8. Akebono vs. The Big Show - Sumo Match - WrestleMania 21
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWTCS4BKN_c This barely qualifies as a match, except that it took place in a wrestling ring at WrestleMania. With the ropes taken down and a sumo ring (dohyo) set up inside, Akebono and Big Show disrobed, did the pre-match rituals, salted the ring, and locked up for all of 63 seconds from the time they made first contact. The "psych-out" and salting took longer than it did for Akebono to toss Show out of the circle and out of the ring itself. For wrestling fans, this had to be thoroughly confusing. Unless you've seen a sumo match before, it looked like two big guys in diapers having a slapfight. To their credit, Michael Cole and Tazz treated it very seriously and tried to educate viewers about the various aspects of the match. But it was still an awful "match" for a wrestling PPV. Interestingly, Akebono has gone on to a lengthy pro wrestling career in Japan, so there's that.
Scott Carlson
Contributor
Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.
See more from
Scott