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King of the Ring tournament

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This article is about the tournament. For the event series, see King of the Ring.

The King of the Ring tournament is a professional wrestling single-elimination tournament held periodically by WWE, a Connecticut-based professional wrestling promotion. Established in 1985, the winner of the tournament is crowned the "King of the Ring." Some wrestlers have incorporated this into their character, such as adorning king's attire and acting and speaking with a regal attitude; for example, after winning the 2006 tournament, Booker T became King Booker and maintained that character over the next year. Only one tournament awarded an additional reward, which was the 2002 tournament where winner Brock Lesnar received a match for the WWE Undisputed Championship. The tournament is also notable for beginning Stone Cold Steve Austin's rise to stardom after he won the tournament in 1996.

The tournament was established when the promotion was still called the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, renamed to WWE in 2002). It was held annually from 1985 to 2002, with the exception of 1990 and 1992. The tournaments from 1985 to 1989 and in 1991 were held as special non-televised house shows. A pay-per-view (PPV) event titled King of the Ring then began airing as the annual June PPV from 1993 until the final PPV in 2002; these titular PPVs featured the final few matches of that year's tournament as well as other matches not part of the tournament. After a four-year hiatus, the tournament returned in 2006 and has since been held periodically with the most recent occurring in 2019. These tournaments' matches aired across episodes of Raw and SmackDown with the finals occurring at a different PPV, such as Judgment Day for 2006, or on an episode of Raw. The semifinals and final of the 2015 tournament aired exclusively as a WWE Network event.

WWE introduced the brand extension in early 2002 and the tournament that year was held for wrestlers from both the Raw and SmackDown! brands. However, when the tournament returned in 2006, it was held exclusively for wrestlers from SmackDown!. The tournaments in 2008 and 2010 were held as interbrand tournaments, with the one in 2008 also featuring wrestlers from Raw and ECW, while the one in 2010 just featured those from Raw and SmackDown after ECW was disbanded earlier that same year. The 2015 tournament occurred when the brand split was not in effect. The brand split was reinstated in 2016, followed by the tournament's return in 2019 which featured wrestlers from both Raw and SmackDown.

History

Early tournaments

The first King of the Ring tournament was held by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) on July 8, 1985 at the Sullivan Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts. The inaugural tournament was won by Don Muraco, who defeated The Iron Sheik in the final. In addition to the tournament, there was only one other match during the night, in which Hulk Hogan defeated Nikolai Volkoff to retain the WWF World Heavyweight Championship.[1] Further King of the Ring tournaments were held from 1986 to 1989 and in 1991.[2] The winner of the tournament was bestowed the title "King of the Ring," although 1986 winner Harley Race was the only one to carry this gimmick onto television during these early years of the tournament, which were held as special non-televised house shows in an effort to boost attendance at these events.[3]

Pay-per-view

In 1993, the WWF began to produce an annual June pay-per-view (PPV) titled King of the Ring. The inaugural King of the Ring PPV took place on June 13, 1993, at the Nutter Center in Dayton, Ohio. Unlike the previous non-televised events, the PPV did not feature all of the tournament's matches. Instead, several of the qualifying matches preceded the event with the final few matches then taking place at the pay-per-view. There were also other matches that took place at the event as it was a traditional three-hour pay-per-view.[4] The King of the Ring pay-per-view was considered one of the promotion's "Big Five" PPVs of the year, along with the Royal Rumble, WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and Survivor Series, up until its disestablishment after the 2002 event—the 2002 tournament was also the only tournament to award the winner a reward other than the title of "King of the Ring;" winner Brock Lesnar received a match for the WWE Undisputed Championship at that year's SummerSlam.[5] Also in early 2002, the WWF was renamed to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) following a lawsuit from the World Wildlife Fund over the "WWF" initialism,[6] and the promotion introduced the brand extension, in which the roster was divided between the Raw and SmackDown! brands where wrestlers were exclusively assigned to perform.[7] The 2002 tournament was in turn held for wrestlers from both brands.[5]

