The 411 Wrestling Top 5 3.07.12: Week 164 – Top 5 Worst WrestleMania Performers

Hello everyone and welcome to 411 Wrestling’s Top 5 List. What we are going to is take a topic each week and all the writers here on 411 wrestling will have the ability to give us their Top 5 on said topic, plus up to three honorable mentions. Most of our topics will be based on recent events in the Wrestling World, looking at those events that make us think of times past.

So, on to this week’s topic…

TOP 5 WORST WRESTLEMANIA PERFORMERS

Gavin Napier
Criteria: No kayfabe here, just the men and women that made me lose interest in Wrestlemanias through the years.

5. The Undertaker – Okay, I’m pretty sure I’m going to catch hell for this. If we’re being completely honest, though, there have been some absolute stinkers of matches in “the streak”. Looking at you, Jimmy Snuka, Jake Roberts, Giant Gonzalez, King Kong Bundy, Psycho Sid, Big Bossman, A-Train/Big Show, Kane 2, and Mark Henry. If you weren’t counting, that’s about half of “the streak” that sent me into the other room, to the computer, to the bathroom, or to a nap. Can you name anybody else that’s had as many as 9 terrible matches at Mania? Didn’t think so.

4. The Big Show – Just let me say that this isn’t a reflection on my opinion of Big Show as a wrestler. He’s a consummate professional, who puts people over regularly and does what is asked of him without complaint. That being said, he’s not been much fun at Wrestlemania. A plodding setup match vs. Mankind, a handicap match against Undertaker, a dull match vs. Cena, the Akebono debacle, an awful tag team match, another bad tag match, and a pointless six man tag are all on his resume at ‘Mania. When a match against Floyd Mayweather is one of your highlights…it’s not a good thing.

3. Hercules – Think about the bad matches the last two guys had, minus all the star power. Hercules and Billy Jack Haynes had maybe the worst blow off match ever at a ‘Mania at III, and it was just the beginning. What he lacked in number of appearances, Herc made up for in sheer boredom.

2. Jake Roberts – I expect more from Jake. One of the greatest talkers and ring psychologists of all time, Jake often found himself sort of in no man’s land around Wrestlemania time. Whether he was taking advantage of jobbers, wrestling under a hood (literally, not a mask), lost in 6 man tags, or trying to get something out of Andre, Jake underachieved in a big, big way at Wrestlemania.

1. Michael Cole – Cole gets this honor by managing to stink out loud in two separate roles. I understand the wrestling thing. The feud with Lawler actually drew massive heat and the match wasn’t supposed to be good. I understand it was to get Lawler a “Wrestlemania moment”. All that aside, they could have found another way for Jerry to get that. The bigger problem is the announcing. We’ve gone from being unintentionally bad and forced to follow Jim Ross on commentary to being intentionally grating in a way that just annoys me. I don’t dislike Cole like I disliked Bobby Heenan when I was 8, I dislike him like I dislike going to the dentist. Worst of all, unlike wrestlers, Cole is involved in multiple matches every year. For all of that, he’s my worst of the worst at Wrestlemania.

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Aaron Frame
Criteria: Based off of record.

5. Jacques Rougeau (The Mountie) (1-6) – Never really was a huge fan of his. Most of his Wrestlemania matches were grossly uninspiring. Well, The Rougeau Brothers were entertaining enough. And Jacques met his first loss as a part of that team at WrestleMania III to the Dream Team. At WrestleMania IV, his second loss was from not winning a battle royal. WrestleMania V he got his third loss from the Bushwackers. WrestleMania VII was his one and only win against a guy who I’ll talk about later, Tito Santana. That was also his first WrestleMania as The Mountie. WrestleMania VIII he took yet another loss in 8-man tag action. Wrestlemania X Men on a Mission gave him another loss. This time he was part of The Quebecers. WrestleMania XIV, he was a part of a rather terrible tag team battle royal. As you can see, most of the matches he was in were garbage. Technically, he never ate a pin, but he was never really in any memorable matches.

4. Big Show (3-8) – Show is another guy that I never really enjoyed at WrestleMania. He has yet to really have a match that is memorable. He lost two gimmick matches against Akebono and Floyd Mayweather. His three wins aren’t even that impressive. His first win was against Rikishi, his second was Morrison and Truth, and his third was last year in that horrible 8-man tag match. Show has just had horrible luck at WrestleMania as well as horrible matches.

3. JBL (2-8) – Two wins? Only two measly wins on the biggest stage? I thought JBL was supposed to be some sort of self-proclaimed wrestling god. His only two wins were against Finlay and Right to Censor. His last loss was against Rey Mysterio who also retired him. All around, JBL has just had terrible outings at WrestleMania.

2. Tito Santana (2-7) – While Tito has had some absolutely fantastic matches at WrestleMania, he owns one of the worst records out there. His only 2 wins were at WrestleMania I where he defeated The Executioner by submission and WrestleMania IX he defeated Papa Shango by pinfall. Other than that, it was a lot of forgettable losses.

1. Goldust (0-5) – While Goldust’s record isn’t as horrible as some of the aforementioned, he owns the worst WrestleMania record. A whopping 5 losses with absolutely no wins at all. The son of The Dream just couldn’t catch a break. Not to mention that his only five matches I can’t even remember. Well, I’ll take that back. I do remember the Hollywood backlot brawl against Roddy Piper. But I think the worst loss of all has to have been his last WrestleMania loss. Against Maven. As much of a fan of Goldust I am, he just has had the worst performance record at WrestleMania.

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TJ Hawke
Criteria: It’s a combination of things, but mostly it’s determining expectations for a performance and seeing which people fell short the worst and the most often. The performance could be judged, financially, match-quality wise, and a little bit of his or her kayfabe performance.

