April 7th, 1986
Venues/Locations:
- Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum/Uniondale, New York
- Rosemont Horizon/Rosemont, Illinois
- Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena/Los Angeles, California
Attendance: 40,085 (combined)
After the success of WrestleMania 1 at Madison Square Garden, Vince McMahon wanted to go bigger for its sequel. He probably sat in his office and wondered, "how can I top last year?"
Somehow, that thought led to "Let's host WrestleMania 2 in three different cities!"
McMahon announced that Uniondale, Rosemont (near Chicago), and Los Angeles would be hosting WrestleMania 2. On top of that, the date selected for the event was April 7th, 1986. Why is that important?
If you were to go in your calendar and see what day April 7th landed on in 1986, you'd notice it was on a Monday. That's right, WrestleMania 2 took place on the day that everybody dreads after the weekend. It's the only WrestleMania in history to have taken place on a Monday and should be for the rest of eternity.
Now because of how complex WrestleMania 2 was, I figured I needed to break this down city by city. That being said, this review will be a long one. With 12 matches on the card all split up, it's only reasonable that there's a section for each venue and share what happened with my thoughts.
As disastrous as hosting an event in different places sounds, I have to give WWE credit for splitting everything up evenly and managing to give each venue an hour's worth of action. Let's get into it.
Hour 1 - Uniondale, NY
The first portion of the evening took place inside the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, roughly an hour's drive from Madison Square Garden.
Before anything began, legend Ray Charles performed "America the Beautiful." which started a tradition that carried over the years to open WrestleMania.
The celebrity presence was shown early, as actress Susan St. James joined McMahon as a guest commentator. To avoid any critique on her performance, let's just leave it at "she was a big fan of the good guys" and "uh-oh."
WrestleMania 2 began with an uneventful double countout between "Mr. Wonderful" Paul Orndorff and The Magnificent Muraco. Jake "The Snake" Roberts picked up a win in his bout and wrapped his opponent, George Wells, with a python.
"Macho Man" Randy Savage defended his Intercontinental Championship against George "The Animal" Steele. As Steele was distracted in admiring Miss Elizabeth, it was the "Macho Man" who took advantage and retained his title.
However, like what happened at the previous year's WrestleMania, the celebrity presence became the sole focus, at least in the main event in Uniondale.
Mr. T returned to the ring to take on "Rowdy" Roddy Piper to settle a difference that began just months before WrestleMania 1. The catch? It was in a 10-round boxing fight. Not wrestling. Boxing.
To enhance this matchup even further, comedian Joan Rivers was tasked to be the guest ring announcer, in which her time on the microphone became a complete disaster.
Rivers first tried to introduce the judges. Darryl Dawkins of the New Jersey Nets, singer Cab Calloway, and former FBI agent turned talk show host G. Gordon Liddy was asked to look over the fight. A sense of awkwardness overcame the segment as she was introducing the trio.
The judges weren't sure if they need to get in the ring or not. With Rivers looking confused about what she should say next, the timing caught up to her and only became worse from there.
Herb, a fictional character involved with Burger King commercials, was presented as guest timekeeper. While Rivers was introducing him, Piper began to come down to the ring, oblivious to the comedian. Once Rivers began introducing Piper, Mr. T suddenly started making his entrance, accompanied by boxing great Joe Frazier.
Eventually, the boxing match ended in a disqualification after Piper had enough of the fight in the 4th round and body-slammed Mr. T.
Unfortunately, with the fight feeling more like a schoolyard scuffle and not an actual boxing fight, Uniondale couldn't deliver a great product for the fans in attendance.
As Nassau's festivities ended, McMahon threw it over to Gorilla Monsoon, where he was ready to call the action in Rosemont.
Hour 2 - Rosemont, Illinois
The Rosemont Horizon was the venue for the 2nd hour as Monsoon was joined by "Mean" Gene Okerlund and celebrity guest commentator, actress Cathy Lee Crosby.
Once again, to avoid any critique, let's leave it at "I am very excited to be here!" for Crosby's performance.
Like Uniondale, this hour started uneventfully with the Fabulous Moolah squashing Velvet McIntyre to retain her Women's Championship.
However, here's where the fun finally began for WrestleMania 2. The second marquee match of the night took place with the 20-man battle royal.
The traditional over the top rope match consisted of not only WWF superstars but also six NFL players, both past and present. It was labeled as the "WWF vs. NFL" battle royal.
Players like Bill Fralic of the Atlanta Falcons, Russ Francis of the San Francisco 49ers, Ernie Holmes of the Pittsburgh Steelers, and Harvey Martin of the Dallas Cowboys were among the participants.
