out of nowhere, Special Olympian Kathy Huey began to sing "American the Beautiful." It wasn't a bad performance, per se. One may say, vibrant?
The festivities were ready to get underway as McMahon welcomed the television audience to WrestleMania 11. The irony of him saying "sold-out crowd" with roughly 40-50 seats in the stands behind him empty was just another example of the lack of interest for WrestleMania 11.
In saying that, I'm going to get right into the three things that stood out. Nothing else is worth mentioning on the card. And no, the Bret Hart "I quit" match against Bob Backlund isn't one of them, believe it or not.
The streak is mentioned
Following the 1994 Royal Rumble, The Undertaker took some time off to deal with a back injury he sustained a month before his departure. Thanks to this, 'Taker was forced to miss WrestleMania 10.
Months later, Ted DiBiase began to tell everybody he knew where Undertaker was and brought in a fake look-a-like (fun fact, it was Undertaker's real-life cousin).
Paul Bearer took exception to this and promised everybody that at SummerSlam, the real Undertaker would return. Soon enough, an Undertaker vs. Undertaker match took place as the real one made his return and took care of the fake.
By the time we reached the 1995 Royal Rumble, The Undertaker was still feuding with DiBiase. Irwin R. Schyster, at the end of his match with The Undertaker, stole Bearer's urn (aka, 'Taker's "power source"). Eventually, that led to DiBiase tasking King Kong Bundy to take down The Undertaker at WrestleMania 11.
Like some of his past matches, this doesn't deserve too much detail other than American League umpire Larry Young was the special guest referee.
The only important thing to note was that as The Undertaker walked to the ring, McMahon brought up the fact that he had never lost at WrestleMania.
It may have only been three wins until that point, but bringing up a little streak was the first hint to fans of its importance. Bundy was the next victim in line, and the streak grew to 4-0.
A wasted Royal Rumble win
Going back to the 1995 Royal Rumble, history was made again when Shawn Michaels pulled off the impossible. Having entered the Royal Rumble match at number one, Michaels outlasted the other 29 men that followed him and won it all.
Michaels booked his ticket to WrestleMania 11 and was scheduled to face WWF Champion "Big Daddy Cool" Diesel.
As mentioned before, the celebrity presence played such a massive role, more than it needed to, quite frankly.
Throughout the night, Pamela Anderson was nowhere to be seen and was supposed to escort Michaels to the WWF Championship match. Instead, Jenny McCarthy was asked to accompany the "Heart Break Kid."
As Diesel was making his entrance in a sudden turn of events, he brought out Anderson to escort him and got Michaels to go crazy. (Do you see how I'm dreading to write all this?)
Shawn nearly came close to winning the match, connecting with his "Sweet Chin Music" superkick, but with no referee to count the pinfall, Michaels missed his opportunity.
The conclusion of the match, in hindsight, could have severely hurt Michaels. To finish off his opponents, Diesel would pick them up and perform his "Jackknife Powerbomb." But upon lifting Michaels, it looked as if he released him too early, causing him to land awkwardly onto the mat.
That led to the pinfall, and Diesel left the Civic Center still WWF Champion. Nothing more, nothing less to say about this match. Oddly enough, and like WrestleMania 8, this wasn't the closing match of the night.
LT scores a touchdown
Once again, the Royal Rumble event played a large role in the main event of WrestleMania 11. At this rate, you may as well have WrestleMania pushed ahead to January.
Bam Bam Bigelow was in a tag team tournament match with Tatanka for the vacant Tag Team Championship. In the final, the team lost to the 1-2-3 Kid and Bob Holly. After the match, fans began to heckle Bigelow and, in response, pushed a fan to the ground.
That "fan" ended up being New York Giants' linebacker, Lawrence Taylor.
That "moment" set up their WrestleMania 11 matchup. Due to Taylor's involvement, many media outlets began to closely cover the event in the lead up to the big day, giving the WWF mainstream attention.
Thanks to that coverage, it was pinned to be the MAIN EVENT OF WRESTLEMANIA.
In preparation for Taylor's WWF debut, Diesel took Taylor under his wing and trained him for the big match.
As an add-on for the match, each competitor could have a posse of sorts to be at ringside.
Bigelow had his stable "Money Inc." with Ted DiBiase, King Kong Bundy, Tatanka, Irwin R. Schyster, Nikolai Volkoff, and Kama.
Taylor brought his football friends, including Ken Norton Jr, Chris Spielman, Rickey Jackson, Carl Banks, Reggie White, and Steve McMichael.
The two stood in the middle of the ring in a staredown as the main event was underway. In true WWF fashion, Taylor got the match started the only way a wrestler knows how: slap the living heck out of the other.
In what was a shock to me, Taylor was solid in the ring. The Giants' legend executed his punches well, performed a suplex, even got creative from the second rope with a diving clothesline.
It was that diving clothesline that sealed his win over Bigelow and got the crowd on their feet. Taylor was lifted in the air by his teammates as that was the closing image of WrestleMania 11.
Final thoughts
This is hands down the worst WrestleMania of all time. Having already seen most Manias before I started this marathon, I can assure you that there won't be a WrestleMania worse than 11.
The production team was at its worst. With examples like continuous audio cuts, the terrible camera takes, placing graphics over wrestlers when they shouldn't have (Michaels' nameplate blocked him when he was in the ring), nothing went well.
Vince McMahon, on the other hand, I think, was at his worst on commentary. He usually promotes the content with great excitement throughout the show. This time, it felt as if he was just over-promoting and exaggerating to try and really sell WrestleMania 11.
It's as if he knew this was going to be an absolute mess. Was he doing his job? Absolutely. Could the commentary have been a bit more subtle? Probably.
Critics have said that WrestleMania 11 saved the WWF from complete disaster (either bankruptcy or folding the company). I find it very hard to believe, personally, unless it was only because of Lawrence Taylor's appearance.
Once again, Taylor wasn't bad at all. I would have presumed that in 1995, everybody wanted to see how Taylor did in the ring.
Everything else, as I've said already, was a disaster. How the WWF recovered from such a bad show, I'll never know.
WrestleMania 11 set the bar very low for next year's event in Anaheim. The only thing they would need is a man with a boyhood dream.
Results:
- The Allied Powers (Lex Luger and The British Bulldog) def. The Blu Brothers (Jacob and Eli Blu)
- Razor Ramon def. Jeff Jarrett (c) via disqualification - WWF Intercontinental Championship (Jeff Jarrett retained)
- The Undertaker def. King Kong Bundy
- Owen Hart and Yokozuna def. The Smoking Gunns (Billy Gunn and Bart Gunn) (c) - WWF Tag Team Championship
- Bret Hart def. Bob Backlund - "I Quit" match
- Diesel (c) def. Shawn Michaels - WWF World Heavyweight Championship
- Lawrence Taylor def. Bam Bam Bigelow
Rating: F
Thanks for reading. Look out tomorrow when I take a look at WrestleMania 12.
24 days away until WrestleMania 35.
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