Revivals

After a four-year hiatus, the tournament returned in 2006 and was held exclusively for wrestlers from the SmackDown! brand. Unlike the previous years, however, there was not an associated pay-per-view. Instead, tournament matches took place across episodes of SmackDown!. The finale of the 2006 tournament did occur at a PPV, but it was Judgment Day where Booker T defeated Bobby Lashley in the tournament final.[8] The tournament then returned in 2008, and was held as a special episode of Raw on April 21. This tournament was held for wrestlers from all three of WWE's brands—Raw, SmackDown, and ECW, which had been established as a third brand in 2006. The 2008 tournament was won by William Regal, who defeated CM Punk in the finale.[9] The 2010 tournament was then held in November that year. Qualifying matches occurred on the November 22 episode of Raw with the tournament itself being held on the November 29 episode. It was won by Sheamus, who defeated John Morrison in the finale. The 2010 tournament featured wrestlers from Raw and SmackDown as ECW had been disbanded in February that year.[10]

After a five-year hiatus, the tournament returned in 2015. Quarterfinal matches were held on the April 27 episode of Raw, with the semifinals and final airing exclusively as a WWE Network event the following night. Bad News Barrett defeated Neville in the final round. At this time, the brand split was not in effect as the brand extension had been dissolved in August 2011; also in April 2011, the promotion ceased using its full name with "WWE" becoming an orphaned initialism.[11] After another four-year hiatus and after the brand extension had been reinstated in 2016, the tournament returned in 2019 and featured wrestlers from Raw and SmackDown. In this tournament, there was a Raw bracket and a SmackDown bracket and the winners of each faced off in the King of the Ring tournament final. Tournament matches began on the August 19 episode of Raw and were held across episodes of Raw and SmackDown over the next month.[12] The finale was originally scheduled to occur at that year's Clash of Champions PPV, but was rescheduled to occur on the following night's episode of Raw on September 16. The tournament was won by Baron Corbin, who defeated Chad Gable in the final.[13]

King gimmicks

In 1986, the second King of the Ring winner, Harley Race, parlayed his victory into an arrogant King of Wrestling gimmick, featuring a regal cape and crown. This gimmick led to several notable feuds for Race with Junkyard Dog, Hulk Hogan, "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan, and others, even after new winners had been crowned in the annual tournament. In 1988, Race suffered an abdominal injury and during his absence, his manager Bobby "The Brain" Heenan awarded the crown to Haku in July, rechristening him King Haku, even though Randy Savage had won the tournament by that point and Ted DiBiase would also win the tournament during this storyline. Race eventually returned from his injury and briefly feuded with King Haku, but was unable to regain the crown at the 1989 Royal Rumble. King Haku then lost the crown to "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan in May 1989.[14] "King Hacksaw" then lost it on August 30, 1989 to "Macho Man" Randy Savage, who rebranded himself "Macho King."[15] Savage abandoned the "Macho King" gimmick upon his loss in a "Career ending match" to The Ultimate Warrior at WrestleMania VII in 1991, declaring afterwards that "the Kingdom of the Madness has been cracked in half." Following this, only wrestlers who had won the most recent tournament, as well as Jerry Lawler (who had used a King of Wrestling image regionally in the Memphis area since the early 1970s) would use the gimmick.

Owen Hart ("King of Harts"),[16] Mabel ("King Mabel"),[17] Kurt Angle ("King Kurt"), Edge ("King Edge the Awesome"), Booker T ("King Booker"),[18] Sheamus ("King Sheamus"),[19][20] Bad News Barrett ("King Barrett"), and Baron Corbin ("King Corbin") are all wrestlers that also took on "King" nicknames after winning King of the Ring tournaments, with varying amounts of indulgence in their respective gimmick. William Regal won the tournament while serving as General Manager of Raw[21] and began displaying King Lear signs of tyranny and delusion. Triple H alluded to his King of the Ring victory as part of his integrated gimmick starting in 2006 as the "King of Kings."[22] In addition to the King's crown, various female wrestlers were portrayed as Queen while they were aligned with Kings, including "Queen of the Ring" The Fabulous Moolah (aligned with King Harley Race at WrestleMania III), Sensational Queen Sherri (manager of "Macho King" Randy Savage),[23] and Queen Sharmell (manager of King Booker).[24] Mo, Mabel's tag team partner in Men on a Mission, was "knighted" as Sir Mo by his partner after the latter's 1995 victory. Finlay and Regal were "knighted" as Sir Finlay and Sir Regal when they were part of King Booker's Court. In December 2020, King Corbin started a faction with Steve Cutler and Wesley Blake, knighting them as the "Knights of the Lone Wolf" (with lone wolf a reference to his previous nickname), although this would be short-lived as Cutler was released by WWE in February 2021.[25]

