SummerSlam is an annual pay-per-view (PPV) produced every August by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) since 1988. Dubbed "The Biggest Party of the Summer",[2] it is one of the promotion's original four pay-per-views, along with WrestleMania, the Royal Rumble and Survivor Series,[3] and was considered one of the "Big Five" PPVs, along with King of the Ring.[4] It has since become considered WWF's second biggest event of the year behind WrestleMania.[5][6] The 1996 event was the ninth event in the SummerSlam chronology and was scheduled to be held on August 18, 1996, at the Gund Arena in Cleveland, Ohio.[1]
The second bout, and the first bout to air on the pay-per-view proper, was a singles match between Owen Hart and Savio Vega. During the match, Hart wore an orthopedic cast on his left arm. The match ended when Hart hit Vega with his cast then applied the Sharpshooter, defeating Vega by submission. Following the match, Justin Hawk Bradshaw attacked Vega.
The sixth bout was a singles match between Jake "The Snake" Roberts and Jerry "The King" Lawler. Lawler won the bout by pinfall after hitting Roberts with a bottle of Jim Beam whiskey. Following the match, Lawler poured whisky onto Roberts until being stopped by Mark Henry.
The penultimate bout was the first ever Boiler Room Brawl, Mankind’s specialty match. The heel Mankind would be facing The Undertaker, whom Mankind had been harassing and assaulting at random for months. Mankind would often hang out in the darkness of an arena’s boiler room (also known as a mechanical room), which was often hot and dusty, and where most of the arena’s internal infrastructure was. This match first featured The Undertaker entering the Gund Arena’s boiler room to seek out his arch-enemy, but Mankind struck first and they then proceeded to brawl for 30 minutes in the boiler room, the arena’s corridors, the entrance ramp and finally the ring, where Paul Bearer was waiting for one of the wrestlers to take his urn, which was the winning objective of the match. Bearer turned on his long-time protege, The Undertaker, to align himself with Mankind.
The main event saw Shawn Michaels defend the WWF Championship against Vader. Vader originally won the match twice, first by countout (after he press-slammed Michaels onto the guard rail) and then by disqualification (when Michaels struck Vader repeatedly with Cornette's tennis racket), but because WWF championships can only change hands by pinfall or submission, Cornette demanded that the match restart both times. WWF PresidentGorilla Monsoon allowed this when Michaels agreed. Michaels went on to pin Vader after hitting him with a moonsault, thus retaining his title.
Aftermath
The main event feud between Shawn Michaels and Vader was supposed to continue until that year's Survivor Series event with Vader capturing the WWF Championship from the champion Michaels. However, due to several botches on the part of Vader during the match, Michaels voiced his frustrations about the match's execution to backstage where Vader was eventually stripped of his push. Michaels would eventually lose the title to Sycho Sid at Survivor Series. The 1996 SummerSlam was also WWE's only PPV to be held in Clevland until the same event would return in 2024.
^Ian Hamilton. Wrestling's Sinking Ship: What Happens to an Industry Without Competition (p. 160)
^Sullivan, Kevin (November 23, 2010). The WWE Championship: A Look Back at the Rich History of the WWE Championship. Gallery Books. p. 124. ISBN9781439193211. At the time, SummerSlam was one of WWE's "big five" Pay-Per-Views (Royal Rumble, WrestleMania, King of the Ring, and Survivor Series were the others), ...
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