10 Wrestling Matches That Shaped Vince McMahon’s Vision Of Sports Entertainment
1. Randy Savage Vs. Ricky Steamboat - WWF WrestleMania III
In the halcyon, pre-expansion era of pro wrestling, matches were called on the fly - contests were dictated by the reaction of the audience, whose role in the composition was as vital as the composer.
Randy Savage changed all that in a match which was the best - and most innovative - held under the WWF banner in the 1980s. To the quiet disgust of his opponent Ricky Steamboat, who conspicuously never counts this cast-iron classic among his favourite matches, Savage insisted on laying it out, move for move, in advance. Most critics believe that he was successful in his quest for perfection - the bout has barely aged - but it came at a cost even the prescient Macho Man could not conceive of.
Its influence was seismic; nowadays, in WWE, the art of improvisation Savage consciously dismissed has long since been lost.
The content of matches remains a collaborative endeavour, but the road agent has replaced the fan as a wrestler's collaborator - the jam now a rehearsal - meticulously laying out with the talent every move in advance so that they can be captured by the sophisticated multi-camera setup, and controlled by the whims of the totalitarian Vince McMahon.