List of winners

SmackDown-branded tournament
# Year Winner Times won Finals date Runner-up Finals location Ref.
1 1985 Don Muraco 1 July 8, 1985 The Iron Sheik Foxborough, Massachusetts [1]
2 1986 Harley Race 1 July 14, 1986 Pedro Morales [26]
3 1987 Randy Savage 1 September 4, 1987 King Kong Bundy Providence, Rhode Island [27]
4 1988 Ted DiBiase 1 October 16, 1988 Randy Savage [28]
5 1989 Tito Santana 1 October 14, 1989 Rick Martel [29]
6 1991 Bret Hart 1 September 7, 1991 Irwin R. Schyster [30]
7 1993 2 June 13, 1993 Bam Bam Bigelow Dayton, Ohio [4]
8 1994 Owen Hart 1 June 19, 1994 Razor Ramon Baltimore, Maryland [31]
9 1995 Mabel 1 June 25, 1995 Savio Vega Philadelphia, Pennsylvania [32]
10 1996 Stone Cold Steve Austin 1 June 23, 1996 Jake Roberts Milwaukee, Wisconsin [33]
11 1997 Hunter Hearst Helmsley 1 June 8, 1997 Mankind Providence, Rhode Island [34]
12 1998 Ken Shamrock 1 June 28, 1998 The Rock Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania [35]
13 1999 Billy Gunn 1 June 27, 1999 X-Pac Greensboro, North Carolina [36]
14 2000 Kurt Angle 1 June 25, 2000 Rikishi Boston, Massachusetts [37]
15 2001 Edge 1 June 24, 2001 Kurt Angle East Rutherford, New Jersey [38]
16 2002 Brock Lesnar 1 June 23, 2002 Rob Van Dam Columbus, Ohio [5]
17 2006 Booker T 1 May 21, 2006 Bobby Lashley Phoenix, Arizona [8]
18 2008 William Regal 1 April 21, 2008 CM Punk Greenville, South Carolina [9]
19 2010 Sheamus 1 November 29, 2010 John Morrison Philadelphia, Pennsylvania [10]
20 2015 Bad News Barrett 1 April 28, 2015 Neville Moline, Illinois [11]
21 2019 Baron Corbin 1 September 16, 2019 Chad Gable Knoxville, Tennessee [13]

