Ask 411 Wrestling: What Was The Undertaker’s Last TV Match?

Welcome guys, gals, and gender non-binary pals, to Ask 411 . . . the last surviving weekly column on 411 Wrestling.

I am your party host, Ryan Byers, and I am here to answer some of your burning inquiries about professional wrestling. If you have one of those queries searing a hole in your brain, feel free to send it along to me at [email protected]. Don’t be shy about shooting those over – the more, the merrier.

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Brandon gets straight to the point:

What was The Undertaker’s last TV match?

I was a bit surprised that it was this long ago, but you have to go all the way back to April 23, 2013, when Taker defeated Dean Ambrose on the episode of Smackdown that ultimately aired on April 26. The match took place at the O2 Arena in London, England. The Dead Man’s next to last television match was actually the night before on Monday Night Raw, also from the O2, as he partnered with Team Hell No in a loss to the Shield.

Before that, you actually have to go back several more years to October 1, 2010 when Taker beat CM Punk, also on a Smackdown episode.

Tyler from Winnipeg gets straight to the point:

Any good Abyss matches?

I always think of AJ Styles as Abyss’s best overall opponent, as I enjoyed the bouts that they had from the mid-2000s during Impact Wrestling’s weekly pay per view period. He also had a match with Kurt Angle at the 2008 Turning Point pay per view that may have been the single best of his career.

Gee, a wrestler had some of his best matches against AJ Styles and Kurt Angle. Big shocker there, right?

Jonfw2 is my sherpa:

What’s your Mount Rushmore of wrestling moments that went mainstream?

Well, here we go, in no particular order:

Jerry Lawler slaps Andy Kaufman: On the July 18, 1982 episode of Late Night with David Letterman, comedian Andy Kaufman joined the show, wearing a neck brace to sell the after effects of a wrestling match he had that May against Jerry “The King” Lawler in Memphis. Lawler was also a guest on the show. Though Letterman initially seemed prepared to treat the wrestling rivalry between the two men as a joke, things appeared to get more serious when Latka incited the King to the point that he slapped the taste out of his rival’s mouth. Though years later we know this was all a work, at the time it blurred the lines between what was real and what was staged. For years, this moment has been included on lists of the most shocking television moments prepared by TV critics.

Rikidozan vs. The Destroyer: On May 24, 1963, the man who first popularized pro wrestling in Japan, Rikidozan, faced off against American masked man the Destroyer in a battle for the ages. It so captured the imagination of the Japanese television audience that it garnered a monster 64.0 rating, meaning that 64% of Japanese televisions were tuned into the bout. This was, at the time, the most watched television program in the history of the country, and even today it remains the fourth-largest Japanese TV audience in history. Bigger than multiple Olympics, bigger than multiple World Cup matches, and bigger than Beatles concerts. It doesn’t get much more mainstream than that.

The Death of Owen Hart: Obviously this is not a positive answer, but if we’re looking for things that happened on wrestling shows that garnered attention from outside the wrestling bubble . . . this is probably the single biggest example in the lifetimes of people reading this column. It was on every major news program and even got late night talk show host Craig Killborn in a bit of hot water thanks to his less-than-sensitive monologue joke about the incident.

Thunderlips Roughs Up Rocky: It seems odd that two of my moments are from the same year, 1982, but here we are. When he was cast in Rocky III, Hulk Hogan was already a main event star in Japan and there were eyes on him in the United States, but he was nowhere near what he would become. However, playing the pro wrestler Thunderlips in the film and sparring with Sylvester Stallone is what caused him to become a household name and what brought him back to the WWF from the AWA in order to become the crown jewel in Vince McMahon’s collection. Without this moment, which was seen by moviegoes throughout the United States and eventually the world, we may never have seen Hulk reach the heights he did.

Redmond is embarrassed to be here:

What are your favorite guilty pleasure matches? Y’know, maybe not technically the greatest matches, but for one reason or another they hold a special place in your heart. I’d have something like Doink (Evil Doink was amazing) vs Crush at WM 9 near the top of my list of such matches.

The one that immediately springs to mind is Tarzan Goto versus Dan Severn for Severn’s NWA World Heavyweight Title on IWA Japan’s Kawasaki Dream show from August 20, 1995, also known as the “King of the Deathmatch” tournament card that featured Terry Funk and Cactus Jack blowing each other up in the main event. I love this match because it’s so bizarre, with the legitimate MMA fighter and amateur wrestler Severn going up against Japanese garbage wrestler Goto on what was essentially an outlaw puroresu show, demonstrating just how far the NWA Championship had managed to fall in five or six years. It even includes a spot of Severn using a steel chair as a shield to block Goto’s efforts to stab him with a broken glass bottle. Jack Brisco versus Dory Funk this is not.

