This comprehensive list of WWE main event stars includes Baron Corbin, but not Kofi Kingston or Becky Lynch

Almost six years ago, it looked like Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose had a chance to main event Hell in a Cell 2014 over the latest iteration of John Cena versus Randy Orton.

Neither Rollins nor Ambrose had ever headlined a WWE pay-per-view (PPV) event in a singles match prior to that night, so I did some research to find out how often WWE main evented a card with a 1-on-1 match featuring two main event rookies. It was a rare occurrence in WWE history.

I have always been particularly fascinated with who WWE chooses for 1-on-1 main event matches. Plenty of mid and upper card guys can sneak into multi-man main events like Elimination Chamber matches, but it’s usually much harder to earn that 1-on-1 main event spot in Vince McMahon’s eyes. Maybe the rules have changed a bit over these last several years with PPV buyrates taking a backseat to WWE Network subscriptions, but it’s a detail that I think is still interesting and worth paying attention to.

In early 2018, I updated a lot of these numbers and concepts related to PPV main events that I initially discussed in late 2014. It’s now time to update the data again, with information that is accurate as of Backlash 2020, which just took place earlier this week (June 14).

By my count, WWE has aired 373 total PPV events starting with WrestleMania in 1985, excluding NXT events and UK-exclusive shows. This counts each night of WrestleMania 36 as a separate event with its own main event. Each of the 373 cards has exactly one main event match, with Money in the Bank 2020 being the lone exception. WWE concurrently ran two separate Money in the Bank ladder matches during the final segment of that show, so that card has two main event matches. Therefore the 373 total PPV events have included 374 total main event matches.

The main event match is defined here as the final match of the night, excluding Money in the Bank cash-ins or whatever that crap was Hulk Hogan pulled at WrestleMania 9. This means that Chris Jericho versus Triple H is the main event of WrestleMania 18 rather than Hulk Hogan versus The Rock. I am not interested in falling down the slippery slope of subjectively assessing which match had the heaviest promotion by the company or featured the most star power, so I’m keeping this simple and just using the final match of the night as the main event, including any tournament finals that closed out the night.

My definition of a “main event rookie” is a wrestler who has never headlined a WWE PPV in a one-on-one match. Similarly, a “main event veteran” is a wrestler who has headlined at least one WWE PPV in a one-on-one match.

Main Event Match Types

With that in mind, here is a breakdown of the match types that comprise those 374 main event matches. Brock Lesnar versus Roman Reigns from WrestleMania 31 counts as a 1-on-1 match on this list rather than the triple threat it eventually turned into once Rollins cashed in. There have been 238 different 1-on-1 matches (denoted as “1 vs. 1” in the list below) out of 374 total main event matches.

• 238: 1 vs. 1
• 28: Royal Rumble match
• 27: 1 vs. 1 vs. 1
• 17: 2 vs. 2
• 14: Elimination Chamber match
• 11: 4-way (singles)
• 8: 5 vs. 5
• 8: Group ladder match
• 5: 3 vs. 3
• 4: 4 vs. 4
• 4: 6-way (singles)
• 2: 1 vs. 2
• 2: 3 vs. 5
• 2: 5-way (singles)
• 1: 7 vs. 7
• 1: 2 vs. 5
• 1: 2 vs. 3
• 1: Scramble match

For the rest of this article I am only going to focus on the 238 one-on-one main event matches that have occurred. The full list of 238 matches is included at the bottom of this article.

The List of Main Event Veterans

These 238 main event matches have featured just 81 different competitors across roughly 35 years. Here is the full list of the current 81 main event veterans, sorted by how many of the 238 main event matches they each competed in:

