13 Times The Undertaker Lost Clean
The Deadman has always been keen to do business...
Ever since his WWE debut back in 1990 The Undertaker has been pushed like no other Superstar has. Thus, whenever he has lost a match it has always been a big deal.
Instead of being shoved down fans' throats against their will like John Cena and Roman Reigns have been down the years, Vince McMahon has been subtle in the way he has booked the Deadman. He hasn't always been in the WWE Championship picture, but he's always been in a meaningful position close to the top of the card. It's one of the main reasons we haven't grown tired of the Phenom over the last 26 years.
Of course, the nature of the Undertaker gimmick demands this treatment. He's already dead, essentially, so no one should be able to beat him. When he goes down, it's usually because of a outside interference that has stacked the odds completely against him. For that reason a clean loss for Taker is as rare as rare can be.
Given his recent record you might well think that Taker losing isn't anything special, but that's merely because he's winding down his career and putting over the stars that will carry WWE forward in the future.
Before his most recent run in the ring however, an Undertaker loss was earth-shattering news...
Here are 13 times The Undertaker has lost clean in a WWE ring. Watch it in video form below and then read the article...
Honorable Mentions
There have been times in the past when The Undertaker has been pinned to the mat in the cleanest way possible, but some shenanigans took place that cast those victories' legitimacy into doubt.
The Phenom has lost two matches clean inside Hell in a Cell, both to Brock Lesnar. Well, they're only clean because those matches didn't have any rules whatsoever.
The first HIAC took place at No Mercy 2002 where the then Next Big Thing pinned Taker following one of the bloodiest encounters in WWE history. Brock somehow managed to reverse a Tombstone into an F-5 for the duke. Paul Heyman did get involved on the outside of the cage, but it was still as clean a win as we could see inside a cell.
The second happened last year at the HIAC pay per view.
Even though Brock ripped up the ring mat, no rules were broken. The Beast hit an F-5 onto the exposed wooden ring boards and pinned The Deadman to win their series of matches which started at WrestleMania 30.
Taker has also been on the wrong end of a couple of turns during tag team matches. The first happened in 1997 when the unlikely team of Ahmed Johnson and The Deadman took on Nation of Domination members Farooq & Kama on an episode of Raw, and lost. Kama pinned Taker on the mat after Johnson refused to tag in to his partner. Ahmed then hit the Pearl River Plunge on Taker after the bell before joining the Nation at the top of the ramp.
The second time occurred at No Way Out 2007, when Batista turned on Undertaker. The Animal walked away from the bout, which left Taker in a handicap situation. Batisa hit a Spinebuster on his partner before leaving the match. This allowed Michaels to hit a Sweet Chin Music and Cena an Attitude Adjustment for the win. Even though Batista turned on his partner, no rules were broken. Batista watched from the outside as Michaels and Cena picked up the win.
No rules were broken in any of the four matches mentioned above, which could see them go down in the history books as clean defeats for The Undertaker. However, because of the shenanigans that happened during each of these matches, their cleanliness is up in the air somewhat...