{"id":111816,"date":"2022-03-23T10:00:48","date_gmt":"2022-03-23T14:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=111816"},"modified":"2022-03-22T21:48:50","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T01:48:50","slug":"notable-champion-vs-champion-matches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2022\/03\/23\/notable-champion-vs-champion-matches\/","title":{"rendered":"Notable Champion vs Champion Matches"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The writing was long on the wall. It was a surprise to few that <strong>Roman Reigns<\/strong> and <strong>Brock Lesnar<\/strong> would stage a reprisal of their 2021 <em>Crown Jewel<\/em> bout at April\u2019s upcoming <em>WrestleMania 38<\/em>. In the ensuing months between <em>Crown Jewel<\/em> and the \u2018Road to WrestleMania\u2019 Lesnar became WWE champion, upping the stakes of his upcoming match against Reigns. It is set to be a champion vs. champion, unification bout to unite the WWE championship, held by Lesnar, and the WWE Universal Championship, currently held by Reigns.<\/p>\n<h2>Notable WWE Champion vs Champion Matches<\/h2>\n<p>Throughout WWE history, notable champion vs. champion encounters, which set the precedent for WrestleMania 38\u2019s main event include:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Hulk Hogan vs. Ultimate Warrior: WrestleMania VI - Champion vs. Champion Match\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BfqV3xI8l_s?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>The Ultimate Warrior vs. Hulk Hogan<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>April 1, the eve of <em>WrestleMania<\/em> Saturday, also <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2020\/04\/01\/30-years-ago-ultimate-warrior-vs-hulk-hogan-at-wrestlemania-vi\/\" target=\"_self\">marks the anniversary of <strong>Ultimate Warrior <\/strong>and <strong>Hulk Hogan\u2019s<\/strong> 1990 <em>WrestleMania 6<\/em> bout<\/a>. Despite the controversy attached to both their names in later years, the 1990 <em>WrestleMania<\/em> main event is a seismic installment in WWE\u2019s history, simply for the fan furor around it at the time. Though <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2021\/05\/25\/ae-biography-ultimate-warrior\/\" target=\"_self\">his star waned quickly due to self destructive behavior<\/a>, in 1990 Warrior was the reigning Intercontinental Champion and Hogan\u2019s rival in a rare babyface vs. babyface feud for not just the top echelon of WWF, but the hearts and minds of its youthful audience. Hogan had been WWF\u2019s dominant star for several years. However, at the Toronto, Ontario, Canada event, Warrior momentarily eclipsed him. Claiming the WWF World Heavyweight Championship at the same time.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon watch their historic WrestleMania X Ladder Match: WWE Playback\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/YegEqMalt1Y?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Shawn Michaels vs. Razor Ramon<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The recent passing of <strong>Scott Hall, <\/strong>\u00a0aka <strong>Razor Ramon, <\/strong>\u00a0called to mind the simple fact that he is part of a distinctive club of WWE-associated wrestlers. Despite his lauded notoriety, he never held a World Championship title within WWE. However, Hall\/Ramon was a notable Intercontinental Champion. In the lead-up to <em>WrestleMania X, <\/em>Ramon and <strong>Shawn Michaels<\/strong> both claimed to be the Intercontinental Champion. The matter was set to be decided at <em>WrestleMania 10.<\/em> With a stipulation that was rare at that time: a ladder match. The WWE, then WWF\u2019s, first ladder match was fought between Michaels and real-life rival <strong>Bret Hart. <\/strong>Who was familiar with the concept from his family\u2019s legendary Canadian promotion <em>Stampede Wrestling<\/em>. However, the mere words \u2018Shawn vs. Razor\u2019 evokes to pro wrestling fans the true genesis of the ladder match, setting the stage for the hardcore antics of the \u201cAttitude Era\u201d to come.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"FULL-LENGTH MATCH - Raw - RVD vs. Jeff Hardy - Title vs. Title Ladder Match\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Xx-2PcAzTIM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Rob Van Dam vs. Jeff Hardy<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>By the turn of the millennium, Hall\/Ramon\u2019s and Michaels\u2019s groundbreaking ladder match had set the bedrock for a new generation of high-flying extreme wrestlers like <strong>Jeff<\/strong> and <strong>Matt Hardy. <\/strong>As well as their frequent rivals <strong>Edge<\/strong> and <strong>Christian, <\/strong>and <strong>Rob Van Dam<\/strong>, who migrated to WWE when they acquired <em>ECW<\/em>. Van Dam and Hardy shared an airborne skill set, and in 2002 on <em>Monday Night Raw <\/em>they battled in a unification ladder match to unite the Intercontinental and European Championships. Van Dam was victorious in the match that showed the high-flying antics of both wrestlers.