Really, a lot of the 1990s Japanese deathmatch stuff falls into the guilty pleasure category for me, just because they are matches that I would read about on the early internet before I had access to any video of them and would have to imagine what they could possibly be, whether it was desert deathmatch featuring scorpions and cacti or the piranha deathmatch featuring, well, live piranha. Within a few years I would have the opportunity to actually watch many of them and, believe it or not, none of them lived up to anything I had dreamed. However, I still like to rewatch them from time to time largely because I’m still amused by the fact that somebody came up with these in the first place.

Oh, and did I mention FMW’s anus explosion deathmatch? If not, I should have . . .

Big Al used to be known as 911 in another company:

You mentioned in a prior column that other promotions can do a battle royal but not call it the Royal Rumble because of trademarks. If that is the case how are AEW wrestlers able to constantly mention WWE wrestlers when the WWE owns those name?

It’s all context dependent. When somebody owns a trademark, other individuals or companies are not supposed to use the same trademark or a substantially similar trademark in a way that would create confusion in the marketplace and cause consumers to think that the owner of the trademark is somehow affiliated with the other company.

That’s why another promotion calling a battle royale the Royal Rumble would be a no go. They can’t create the illusion that they are somehow affiliated with WWE or offering a version of WWE’s product.

The same general rule applies to wrestler names, though this is also somewhat context dependent. If a WWE-owned name is the only thing a wrestler is known by and it’s just a fleeting reference to them, chances are good that this would not be seen as creating confusion in the marketplace. However, Adam Page goes on Dynamite week in and week out and constantly talks about Braun Strowman, then WWE could very easily send a cease and desist because it could arguably cause consumers to believe that there’s some affiliation between the companies when there is not.

Beenie feels like something is missing:

Was Summerslam the first ever WWE PPV to have no tag team matches? Not only that it was only one on one matches. No triple threat, fatal four way, battle royale, rumble etc. A portent of the future?

No, it was not the first ever WWE PPV to be devoid of tag team matches. In fact, even though the majority of PPVs over the course of history have included tag bouts, I would say that a show without them is common enough that I would not call it unusual, even if they are in the minority.

You know what other recent major show had no tag team matches on it?

Summerslam 2023.

Yeah, that’s right. The exact same thing happened a year ago. It also happened at Summerslam 2005, 2007, 2014, and 2019, though in ’07 and ’19 there were at least pre-show tag matches.

This isn’t a phenomenon unique to Summerslam, either. Perhaps the biggest show to not include a tag match on the card was Wrestlemania XXI, where the main card was all one-on-one bouts except for the first ever Money in the Bank ladder match.

The Royal Rumble is perhaps the event where tag matches are left off the show most often, which makes sense because the Rumble card usually has fewer matches than most other PPVs/PLEs, creating less opportunity for tag matches to break through. That has been the case in 1999, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2014, 2017, 2020, 2021, 2023, and just this year in 2024. However, some of those Rumbles had pre-show tag matches, namely ’99, ’08, ’10, ’14, and ’21.

Similar to the Royal Rumble, Money in the Bank often sees its signature gimmick match take away opportunities for tag bouts. This happened in 2011, 2013, 2018, and 2019, though in each of those years there was a tag match on the pre-show.

Singles tournaments also often get in the way of tag matches, which happened at 1985’s The Wrestling Classic (considered in some circles to be the first WWF PPV), King of the Ring 2002, and King and Queen of the Ring 2024.

Then there are the miscellaneous shows where there were no tag matches for seemingly no reason. These include In Your House 6, In Your House Beware of Dog*, In Your House Beware of Dog 2*, Vengeance 2005, New Year’s Revolution 2006, Great American Bash 2007, Cyber Sunday 2007, Elimination Chamber 2008, One Night Stand 2008, No Mercy 2008, No Way Out 2009, Judgment Day 2009, Hell in a Cell 2010, Capitol Punishment, Elimination Chamber 2012, Hell in a Cell 2020, Hell in a Cell 2021, and Crown Jewel 2023.

(*Readers may recall that Beware of Dog was a unique PPV because a power outage at the venue prevented most of the show from airing, only for it to be redone a few days later. Interestingly, the lack of tag matches had nothing to do with the power outage – it was planned that way from the beginning.)

