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Wrestlers Who Ruined Their Own Legacy
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00:00If there's anything wrong, people will be sure to let you know about it every chance.
00:06...wrestlers who ruined their own legacy.
00:08Number 10, John Bradshaw Layfield.
00:11Despite popularity as a member of the Acolytes,
00:13John Layfield's true renaissance came in 2004
00:16when his character unexpectedly shifted completely
00:18into an egocentric, money-obsessed American patriot.
00:22It worked so well that he climbed the card to the WWE Championship.
00:26Many people remember JBL more, though, for his presence on WWE commentary
00:29for the better part of 10 years.
00:31Stories about Layfield working stiff have always been rumoured,
00:34but it was around 2017 that the allegations of bullying became much more vocal.
00:39Fans called for the man to be fired from TV,
00:41and many got sick of hearing him commentate after reading the accounts of his victims.
00:45Justin Roberts, the former WWE announcer,
00:48said in his autobiography that JBL had stolen his passport,
00:51and many ex-WWE stars also described Layfield as a bully.
00:54In April 2017, NXT announcer Mauro Ranallo left the company,
00:58and whilst he claimed it wasn't the case,
01:01many viewers felt the comments JBL had made on air about Mauro
01:04had affected the commentator's mental well-being.
01:06JBL was forced to make a statement claiming that he had pranked many stars,
01:10but that the WWE had addressed his actions years ago.
01:13In September of the same year,
01:14with the wrestling community sick of the sound of him,
01:16Layfield opted to leave the company to pursue other interests.
01:19Number 9, Perry Saturn.
01:21Many forget that during the late 90s,
01:23Perry Saturn was a valuable commodity.
01:25Starting off as an important part of ECW's early tag division,
01:28Saturn moved on to WCW and became a member of the severely underrated stable Raven's Flock.
01:34When the faction dissolved, he was the lead babyface of the story.
01:37In 2000, Saturn and some of his WCW friends jumped over to the WWF as part of the Radicals
01:43in one of the most talked about moments of the Monday Night War.
01:46A match taped for WWF Jacked was where it all started to go wrong.
01:50After being dropped on his head following a botched arm drag by jobber Mike Bell,
01:54Saturn flipped and legitimately started throwing punches at his opponent.
01:58The match became a fight,
01:59and Mike Bell was also dropped on his head during the ensuing scuffle.
02:03It's generally believed that Saturn's next gimmick change was punishment for these actions,
02:06and the star found himself playing a brain-damaged wrestler who fell in love with a mop.
02:10Saturn's hard work and commitment got the gimmick over,
02:13and so, as WWE do with those who organically get over,
02:16they killed off Moppy and ended the character sooner than perhaps they should have.
02:20With nothing left for him creatively, WWE booted Saturn in November 2002.
02:25If Saturn had kept his cool with Mike Bell, one has to wonder what could have been.
02:29Number 8, Abdullah the Butcher.
02:31Larry Shreve, better known as Abdullah the Butcher,
02:33made a name for himself being one of the most sadistic men in the pro wrestling industry.
02:38His extreme, low-holds-barred and obscenely bloody matches split opinion.
02:42Some were curious and some were disgusted,
02:44and this divide made Abdullah the stuff of legend.
02:46Abdullah had no issues blading himself into a bloody pulp,
02:49and more often than not did the same to his opponents,
02:52sometimes whether they wanted it or not.
02:54Always a controversial figure amongst both fans and peers,
02:56it was in 2012, though, that Shreve was brought before a court
02:59and sued for damages to one of his former opponents,
03:02Hannibal Devin Nicholson.
03:03Nicholson claimed that in 2007 he'd participated in a match with Abdullah
03:07where he had been repeatedly cut open without his consent,
03:10with a blade hidden on the Butcher's finger.
03:12Most importantly, he claimed that the sharing of blood
03:14had caused him to contract Hepatitis C.
03:17The knock-on effect of this diagnosis had caused the WWE contract
03:20that he had worked so hard for and finally earned in 2009
03:24to be rescinded,
03:26and Hannibal was forced to retire from wrestling because of it.
03:29The court found Shreve guilty of negligence, assault and battery,
03:32and he was sued for $2.3 million.
03:35Number 7, Hannibal Devin Nicholson.
03:38Oh, that's awkward.
03:39Having wrestled only on smaller stages, such as Stampede Wrestling,
03:43it was the dream of Devin Nicholson, as with many, to be hired by the WWE,
03:47a dream that was shattered by his interactions with Abdullah the Butcher.
03:51The wrestling community rallied around Devin's pursuit of justice
03:53until he won his court case.
03:55After he was cured of Hepatitis, Hannibal returned to the ring in 2014,
03:59working for his own company, Great North Wrestling,
04:01as well as making appearances elsewhere.
