The Magnificent Seven: The Top 7 Summerslam Moments

Now approaching its thirtieth edition, there’s a pretty fair argument to be made that SummerSlam is WWE’s second biggest annual show, falling behind only WrestleMania (some would argue that distinction goes to The Royal Rumble, and that’s fair enough, too—it’s an argument for another time/column). Not unlike WrestleMania, SummerSlam has played host to its share of iconic and exciting moments to help a certain level of mystique and legend around the event. This week, I’m looking back at seven of the very best. Full disclosure, this list is pretty arbitrary, and might be better looked at as my favorite moments, rather than the objective greatest. I did try to take into account, however, memorability of the moment, historical impact, and sheer excitement and satisfaction of that moment in time, in a vacuum.

#7. Brock Lesnar Squashes John Cena, 2014

When Brock Lesnar returned to WWE in 2012, he had a lot of mystique around him. After all, this was a beast of an athlete who’d already been a WWE main eventer, before he left to prove himself as one of the greatest heavyweight mixed martial artists in the world. With that extra injection of real-life credibility, surely he’d go on a tear and destroy anyone WWE put in front of him, at least for a while. Right?

John Cena beat him in his first match back.

I’m actually relatively OK with the way Cena-Lesnar at Extreme Rules 2012 went down. Lesnar was mostly dominant, it was a rare-for-its-time bloody encounter, and the match felt legitimately different from anything else WWE had put together, save for Cena stealing the win in the closing moments.
Still, that first loss, followed by trading wins with Triple H, then just squeezing out a win over CM Punk caused Lesnar to lose some of his sizzle. He started regain momentum by ending The Undertaker’s streak at WrestleMania 30, but really kicked things into the next gear for his monster push when he main evented SummerSlam against John Cena.

Lesnar-Cena was one-sided and decisive. It was the face of the company enduring an absolutely crushing loss the likes of which WWE had never done in a PPV main event before. No, this wasn’t a feel good moment, but it was shocking, unforgettable, and historically important for launching an era when main event squashes weren’t outside reason, not to mention launching Lesnar part-time main event run that lasted the better part of a year.

#6. Daniel Bryan’s Return, 2010

Summer 2010, the Nexus angle was red hot. The new faction had had started their momentum with a surprise attack on John Cena in which they tore apart the ringside area, laying waste to anything and anyone they came across. Unfortunately, the group lost its best worker when Daniel Bryan improvised and choked Justin Roberts with his tie—a move WWE (or its sponsors) deemed too violent and that led to Bryan’s termination. Still, between some shrewd booking and an admirable effort from The Nexus’s young studs, they got over heading into a seven-on-seven main event match at SummerSlam.

Cena’s opposing team came into the match a man down. The Miz looked to arrogantly swoop in and fill the spot, only for Cena to cut him off. Instead, it would be Daniel Bryan who pulled off a positively electric surprise return to join the face team. WWE recast his termination as Nexus kicking him out of the group, thus giving him a chip on his shoulder going into the match. Bryan submitted Darren Young in under a minute to pick up the first elimination for his team and last, alongside Cena, as the final two for his team.

No, the match at hand wasn’t as good or productive as it probably should have been. Cena needlessly overcame a DDT on the floor and a two-on-one disadvantage to kill The Nexus’s momentum when he won the mach for his team. Just the same, on a night that looked designed to put the Nexus’s seven young stars on the map as top guys, Bryan returned out of nowhere. To the delight of the fans, he outshone any of his former allies, immediately asserting himself in a higher position than he probably would have had he kept his job all summer.

#5. The Ultimate Warrior Defeats The Honky Tonk Man, 1988

SummerSlam 1988 saw The Honky Tonk Man walk in with his record-long Intercontinental Championship reign. After would-be challenger Brutus Beefcake’s got kayfabe injured, Honky Tonk over confidently welcomed whatever challenger the locker room could muster.

The Ultimate Warrior was perfectly positioned for this spot—still a young, fresh talent, who was over for his energetic squashes of enhancement talent, and ready for a rock solid mid-card push en route to his eventual main event run. Charging to the ring and utterly squashing The Honky Tonk Man was the perfect moment to get Warrior over at the next level and pay off Honky Tonk’s long, annoying reign in a thrilling moment.

#4. Shawn Michaels Returns, 2002

Shawn Michaels was certainly among the greatest wrestlers of all time when he finished up at WrestleMania 14, but he also went down as one of those stars who had his career cut short by injuries and personal problems. The kind of guy for whom you always had to wonder what else he might have accomplished, and what dream matches might have looked like between him and the next generation of stars like Kurt Angle and Chris Jericho.

A little over four years had passed before Michaels made his return—a decent chunk of time, and one that felt longer for Michaels having missed the meat of the Attitude Era and come back after that period had mostly passed.

Questions abounded, though, about whether Michaels could still go in the ring at anything like the level he’d left off at. A half hour Unsanctioned Street Fight later, we had our answer—HBK was most certainly good to go. The match was an all-time classic that lands on many critics’ short lists for best SummerSlam encounters of all time. Combine a great match and the great feel-good story of a comeback, with the return of an all-time great for another seven-years-plus in the ring to shore up his legacy, and you have an easy top-tier SummerSlam moment.