• 42 matches: Undertaker
• 39 matches: John Cena
• 31 matches: Triple H
• 25 matches: Brock Lesnar
• 23 matches: Randy Orton
• 21 matches: Shawn Michaels
• 20 matches: Steve Austin
• 17 matches: The Rock
• 15 matches: Roman Reigns
• 14 matches: Bret Hart, Seth Rollins
• 11 matches: Hulk Hogan, Batista
• 10 matches: CM Punk, Edge
• 8 matches: Diesel
• 7 matches: Sid, Angle, Ambrose, Bryan, Goldberg
• 6 matches: Foley, Jericho, JBL, Styles
• 5 matches: Bulldog, Kane, Wyatt
• 4 matches: Yokozuna, Big Show, Jeff Hardy, Owens, Strowman
• 3 matches: Savage, Benoit, Booker T, Guerrero, Barrett, Mahal
• 2 matches: Warrior, Bigelow, Vince, Henry, Mysterio, Khali, Miz, Ryback, Sheamus, Joe, Ziggler
• 1 match: JYD, Bundy, Andre, DiBiase, Rude, Slaughter, Luger, Piper, Lawler, Fake Undertaker, Lawrence Taylor, Mabel, Goldust, Vader, Faarooq, Shamrock, Flair, RVD, Umaga, Lashley, Truth, Del Rio, Laurinaitis, Sting, Sasha, Charlotte, Shane, Rousey, Bella, Corbin, McIntyre

Main Event Debuts

Here is the complete list of each superstar’s initial one-on-one main event match on PPV, in chronological order.

The number in parentheses next to the wrestler’s name is the PPV’s rank in chronological order out of all 373 events. For example, Ronda Rousey has a 349 next to her name because Evolution was the 349th PPV that WWE hosted out of all 373 PPV events in this study.

1. Randy Savage (2): November 1985, versus Junkyard Dog
2. Junkyard Dog (2): November 1985, versus Randy Savage
3. Hulk Hogan (3): April 1986, versus King Kong Bundy
4. King Kong Bundy (3): April 1986, versus Hulk Hogan
5. Andre the Giant (4): March 1987, versus Hulk Hogan
6. Ted DiBiase (6): March 1988, versus Randy Savage
7. Ultimate Warrior (15): April 1990, versus Hulk Hogan
8. Ravishing Rick Rude (16): August 1990, versus Ultimate Warrior
9. Sgt. Slaughter (19): March 1991, versus Hulk Hogan
10. The Undertaker (22): December 1991, versus Hulk Hogan
11. Sid Justice (24): April 1992, versus Hulk Hogan
12. Bret Hart (25): August 1992, versus British Bulldog
13. British Bulldog (25): August 1992, versus Bret Hart
14. Shawn Michaels (26): November 1992, versus Bret Hart
15. Yokozuna (28): April 1993, versus Bret Hart
16. Bam Bam Bigelow (29): June 1993, versus Bret Hart
17. Lex Luger (30): August 1993, versus Yokozuna
18. Roddy Piper (34): June 1994, versus Jerry Lawler
19. Jerry Lawler (34): June 1994, versus Roddy Piper
20. Fake Undertaker (35): August 1994, versus Undertaker
21. Lawrence Taylor (38): April 1995, versus Bam Bam Bigelow
22. Diesel (39): May 1995, versus Sycho Sid
23. Mabel (42): August 1995, versus Diesel
24. Goldust (52): May 1996, versus Undertaker
25. Vader (55): August 1996, versus Shawn Michaels
26. Mankind (56): September 1996, versus Shawn Michaels
27. Steve Austin (63): April 1997, versus Bret Hart
28. Faarooq (65): June 1997, versus Undertaker
29. Ken Shamrock (71): December 1997, versus Shawn Michaels
30. Kane (77): June 1998, versus Steve Austin
31. The Rock (82): November 1998, versus Mankind
32. Mr. McMahon (85): February 1999, versus Steve Austin
33. Triple H (93): October 1999, versus Steve Austin
34. Chris Benoit (102): July 2000, versus The Rock
35. Kurt Angle (105): October 2000, versus The Rock
36. Booker T (115): August 2001, versus The Rock
37. Chris Jericho (119): December 2001, versus Steve Austin
38. Brock Lesnar (127): August 2002, versus The Rock
39. Goldberg (135): April 2003, versus The Rock
40. Big Show (136): May 2003, versus Brock Lesnar
41. Eddie Guerrero (145): February 2004, versus Brock Lesnar
42. John Bradshaw Layfield (148): May 2004, versus Eddie Guerrero
43. Randy Orton (152): August 2004, versus Chris Benoit
44. Ric Flair (155): October 2004, versus Randy Orton
45. Batista (161): April 2005, versus Triple H
46. John Cena (163): May 2005, versus John Bradshaw Layfield
47. Mark Henry (174): January 2006, versus Kurt Angle
48. Rey Mysterio (178): May 2006, versus John Bradshaw Layfield
49. Rob Van Dam (179): June 2006, versus John Cena
50. Edge (182): August 2006, versus John Cena
51. Umaga (189): January 2007, versus John Cena
52. The Great Khali (194): May 2007, versus John Cena
53. Bobby Lashley (197): July 2007, versus John Cena
54. Jeff Hardy (222): May 2009, versus Edge
55. CM Punk (225): July 2009, versus Jeff Hardy
56. Sheamus (238): July 2010, versus John Cena
57. Wade Barrett (242): October 2010, versus Randy Orton
58. The Miz (247): April 2011, versus John Cena
59. R-Truth (250): June 2011, versus John Cena
60. Alberto Del Rio (255): October 2011, versus John Cena
61. John Laurinaitis (262): May 2012, versus John Cena
62. Ryback (267): October 2012, versus CM Punk
63. Dolph Ziggler (269): December 2012: versus John Cena
64. Daniel Bryan (276): August 2013, versus John Cena
65. Seth Rollins (291): October 2014, versus Dean Ambrose
66. Dean Ambrose (291): October 2014, versus Seth Rollins
67. Bray Wyatt (293): December 2014, versus Dean Ambrose
68. Roman Reigns (295): February 2015, versus Daniel Bryan
69. Sting (303): September 2015, versus Seth Rollins
70. AJ Styles (310): May 2016, versus Roman Reigns
71. Kevin Owens (316): September 2016, versus Seth Rollins
72. Sasha Banks (318): October 2016, versus Charlotte Flair
73. Charlotte Flair (318): October 2016, versus Sasha Banks
74. Braun Strowman (326): April 2017, versus Roman Reigns
75. Jinder Mahal (327): May 2017, versus Randy Orton
76. Samoa Joe (330): July 2017, versus Brock Lesnar
77. Shane McMahon (334): October 2017, versus Kevin Owens
78. Ronda Rousey (349): October 2018, versus Nikki Bella
79. Nikki Bella (349): October 2018, versus Ronda Rousey
80. Baron Corbin (359): June 2019, versus Seth Rollins
81. Drew McIntyre (371): April 2020, versus Brock Lesnar