04:03In December 2021, at a World Class Pro Wrestling event,
04:07a horrible incident occurred involving Nicholson and referee Lando Del Toro.
04:11Following his match with Carlito, Nicholson, as his character Blood Hunter,
04:15was booked to kayfabe attack the ref with a spike,
04:18who would then bleed, roll out of the ring, and leave.
04:21What happened instead was Nicholson knelt on Del Toro's back
04:23and repeatedly stabbed him with the spike,
04:26severing an artery and causing Del Toro to nearly pass out.
04:29Reports are mixed on the true version of the events that led up to and followed this.
04:33Nicholson made a statement of about six different excuses as to what went wrong,
04:37but others claimed he was unhinged, smelling like booze before the match,
04:41and even carried on his attack backstage.
04:43Either way, Nicholson shamefully retired from wrestling for a second time,
04:47and any goodwill he'd garnered with his previous struggles was tarnished forever.
04:51Number 6, Shawn Michaels.
04:52The Heartbreak Kid finished off his perfect career
04:55with a spectacular performance at WrestleMania 26 against The Undertaker.
04:59Following this, and the first of two Hall of Fame inductions,
05:02at WrestleMania 28,
05:03Michaels and Taker assisted Triple H to the back to end the show,
05:07a beautiful moment that, to many, truly showed the end of an era.
05:11Michaels managed to resist ruining this moment for oh so long,
05:14so fans were shocked and largely dismayed in late 2018
05:17when HBK unexpectedly jumped from promoting a match
05:20between Triple H and The Undertaker to being physically involved.
05:24That lucrative Saudi Arabia deal had come knocking,
05:27and it demanded a Brothers of Destruction vs. D-Generation X nostalgia match.
05:32At Crown Jewel that November, Michaels put in an awful performance
05:35in what was a no-win situation.
05:37The match was largely agreed to be an unwatchable mess
05:39that demonstrated what Pass Your Prime truly means.
05:43Kane's mask fell off,
05:44Triple H got injured,
05:45and Michaels looked understandably out of his depths.
05:48HBK has since said that he regrets coming out of retirement for,
05:51in his words, a glorified house show.
05:54At the time, Saudi Arabian WWE shows were largely inconsequential
05:57and considered non-canonical,
05:59but it doesn't change the fact that Michaels put the boots on,
06:02went to work,
06:03and ruined the sanctity of his previous retirement.
06:05Number 5, Enzo Amore.
06:07For a time, Enzo Amore and Big Cass were the most over thing on WWE TV.
06:12Quickly jumping from NXT to the main roster,
06:15Enzo's mic work instantly engaged the audience,
06:18and absolutely everyone in every arena was chanting along
06:21that being seven foot tall was not something that one could teach.
06:25After breaking the tag team up, as is WWE want in this era,
06:29Enzo started a successful solo run
06:31that saw him get a hold of the Cruiserweight Championship.
06:33Three months into his second reign, however,
06:35he was suddenly fired from the company.
06:38Allegations appeared that Enzo had sexually assaulted a woman
06:41in a hotel in Phoenix, Arizona.
06:43Amore found himself under investigation,
06:45which was hot water for the company,
06:46and they immediately took action.
06:48Whilst Enzo swore that he had no idea that such a thing existed,
06:51the WWE terminated his contract on the ground
06:53so that they were not informed of the investigation.
06:56Even though said investigation went cold due to insufficient evidence,
06:59Enzo's public perception was further ruined by the man's actions
07:02when he tried to make a scene in the crowd at Survivor Series 2018
07:05by standing on his seat.
07:07Instead of patiently waiting to be forgiven,
07:09he tried to grab the spotlight out of Vince McMahon's hands.
07:12This saw him banned from WWE events for the future,
07:15and since then, his independent bookings have been minimal at best.
07:19Number four, Sonny.
07:20Tammy Sitch is an example of someone who is more well known
07:23for her struggles outside rather than her time within the wrestling industry.
07:27From 1992 to 2000, she bounced around various promotions,
07:30most noticeably the WWF for three years,
07:33positioned on screen as the beautiful blonde girl next door.
07:36Described by the company as the original diva,
07:38Sonny was meant to signify a change of roles for women within the company.
07:42Beautiful, but also smart and deadly.
07:44Behind the scenes, however, she was gathering a reputation for causing issues everywhere she went.
07:48She left the WWF after no-showing events and apparently becoming addicted to painkillers,
07:53and a feud in ECW was interrupted by her being arrested for violating a restraining order.
07:58Her lone year in WCW ended with her leaving the company surrounding rumors of drug abuse.
08:03In 2012, Sonny's path of destruction intensified with being arrested five times over the course of four weeks.