#3. Daniel Bryan Beats John Cena, 2013

Maybe it was Daniel Bryan’s undeniable talent. Maybe it was the degree to which he was organically over with the fans. Maybe it was the way he’d made chicken salad out of his angle with Kane, resulting in the wildly entertaining Team Hell No and facilitating some of The Shield’s very best matches. For whatever the combination of reasons, in the summer of 2013, WWE decided to cash in on Daniel Bryan’s potential with a main event push.

In the main event of SummerSlam, Bryan challenged Cena for the WWE Championship. The match was great, highlighted by a sequence that saw Cena perched up on the turnbuckles only for Bryan to charge him, get pushed down, charge him again, get pushed down again, only to keep coming back up again in a brilliant representation of Bryan’s WWE journey and overcoming obstacle after obstacle, de-push after de-push, only to keep rising.

And then there was the finish. Bryan nailed his brand new running knee finisher to knock out Cena and collect the title in decisive fashion in a truly exceptional moment that looked to pass the torch to Bryan as the new top guy in WWE.

You can debate the efficacy of the follow up—Triple H turning on Bryan and Randy Orton cashing in his Money in the Bank opportunity. The end of SummerSlam gave Bryan someone to chase, and a storyline trajectory to carry him through WrestleMania. Just the same, the story did get stretched out a bit and, particularly when it was unclear if Bryan would get his shot, could be frustrating. Just the same, the moment itself really did seem to represent change in WWE, and an unforgettable moment.

#2. HBK Nails The Undertaker With a Steel Chair, 1997

The year was 1997, and the WWF was on the cusp of big things. Steve Austin had turned face, was in the early stages of his anti-hero act, and was showing flickers of feuding with Mr. McMahon; The Rock had recently turned heel to join The Nation of Domination. The winds of change were in motion and within a year’s time the Attitude Era would have firmly taken hold and put WWF ahead of WCW in the Monday Night War once and for all.

There’s no definitive moment when Attitude took hold, though some of the more common points people will argue for were Austin and Bret Hart’s double turn at WrestleMania 13, and The Montreal Screwjob at Survivor Series 1997. SummerSlam fittingly fell in a mid-point between those major markers, and was also hugely influential.

To set the stage, Bret Hart was feuding with Shawn Michaels—Hart as a full-blown heel and Michaels was edging in that direction. The Undertaker was the WWF Champion and playing a face, but already edging toward the darker character he’d portray the following year. Michaels was named the guest referee for Hart’s main event match challenging The Dead Man for the title, with stipulations that if Hart lost he was done wrestling on American soil, and if Michaels didn’t call the match down the middle, neither would he.

The match itself was very good, with Hart still in his prime and The Undertaker steadily improving during this era from a guy with a cool gimmick, to a main event level worker in his own right. The finish was particularly masterful, though, as The Hitman and HBK’s tempers boiled over into an argument that saw Hart spit on Michaels, and Michaels respond by swinging a steel chair at him. Hart ducked, The Undertaker took the hit, Hart made the pin, and, to save his career, Michaels had no choice but to count the pin fall.

This moment put the title in Hart’s hands as the red hot top heel. It furthered the Michaels-Hart feud. Additionally, it launched a sub-feud between The Undertaker and Michaels which both compelled Michaels to assemble the beginnings of Degeneration X for his protection, and gave cause for the very first Hell in a Cell Match.

Add it all up, and this moment was electric, creative, perfectly executed, and hugely important from a historical perspective.

#1. Davey Boy Smith Pins Bret Hart, 1992

Long-time readers of this column may not be so surprised by this pick, because it’s the finish from my favorite SummerSlam match of all time, and quite possibly my favorite WWE main event of all time. Davey Boy Smith vs. Bret Hart was the final match for SummerSlam 1992, a stadium show from London. While the two men involved were ostensibly mid-carders at the time, it was masterfully booked match given Smith was over huge in his home country and, for as popular as Hart was and would become in the States, he, too, tended to get an even bigger reaction in Europe.

So, this match was cast as a battle between folk heroes and, better yet, was a battle that delivered. It was a tremendous pure wrestling match with no outside interference or wacky stipulations. Even more impressive, if you believe Bret Hart’s account from his autobiography, Smith came into the match under-prepared and out of shape, and it’s remarkable the degree to which Hart carried him to a five-star classic. It all ended with Smith countering a sunset flip by kneeling, and holding The Hitman’s legs hooked in an inescapable pinning predicament.

The match was great, furthered both Hart and Smith’s credibility as future main eventers, and furthered WWE’s movement toward great wrestling matches at the top of the card, rather than focusing on over-the-top characters.

Which moments would you add to the list? Some of my top honorable mentions included The Ultimate Warrior squashing The Honky Tonk Man, Bret Hart beating Mr. Perfect for the Intercontinental Championship, and Brock Lesnar giving The Undertaker the finger from the grips of Hell’s Gate. Let us know what you think in the comments.

Read more from Mike Chin at his website and follow him on Twitter @miketchin.