Tis the season of the SummerFest! God bless us, everyone, here’s hoping that Jeremy Piven visits you in the night and leaves something nice under your pillow and that’s the worst sentence anyone’s ever said.
We’re on the road to SummerSlam, which is widely regarded as WWE’s number two show of the year, and speaking of number two, oh boy have there been some turds in the pool at the biggest party of the summer.
We’ll do a Top 10 Best Matches in Summerslam history, don’t worry, but WWE released Bray Wyatt last week and so, you know, screw em.
Time to put the boots to the big dub and their stupid habit of doing stupid things in the stupid summertime. Everything’s bad, everyone’s terrible, everything you love will one day crumble to ash, nothing matters, let’s do this.
I’m Adam hailing from partsFUNknown and here are the 20 Worst Matches In SummerSlam History.
Spoiler: Team WWE vs. Team NEXUS isn’t on the list, because the match itself actually rules, it’s just a truly atrocious bit of booking. Disagree with that, let me know, and hey why not let us know YOUR most hated SummerSlam match.
20. Kofi Kingston vs. Randy Orton – 2019
Aw man. Everyone really wanted Kofi’s WWE Championship run to be good. Every month we’d think, maybe this is the one, this is the match, please, Kofi, please stop feuding with Dolph.
The feud going into this was solid, built on an infamous moment of wrestling quotes “getting real” and legit backstage heat.
Unfortunately, the match is real boring, glacially paced, thank Randy, and ends to chants of bulls**t when the two men get counted out because I guess Randy couldn’t stop… looking at Kofi’s kids… that’s weird, and exactly a year on from AJ Styles vs. Samoa Joe ended in a s**tty LEAVE MY FAMILY ALONE non-finish.
19. Shane McMahon vs. Eric Bischoff – 2003
Always a treat when Eric Bischoff wrestles in his stupid little karate outfit.
The man was a fantastic GM, a serviceable dad, but anytime he competed in the ring it was the dog worst, be it Starrcade 1997, Survivor Series 2005, or SummerSlam 2003.
We all know Shane can go, I mean not now, he’s a thumb now, but back then with the right wrestler, sure.
Eric Bischoff is not that, and what starts out boring gets downright unwatchable when Coach heels over and does solo commentary for it. The Austin comeuppance is at least fun, but it is a long road to get there.
18. Dean Ambrose vs. Dolph Ziggler – 2016
When the brand split happened in 2016, hopes were high for SmackDown.
They made a huge deal out of Dean Ambrose taking the WWE title to the blue brand, and marketed the show as the land of opportunity, confirmed when Dolph Ziggler, the patron saint of missed opportunities, won the right to face Ambrose at SummerSlam.
This should have ruled, but instead, the two wrestled a disconnected, storyless, intensely boring match.
Can anyone remember one moment from this match? This match for the WWE Championship at the second biggest show of the year? Because that’s DAMNING.
17. Edge vs. Matt Hardy – 2005
WWE has a habit of instead of striking while the iron is hot, letting the iron cool on the window sill, forgetting they put it there overnight, and then pissing on the iron.
Going into SummerSlam 2005, the Edge/Matt Hardy feud might have been the legit hottest thing in wrestling at the time.
It was a blood feud soaked in worked-shoot hatred, their match at SummerSlam was super hyped, but ended by having returning hero Matt Hardy lose in four minutes by technical knockout to ENORMOUS boos, shelving the proper match until Unforgiven a month later.
Don’t get excited about anything ever.
16. The Oddities vs. Kaitenti – 1998
SummerSlam 1998, the most bought SummerSlam of all time, but not one single ticket or pay-per-view order was made for this giant waste of time.
To be fair, your appreciation of this match is going to depend on how much you enjoy Kurgen dancing COS HE DOES IT A WHOLE F**KING BUNCH.
It’s a 10-minute match of three large men who can barely walk, embarrassing some legitimately great Japanese light heavyweights, with Golga pinning all four lads by himself.
A comedy squash that somehow went ten excruciating minutes, but hey at least we got to see Shaggy 2 Dope and Violent J. I don’t miss the nineties.
15. Randy Savage vs. Dusty Rhodes – 1990
Not so much on the list for what it was, although what it was was also shit, but for what it could have been.
Former WWF Champion and ultra charismatic superworker “Macho Man” Randy Savage vs. ultra charismatic, former NWA Champion Dusty Rhodes, icons of their respective territories, meeting at SummerSlam, in a match that went 2:15 and was interrupted by an angle whereby Ted DiBiase purchased Sapphire, Dusty’s sort of manager friend lady.
The match started, then after two minutes Savage hit Dusty with a purse and that’s your lot. Oh and Dusty wore polka dots, but then you already knew that.
