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The Magnificent Seven: The Top 7 WWE Autumn Rivalries

November 13, 2017 | Posted by Mike Chin
Shawn Michaels and Chris Jericho face off wwe No Mercy Image Credit: WWE

Autumn tends to be down period for WWE. We’re about as far in between WrestleManias as possible. SummerSlam has blown off big rivalries for what WWE treats as the second biggest showcase of the year. The fall’s top traditional show is Survivor Series—a show with a great tradition to be sure, but also the PPV that trails a distant fourth in terms of viewership and fan excitement relative to ‘Mania, SummerSlam, and The Royal Rumble. Sometimes the fall is a time of transition as new stars rise, or at least get a shot at a higher spot on the card. Sometimes it feels like a bunch of filler as hot rivalries from the summer overstay their welcome, or we get clear placeholders at the top of the card before more meaningful matchups get set up for WrestleMania season.

WWE has assembled some strong storylines in the fall, however, and this week’s column is dedicated to them. The idea of a “autumn rivalry” is a bit tough to define as its rare for a rivalry to exist purely within the technical bounds of the season from mid-September to mid-December, but I was loosely aiming for storylines that started at or after SummerSlam, and were mostly wrapped by mid-December, or at had at lease included their peak moments within those confines. So, for example, while Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels could arguably be called a fall rivalry from 1992 or 1997, I didn’t count them because their issue had extended so clearly beyond the confines of the season across a period of years and multiple iterations with the two often revisiting their issue at the drop of a hat and arguably never resolving it until 2010.


#7. Randy Orton vs. Mark Henry, 2011

Mark Henry was widely considered a cautionary tale in wrestling for having been signed to a decade long, big money contract, only to turn out to be a largely forgettable mid-card talent.

As Henry’s time with WWE looked to wind up, however, he began to find himself. He had flickers of brilliance as a big, bruising heel before putting it altogether in 2011 for his Hall of Pain gimmick that saw him physically dominate anyone who dared challenge him. It all culminated in Henry getting a shot at Randy Orton’s World Heavyweight Championship.

At Night of Champions 2011, Henry defeated Randy Orton decisively in yet another terrific monster heel moment. But surely, when the two clashed inside Hell in a Cell a month later, the golden boy Orton would get his win and his title back, right?

Henry would destroy Orton inside the Cell, too, clearly winning the feud and cementing one of the great, short monster heel runs in WWE history. While I was all for the title shifting to Daniel Bryan in December, the only down side was that Henry chasing Bryan marked the end of his that run as a true main event talent (besides the arguable coda of briefly chasing John Cena in spring 2013). As such, Henry was an autumn main eventer, who peaked in this feud through which Orton selflessly put him over.


#6. Sasha Banks vs. Charlotte Flair, 2015

I know that there are those parties who didn’t care for Sasha Banks vs. Charlotte Flair, citing that WWE traded championship wins too much and that the rivalry stretched too long without enough storyline development, and too much weight on how much “history” the pair was making in their first-time-on-the-main-roster-for-women match types.

The thing that I keep coming back to, however, is that Banks and Flair put on a number of very good to great matches throughout this spell. Whether it was Banks beating Flair on Raw, or the solid Hell in a Cell main event, or Banks’ Falls Count Anywhere win on Raw, or the Iron Man Match at Roadblock (admittedly, stretching the limits of autumn) these two put on terrific matches together, and it is worth celebrating that no women before them got the opportunity nor capitalized on it as well as these two.

(Side note for those who will nitpick in the comments, yes, this rivalry did technically reach before the autumn and after, but I’d argue that was generally in three- or four-way clusters of rivalries, and so I’m still counting, albeit a bit arbitrarily, for this countdown.)


#5. Bret Hart vs. Bob Backlund, 1994

In 1994, Bob Backlund rose from the status of forgettable mid-card veteran on a come back kick, to crazy heel. It all started with a loss to reigning WWF Champion Bret Hart, after which Backlund snapped and assaulted him with a crossface chickenwing. Through some shrewd storytelling, Backlund struggled with his own actions before embracing them, to culminate in him challenging Hart for the title at Survivor Series. In an unexpected turn, Backlund actually won the title through wonky throw-in-the-towel submission rules, and became the vehicle to transition the title to Diesel.

Hart and Backlund would revisit and blow off their issue once and for all at WrestleMania, but the best stuff in this feud all happened in the fall, and the brief title reign for Backlund was rumored to be about equal parts so he could be the transitional champ and token of recognition for how good he was in his unlikely new gimmick. The WrestleMania blow off match would pale in comparison to the intense, technical match between the two at Survivor Series.


