Behind The Secret Classic WWE PPV Nobody Ever Talks About

3. The Greatest Single-Night Performance In WWE History

Bret Hart Bam Bam Bigelow King of the Ring 1993
WWE.com

Of course, for anyone remotely familiar with your writer, you'll be totally unsurprised to see an entire entry dedicated to Bret Hart.

To be fair, at King of the Ring 1993, the Hitman gave the greatest single-night performance in WWE history. If there were any concerns over how Hart would be used after he dropped the WWF Title to Mr. Fuji's Yokozuna at WrestleMania IX, such concerns were eased at Dayton's Nutter Center.

Across KOTR '93, the Excellence of Execution wrestled three vastly different matches against three vastly different opponents in Razor Ramon, Mr. Perfect, and Bam Bam Bigelow. To position Hart even more as scrappy underdog, kayfabe damaged fingers in his opening round encounter against Razor saw the Canadian lose his most trusted weapon: the Sharpshooter.

With his injured fingers preventing the Calgary native from being able to lock on his patented submission manoeuvre, that meant Bret had to find other ways to win, and boy did he ever do that. Against Ramon, Hart reversed a top rope back suplex into a crossbody pinning combination; against Perfect, the Hitman reversed a small package into an inside cradle for the pin; and against Bam Bam, the former Hart Foundation man put the Beast from the East away with a victory roll.

It wasn't just the inventiveness of his victories that made Bret Hart's King of the Ring performance stand out, for even more important was how Hart sold the battles he'd been through. Each match took a toll on Bret's body, and he beautifully expressed this damage through his body language, his facial expressions, and through his in-ring work.

Bret Hart, man. Truly the Best There Is, the Best There Was, and the Best There Ever Will Be.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.