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"John Cena vs. CM Punk: SummerSlam 2011\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/frPkhgnepLg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>CM Punk vs. John Cena<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>WWE of the 2010s is sometimes referred to as the \u201cReality Era\u201d. Not only did this era launch actual reality-era television programming like <em>Total Divas,<\/em> but WWE storylines themselves were punctuated with an air of high drama. The feud between the decade\u2019s top star, <strong>John Cena, <\/strong>and the era\u2019s alternative icon <strong>CM Punk<\/strong> had several twists and turns. In 2011, Punk and Cena found themselves in a similar predicament as Ramon and Michaels had faced in their Intercontinental championship feud of nearly a decade before. Both laid claim to the WWE championship. Their champion vs champion match was the main event of 2011\u2019s <em>SummerSlam, <\/em>and the genuinely admirable bout ended with a brief victory for Punk, until cash-in by then Mr. Money in the Bank <strong>Alberto Del Rio.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"FULL MATCH - Becky Lynch vs. Bayley vs. Shayna Baszler \u2013 Triple Threat Match: Survivor Series 2019\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/QRt7bvgPfJ4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Shayna Baszler vs. Becky Lynch vs. Bayley<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The women of NXT are represented by 2019\u2019s <em>Survivor Series\u2019s<\/em> cross-brand showdown between the <em>NXT, Monday Night Raw, <\/em>and <em>Friday Night SmackDown<\/em> women\u2019s champions, <strong>Becky Lynch, Shayna Baszler, <\/strong>and <strong>Bayley.<\/strong> The \u201cWednesday Night Wars\u201d between <em>NXT<\/em> and <em>All Elite Wrestling<\/em> was nascent, and crossover between NXT and the main roster was frequent as, at that time. WWE was confident that its third brand could knock out the fledgling competition. Lynch was on top of the world in the heyday of her \u201cThe Man\u201d gimmick, Bayley had left \u201cThe Hugger\u201d behind and was in the early days of her heel turn, and Baszler had been built up as a near-invincible, vicious contender. The victory went to Baszler in this showdown between all three of WWE\u2019s women\u2019s champions at the time, but she was attacked immediately post-victory by Lynch.<\/p>\n<p><em>Stay tuned to the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/\" target=\"_self\">Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a>\u00a0for more on this and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world. As well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. You can check out an almost unlimited array of WWE content on the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/watch.wwe.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">WWE Network<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.peacocktv.com\/watch\/home\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Peacock<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The writing was long on the wall. It was a surprise to few that Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar would stage a reprisal of their 2021 Crown Jewel bout at April\u2019s upcoming WrestleMania 38. In the ensuing months between Crown Jewel and the \u2018Road to WrestleMania\u2019 Lesnar became WWE champion, upping the stakes of his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3715,"featured_media":111821,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[160,163,140,587,124,165,927,1734,829,395,1182,2306],"class_list":["post-111816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wwe-universe","tag-bayley","tag-becky-lynch","tag-cm-punk","tag-hulk-hogan","tag-jeff-hardy","tag-john-cena","tag-razor-ramon","tag-rob-van-dam","tag-scott-hall","tag-shawn-michaels","tag-shayna-baszler","tag-ultimate-warrior"],"modified_by":"Dominic Padula","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3715"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111816\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}