7 Secret Versions Of Classic WWE Matches
1. Shawn Michaels Vs. Bret Hart - Ladder Match
Not technically a secret, since the WWF released the match on home video, but Bret Hart is never credited in canon for importing the Stampede Wrestling experiment to the company - nor is he credited for starring in the first, experimental iteration.
Bret made sure not to walk under the ladder during his entrance, as if fate gave half a f*ck. Bret pummelled Michaels in the opening phase, and Michaels sold that old, concrete WWF ring with a pained conviction. They say, now, that the apron is the hardest part of the ring. Before the WWF made the sensible, belated decision to add more spring to it, every part of that ring was the hardest, and Michaels sold it as the ultimate battleground.
Gorilla Monsoon was a joy on commentary. "She has a tattoo - right on her breast!" he said of Sensational Sherri, in a quite endearing display of moral outrage, before going full Jerry Lawler and requesting a close-up, just to make sure.
The primitive match was a committed but gruelling exercise in delayed gratification, fought at a deliberate pace with a strategic bent. It at times lived down to those euphemisms. There were no birdbrained decisions employed, but the lack of urgent, escalatory drama flattened the pace. Sensational Sherri was the difference-maker; this wasn't a relentless, unyielding war that required a bold high spot to finally settle it, although Shawn did yeet himself right into the steel near the finish.
The crowd is almost too anxious to react to a punishing and unprecedented match, creating a weird and distracting dissonance between the suffering endured and the sympathy directed towards it.
It's better than the Iron Man match, but then...