10 Best 21st Century WWE Moments In Madison Square Garden

6. The Rock Returns To The Ring - Survivor Series 2011

The Rock John Cena cardboard cutout
WWE.com

After a nine year absence, Survivor Series returned to Madison Square Garden on November 20th 2011. But that wasn't the only staple of WWE making a comeback. Almost exactly fifteen years to day after his WWE debut (and in the same building), Dwayne "Rocky Maivia" "The Rock" Johnson had his first WWE match since 2004.

For the first time since WrestleMania XX, The Rock competed in a WWE ring, teaming up with John Cena to do battle with... The Miz and R-Truth. We'd like to say that they were bigger deals back in 2011, but they really weren't.

The match wasn't much to write home about (shockingly) and Rocky and Johnny won the match (even more shockingly), but this was far from the end of The Rock's run in WWE. His comeback tour would include two WrestleMania main events and a WWE title run, the latter unfortunately coming at the expense of CM Punk's record-setting reign with the gold.

A star like The Rock deserved a venue as big as MSG for his grand wrestling return and the fact that it was the same venue he got his start in made this moment all the sweeter.

Contributor
Contributor

Jacob Simmons has a great many passions, including rock music, giving acclaimed films three-and-a-half stars, watching random clips from The Simpsons on YouTube at 3am, and writing about himself in the third person.