For the crowd, members of the Chicago Bears Super Bowl XX championship roster, William "The Refrigerator" Perry and Jimbo Covert, also participated and were greeted to a tremendous ovation.
In a feel-good moment for the crowd, after Perry was eliminated, he reached his hand out to Big John Studd and pulled him over the top rope for the elimination. Unfortunately, none of the NFL players won as Andre the Giant last eliminated Bret Hart and Jim Neidhart to win the match.
The final match in Rosemont had the Tag Team Championship on the line as The British Bulldogs (Davey Boy Smith and Dynamite Kid) defeated The Dream Team (Greg Valentine and Brutus Beefcake) to claim the gold.
Oh yeah, Ozzy Osbourne was in the corner of the Bulldogs.
As the festivities concluded in Rosemont, Gorilla Monsoon signed off and threw it over to Los Angeles, where Jesse "The Body" Ventura was waiting for the final hour of WrestleMania 2.
Hour 3 - Los Angeles, California
The Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena was the final venue for WrestleMania 2. Ventura took on the lead commentator role as he was joined by Lord Alfred Hayes and guest commentator, TV personality Elvira.
Elvira, in my opinion, was the better guest commentator of the trio involved.
Like in Uniondale and Rosemont, Los Angeles as well had a slow start. In fact, the first three matches really shouldn't be brought to attention due to their lack of quality and, frankly, quite dull.
Instead, it was the anticipated main event as Hulk Hogan took on King Kong Bundy inside a steel cage for the WWF Championship.
Los Angeles Dodgers' manager Tommy Lasorda was responsible for being the ring announcer for the match, while actor Ricky Schroder was introduced as the guest timekeeper. However, like his counterparts in Uniondale, Schroder looked confused about whether he should enter the ring and awkwardly stood beside Lasorda as he finished announcing.
The storyline for Hogan and Bundy was simple. A big villain attacks everybody's favorite hero, who ends up with damaged ribs and wonders if he can go on and avenge his attack.
Plot twist: Hogan did just that. The Hulkster stormed to the ring and climbed the cage to enter the ring.
In a reasonably decent bout, one that told the story of a said hero rising back to the top, Hogan eventually slowed down Bundy, climbed over the cage once again, and successfully escaped to retain his WWF world title.
Soon after, Ventura threw it back to Uniondale one more time to McMahon as he and Susan St. James closed WrestleMania 2.
Conclusion
After watching this event in its entirety, I'm reminded of how brutal WrestleMania 2 was.
From the wrestling side, nearly the entire card had many lackluster matches that were either too short or had trouble delivering in their performance. It felt as if most fights were simply thrown last minute without any fair chance to excel. For an event that wants to show the world how great wrestling is, it certainly wasn't the case.
Then, the location problems with WrestleMania 2. It clearly was a big mistake to host an event like this in three different cities. Suppose I was a fan attending the Uniondale portion, only to have my favorite wrestler Hulk Hogan be in L.A. In that case, I'm sure I would have been frustrated not seeing him in person and jealous of the fans in California.
While fans back in 1986 knew this ahead of time, I still can't imagine it being any more comfortable to sit through 2 hours of looking at a projector screen instead of one hour of wrestling.
Finally, I need to focus on the celebrities involved. As you'll see for WrestleMania 3, the celebrity involvement was reduced. For WrestleMania 2, it never clicked. Nearly all guests looked confused, lost, or struggled to find something to say. It worked for WrestleMania 1 to get everybody's attention but failed a year later.
As the WWF thought it could piggyback off the year's success, they had instead learned a hard lesson and needed to hit the reset button. McMahon knew WrestleMania required to be in one venue, but that didn't mean he couldn't continue to think big.
Results:
- The Magnificent Muraco and Paul Orndorff ended in a double countout
- Randy Savage (c) def. George Steele - Intercontinental Championship
- Jake Roberts def. George Wells
- Mr. T def. Roddy Piper via disqualification - Boxing match
- The Fabulous Moolah (c) def. Velvet McIntyre - Women's Championship
- Corporal Kirchner def. Nikolai Volkoff - Flag match
- Andre the Giant wins 20-man WWF vs. NFL Battle Royal
- The British Bulldogs (Davey Boy Smith & Dynamite Kid) def. The Dream Team (Brutus Beefcake & Greg Valentine) (c) - Tag Team Championship
- Ricky Steamboat def. Hercules Hernandez
- Adrian Adonis def. Uncle Elmer
- Hoss Funk & Terry Funk def. Junkyard Dog & Tito Santana
- Hulk Hogan (c) def. King Kong Bundy - Steel cage match for WWF Championship
Rating: D-
Thanks for reading. Look out tomorrow when I take a look at WrestleMania 3.
33 days away until WrestleMania 35.
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