100 Greatest WWE Matches Of All Time (Ranked)
92. Bret Hart vs. 1-2-3 Kid (Raw, 11 July 1994)
Three dates must stick out to Sean Waltman when he looks at his first full year on the WWF's roster. 17 May 1993 saw him shockingly beat Razor Ramon on Raw. Then, The 1-2-3 Kid made his pay-per-view debut on 30 August '93 at SummerSlam. He was a regular workhorse on the house show loops throughout the rest of the year, but Kid did pop up on TV enough to score an unlikely (and short) tag title run alongside Marty Jannetty in early-1994.
11 July 1994 is a show Waltman will never forget too. There, his WWF Title crack vs. Bret Hart aired on the 'A' show. It'd been taped on 1 July, but The Kid and Bret must've been aware they'd torn the house down together. This, at the time, was arguably the best WWF Title match that had ever aired on free television. The bout was a credit to the still relatively new federation flagship Monday Night Raw.
Kid should've been very proud of his efforts against one of the top workers in the biz.
Hart was always the kind of main eventer who prioritised having a great match over making himself look good. Therefore, he was the perfect champion to shine 1-2-3 Kid up some more, and prove why this scrawny underdog was so popular behind the scenes. Kid could get a good match out of everybody even then, but working with the tippy top stars was a luxury spot to be in for someone so fresh-faced.
So many matches on early editions of Raw proved functional. This was a rare exception. The outright best from Raw's first few years? Not quite, but close.