08:09For the next decade, she would routinely be a footnote on wrestling news sites,
08:13and it was terrible that it became normal to hear that she had yet again received a DUI.
08:18It would be impossible to list every legal issue that Sitch has been embroiled in,
08:21but the most important thing is that in March 2022,
08:24her drunken conduct behind the wheel took the life of a 75-year-old man in a parked vehicle.
08:30Sonny, at the time of writing, faces up to 26 years in prison.
08:33Number 3, Ric Flair.
08:35A lot of younger wrestling fans probably know Ric Flair as the man who assaults suit jackets,
08:39enthusiastically yells out a single syllable,
08:42and gets involved in awful pregnancy stories that thankfully never resolve.
08:46But for a time in the 1980s, Ric Flair represented the height of wrestling counterculture.
08:51Flair's 2008 retirement storyline, match with HBK,
08:54and subsequent farewell address were the stuff that any wrestler would dream of.
08:58Flair went out on his own terms in a match-of-the-year winning bout,
09:01and was lauded for it.
09:0318 months later, he ruined it all by wrestling at an ROH show against Hulk Hogan.
09:08Most noticeably, Flair's ensuing stint in TNA was a blemish on his previous swan song
09:13that ended in a second, far less impactful, pun unintended,
09:16retirement against long-time rival Sting.
09:19Despite him vowing to never return to the ring after Jerry Lawler's terrifying on-air heart attack in 2012,
09:25here we are a whole decade later with Flair at 73 years old,
09:29gearing up for one last match on the independent scene.
09:32His original retirement seems a world away now,
09:34tarnished either by Flair's boredom or an unresolved need to prove himself.
09:39There is no way, no matter who the opponent is,
09:41that a geriatric Flair will be able to put on a good match this summer.
09:45Since his perfect retirement is gone, the most we can hope for is something safe.
09:502. Hulk Hogan
09:52If you went back to the 1980s and told a wrestling fan that there would come a time
09:56that the immortal Hulk Hogan was so shamed that the WWE would ignore his existence,
10:00picture them trying to imagine what it was that he could do so wrong.
10:04Whatever you think of his twilight years in the ring,
10:06Hulk Hogan ruined his legacy via some pretty awful comments made in his personal life.
10:11A very personal part of his personal life.
10:14In 2015, a leaked sex tape hit the web recorded 8 years prior featuring the Hulkster
10:19and this would be cause for alarm regardless.
10:22But Hogan's choice of bedroom conversation was bizarre and horrid,
10:26expressing his dissatisfaction that his daughter Brooke was dating a black man
10:29and admitting that, in his words,
10:31he was racist to a point.
10:33In the fallout, WWE removed all references to him from their website.
10:38His position as judge on the upcoming series of Tough Enough was revoked
10:41and his merchandise and the WWE 2K15 DLC for the character was taken down from sale.
10:47Three years later, WWE began to rebuild the bridge for Hogan's return to the company
10:52and their history and he's since hosted WrestleMania and had his second Hall of Fame induction.
10:57The damage to his legacy, however, is still felt,
11:00garnering a feeling of unease whenever he's on WWE TV.
11:031. Chris Benoit
11:05There almost certainly isn't a worse way to ruin your own legacy than this
11:09and I want to state now that that is not meant to be a light-hearted jab.
11:13Chris Benoit's mental health issues that led to two murders and his own suicide
11:17absolutely rocked the sports world
11:19and the effects of it are still felt to this day.
11:21Unlike Hogan able to come back from his horrible displays of bigotry,
11:25Benoit remains the wrestling name that is the furthest from ever being mentioned again.
11:29In the 15 years since the incident,
11:31WWE has done their best to ignore the contributions of Chris Benoit.
11:35Not just cutting around him in video packages that look back on great moments,
11:39but whilst content that features him was on the original version of the WWE Network,
11:43it would often be preceded by a vague discretion message.
11:46With Peacock editing controversies out of WWE programming on their service,
11:51you have to imagine Benoit's name has come up in conversation.
11:54Your own personal opinion of it may vary.
11:56Some can separate the art from the artist and appreciate Chris's career highlights,
12:00culminating in a WWE Championship win at WrestleMania 20.
12:04Others, however, cannot bear to look back and celebrate a man who did what he did.
12:08Whatever you personally think,
12:10the WWE will never acknowledge Chris Benoit and his ruined legacy ever again.
12:15And that's the list.
12:16Let us know what you thought of this video down in the comments below
12:19and any other wrestlers that ruined their legacy.
12:22Sadly, there are plenty more that we couldn't fit into this list.
12:25Make sure you like this video,
12:27share it with your friends,
12:27subscribe and hit that notification bell.
12:30I've been Si from WhatCulture
12:32and have a good week.
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