14. The Kat vs. Terri Runnels – 2000
Wow, prior to the Women’s Revolution of 2015, women’s wrestling at SummerSlam was NOT a thing.
Seriously, Bull Nakano vs. Alundra Blayze was decent in 1994, then there wouldn’t be another good women’s match until Stephanie McMahon vs. Brie Bella TWENTY YEARS LATER. That is SAYING SOMETHING.
In fact, throughout the entire decade of the 2000s, there was only one women’s singles match at the biggest party of the summer, Terri Runnels vs. The Kat in a Stinkface match, A.K.A. the first lady to rub her butthole in the others face wins.
The match is a mess of slaps, stumbles and Jerry Lawler, before The Kat knocks out Terri with head and wins.
13. Hulk Hogan & The Ultimate Warrior vs Sgt. Slaughter, Colonel Mustafa & General Adnan – 1991
After the dreadful WrestleMania VII main event, WWE doubled down by having Warrior and Hogan team up against not one, not two, but THREE old ass men in the name of sports entertainment.
Adnan couldn’t go, The Iron Sheik in disguise couldn’t go, so Sgt Slaughter was the agile one for his team, and great googly moogly, Luke Owen’s hair grows faster than the pace of this awful, AWFUL match that went twelve but felt forty.
It was also refereed by Sid Justice, and the only way that added to the story was that Sid occasionally got in the way. Fun! But hey, it’s not the worst tag match in SummerSlam history, that would be…
12. Kane & The Undertaker vs. DDP & Kanyon – 2001
In 2001, the song of the summer was entitled F**k You, DDP.
One of the most enduring loveable babyfaces (as well as actual good dude humans) in WCW history was made into a stalker, destroyed by Taker at King of the Ring, pinned by Taker’s wife on Raw, and squashed into neutrons at SummerSlam in a how-to guide for how to kill someone’s brand.
It manages to be insulting AND boring, Taker and Kane making the destruction slow and painful.
It’s such a lifeless drubbing, that after the match Heyman on commentary starts to spin something positive out of it, saying ‘The Alliance… ah forget it’. Hell, you said it Paul.
11. Lex Luger vs. Yokozuna – 1993
Quite possibly the dumbest-produced match in WWE history. A match made infamous by backstage politics and laughable presentation.
Hogan won the big belt at WrestleMania IX, refused to drop it to Bret at SummerSlam, dropped it to Yokozuna instead and left the company.
Vince then tried to build Lex Luger as a off-brand, non-union, legally distinct Hulkster replacement, but got cold feet on crowning Luger at SummerSlam, instead booking Lex to win by countout, only to then celebrate with a full-on f**king in-ring parade, despite not winning the title.
The match was slow-ass garbage too. If Bret Hart couldn’t get a good match out of Yoko, Lex Luger sure as hell wouldn’t.
10. Kane vs. Bray Wyatt – 2013
Well, this stings a hell of a lot more now, doesn’t it? Bray Wyatt has been one of the best characters in WWE in the last ten years, but even that doesn’t change the fact that his debut match was a flame-grilled turkey.
Wyatt vs. Kane in an Inferno Match sounds like a dream on paper, but oh no, it was really boring.
The whole thing took place under weird pink lighting, Bray and Kane had a weird anti-chemistry, bumping into each other and fumbling a bunch of spots, and even the occasional pyro couldn’t elevate it.
A bad start for who would become possibly the most mishandled wrestler of all time.
9. Nailz vs. Virgil – 1992
Oh Nailz. He turned up in WWE looking for revenge against the Big Bossman who apparently abused him in prison, had a digitally modulated voice that made him sound like The Claw from Inspector Gadget, before getting fired for choking Vince McMahon over his payout to this match, which is one of SummerSlam’s all-time worst.
Nailz was a very bad wrestler, you see, he has precisely one move, which is choking someone.
He chokes Virgil, who’s cosplaying as toothpaste for some reason, then he chokes him again, then, just for some variety, he goes for a choke.
Even the rabid UK crowd at Wembley couldn’t get into this.
8. Jinder Mahal vs. Shinsuke Nakamura – 2017
WWE had the chance to take their WWE Championship, take it off an enhancement talent that had repeatedly proved incapable of having main-event quality matches, and strapping it to a superstar who’d been having main-event quality matches for a decade and who’d just pinned John Cena clean.
Instead, Singh interference, Jinder wins, handing Nakkers his first main roster loss.
The match is really, really boring. Jinder’s got five moves, punch, kick, rest hold, Singh interference, Khallas, and a different rest hold.
Even Nakamura seems to be sleepwalking through it, just… f**king sucked.
7. Steve Austin vs. Owen Hart – 1997
An uncomfortable watch.
