10 Obscure WWE WrestleMania Facts You'll SWEAR Aren't Real
6. What’s In A Name
Longtime WWE followers are keenly aware that Vince McMahon had an infamous list of “banned” terms that were not to be used on WWF/E programming, which is why we’d constantly hear about injured superstars being taken to a “local medical facility” after being hit with a championship, rather than wrestler being transported to a hospital after he was struck with a title belt.
That’s why it was so odd that the company’s signature event was dubbed WrestleMania when they forbade the use of the word “wrestling” and its derivatives.
Indeed, the first WrestleMania very nearly had a different – albeit dubious – name: The Colossal Tussle.
It sounds insane to say out loud today (though maybe not as crazy as Wrestlepalooza), and it’s even more difficult to imagine WWE promoting Colossal Tussle 42 this spring.
Thankfully, longtime ring announcer and Hall-of-Famer Howard Finkel coined and suggested WrestleMania as an alternative, and mercifully, the powers that be ran with that moniker.
The rest, as they say, is history.