TOP 5 ALL-TIME STIPULATION MATCHES: The Royal Rumble of course, but what other matches make the top five?

With traditional sports, there are one set of rules for gameplay per league. Rules may be altered from a sport-sponsored amateur league to a professional one, but you know what type of game you’ll experience.

In the world of professional wrestling, there are plenty of options to hold our interest. Singles, tag teams, multi-person matches where the first pin wins, and other times there are eliminations to leave a last person standing. Sometimes these are announced ahead of time so we can anticipate the match as an audience, and sometimes we get surprised. It’s even happened where the rules of the match change during the match!

Stipulations work best to add stakes to a feud. When there hasn’t been a clear winner, the next step is to take it to a tables match, a Last Man Standing match, or clip something to the top of a pole and attach that pole to the corner, bro. Any stipulation you can think of can be done. Light your opponent on fire? Done it. Fight in the concession area? Welcome chaos. Some smaller companies have even encouraged fans to bring their own weapons for performers to use.

There have been stipulations that were terrible ideas, but the story getting there was still memorable. Like the time that Big Boss Man ground up Al Snow’s dog Pepper into his chili like he was Cartman getting revenge on Scott Tenorman. The blindfold match is one that promotes well and sounds great in theory, but I have yet to see the match work well.

Of the match stipulations that are often used, these five are not only my favorite, but I also believe, well-enough protected to matter.

2 Out of 3 Falls

What was once common in professional wrestling, is something rarely used in modern times. When two performers, or two teams, are evenly matched, this is an excellent way to settle the score. In baseball, games are played in a multi-game series as to see a clear winner. Sometimes these five games can be lopsided where one team dominates, and you’ll see other series where teams exchange victories. In the wrestling equivalent of the even match-up, it can be settled when you don’t have you only prove your dominance over your opponent by winning the match, but doing it twice in one night.

This can be done in singles matches or tag matches and works well with your fast pace workers. Occasionally, the Three Stages of Hell Match happens, where they get meta with it and place stipulation matches inside of this stipulation match, making each fall different than the last.

Ladder Match

At one point overused, it’s hard to beat the excitement of a ladder match. Put anywhere from two to 102 wrestlers in the match, place a belt or a contract from the venue rafters, and make sure you’ve placed a Home Depot’s worth of ladders underneath the ring. The winner is the one who grabs the item after climbing the ladder to retrieve it.

You get death-defying heights that used to be reserved for trapeze artists and the scaffolding matches Jim Cornette will advise against. The drama of the hero getting close then knocked off just as the fingers touch. It creates the same effect a near fall gives, and adds an extra element of car crash danger to it. They probably could have gotten too, but it takes forever to climb a ladder in a wrestling match.

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I Quit

I debated between the I Quit stipulation and a Last Man Standing match. Both similar in that a win by pinfall or a tap out isn’t enough. Fluke roll ups happen. You can get caught in a submission hold. This is throwing rules out the window and demolishing your opponent until they have nothing left.

The I Quit stip won out with me because of the added humiliation of actually making your opponent say into a microphone, “I Quit.” It’s not just getting your ass kicked, it’s having your ass kicked by your sworn enemy and telling everyone that you’re not as good as them.

Cage/Hell in the Cell

With both important, the Hell in the Cell match has become the ultimate in cage matches. While the structure is larger, the purpose of the match remains. In a feud, you will see wrestlers win any way necessary.

Made famous by factions like the Fabulous Freebirds or the Four Horsemen, you’d see interference that would keep a clear cut winner from having the spotlight. Sometimes you’d see the action spill out of the ring like you did on Saturday Night’s Main Event when Jacob Fatu and Cody Rhodes made their way into the crowd before the referee could have the bell ring.

A cage is, in theory, able to contain those two men until a winner is clear, and keep other distractors or weapons out. With open tops on cages, and padlocks that won’t stay locked, a lot more interference happens than advertised, but still a reason it is the ultimate in one on one matches.

Royal Rumble

My favorite match of the year, and the match that sells the most streaming subscriptions to PLE services. 30 people enter at intermittent times, and are eliminated when thrown over the top rope and both feet hit the floor.

Essentially a big game of King of the Mountain we played as kids, but the king of this mountain gets a significant title match at WrestleMania. The anticipation, surprise entrances, unique eliminations, and the John Morrison/Kofi Kingston spot of not getting eliminated. A perfect match to introduce someone to professional wrestling.

(Griffin is a lifelong fan of wrestling, superheroes, and rebellious music of all forms. He is the owner of Nerdstalgia, and you can shop online, learn about visiting the store in Colorado Springs, or catch him at a comic con in the Rocky Mountain area by going to http://nerdstalgia.shop.)