10 Things WWE Wants You To Forget About WrestleMania 28
10. The Tag Titles Were Defended On The Pre-Show
WrestleMania hasn't been kind to the WWE Tag Team Titles over the past decade. There was uproar prior to WrestleMania XXV when it was announced that the unification match between WWE Tag Team Champions Carlito and Primo and World Tag Team Champions John Morrison and The Miz was being bumped to the pre-show and, since then, things have gotten worse - the straps have only been defended on the main show twice, for a total of less than ten minutes of action. At WrestleMania 28, champs Primo and Epico defended against The Usos and Tyson Kidd and Justin Gabriel in a high-flying match designed to pump up the crowd before the actual show started. The bout was exciting, but even on the pre-show it was shafted for time - the champions retained in 5:11. Adding injury to insult, Gabriel hurt his elbow during the bout that would keep him out of action for approximately two months. The delineation between wrestling on the 'Mania pre-show and the actual pay-per-view may not be immediately discernible to fans, who see the superstars compete in front of tens of thousands of fans either way. For the wrestlers, though, the difference in pay structure ensures that making the main card is very important.
Scott Fried is a Slammy Award-winning* writer living and working in New York City. He has been following/writing about professional wrestling for many years and is a graduate of Lance Storm's Storm Wrestling Academy. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/scottfried.
*Best Crowd of the Year, 2013