Breaking In The Rookies

These 81 superstars made their PPV main event debuts across 74 different matches. There have been 7 matches that featured two main event rookies going against one another, so removing those matches leaves 67 remaining matches where a main event veteran was used as the foil for the wrestler making his main event debut. There are no women in these 67 matches; the 4 women who are included in the list of 81 main event veterans have never main evented a second pay-per-view.

So here is the list of how many main event rookies each established veteran broke in to the main event scene. The parentheses include the names of the all main event rookies that they broke in. It might seem ridiculous to characterize WCW main eventers like Goldberg and Ric Flair as main event rookies, but I humbly request that you just sit there and Deal With It!

• 12 - John Cena (RVD, Edge, Umaga, Khali, Lashley, Sheamus, Miz, Truth, ADR, Laurinaitis, Ziggler, Bryan)
• 5 - Hulk Hogan (Andre, Warrior, Slaughter, Undertaker, Sid)
• 5 - The Rock (Benoit, Angle, Booker T, Lesnar, Goldberg)
• 4 - Bret Hart (HBK, Yokozuna, Bigelow, Austin)
• 4 - Steve Austin (Kane, Mr. McMahon, Triple H, Jericho)
• 4 - Brock Lesnar (Big Show, Guerrero, Joe, McIntyre)
• 3 - Undertaker (Fake Undertaker, Goldust, Faarooq)
• 3 - Shawn Michaels (Vader, Mankind, Shamrock)
• 3 - Randy Orton (Flair, Barrett, Mahal)
• 3 - Seth Rollins (Sting, Owens, Corbin)
• 2 - John Bradshaw Layfield (Cena, Mysterio)
• 2 - Roman Reigns (Styles, Strowman)
• 1 - Randy Savage (DiBiase)
• 1 - Ultimate Warrior (Rude)
• 1 - Yokozuna (Luger)
• 1 - Bam Bam Bigelow (Lawrence Taylor)
• 1 - Sid (Diesel)
• 1 - Diesel (Mabel)
• 1 - Mankind (The Rock)
• 1 - Eddie Guerrero (JBL)
• 1 - Chris Benoit (Orton)
• 1 - Triple H (Batista)
• 1 - Kurt Angle (Henry)
• 1 - Edge (Hardy)
• 1 - Jeff Hardy (Punk)
• 1 - CM Punk (Ryback)
• 1 - Dean Ambrose (Wyatt)
• 1 - Daniel Bryan (Reigns)
• 1 - Kevin Owens (Shane)

