Did The Brooklyn Brawler Ever Win In WWE?
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The Brooklyn Brawler was one of the most beloved jobbers in WWE history, and managed to endure himself to audiences despite his impressively bad loss record in the company, but did he ever actually win a match in WWE?
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Well, in short, the answer is yes. Yes, despite spending his entire WWE career as nothing more than enhancement talent, The Brooklyn Brawler actually managed to pick up a surprising amount of wins. In fact, he actually recorded no less than 35 wins in 1990, a year that proved to be the most successful of his career.
Whether it was as a heel, or a face, Brawler never really progressed further than being an enhancement talent, and very rarely actually had real meaningful storylines to take part in, but that didn't stop him from having his hand raised on a number of occasions.
He Was Initially Paired With Bobby Heenan But Still Didn't Win
After several years as an enhancement talent without any real character, Steve Lombardi aligned himself with Bobby Heenan in January 1989 and donned the gimmick of The Brooklyn Brawler in a feud with The Red Rooster.
While the move initially hinted at maybe some semblance of success for Lombardi going forward, that was quickly squashed as he continuously failed to win a match during his time with Heenan. He was beaten by The Red Rooster more than once during the rivalry, and just four months after they joined forced, Brawler and Heenan went their separate ways.
From there he returned to his place as an enhancement talent, but kept the Brooklyn Brawler gimmick, managing to win five matches against other enhancement talents throughout the rest of 1989.
1990 Was His Most Successful Year With 35 Wins
After a rough 1989, 1990 proved to be the Brooklyn Brawler's most successful year as he picked up 35 wins throughout the 12 months, a feat he'd never come close to again.
Brawler even managed to get some level of revenge on the Red Rooster as he finally got the better of him on more than one occasion, and actually embarked on a winning streak for the first time in his career.
The streak didn't last too long, though, and he soon returned to losing ways. He regularly found himself on the losing ends of matches throughout the rest of 1990, but his wins over other enhancement talents still ensured it was the best year of his career.
His Eight Match Winning Streak In 1993 Was The Longest Of His Career
While he seemingly had no direction whatsoever heading into 1993, somehow Lombardi embarked on the biggest winning streak of his entire WWE career when he rattled off eight straight victories.
Including several wins over Jim Powers, the eight-match winning streak was the most success he'd seen in WWE, despite being in the company for over a decade at this point.
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Brooklyn Brawler even managed to pick up a win against a very young, future ECW World Champion in Tommy Dreamer later that summer, but it was one of his final acts in the gimmick, as Lombardi ditched the character just two weeks later. Instead, he began trying out several different gimmicks, in search of more success.
His legacy as the Brooklyn Brawler is still what most fans fondly remember of him, though, and despite his record inside the squared circle, he still managed to endure himself to audiences all over the world and may be one of the finest examples of how little win/loss records can sometimes matter in the world of professional wrestling.
He eventually returned as the Brooklyn Brawler and enjoyed the biggest moment of his career when he surprisingly won a battle royale in September 1997 to take on WWF Champion Shawn Michaels in a title match, alas it wasn't to be and despite dominating the champion, he came out, like he did so many other times, on the losing end.
