My Top 5 WWE Fantasy Matches

With WWE’s Survivor Series event hyping the “fantasy” matchup of Brock Lesnar vs. Goldberg II, I thought that this would be a good time to share five fantasy bouts of mine. Some of these matches have a slight chance of happening while others can only take place in the world of WWE video games. For the sake of variety, I will not repeat wrestlers for this post. Without any further ado, here are my top five WWE fantasy matches.

5. Brian Pillman vs. Dean Ambrose

Being a Greater Cincinnati native, I would love to see the two most famous wrestlers from the Queen City square off in the middle of the ring. Pillman’s high flying maneuvers that earned him the nickname of “Flyin’ Brian” combined with his “loose cannon” gimmick would make for a very interesting wrestling mash up with Ambrose’s hardcore reputation and “lunatic fringe” character. As I said in my introduction, some of these matches can only take place in video games, and this match is one of them as Pillman tragically passed away in 1997.

4. Randy Orton vs. The Rock

This is a bout that I have played many times on my WWE video games. The “Viper” and the “Brahma Bull” would no doubt tear the house down if they ever met in a ring for a one-on-one match. They did have a previous encounter at Wrestlemania 20 in a 3-on-2 tag team match when Evolution took on the Rock ‘n Sock Connection, but these two third generation wrestlers have never battled each other in a singles match. Orton’s slow and calculating approach would clash wonderfully with the charismatic and electrifying tactics of the Rock. This match has a pretty good chance of taking place as Orton is still an active wrestler, and the Rock usually comes back to the WWE once a year.

3. John Cena vs. Hulk Hogan

I think this match is a no brainer as Cena, the self-proclaimed “face that runs the place,” is today’s version of Hulk Hogan. The similarities between their two characters are obvious as Cena’s mantra of “hustle, loyalty, and respect” is a modern twist on Hogan’s motto of “training, saying your prayers, and eating your vitamins.” Both are notorious for turning matches around in their favor with Hogan “hulking” up and Cena utilizing what have become known as the “five moves of doom.” These two teamed up with Shawn Michaels in 2005 on an episode of Monday Night Raw with Hogan going on to face Michaels instead of Cena later that year at Summerslam. A matchup between these two wrestling titans likely will not happen due to Hogan’s back issues and the fact that he is currently not with WWE.

2. Goldberg vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin

Two of the biggest names to come out of the Monday Night Wars of the late 1990s and early 2000s have never exchanged fists inside the squared circle. Goldberg was arguably the biggest star in WCW, and the same can easily be said about Austin in WWE. Both of their onscreen characters were legitimate tough guys, and their look, wrestling style, and appeal to wrestling fans are eerily similar. Unfortunately, Austin’s history with neck injuries has made this matchup impossible to happen. These two just missed squaring off in 2003 as Goldberg made his WWE debut the night after Austin had his final match at Wrestlemania 19.

1. Sting vs. The Undertaker

To me, this is the ultimate dream match. Sting and the Undertaker were the two cornerstones for their respective companies during the Monday Night War. The stinger never left WCW, and the dead man remained loyal to WWE. Both of their characters evolved during this era of professional wrestling with Sting transitioning from a colorful surfer like wrestler to a silent vigilante reminiscent of “the Crow,” and the Undertaker morphing into the sinister leader of the “Ministry of Darkness” and eventually the intimidating reaper who rode motorcycles to the ring. After WCW was bought out by WWE in 2001, everybody thought that Sting and the Undertaker would finally meet. However, Sting would not appear in a WWE ring until 2014 when he made his WWE debut as the silent vigilante at Survivor Series. During Sting’s absence, the Undertaker had gone back to his dead man character, and these two wrestlers with similar gimmicks seemed destined to clash at the “Showcase of the Immortals.” It looked like the dream match between the Undertaker and Sting was on the verge of becoming a reality at Wrestlemania 31, but Sting faced Triple H and the Undertaker battled Bray Wyatt. A neck injury then forced Sting into early retirement, making this dream match just that, a dream. Sting has hinted that may have one more match left in him, but a bout between the icon and the phenom will most likely never happen.

Those are my top five WWE fantasy matches. I think that each match would be an exciting bout to watch and would easily be a match of the year candidate. There are more dream matches that I would like to see such as D-Generation X taking on the New World Order or Austin and Hogan meeting for the first time, but as I said in the introduction to this post, I was only listing one wrestler per match for the sake of variety. Hopefully one of these matches does indeed happen in the future, but until then, I will continue to play out these bouts in the form of video games.