#4. DX vs. Legacy, 2009

In the summer of 2009, Cody Rhodes and Ted Dibiase had the audacity to challenge Shawn Michaels and Triple H, culminating in one last DX reunion, and a very good tag match at SummerSlam. The story might have ended there, but these two teams kept going. The final two thirds of their trilogy happened in the autumn, and those final two thirds were fantastic.

First, there was the Submission Match at Breaking Point. This was a nicely brutal little war, and best of all it culminated in a ring post-assisted figure four leglock/Million Dollar Dream combo that made Michaels tap out. This was the win that temporarily put Rhodes and Dibiase on DX’s level, and it set the stage for a rubber match at Hell in a Cell.

The tag match got the main event spot, starting something a tradition of non-traditional and underdog matches getting top billing at that annual show. The match was intriguing for the offbeat tag team dynamic within the Cell, and all the better for the creative choice for Triple H to be locked outside the Cell for the early stages of the match while Legacy tore apart Michaels. Ultimately, DX would turn the tables, locking out Dibiase and finishing off Rhodes with a super kick-sledgehammer combination shot—a fittingly epic finish to an epic match and rivalry.

Ultimately, we’d probably all remember this rivalry more fondly had it accomplished what appeared to be its mission—to elevate Rhodes and Dibiase. Unfortunately, like their whole Legacy run alongside Randy Orton, that intention was never realized and the twosome would never truly exceed the mid-card.


#3. Randy Savage vs. Jake Roberts, 1992

At SummerSlam 1991, Randy Savage kayfabe married Miss Elizabeth in a tear jerking moment and off beat main event segment. In the aftermath of the show, the WWF revealed the reception after the ceremony had not been as peaceful or joyous. Instead, they had their party crashed by Jake Roberts in his new heel persona.

In a dark turn for WWF programming at the time, Roberts emerged as legitimately sinister and terrorized Savage and Elizabeth with his king cobra. The issue would continue with Roberts having the snake bite Savage while he was tied up in the ropes. The story brought out the very best of both performers. Savage tended to be at his best when heated, and particularly when heated about defending Elizabeth. Roberts reached new heights in this profoundly evil character.

Despite having two top shelf workers on hand, Savage and Roberts unfortunately never blew off their rivalry properly, brawling multiple times and having a singles match at the This Tuesday in Texas PPV. The rivalry would technically continue but lose focus going into the winter before an anticlimactic finish in February, after which point Roberts shifted to feuding with The Undertaker so Savage could transition to the world title picture.


#2. The Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels, 1997

At SummerSlam 1997, Shawn Michaels played the guest referee for a WWF Championship match between The Undertaker and Bret Hart. Michaels was ostensibly torn between screwing over his arch-rival Hart and the promise that he’d never be allowed to wrestle in the US again if he didn’t call things down the middle. It was a pretty masterful little story with Michaels and Hart both ostensibly playing heel, while The Undertaker wasn’t exactly behaving like a face either. It all culminated in Hart spitting on Michaels, Michaels swinging at him with a steel chair and accidentally nailing The Undertaker, and then Michaels being forced to count the pin.

In the aftermath, The Undertaker stalked Michaels in an entertaining weeks long game of cat and mouse that led to the reintroduction of Rick Rude, now cast as HBK’s bodyguard, and then the first assemblage of DX, basically to protect him from The Dead Man. That gave way to the first Hell in a Cell Match, a genuine classic between The Undertaker and Michaels.

While the match didn’t have a conclusive finish, it was fulfilling at the time for Kane’s on screen debut to confront and destroy his brother, allowing Michaels to escape with the win, and the two to go on to other storylines.


#1. Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Jericho, 2008

The 2008 rivalry between Shawn Michaels and Chris Jericho technically started in the spring with Jericho harassing Michaels about faking a knee injury in his feud with Batista. Things escalated to include a war of words, Jericho throwing Michaels through flat screen TV, Jericho getting the better of a brawl at the Great American Bash, and Y2J accidentally punching Michaels’s wife at SummerSlam.

So, in the fall, we were off and running with brawls, intense promos, and violent wars in the ring. I’ll openly acknowledge that it’s really hard to call this an autumn rivalry for how good it had already gotten over the summer, but the intensity went up another notch when Michaels got the better of an unsanctioned match at Unforgiven. From there, the great feud would reach its truly great blow off—a ladder match with Jericho’s newly won World Heavyweight Championship on the line. Some have called it the greatest one-on-one ladder match of all time, and while I think that’s a bit of a stretch, it was an outstanding final match to wrap up a great storyline and send the performers their separate ways.

Which rivalries would you add to the list? Let us know what you think in the comments.

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

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The Magnificent Seven, WWE, Mike Chin