Sunday, July 10, 2016

Top 5 Worst Turns in Wrestling

5) Nearly Every Big Show Turn: It pretty much has to be said. The obligatory Big Show turns too much joke. I won't say that every turn was a bad one because some made sense. I liked his heel turn around the Royal Rumble 2000 because his face title run flopped so hard and while I saw his heel turn against John Cena at Over the Limit 2012 coming a mile away, it led to a good run for him. But, the guy has flopped back and forth so many times that it's comical. Mark Henry and Kane also fit this mold too but nobody is quite at his level.

            4) Steve Austin at WrestleMania X-Seven: It sucks that I have to put this here since I love the match itself. I get that there were plans in place to turn Steve Austin heel going into this show. And I get that Austin's desperation for the belt led him to make a deal with the devil. That's fine, but once they heard the pop he got that night they should have called an audible. Austin was insanely over with his hometown crowd and the turn didn't go as well as they hoped. Then, things got worse when Austin became this whiny and cowardly heel. It did not fit the image of the guy we had seen over the years and it all went to shit. 2001 was a time for odd turns as I could also mention turning Chris Jericho heel when he was red hot and Kurt Angle turning heel after being the WWF's saving grace in the Alliance angle.

3) Randy Orton Turns Face: I didn't expect to find a face turn that went wrong when compiling this list but here it goes. 2004 was a year that featured Chris Benoit win the World Heavyweight Title. Triple H, the leader of Evolution, was obsessed with the gold but was never able to wrestle it away from Benoit. At SummerSlam, Triple H's protege in Evolution, Randy Orton, earned a title shot. Orton was able to win the belt that Triple H couldn't and repeat the performance of beating Benoit the following night. Triple H had Evolution turn on Orton in the midst of that celebration. This proved to be a complete mistake though. Orton should have driven a jealous Triple H out as leader of Evolution and taken over. Instead, he was turned face and totally bombed before losing the title to Triple H a month later. He was so bad at being good that he was a heel again within a few months.

2) Monty Brown Aligns Himself with Jeff Jarrett: Oh man, this one really, really felt like a missed opportunity. I had just started getting into TNA during 2005 and Monty Brown was one of the best acts they had going early on. Yes, he was limited in the ring but he had the gift of gab and connected with the fans in a great way. He had come close on several occasions to winning the NWA World Heavyweight Title and seemed destined to be a big star. Instead, he turned on DDP and sided with Jarrett. Somehow he did this because he was tired of being held back from title shots. This made no sense and completely killed Monty Brown's potential in TNA.

1) Rikishi Turns Heel in 2000: This tops my list purely because it's the most ill timed and ill conceived turn that I can recall. For those who don't recall, Rikishi was scorching hot in 2000. He dominated the early portions of the Royal Rumble and had an Intercontinental Title run. He and Too Cool were among the most over acts in the WWE, with Too Cool even scoring their own WWF Tag Team Title run. Then in late 2000, Rikishi randomly revealed that he was the one who ran Stone Cold down the previous year. His reasoning that he did it "FO DA ROCK" was lame and he was clearly a poor choice. The turn did nothing for him as it hard to take a guy serious as a heel when he walks around in a thong. This was a terrible idea, was poorly executed and ended a potentially great angle with a tremendous whimper.