Let’s Say Nice Things About... The Curtain Call

In an effort to bring some positivity to professional wrestling—and the world for that matter—Cageside Seats and its community will say nice things about people and things in wrestling every single day throughout 2017.

Remember, only positive comments allowed here. Negativity will not be tolerated, and that includes back-handed compliments and troll comments. Any comments that are not in the spirit of this feature will be flagged, deleted, and posters of said comments may be subjected to a ban.

Today’s the 21st anniversary of one of the most infamous events in wrestling history. I’ll have a detailed write-up about it later. The subject: The Curtain Call.

NOTE: For the younger or unfamiliar fans, the Curtain Call was basically four good friends (Shawn Michaels, Razor Ramon, Triple H, and Diesel) saying goodbye to one another as two of them were heading for WCW (Razor and Diesel). Basically, it’s this...

...but with four guys. At a not-televised show. At a time when doing this wasn’t okay. Something like this...

I’ll start. Let’s be honest: by 1996, a lot of people fully understood wrestling wasn’t totally on the level and people were okay with that. This is one of those moments that doesn’t nearly have the impact it has if (a) it was done anywhere other than Madison Square Garden, (b) if it was done with most anyone else, and (c) if it wasn’t videotaped.

To the two fans that somehow snuck a recording device in (this was back when recording devices were the size of a couple of bricks and not the size of credit cards), that took some serious guts.

Perhaps most amazing about the Curtain Call is that just about everyone involved came out ahead in the end. Without the Curtain Call, we probably don’t get Austin 3:16, and you can pretty much figure out the butterfly effect from there.

Also, if it wasn’t for the Curtain Call in 1996, we wouldn’t have gotten the Curtain Call in 2015.

Got a suggestion for a future “Let’s Say Nice Things About...”? Hit me up on the Twitter gimmick @notoriouseddie. I may not always respond, but I promise I will read it.