Today In Pro Wrestling History

As as pro wrestling fan I can remember seeing some of the biggest names of the industry growing up. I grew up watching in the 1990's seeing the big names like Sting, Triple H, The Rock, Steve Austin, Flair and many more each week.

Over the years as I've grown older I have come to appreciate what the pro wrestler of the past did before I started watching. I have always wanted to know as much about the industry as I can and I wanted to share some of what happened on June 23rd in the wrestling industry.

Austin 3:16 Is Born

In 1996 at the King of the Ring pay-per-view, Steve Austin defeated Jake Roberts in the finals of the annual 16-man tournament to become the King of the Ring.

After being crowned the King of the Ring, Austin would go on the cut a promo that would create the famous "Stone Cold" character that he would become best know for.

Final King of the Ring Pay-Per-View

The King of the Ring tournament was created by WWE (formerly know as WWF) in 1985. The King of the Ring took place as an annual pay-per-view event starting in 1993 and continued this tradition until 2002.

The King of the Ring was a 16-man single elimination tournament that consisted of qualifying matches on television with winners moving on to the King of the Ring card to decide the winner of the tournament.

Famous winners of the tournament include Steven Austin, Triple H, Kurt Angle and Brock Lesnar. All of these winners went on to become multi-time world champions.

WCW World Heavyweight Championship Unified

During the 1990's Ric Flair was working with companies like the National Wresting Alliance , World Championship Wrestling , and World Wrestling Federation (now WWE).

Flair was the NWA champion at during 1993 when WCW who at the time was a member of the NWA left to become it's own company. Flair was referred to as the WCW International Heavyweight Champion during this time.

In 1994 WCW had been looking for a way to write of the International Heavyweight Championship and this would happen at WCW's Clash of Champions XXVII which saw WCW World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair facing WCW International Heavyweight Champion Sting in a title unification match.

Flair would win the match and WCW would have one unified world title until its closure in 2001.

Monday Night War Win For WCW

The Monday Night Wars was a time in the wrestling industry that saw the two biggest companies WWF and WCW going head to head over many years to see which was the best company.

Though Vince McMahon's WWF would eventually win the battle of the companies, there was a period between 1997-1998 that
WCW's Nitro! as beating RAW is WAR in television rating. one particular night saw Nitro! pull in a rating of 3.30 while RAW pulled in a 2.40

Kane Loses His Mask

The character has been a big name ever since he debuted by attacking The Undertaker in 1997 at WWF Bad Blood. Kane was a 7-foot tall monster and anyone that was on the other side of the ring was in for a tough fight.

In 2003 then World Heavyweight Champion Triple H found himself in that spot staring down Kane. In a feud at the time, Triple H faced off against Kane in the main event of RAW episode 526 in Madison Square Garden.

The match saw Kane put his mask on the line against Triple H's title in a winner takes all match. At the end of the match Kane was defeated and was forced to unmask. No one had seen Kane without his mask before and in the following weeks Kane became more violent by attacking anyone that made any mention of him without his mask.