References

  1. ^ a b "WWF King of the Ring '85 at Sullivan Stadium wrestling results - Internet Wrestling Database". www.profightdb.com. Retrieved 2019-10-08.
  2. ^ "WWF King of the Ring '91 at Providence Civic Center wrestling results - Internet Wrestling Database". www.profightdb.com. Retrieved 2019-10-08.
  3. ^ Beaston, Erik (August 18, 2019). "WWE King of the Ring: Everything You Need to Know About Historical Tournament". Bleacher Report. Retrieved April 9, 2021.
  4. ^ a b "King of the Ring 1993". Pro Wrestling History. Retrieved 2008-10-02.
  5. ^ a b c "King of the Ring 2002 results". Online World of Wrestling. June 23, 2002. Archived from the original on May 24, 2011. Retrieved 2010-08-19.
  6. ^ "World Wrestling Federation Entertainment Drops The "F" To Emphasize the "E" for Entertainment". WWE. Archived from the original on January 19, 2009. Retrieved August 28, 2008.
  7. ^ "WWE Entertainment To Make RAW and SMACKDOWN Distinct Television Brands" (Press release). WWE. March 27, 2002. Archived from the original on April 17, 2010. Retrieved April 5, 2012.
  8. ^ a b "Judgment Day 2006 results". Pro Wrestling History. Retrieved 2007-12-16.
  9. ^ a b "WWE Raw Results". Online World of Wrestling. April 21, 2008. Retrieved 2010-08-28.
  10. ^ a b Plummer, Dale (29 November 2010). "Raw: King of the Ring crowned". Slam! Sports. Canadian Online Explorer. Retrieved 30 November 2010.
  11. ^ a b "PWTorch.com – CALDWELL'S WWE KOTR SPECIAL REPORT 4/28: Complete "virtual-time coverage" of King of the Ring finals on WWE Network". pwtorch.com. Retrieved 2017-11-27.
  12. ^ HBN Staff (August 12, 2019). "WWE King Of The Ring Tournament Announced". Heel By Nature. Retrieved April 9, 2021.
  13. ^ a b Silverstein, Adam; Crosby, Jack (September 10, 2019). "2019 WWE King of the Ring bracket, winners, tournament matches, results, dates, schedule". CBS Sports. Retrieved September 10, 2019.
  14. ^ "Accelerator profile". Accelerator's Wrestling Rollercoaster. Retrieved August 30, 2017.
  15. ^ "WWF Show Results 1989". Angelfire. Archived from the original on March 4, 2008. Retrieved May 3, 2008.
  16. ^ Conner, Floyd (2001). Wrestling's Most Wanted: The Top 10 Book of Pro Wrestling's Outrageous Performers, Punishing Piledrivers, and Other Oddities. Brassey's. p. 175. ISBN 1-57488-308-9.
  17. ^ Schrader, Bob. "The Irresistible Force". WWE. Retrieved 2007-07-03. Viscera used to be known as Mabel. [...] He started as a friendly rapping giant Then Mabel shocks everyone by winning King of the Ring, loses the rapping and becomes KING Mabel.
  18. ^ John M. Milner, Andy McNamara and Greg Oliver (June 2, 2005). "Booker T's bio". SLAM! Wrestling. Retrieved April 18, 2008.
  19. ^ Plummer, Dale (29 November 2010). "Raw: King of the Ring crowned". Slam! Sports. Canadian Online Explorer. Retrieved 30 November 2010.
  20. ^ Caldwell, James (19 December 2011). "WWE TLC PPV Results 12/19: In-person "virtual-time" coverage of TLC PPV – off-air PPV notes, Miz vs. Orton, Cena vs. Barrett". Pro Wrestling Torch. Retrieved 25 March 2011.
  21. ^ "IGN: William Regal". IGN. Archived from the original on 25 October 2008. Retrieved 19 May 2008.
  22. ^ Triple H: The King of Kings (DVD). WWE Home Video. 2008.
  23. ^ Spears, Jim (January 4, 2005). "Women's wrestlers today are tougher, better". The Times and Democrat. Retrieved 2009-05-23.
  24. ^ "Booker and Sharmell released by WWE". SLAM! Wrestling. October 16, 2007. Retrieved 2008-04-17.
  25. ^ HBN Staff (February 4, 2021). "WWE Announces Release Of Steve Cutler". Heel By Nature. Retrieved April 9, 2021.
  26. ^ "WWF King of the Ring '86 at Sullivan Stadium wrestling results - Internet Wrestling Database". www.profightdb.com. Retrieved 2019-10-08.
  27. ^ "King of the Ring 87 - Providence, RI - Civic Center - September 4, 1987 (12,000; sell out)". The History of WWE. Retrieved October 8, 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  28. ^ "King of the Ring 88 - Providence, RI - Civic Center - October 16, 1988 (6,700)". The History of WWE. Retrieved October 8, 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  29. ^ "WWF King of the Ring '89 at Providence Civic Center wrestling results - Internet Wrestling Database". www.profightdb.com. Retrieved 2019-10-08.
  30. ^ "WWF King of the Ring '91 at Providence Civic Center wrestling results - Internet Wrestling Database". www.profightdb.com. Retrieved 2019-10-08.
  31. ^ "King of the Ring 1994". Pro Wrestling History. Retrieved 2007-11-01.
  32. ^ Pantoja, Kevin (June 26, 2015). "Random Network Reviews: King of the Ring 1995". 411mania. Retrieved April 9, 2021.
  33. ^ "King of the Ring 1996 results". Wrestling Supercards and Tournaments. June 23, 1996. Retrieved 2010-09-05.
  34. ^ "King of the Ring 1997 results". Wrestling Supercards and Tournaments. June 8, 1997. Retrieved August 28, 2010.
  35. ^ Powell, John (1998-06-29). "Kane wins WWF World Title, Foley soars". Slam! Sports. Canadian Online Explorer. Retrieved 2007-10-24.
  36. ^ "Historical Cards: King of the Ring (June 27, 1999. Greensboro, North Carolina)". PWI Presents: 2007 Wrestling Almanak and book of facts. Kappa Publications. p. 151. 2007 Edition.
  37. ^ "King of the Ring 2000 results". Wrestling Supercards and Tournaments. June 25, 2000. Retrieved August 25, 2010.
  38. ^ "King of the Ring 2001 results". Online World of Wrestling. June 24, 2001. Archived from the original on August 13, 2011. Retrieved 2010-08-22.
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