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Rikishi (And Other Pushes You Didn't Buy)

9K views 73 replies 44 participants last post by  Codyreigns 
#1 ·
What are some of the more obscure (as in, not John Cena or Roman Reigns) pushes that you just couldn't get behind?

Rikishi is always high up on this list for me. It culminated at the Armageddon HIAC. I specifically remember thinking how many other people I would have preferred to see in his spot and how out of place he seemed next to the other 5 GOATs involved in the match. Like the Morrison/Miz song says, he got "famous for twerking" alongside a nauseating Scotty 2 Hotty, and I never bought him as a believable main eventer.

Goldust was another one. He was pushed pretty hard in the mid-90s, albeit on a very thin roster.
 
#42 ·
Edge. I just couldn't buy it. He was a tag guy who was never even in the best team and then he split and the lesser guy Christian kept getting the upper hand on him. It was only watching the recent documentary about his return that I truly started to appreciate him
 
#51 ·
Hope it's ok to bump this, but I'm rewatching WWE (started in 1996, now up to just after Mania 2000) and Rikishi is booked very strong....but it's believable. I actually buy him being an upper mid carder. Not only is he in even matches with HHH, Big Show, and KOing Benoit, but the fans are totally with him, believing in what they are seeing.

I think the heel turn may have been more of an issue than the actual placement on the card? Granted, where I am atm there is no Austin or Undertaker so he may be unnaturally high where I am watching now.
 
#59 ·
It's kind of frustrating to have so many former champions running around. Starting from 1997, you had Bret Hart, Sycho Sid, The Undertaker, Shawn Michaels, Steve Austin, Kane, The Rock, Mankind, Triple H, Vince McMahon, Big Show and Kurt Angle before you get to the end of the Attitude era. You can maybe count Chris Jericho's phantom win if you want to. That's 12, maybe 13 guys, and Vince was basically an angle. By the time you get to the end of the Attitude era, Bret, Sid, Shawn and Mick are gone.

Here are the wrestlers counted by the WWE as former "World Champions" on the roster today:

  • Aleister Black
  • Andrade
  • Big Show
  • Bobby Lashley
  • Brock Lesnar
  • Dolph Ziggler
  • Drew McIntyre
  • Jinder Mahal
  • Kevin Owens
  • Randy Orton
  • Rey Mysterio
  • Seth Rollins

That's 12 right there on Raw.

  • AJ Styles
  • Braun Strowman
  • Bray Wyatt
  • Daniel Bryan
  • Jeff Hardy
  • Kofi Kingston
  • The Miz
  • Roman Reigns
  • Sheamus

9 on SmackDown. 21 World Champions so far. If you want to count NXT.

  • Adam Cole
  • Finn Balor
  • Johnny Gargano
  • Keith Lee
  • Tommaso Ciampa

A bit leaner on NXT with 5. 26 all up. It's just too many. That's more than you really need for a roster, haha.
 
#60 ·
Heidenreich being pushed as a new member of the LOD and even winning the tag titles with Animal, and then going on to feud with The Undertaker (or was that the other way round?). Either way he was pretty awful and his only redeeming achievement was getting laughs for bumming Michael Cole in a backstage segment.
 
#62 ·
Rey Mysterio...ESPECIALLY the 2006 milking Eddue's death run. It is hard for me to enjoy a Rey Mysterio match because he has the most unrealistic moveset (and that is not a compliment)....his opponents have to do most if the work to make it look like he flipped them or hurt them. He also looks ridiculous performing the moves on heavyweights and even beating them.

I get that he has been exciting fans with the flips and twists for 2 decades now, but he should have NEVER been near any World Title or anything not a cruiserweight or lightweight.


I didn't get it when I first saw him in WCW when I was a teenager and still don't buy him now.
 
#63 ·
I can't recall why but I remember having a real hard time buying into Al Snow as a main event guy during that brief run in ECW.

A lot of people have singled out Justin's main event spot in ECW as weak but I thought the push was gradual enough over a three year period to be believable. I think the booking was just falling part at the seams over there with too many guys exiting and not enough time spent building up new faces to get them over. For example, they had Steve Corino doing a work horse Cinderella angle as champion, just a few months after they did it with Jerry Lynn. Either one on their own would have probably worked but doing them both so close to each other kind of lessened the impact and made it feel like the same hot potato booking that was devaluing both WWF and WCW at the time.
 
#66 ·
Was just reading through this thread and was surprised that people wanted more for Billy Gunn. He was the better wrestler of the group, but didn't have the appeal/charisma compared to his boys, Road Dogg and X-Pac in my opinion. He was good where he was placed but he definitely deserved a better gimmick after dropping Mr Ass and a longer reign with the Intercontinental title.
 
#67 ·
Cena. I thought Batista was more of Vince’s cup of coffee, muscleman, Brock Lesnar Lite, friends with his son in law, flair co-sign. When I saw cena getting the push at first I was baffled especially since Vince doesn’t get hiphop culture so it didn’t make sense at first.
 
#71 ·
Batista was obviously the chosen one. He was the one who got the rumble win, the big story with the slow turn, and the main event of mania. Cena was obviously also getting pushed, but he was obviously not the chosen one at this point in time.

It wasn't until around summerslam 2005 that Cena started replacing him as FOTC.
 
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