This Day in Pro Wrestling History (July 6)

What if I told you that despite WCW having its biggest year ever that the best show from that year not only did NOT come from WCW, but can be watched from beginning to end in under two hours? You wouldn't believe it, would you?

29 years ago today, the NWA held the first ever Great American Bash event from Memorial Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina. Over 25,000 fans were in attendance. Featured bouts included NWA world heavyweight champion Ric Flair defeating Nikita Koloff (David Crockett, Jim Crockett's son, was the special referee) and Dusty Rhodes defeating Tully Blanchard in a steel cage win the NWA world television championship and Blanchard's valet, Baby Doll, for 30 days.

21 years ago today, WWF held a TV taping at the Wilkes University Marts Center in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. In the featured bout, Bret Hart defeated Yokozuna via disqualification when Mr. Fuji hit Hart with the Japanese flag. Lex Luger made the save-post match. The TV taping was also the debut of Ludvig Borga, the Quebecers, and Well Dunn, and the final TV appearances for Sensational Sherri and Tito Santana.

17 years ago, the WWF held In Your House 16: Canadian Stampede (WWE Network link) from the Saddledome in Calagary, Alberta, Canada. The show won Wrestling Observer Newsletter's Best Major Show award that year. 12,151 were in attendance, while 230,000 homes watched the event on PPV. Side note: this would be the last two-hour In Your House, and the last such PPV to have In Your House in the title. This would change with September's Ground Zero: In Your House, the first three-hour In Your House show.

• In the "Free for All" preshow, The Godwinns defeated The Blackjacks (Windham & Bradshaw).
• Mankind vs. Hunter Hearst Helmsley fought in a double countout.
• The Great Sasuke defeated TAKA Michinoku. This was the WWF debut for both men.
• The Undertaker defeated Vader to retain the WWF Championship.
• The Hart Foundation (Bret Hart, Owen Hart, Jim Neidhart, Davey Boy Smith and Brian Pillman) defeated Team USA (Steve Austin, Ken Shamrock, Goldust, and The Legion Of Doom) in a ten-man tag team match when Owen pinned Austin.

16 years ago, WCW draws its largest crowd ever when 41,412 fans packed the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, Georgia for Monday Nitro. Goldberg, residing in Atlanta, won two matches that evening. First, he defeated Scott Hall to retain the WCW United States Championship. In that main event later that evening, Goldberg defeated Hollywood Hulk Hogan to win the WCW world heavyweight championship.

10 years ago today, Ric Flair's autobiography To Be The Man is released. The book reached #5 on the New York Times' Best Seller list for hardback, non-fiction books.

10 years ago today, at a Smackdown taping at the Arena in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, Billy Kidman and Paul London defeated The Dudley Boyz to win the WWE Tag Team Championship. In the featured bout, John Cena defeated Booker T via disqualification when Luther Reigns attacked Cena from behind. Moments earlier, Cena attacked Reigns and Smackdown GM Luther Reigns; Angle would strip Cena of the United States Championship.

2 years ago, Ring of Honor announces via a statement that they had fired Kenny King. King the previous night appeared on TNA Impact in a Destination X qualifying match just days after his contract expired with ROH and seemingly had a handshake agreement for a short-term extension. According to ROH, after King informed them that he would appear on the July 5 Impact, he was told to not appear live on the show as it violated the terms of the agreement. King did not honor the agreement, saying the deal seemed fair at the time, but others told him it was not. It should be pointed out that at the time of King's release, he was one half of the ROH world tag team champions with Rhett Titus as The All-Night Express.