WWF WrestleMania

1) Tito Santana vs. The Executioner - 4
2) King Kong Bundy vs. S.D. Jones - 0
3) Ricky Steamboat vs. Matt Borne - 5
4) Brutus Beefcake vs. David Sammartino - 3
5) Greg “The Hammer” Valentine vs. The Junkyard Dog - 4
6) Barry Windham & Mike Rotundo vs. The Iron Sheik & Nikolai Volkoff - 5
7) $15,000 Bodyslam Match: Andre the Giant vs. Big John Studd – 3
8) Leilani Kai vs. Wendi Richter - 3
9) Rowdy Roddy Piper & Paul Orndorff vs. Hulk Hogan & Mr. T – 4

From the heart of the “Rock-N-Wrestling” era, comes the very first WrestleMania. Now, by no means did it have the grandeur and the spectacle of recent editions, but it was a damn fun show to watch and reminisce about. Tito Santana opened up against a mysterious man known as the Executioner. Not much to be said about this one as Santana goes over to re-establish himself in the intercontinental title picture. Bundy vs. Jones was a complete squash. The thing that gets me about this one is that the fall was announced as eight seconds but in reality, and you can tell by watching the timer on the DVD player, it was about 24 seconds. Steamboat vs. Borne was suprisingly solid and was probably the best overall bout on the card. Beefcake and Sammartino ran way to long for my tastes, as both men were fairly green and really had no idea what to do in the ring. Actually, because he never amounted to nothing more than a pile of crap, Sammartino disappeared for good shortly after this event.

The second half of the show began with the Intercontinental Title match. While it was a pretty even contest, the finish was screwed up so much that it involved Tito Santana and a count-out victory, need I say more? The duo of Windham and Rotundo really had to carry the load for the largely untalented duo of Volkoff and Iron Shiek. The bodyslam challenge didn’t involve anything more than the most basic of wrestling manuevers. I never was a big Andre fan in the first place because the guy only did a few elementary moves but I’ll give both guys credit, they did their best to make it at least watchable. The women’s title match was nothing but a God-awful blunder. They blew the finishing spot so poorly I couldn’t believe it. The main event was loaded with celebrities such as Muhammad Ali, Billy Martin, and Liberace. Now, I’m not a fan of guest ring announcers but of all the guest RA’s they’ve had, Billy Martin was by far the best one. Now then, as for the match itself. It started out fine but then just turned into a blunder. The finish came when Cowboy Bob Orton accidentally whacked Orndorff with the cast. All in all, the first WrestleMania was a pretty entertaining show and it was certainly fun to see the WWF way before it became the gigantic media conglomerate that it is today.