Today In Wrestling History 6/17: Andre The Giant Submits, Fatal In-Ring Injury, WWF Invades MN, More

* 44 years ago in 1971, Alberto Torres passed away at just 37 years old after suffering a ruptured appendix during a match a few days earlier where he teamed with "Cowboy" Bob Ellis against Ox Baker and The Claw. Within wrestling, the death was used by some promoters to get Baker's heart punch finisher over, with the idea that he had killed a man with it.

That ramped up the following year when Ray Gunkel also happened to pass away after wrestling Baker, meaning that Ox could claim to have killed two men with his "deadly" trademark move. It fit his persona of being this mean, scary, ugly heel, though in real life, Ox was a big goofball who loved to dance.

* 31 years ago in 1984, the WWF made its Twin Cities debut with a house show at the Met Center in Bloomington, Minnesota. The whole show was taped, with most of the card airing on TV in some form, both on the domestic WWF recap shows as well as the World Pro Wrestling show that aired major promotion American and Mexican matches on TV Tokyo in Japan.

The show was, in various ways, tailored for the market. The AWA and its cities were a major target of the WWF expansion, with the promotion acquiring top stars like Hulk Hogan, "Dr. D" David Schultz, and Gene Okerlund as well as members of their production crew. Building around them paid off, as the show was a big success.

The main event was Hogan vs. Schultz in a bloodbath that renewed a feud that never quite finished before they left the AWA, something that was even acknowledged in the localized promos for the match. Okerlund was working ringside as an announcer, too, and enduring AWA legend Mad Dog Vachon made his WWF debut on the card, as well. It was quite the shot to fire in the wrestling war, and the AWA was reeling.

* 30 years ago in 1985, the WWF ran the monthly Championship Wrestling syndication taping at the Mid-Hudson Civic Center in Poughkeepsie, New York, which featured a few notable matches:

Terry Funk made his WWF debut, defeating Aldo Marino (Ricky Santana) in a squash match. This is best remembered for what happened before the match. Ring attendant Mel Phillips (the same Mel Phillips who left the company years later amidst allegations of sexual harassment and abuse) had his hands full with most of Funk's gear, so he half-jokingly put Funk's hat on his head to take it to the locker room. Funk snapped and beat the hell out of him, which was a heck of a memorable way to introduce him.

In the last week of the taping, which probably not coincidentally aired during July sweeps, The U.S. Express (Barry Windham and Mike Rotundo) defeated The Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff to regain the WWF Tag Team Championship, which they had lost at the first WrestleMania. It's been forgotten by time, but Windham and Rotundo (the different spelling was so he could have a new "WWF name") were incredibly over during their run together as top babyface tag team. Just check out the crowd reaction for their entrance and even more so their victory here.

* 29 years ago in 1986, NJPW ran a TV taping at Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium in Nagoya, Aichi that was headlined by Antonio Inoki vs. Andre the Giant. While they wrestled each other many times, this match is notable for Inoki getting clean submission win over Andre in what was likely his only submission loss, or at least his only submission loss after he became a major international star. Andre would get back surgery not long after this, setting up his runs as Giant Machine (to hide his back brace) and against Hulk Hogan (when it became clear he didn't have much left).

* 19 years ago in 1996, NJPW ran special event dubbed "Skydiving J" that was taped for TV and home video. The entire card consisted of junior heavyweight matches, with a different title defended in every outing.

The main event saw Black Tiger (Eddie Guerrero) get the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship shot he earned by winning the Best of the Super Junior Tournament. Sasuke won by hitting the most popular finish of 1996, which was to counter a top rope Razor's Edge variation (in this case, Tiger's BT Bomb) off the second rope into a hurricanrana. The match, which was their only singles bout together, was a big disappointment due to Sasuke having the flu.

They shot a big angle after the match, as newly crowned British Commonwealth champion Jushin Thunder Liger (having destroyed Dick Togo earlier in the card) challenged all of the other champions to a winner takes all tournament and everyone threw their belts into a pile in the middle of the ring. The unified title would be called the J-Crown, with the tournament being held on the undercards of the heavyweight division's G-1 Climax round robin tournament in August.