Here's an interesting topic of discussion, I hope anyway--
But my first thought is Randy Savage in 1999. I'm sure age played a huge factor as well but the enormous drop off he had in his ring work from the year prior is astonishing.
Even in his 40s in WCW, Randy proved to be more than serviceable still in the ring but the injuries piled up quickly. He had the incredibly stupid HIIIIGHHHHH cage dive at Halloween Havoc 1997 where I have no idea how he didn't completely destroy both of his legs. Going back and watching it, it's scary as hell.
This led to him eventually tearing his ACL in the match against Sting at Spring Stampede 1998 that ended his title reign very prematurely, dropping it to Hogan the next night on Nitro.
Shockingly, and probably stupidly, he continued to compete occasionally as a member of the nWo Wolfpack before finally disappearing after the Great American Bash 1998... I believe? in a losing effort against Bret Hart.
He returns almost a full year later in 1999 with Gorgeous George with a huge amount of added muscle mass, probably to make up for the fact that the ACL injury had robbed him of what quickness he had left. It's at this point his entire moveset becomes punch, kick, scoop slam, and the flying elbow drop. He wasn't even doing the diving axe handle anymore, probably to prevent the drop onto his knees. The elbow drop itself was scary to watch. He no longer was protecting his opponents, instead landing on them directly with all of his (increased) weight. He injured several guys doing it this way.
Well.....Ravishing Rick Rude immediately comes to mind here although a fun fact about that:
RRR signed a Lloyds of London deal after getting hurt by Sting in 94 thinking he could never wrestle again, mind you this was right before the Hogan boom in WCW that really made everyone a fuck ton of money. The Lloyds deal made it impossible for Rude to get back in the ring, even after he was cleared to go again, unless he paid out some 600,000 dollars to Lloyds.
Barry Windham is the first name that comes to mind. Before Randy Orton came along, Barry was the quintessential naturally gifted, smooth wrestler in his younger, injury-free heyday. According to several shoots with the likes of Flair and Arn, Barry had a much greater desire to chase women than greatness. That lack of focus and a slew of knee injuries slowly robbed Barry of his once all-time projecting career to the point that by his WWF end he was around 300 pounds and essentially a jobber and only found a touch of tag success his last WCW run. If he was healthy and motivated: no reason Barry wouldn't have been a star longer than he was and end up with at least an Orton-esque career.
Ring-ability wise: Scott Steiner certainly comes to mind. Adopted the "Big Poppa Pump" physique/character to compensate. Steiner hasn't had his old speed/crispness or been able to use the freakish parts of his moveset in 20 years, so people forget how freakish he was when he was doing backflip fallaway slams on Ron Simmons, standing frankensteiners at his size and the proper Steiner Screwdriver before it became essentially a tombstone. Guy was legitimately a world-class worker and athlete in his athletic prime.
The first name that popped into my mind was Brian Pillman.
What a damn shame too because his character in 96-97 was AMAZING! The promos were off the charts scary good, and he probably could have coasted off of that alone had he stayed alive for the Attitude Era.
But can you imagine what it would have been like to have 96-97 Pillman's personality inside of 92-93 Pillman's body? Whoa.
2001 HHH and 96-97 Pillman were the first two that came to mind. HHH never again reached his 2000-2001 god tier Best In The World status after the first quad injury.
Andre the giants ankle injury. His in ring work really took a hit in the early eighties, and he also startes gaining weight.
He really changed a lot in two years time, and the added weight put further stress on his body. So sadly, it was the beginning of the end.
Scott Steiner, his WWE run as Big Poppa Pump tanked because he constantly botched in the ring and would get blown up quick due to a slew of injuries. He couldn't handle the schedule anymore by that point. Real shame as Steiner in his prime could have had a great run and he was apparently booked to wrestle Triple H at Wrestlemania but because their match at the Royal Rumble was such so awful the match got scrapped along with Steiner's push.
Another one is Ken Kennedy/Anderson. I don't know if injury changed his ring style but he had a couple of mega pushes in WWE scrapped due to suffering badly timed injuries. He was a guy that had promo skills at the level of The Rock and was pretty solid in the ring, but for whatever reasons things didn't work out for him. He should have been a huge star potentially the top star in WWE.
Two big men that had knee injuries which completely slowed them down were Hulk Hogan & Hillbilly Jim. With Hogan it obviously didn’t slow down his career. With Jim it absolutely did. He was in line to be the clear #2 babyface with WWF and had a ton of momentum.
Others that come to mind that I haven’t seen mentioned:
Stone Cold Steve Austin: yes, the biggest run of his career (and some may argue in the history of professional wrestling...IMO it was Hogan), after the Owen Hart injury. However, he was never the same again. What was great fornhim and the company was that the brawling style that he is known for fit his character better than the technical wrestling style from his days as Stunning Steve or The Ringmaster...or even the VERY EARLY days of Stone Cold.
If you ever want to know how good of a wrestler he was before the injury, watch his matches with Ricky Steamboat in WCW but also his matches with Bret Hart at Survivor Series 1996 (the memorable all time great at WM 13 was more of a fight and a damn good one) and to a slightly lesser degree his King of the Ring 1997 match with Shawn Michaels.
Davey Boy post warrior trapdoor bump was a shell of himself. So so sad. Same with Dynamite after his back. Bam Bam after he blew out a knee & Jake after the guitar shot were also never the same again.
Father time catches all so this should be decent sized list.
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