Main Event Rematches

Of course with 238 main event matches featuring only 81 wrestlers, that means there have been plenty of rematches. Here is the full list of the these main event matches that have occurred at least twice:

• 6 matches: Austin vs. Undertaker
• 5 matches: Triple H vs. Orton, Lesnar vs. Undertaker
• 4 matches: Undertaker vs. HBK
• 3 matches:
  Cena vs. Lesnar/Orton/Edge/Punk
  Edge vs. Undertaker
  Bret vs. HBK
  Austin vs. Rock
  Triple H vs. Batista
  Orton vs. Bryan
  Rollins vs. Ambrose
  Reigns vs. Lesnar
• 2 matches:
  Triple H vs. HBK/Austin/Rock/Goldberg/Cena/Lesnar/Undertaker
  Undertaker vs. Hogan/Bret/Kane/Batista
  Cena vs. Rock/Batista/Khali/Miz
  Bret vs. Bulldog/Yokozuna/Diesel
  HBK vs. Sid/Bulldog
  Austin vs. DudeLove/Jericho
  Rock vs. Angle/Punk
  Hardy vs. Edge/Punk
  Orton vs. Barrett/Mahal
  Rollins vs. Lesnar/Wyatt
  Styles vs. Ambrose/Reigns
  Sid vs. Diesel
  Reigns vs. Strowman

Miscellaneous Thoughts

When I first researched this concept almost six years ago (Oct. 2014), Undertaker had 36 one-on-one main event matches and John Cena had 39. John Cena has not increased his number at all since then. His last such match was at Night of Champions 2014 against Brock Lesnar. Meanwhile the Undertaker has brought his total all the way up to 42 matches.

Those two men have combined to appear in 81 of these 238 matches (34.0%) with zero overlap, meaning Cena and Undertaker have somehow never wrestled each other in a one-on-one match in the main event of a WWE PPV.

Triple H has wrestled in 31 of these main event matches, and four of his matches also included Cena or Undertaker. So when you add his remaining 27 main events onto the 81 from Cena and Undertaker, that means these 3 men have combined to headline 108 out of these 238 matches (45.4%).

Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose did indeed go on to headline Hell in a Cell 2014, and in doing so became just the 5th match on this list to feature two main event rookies. Sasha Banks versus Charlotte Flair at Hell in a Cell 2016 became the 6th such match, and they were joined by Ronda Rousey and Nikki Bella at Evolution (2018). That’s where things currently stand on that front, with 7 total matches out of 238 main events featuring two main event rookies.

Those four women (Banks, Flair, Rousey, Bella) are the only women who have ever wrestled in a one-on-one main event match on WWE PPV. It looked like Becky Lynch was going to join this list at WrestleMania 35 in a match against Ronda Rousey, but WWE later turned the main event of that card into a triple threat match by adding in Charlotte Flair. That disqualified it from making the list of one-on-one main event matches. Lynch’s absence from the list sticks out like a sore thumb. This is a strong reminder that it’s still incredibly difficult for women to main event a WWE PPV in a one-on-one match, especially when men are also wrestling on the card.

Kofi Kingston is also nowhere to be found on the list. He had a lengthy reign as WWE champion for half of 2019, but WWE never put him in a PPV main event of any kind during that time, let alone a one-on-one main event match.

One of those main event matches that took place during Kingston’s WWE championship reign was Seth Rollins vs. Baron Corbin at Stomping Grounds 2019. So yes, Baron Corbin is on this list of WWE main event matches, but Becky Lynch and Kofi Kingston are not.

The Miz appeared in two of these 238 matches (against John Cena) in April and May 2011, but the A-Lister has yet to make it back since then. That main event drought has surpassed nine years, with no end in sight.

Jinder Mahal has wrestled in three of these 238 matches.