Donny from Allentown is the recognized symbol of excellence in professional wrestling:

From start to finish over its entire existence, exactly how many Four Horsemen members were there?

As usual with these sorts of questions, the answer depends somewhat on how you want to define a member of the Four Horsemen.

If you’re talking about full-time, in-ring performers who were unquestionably part of the group, there were fifteen: 1) Ric Flair, 2) Arn Anderson, 3) Ole Anderson, 4) Tully Blanchard, 5) Lex Luger, 6) Barry Windham, 7) Sting, 8) Sid Vicious, 9) Paul Roma, 10) Brian Pillman, 11) Chris Benoit, 12) Steve McMichael, 13) Jeff Jarrett, 14) Curt Hennig, and 15) Dean Malenko.

The first question to ask is whether you want to include managers and valets. If that’s the case, you could add up to seven more names by my count: 1) JJ Dillon, 2) Baby Doll, 3) Dark Journey, 4) Woman, 5) Miss Elizabeth, 6) Debra McMichael, and 7) Asya.

The next question is whether you count the Yamazaki Corporation, the Horsemen offshoot faction that grew out of the events of 1988 in which Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard left Jim Crockett Promotions for the WWF. If that’s the case you can add: 1) Hiro Matsuda as a manager, 2) Kendall Windham, 3) Butch Reed, and 4) Michael P.S. Hayes.

Then, of course, you’ve got the offshoot groups, which would include Evolution in WWE (adding Triple H, Dave Batista, and Randy Orton), the Extreme Horsemen in MLW (Steve Corino, CW Anderson, Justin Credible, and Simon Diamond), and Fortune in Impact Wrestling (AJ Styles, Nigel McGuinness, James Storm, Bobby Roode, Doug Williams, and Matt Morgan).

Thus, depending on what you want to count as a member of the group, you could have as few as fifteen members or as many as 39.

Sim wants us to put ’em back the way they wuz:

I have a triple threat match of moves that used to be finishers but not anymore: Jake Roberts’ DDT, Shawn Michaels’ superkick, and JBL’s clothesline. Pick your winner. The winner gets its finisher status back, and all of its former glory. Which one do you root for and why? Feel free to cash in and make it a Fatal Four Way by adding one of your own.

The Clothesline from Hell was an easy one for me to eliminate from contention, because I don’t think it has been watered down all that much. Yes, wrestlers throw clotheslines all the time, but Bradshaw’s version wasn’t truly a clothesline despite the name. It was a lariat, and I don’t think of a lariat as a once great move that’s become a mid-match transition as much as I think of it as a move that’s become largely forgotten, at least in the United States. Plus, you do have one version of it out there (The Rainmaker) that is still a VERY well protected finish, so the move has that going for it.

That brings us down to the DDT and the superkick.

Of the two, I’m going with the DDT.

Why? It’s really more a personal preference than anything else. Both were iconic finishers and both would end a real fight in a heartbeat if they could be landed. As a result, I think they both deserve to be protected. However, I grew up with the DDT while the superkick came along later in my fandom, so I don’t have the same connection to it.

Also, feel free to refer to it as Jake Roberts’ DDT, but I’m going to state for the record that Arn Anderson’s DDT was AT LEAST as good as Jake’s.

Michael is getting his due:

Who do you think are the most unheralded employees in WWE history? I’m focused primarily on talent that worked behind the scenes. I have two choices: Jerry McDevitt and Howard Finkel. McDevitt obviously for handling lord knows how many lawsuits Vince McMahon and the WWF/E have had. And, yes, Fink is the greatest ring announcer ever, but he was also a producer and did a lot behind the scenes as well as is the person who coined the name “Wrestlemania.”

Linda McMahon.

Fans make fun of her because she was made an on-camera character in a few angles where she didn’t really have the chops to carry them, and fans also don’t give her a lot of credit for her behind the scenes contributions because they weren’t related to any of the sexier aspects of wrestling like creative or talent relations.

However, she oversaw the day-to-day business operations of the WWF for many years including during its national expansion, Attitude era boom, and transitioning from being a family business to a publicly traded company. Though Vince was the promoter, somebody needed to mind the dollars and cents of the operation, and that fell squarely on his wife.

We’ll return in seven-ish days, and, as always, you can contribute your questions by emailing [email protected]. You can also leave questions in the comments below, but please note that I do not monitor the comments as closely as I do the email account, so emailing is the better way to get things answered.