5. Dustin Rhodes aka Goldust – Goldust has had a number of crappy matches over the years at Wrestlemania and he lost them all. That’s bad enough to make this list.

4. Booker T – Booker T was only occasionally put in a good position during his years in the WWE, and his appearances at the biggest show of the year seem to reflect that. He had a shitty feud with Edge over a shampoo commercial in 2002. He lost to Triple H for the WWE Championship in 2003 in a borderline racist angle with a forgettable blowoff at Wrestlemania. He was in a forgettable, get-everyone-on-the-card match in 2004. He was left off the main show in 2005 and was reduced to winning the pre-show Battle Royal. In 2006, he and Sharmell lost to the BOOGEYMAN. Finally, in 2007, in by far the best match of his Wrestlemania career, he failed to win Money in the Bank. Overall, Booker T, one of the most charismatic performers of the 2000’s, had mostly forgettable and/or meaningless showings at the biggest wrestling show of the year.

3. John Bradshaw Layfield – Bradshaw competed in many forgettable Wrestlemania matches from 1997 to 2004, and then he competed in two matches that should have been good but he brought them down tremendously. JBL’s match with John Cena in 2005 was an incredibly dull affair that he dominated almost for the entirety of the bout. JBL then had a below average match with Chris Benoit in 2006. While Benoit was not at his peak in 2006, clearly he could still was having good matches with everybody…just not JBL. After a brief retirement, JBL came back for two more forgettable matches. He defeated Finlay in 2008 in the conclusion to the Hornswoggle’s Father angle. In 2009, he career ended when he was squashed by Rey Mysterio.

2. The Big Show – One could argue that the best match Big Show has ever had at Wrestlemania was against Floyd Mayweather, which tells you all you need to know about his match quality at the biggest wrestling event of the year. Not only has he had very few matches worth watching, but also from a kayfabe standpoint, he has done terribly at Wrestlemania. A lot of people would consider The Big Show’s career to be a disappointment, and I think that that disappointment can be viewed in a nutshell in his performances at Wrestlemania.

1. Kane – Kane has had a bunch of just nothing matches over the years at Wrestlemania. Besides some solid performances in a handful of Money in the Bank matches, Kane has nothing to hang his hat on when it comes to Wrestlemania matches. 12 Wrestlemania matches and he never had a special performance.

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Jon Butterfield
Criteria: To make this list you have to have sucked in the majority of your ‘Mania appearances; you have to have had some of the WORST matches on the card, and in the history of the show. I don’t care if you only wrestled ONCE, or you wrestled TEN TIMES, bottom line, if you sucked and I saw it, you’re on the list.

5. Hillbilly Jim – Hillbilly Jim stumbles in at number five on my list, his ‘fun’ match with King Kong Bundy and a bunch of midgets endearing itself to nobody in particular and pretty much starting the trend for worthless BS on the ‘Biggest Stage of Them All’. To Jim’s credit, he wasn’t a serious wrestler to begin with, but that only makes me hate him all the more. Sideshow crap like this belonged on house shows because live audiences love this goofy shit (in Vinny Mac’s world at least). Millions watching on Pay-Per-View, however, expect more – not that that ever stopped either the ‘E or the ‘F from ramming it down our throats. At a very unreasonable price.

4. Giant Gonzalez – Giant Gonzalez shuffles immobile-y in at number four, losing to the Undertaker by DQ (that’s right, we didn’t even get a finish from this one…) in one of ‘Taker’s many stinkers from the 1990’s. The only thing that can possibly raise a smile from ANYBODY re-watching this travesty has to be when The Undertaker actually FALLS ASLEEP mid-match (much like the rest of us). The announcers seemed to think Gonzalez had used a chloroform-soaked rag or something, but I know better. Trust me.

3. The Big Show – The Big Show staggers aimlessly in at number three having had a series of awful, awful matches. From the dreadful ECW-lite Hardcore horror of Show vs. Kane vs. Raven, to the meaningless handicap squash that was Show & A-Train vs. Undertaker, to THAT ‘Sumo match’ with Akebono, and even Show & Kane vs. Carlito & Chris Masters (two of the greatest tag teams in history well worth showcasing at ‘Mania), Show has done some major damage to the reputation of ‘The Grandaddy of ‘em all’. Go ahead, defend those ‘matches’. Defend also his stinker against Floyd Mayweather and tell me how he’s a swell guy for jobbing so often to put such timeless pro’s over. I won’t listen, but go ahead.

2. Bart Gunn – Bart Gunn slumps unconsciously in at number two on the list, but the question is, should he be number one? Maybe. His boxing match with Butterbean was not only horrendously bad, single-handedly making a mockery of two separate industries, but his ‘performance’ was terrible. Here’s something for you: Johnny Knoxville lasted longer against The ‘Bean than Gunn did on an episode of Jackass, and that’s saying something. It’s also saying something that somebody at the ‘F figured this might be competitive. Or interesting. Or not totally and utterly pointless, which it was.

1. Brock Lesnar – Brock Lesnar plummets face-first into the number one spot on my list on list for two distinct reasons: one, he messed up what could have been the greatest spectacle the show had EVER seen by botching a shooting star press (that he COULD execute years earlier in the development territory) in an otherwise awesome main event, and two, because he then followed that up with the most meaningless turd of all in his ‘double departure’ bout against Goldberg. Seriously, both guys were leaving, WHO GAVE A SHIT WHO WON?! Neither of these two, apparently, because this was bad even for a bout between two lumbering hulks who require everyone else to do the work for them. Crap, crap, crap – and consider this, under other circumstances, couldn’t they have been a pair of really well executed, mega-high profile bouts? For shame, Brock, for shame.

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YOUR TURN KNOW IT ALLS
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