None of the Shield members were on this list of main event matches when I first wrote about it back in October 2014. There have been 52 new main event matches added to the list since then, and at least one Shield member wrestled in 31 of those matches.

However, Dean Ambrose last appeared on the list in December 2016 (and is no longer in WWE), and Roman Reigns’ most recent main event match was in September 2018. That means Reigns has not wrestled in a one-on-one main event match on PPV since he returned to WWE in February 2019, following his cancer diagnosis in October 2018. Seth Rollins did wrestle in five of these 238 matches in 2019, but has yet to appear in one in 2020.

When I first wrote about this topic in October 2014, Brock Lesnar wrestled in 12 such main event matches. Since then his total has increased all the way up to 25 total matches, vaulting past legends like Bret Hart, The Rock, and Steve Austin.

Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns, and Brock Lesnar are the only wrestlers since October 2014 who have broken in more than one main event rookie.

The only years where a main event debut did not take place were 1989 and 2008.

That being said, very few new names have joined the list since the start of 2018. Four people were added to the list since the start of 2018 - Ronda Rousey, Nikki Bella, Baron Corbin, and Drew McIntyre. Nikki Bella is already retired from the ring. Rousey has been on hiatus for over a year. I think it’s fair to say that not many people regard Corbin as a main event level star, despite his lone main event match on this list. It’s too early in McIntyre’s run to know how he will fare. This looks to me like a pretty damning sign of WWE’s inability to create new stars.

Since the start of 2019, five different wrestlers have appeared in more than one of these main event matches. That includes Seth Rollins (5 matches), Bray Wyatt (3), Goldberg (2), Undertaker (2), and Brock Lesnar (2).

Full Match Listing

Finally, I’m going to include a table with the full listing of all 238 matches. But first, here is an explanation of all the column headers in the table:

• Event Number: This is where the match ranks in chronological order out of all 373 PPV events. There are plenty of gaps here because this list only includes the 238 one-on-one main events, rather than all 374 main event matches.
• Event Name: All PPV cards have a name like Extreme Rules or Survivor Series. For In Your House events, I only used a basic numbering system rather than the whole name like St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.
• Month: This is the month that the event took place in, such as August for SummerSlam.
• Year: This is the year the event took place in, such as 2004 for WrestleMania 20.
• Wrestler 1: Each match includes two wrestlers. “Wrestler 1” is the one who had more one-on-one main event matches under their belt coming into the match. In the event of a tie, a coin was flipped to determine “Wrestler 1”.
• Wrestler 2: Each match includes two wrestlers. “Wrestler 2” is the one who had fewer one-on-one main event matches under their belt coming into the match, or otherwise failed to qualify as Wrestler 1, as described above.
• Main Events 1: This is the main event number of the listed match for Wrestler 1. So, Undertaker has “42” listed for WrestleMania 36 Night One, because his Boneyard Match against AJ Styles was his 42nd one-on-one main event match on the list.
• Main Events 2: This is the main event number of the listed match for Wrestler 2. So, AJ Styles has “6” listed for WrestleMania 36 Night One, because that was his 6th one-on-one main event match on the list.
• Combined: This is the sum of “Main Events 1” and “Main Events 2.” You can sort by this column to see which matches included two wrestlers with the most or least combined main events on their record right after the match ended. The “Combined” value for Undertaker versus Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 26 is “56” because that match was Undertaker’s 35th main event and Shawn Michaels’ 21st main event. The sum of those two values is 56.
• In addition to sorting by columns, you can type a name in the search box like “Orton” or “WrestleMania” to filter the table down to entries that include those specific terms. Please keep in mind that some wrestlers like Mick Foley may have their matches listed across multiple gimmicks like “Mankind” and “Dude Love.” Other terms like “Flair” may result in entries from multiple wrestlers, in this case Charlotte Flair and Ric Flair. The term “Rock” will result in entries from The Rock, Brock Lesnar, and Ken Shamrock. However, typing in “The Rock” will eliminate Lesnar and Shamrock’s entries from the search results.

With that out of the way, here is the full listing of all 238 main event matches:

So there you have it, Cagesiders.

What are your thoughts on this comprehensive list of WWE’s one-on-one PPV main events? Do you think Drew McIntyre will get to break in any main event rookies? If so, who will he help join this list in the future?