Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

In this edition of The Wrestling Estate roundtable, we share our picks for wrestlers who should have been bigger stars.

Chad Gelfand’s Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

Monty Brown

Monty Brown had it all – the size, look and charisma to be a top guy. Hell, he even had the NFL background to go along with it. The reason that Brown had to walk away from WWE is admirable, though, having to take care of his sister’s kids after she passed away. He absolutely should have been NWA Champion in TNA instead of Jeff Jarett monopolizing the title.

MVP

Watching MVP host another edition of the V.I.P. Lounge on Raw after 10 years and seeing just how crisp he still was makes me wonder how well he could have done if he was given a World Heavyweight or WWE Title run. MVP had the memorable entrance, mic skills, charisma and was good enough in the ring to be a main eventer.

Carlito

This seems to be a case of someone wasting their own potential. Carlito was a guy who, when he came into WWE in 2004, seemed like he was destined for the main event. He had a good look, charisma and family pedigree to be a main eventer, but he didn’t put in enough effort to rise to the top, instead coasting off of his natural ability.

Shelton Benjamin

There are few better pure athletes in the history of wrestling than Shelton Benjamin. He could do it all in the ring. What he lacked in mic skills, he made up for in how exciting he was to watch wrestle. It’s unfortunate that instead of getting him an actual manager to take him to the next level, WWE decided to bring in the “Mama Benjamin” character and halt his chances of becoming a main eventer.

Wade Barrett

The Nexus is one of the biggest storyline fumbles in WWE history, a red hot group that was killed at SummerSlam 2010 when John Cena beat Wade Barrett and Justin Gabriel two on one to win the match. It took Barrett a while to finally gain enough momentum to propel him to the main event again. Unfortunately, that Bad News Barrett character became too popular on its own, and WWE decided to water it down rather than go with the hot hand at the time. Another missed opportunity.

Steven Jackson’s Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

Hakushi / Jinsei Shinzaki

Referred to WWE by Sean Waltman in late 1994, Hakushi had all the makings of a megastar. A unique moveset, fantastic look and awesome wrestling ability, Jinsei Shinzaki unfortunately never hit his true potential in either the United States or Japan.

Monty Brown / Marcus Cor Von

In the early years of TNA, there were many stars who made their names in the company. But none more so than Monty Brown! Agile, intense and exciting, Monty Brown (later Marcus Cor Von in WWE) had all the tools to be the face of the company. But for some reason, it never happened, and we missed out on one of (potentially) the greatest heavyweight wrestlers of the past 15 years.

Paul Burchill

In 2020, the British wrestling scene is a hive of activity with competitors appearing in all sorts of promotions. Back in the mid-2000s, it was a much tougher place. Paul Burchill was a man who came around at a time when the industry was not what it is today. He had a great gimmick, fun charisma and tons of potential, but again, the ball was dropped on him, and we missed out on another possible heavyweight superstar.

Steve Romero

While not technically a wrestler, Steve Romero was one of the most underutilized play-by-play announcers in WWE history. Commentating Velocity and occasional SmackDown shows in 2005-2007, Romero could have been the voice of WWE. Instead, that torch was given to Michael Cole and Romero returned to his sportscasting routes.

Blitzkrieg

Today there are so many wrestlers who owe a ton of gratitude to Blitzkrieg. Only wrestling for a short time in WCW, he was an independent ace before signing the big money contract with Ted Turner. Sadly, this led to Blitzkrieg’s eventual dissatisfaction with wrestling, and with it, we all missed out on one of the greatest high-flying stars of all-time.

Matthew Smith’s Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

Shelton Benjamin

After splitting from the World’s Greatest Tag Team and moving to Raw, Benjamin was on fire, going toe to toe with greats like Shawn Michaels and Triple H. Sadly, WWE never pulled the trigger on him, especially with his somewhat recent return to SmackDown. He was given very little to work with and was an afterthought within weeks.

Matt Hardy

WWE missed the mark on arguably the most creative man in wrestling, treating the V1 gimmick as a complete joke, airing his real-life dirty laundry (with the help of Matt himself) and then making him to job to Edge – the friend who stole his girlfriend in the first place! After leaving WWE, Broken Matt took the world by storm with catchphrases, amusing side characters and endless deletions. It’s a shame that when he returned in 2017, WWE once again didn’t share his vision.

Rusev

Coming from NXT with an unbeaten streak that was one of the hottest things going, Rusev was positioned to take over WWE. He quickly captured the U.S. Title as he and Lana were getting the strongest reactions of the night, until he ran into John Cena. The first loss at Mania I had no problem with – Rusev still looked strong and rode in on a freaking tank. It’s the next three losses on PPV to Cena that crushed the mighty Rusev and seemly left him for dead. Aiden English breathed life back into him with Rusev Day, but WWE higher ups were seemingly angry he got over by himself and we never saw a big payoff. Although he’s been involved in arguably the biggest storyline in the company right now with Lashley and Lana, he deserves better. He’s a megastar waiting to happen.

Finn Balor

He’s one of the longest-reigning NXT Champions, but past that, what do we have? The first Universal Champion for about 15 hours, two very forgettable Intercontinental Title reigns and an ass kicking by The Fiend. This is the man that started Bullet Club, a faction that still thrives today. His Demon King alter ego, did we just kill that? Finn could have easily turned heel on AJ Styles with the help of the Good Brothers, stating that this is his club and he is sick of everyone profiting off of his creation. We got AJ vs. Finn on a last minute add to a PPV once and it stole the show, so a storyline like that between Styles and Balor has a lot of mileage and could easily main event a WrestleMania.