The first half of the match was good, Owen Hart’s really great, Austin’s a superstar on the rise, and when the two met in a Kiss My Ass Match for the IC title at SummerSlam hopes were high, but then Owen dropped Austin with a botched sit out tombstone, compresses the rattlesnake’s neck and briefly paralyzes him.
The match then terrifyingly both stops and continues.
They don’t ring the bell, because then a man with a broken neck would have to kick Owen’s ass, instead, they stall, horribly, scarily, until Austin is just mobile enough to give Owen the worst roll-up in history. Oof, just…. oof.
6. The Undertaker vs. Giant Gonzalez – 1993
Cryptid Chris with the big bad fists has had some bobbins matches at SummerSlam. Some Mary Bobbins matches.
I’m sure a whole bunch of you expected me to put Taker vs. Taker from Summer 1994 on the list and yeah that’s pretty boring, but the hokey panto bollocks just about pulls it through.
This, on the other hand, Taker still being shackled to a feud with this weird-skinned Big Foot motherf**ker, man it sucks.
Punches, slow-walking and bad selling the musical, thank god at least the deadman decisively won so we could all put Double G behind us.
5. Big Cass vs. Big Show – 2017
How humiliating. The Big Cass vs. Enzo feud was one of the worst of 2017, with WWE splitting up yet another tag team, only for them to barely feud and neither man get over.
First Big Cass demolished Enzo at Great Balls of Fire, then Enzo called in a bigger friend to fight instead (classic babyface) and Cass wrestled Show at SummerSlam with Enzo suspended in a shark cage.
The match sucked, with the crowd deathly silent throughout, then the one spot of the match, Enzo taking ages to escape the cage and get to the ring, ended with him immediately kicked and knocked out.
Like the match itself, what was the f**king point? Big Show’s worst SummerSlam match since the one in 2010 when he beat the Straight Edge Society all by himself, which was also terrible.
4. Triple H vs. Eugene – 2004
In 2005, Kurt Angle wrestled Eugene stiff as a brick and it was an uncomfortable watch, but it was four minutes.
In 2004, Eugene wrestled Triple H and it went fourTEEN minutes. Jesus wept.
The match is a nightmare, with the Toronto crowd having NONE of Eugene’s bollocks, roaring Eugene sucks as the commentators have to try and pick apart why Triple H is being cheered for beating up a disabled person for, once more with feeling, fourteen f**king minutes.
A real gross watch, and speaking of…
3. Jake Roberts vs. Jerry Lawler – 1996
Jerry Lawler is a WWE legend, but I honestly can’t think of a good Jerry Lawler match in WWE history, especially at SummerSlam. Lawler vs. Tazz? Lawler Bret and Doink?
Or this slow-moving affair, where Lawler spends the entire match offering known substance addict Jake Roberts bottles of whiskey to not fight him.
Roberts has recent stated in interviews that he hated doing this storyline, branding Vince an a**hole for forcing it on him and yeah it’s f**king rough to watch, that and dull, right down to the finish which saw Lawler hit Roberts with a bottle right in front of the ref and not get disqualified.
2. King Mabel vs Diesel – 1995
The worst match, at the worst SummerSlam, in the worst year in the history of WWE. That’s an achievement fit for a king.
Like, half the matches from this card could have made the list, but it would have gotten duller than the show itself. Bertha Faye vs. Alundra Blayze, Smoking Gunns vs. The Neo-Nazi Twins, the Blu Brothers, Bret Hart vs. the f**king dentist, Undertaker wrestling Kama for 15 goddamn minutes, but the main event managed to out boring them all.
Mabel, wearing his burger king cardboard crown, awkwardly transitioning from unsafe move to unsafe move, with Diesel doing his best to try and wake up the comatose crowd before Mabel jumps on his back and f**king injures him.
It’s easily the worst main event in Summerslam history but while Mabel is the king of shit SummerSlam matches, someone else is god.
1. The Great Khali Trilogy of S**t – 2007, 2008, 2009
It takes someone truly special to have the worst match on a SummerSlam card three years in a row.
In 2007, Khali fought Batista in a horrendous match that saw the crowd die after repeated chops, lame pin attempts, only to end in a rubbish DQ finish.
In 2008, Triple H couldn’t drag something passable out of him as the crowd screamed ‘You Can’t Wrestle’ at him throughout multiple rest holds.
In 2009, Khali wrestled Kane in a s**tty six-minute plodder in front of another dead crowd. God bless you Kane for bumping for him.
In 2010, WWE finally saw the light, preventing a four-peat by pulling Khali from the SummerSlam main event at the last minute, replacing him with Daniel Bryan, which is like replacing a bullet to the stomach with a cheeseburger.
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