8 WWE WrestleManias That Had A "Real" Main Event in the Midcard

Okay, we need to sit down and talk. It's time to accept the fact that there is no way Shinsuke Nakamura vs. AJ Styles is main-eventing WrestleMania. Yes, Shinsuke won the Rumble, and yes, it's clearly going to be match of the night, but when you consider how Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar are pushed as the top guys in WWE, it's clear they're destined for the main event slot. Heck, I'm gonna be a pessimist and say Ronda Rousey's tag match and Undertaker/Cena are gonna get higher billing.

Still, when you're a nerd who writes about way too much about wrestling on the internet (hi), Shinsuke vs. AJ is the main event, regardless of its spot on the card.

And that's not necessarily a bad thing. Despite the cache the last match at 'Mania has, that doesn't mean every match that goes on last is the best or even the most important. Throughout the years, WWE has spent way more effort in promoting a match that went in the midcard, or a match that ended up stealing the show so much, the main event was doomed to crowd apathy.

Just because you go on last, doesn't make you the main event, especially in these cases.

In 1990, WWE thought that to fill the 100,000 seat Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for WrestleMania VII, the main event would not be a much-anticipated rematch between Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior, but rather Hulk Hogan fighting an out-of-shape, past his prime Sgt. Slaughter.

Let's put aside that WWE were tastelessly capitalizing on the real conflicts in the Middle Eastern at the time and just focus on the fact that Vince McMahon was actually convinced that Sgt. Slaughter would help draw people into any stadium, let alone the LA Memorial Coliseum. They would have had a much better chance drawing that if Hogan was programmed with Warrior, or even Randy Savage again.

So what were Warrior and Savage doing during the show itself? Why, stealing Hogan's thunder, naturally. In the middle of the event, the two put on the classic retirement match, often cited as the best of Warrior's career. What followed was the emotional reunion of Savage and Miss Elizabeth, which was sports entertainment at its finest.

After that, the crowd couldn't care less about Hogan's plodding victory over Iraqi-sympathizer Slaughter in the final match.