Cesaro

The guy speaks like seven languages, is a mad man in the ring and gets the crowd behind him in everything that he does. Yet, Cesaro can’t even seem to get a midcard title shot and always plays second fiddle.

John Corrigan’s Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

Monty Brown

Monty Brown should have been Impact Wrestling’s biggest homegrown star. He got screwed in TNA by not only losing his title shot against Jeff Jarrett, but then joining forces with him in a mind-boggling heel turn just two months later.

Jazz

Did you know that Jazz’ WWE run lasted only three years? Hamstrung by injuries for a big portion of that time, Vince McMahon must have seen money in her because when she was healthy, she was always near the Women’s Championship. Her release made no sense, and when she was brought back but barely used in the ECW relaunch, that made even less sense! How come WWE didn’t keep her? How come Impact never brought her in for the inaugural women’s revolution? She was a credible badass when the industry needed that most in women’s wrestling.

Sean O’Haire

I don’t subscribe to Bruce Prichard’s “Then the bell rang” theory when it comes to Sean O’Haire. He could go in the ring – he was tall, jacked and agile, and his swanton bomb was breathtaking. He could also talk on the mic and had a banger entrance theme. His “devil’s advocate” gimmick was one of the highlights of SmackDown in 2003, but I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know.

Ken Shamrock

The World’s Most Dangerous Man should have faced Stone Cold for the WWE Championship at some point. We didn’t need yet another Undertaker-Austin match; we needed Ken Shamrock locking the Texas Rattlesnake in the Ankle Lock as blood dripped down his face a la WrestleMania 13. At least TNA saw Shamrock’s value, crowning him its inaugural champion.

Lance Storm

Perhaps he came to WWE 20 years too late. With his lack of charisma, unidentifiable character and superior wrestling ability, he’d be a perfect fit on Raw or SmackDown these days. Even in the wake of the Attitude Era, Lance Storm got a raw deal by being portrayed as boring, when he could tear it up with anyone in the ring.

Juan Bautista’s Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

Bobby Lashley

Lashley’s tale is quite interesting. He has been through the biggest wrestling company in the world twice, but his most celebrated run came for Impact, which has always been labeled as minor league. His first run with WWE was kind of snake bitten. He was pushed in the ill-fated ECW relaunch. When he got drafted to Raw, he fell victim to Super Cena. Lashley’s incredible run in Impact came 10 years too late to get critical acclaim, but the return to WWE created excitement. The idea of Lashley vs. Brock Lesnar was intriguing. Instead, we got Lashley’s sisters, a forgettable Intercontinental Championship run and whatever the hell is happening with Lana.

Bret Hart

Coming out of the Montreal Screwjob, Bret Hart was the hottest wrestler in the world. Everybody wanted to see what he would say or do next. However, WCW dropped the ball by quickly treating him like just another guy on an already bloated roster. To be fair, Hart’s heart wasn’t in it anymore, too.

Alberto Del Rio

After a controversial exit from WWE, Alberto Del Rio surprised the wrestling world by returning at Hell in a Cell 2015 to answer John Cena’s U.S. Title Open Challenge. Another surprise came when he defeated Cena. Heading to the Royal Rumble, Del Rio should’ve been booked as the heel he once was, but WWE decided to make it political. Zeb Colter was his manager and the U.S. flag was split down the middle with the Mexico flag. This slowly faded away and transitioned into the League of Nations with Sheamus, Wade Barret and Rusev. While the idea seemed good, the execution was awful.

Bully Ray

An accomplished tag team wrestler, we only got a small taste of what a singles run could look like for Bubba Ray Dudley. He was great as the leader of Aces & Eights and even got a run with the World Title. Imagine if he got a similar run in ECW.

Jack Goodwillie’s Wrestlers Who Should Have Been Bigger Stars

Matt Hardy

I’ll preface by saying I wrote a series of columns for the now spam-infested and violated Wrestledelphia called “Missed 3:16 Moments” where I went in depth on underappreciated superstars and the angles that could have defined them, but just fell short. Matt Hardy has taken a backseat to his brother Jeff for most of his life as a singles star, but Matt’s talent and creativity are undeniable. Still, the biggest missed opportunity came when after weeks of him interrupting Raw in a series of worked shoot angles (that came across as very real), WWE reinstated him in anticlimactic fashion, then left fans feeling unsatisfied after his match with Edge at SummerSlam met a quick end when Matt bled excessively. Overall, the whole situation with Matt-Edge-Lita was a rushed mess and unfortunately, his biggest shot at superstardom.

Shelton Benjamin

Shelton Benjamin’s name gets thrown around with the likes of Brock Lesnar, John Cena, Batista and Randy Orton as far as OVW standouts go, yet he never sniffed the level of stardom those four guys did. How come? Shelton was not a fantastic talker and struggled to stand on his own in talking segments. But in the ring, Benjamin had no equals from an athletic standpoint. The fans were clearly behind him – he held the Intercontinental Championship for nearly a year. At some point, WWE moved off the athletic portrayal of Benjamin and tried to make him a WWE heel by bringing in his “momma.” An entertaining act, but not one that’s going to yield a push to the moon. Had WWE just focused on Benjamin’s athleticism and copied ECW’s booking of Rob Van Dam in 1997, he could have gotten over huge and later helped carry the load once the Ric Flairs and Shawn Michaels of the world rode off into the sunset.

Gino Hernandez

Death obviously put a stopper on Gino Hernandez’ rise up the ranks in pro wrestling, but he was a young Ric Flair for the state of Texas and may have even had more versatility than Ric as a character. As the rumored illegitimate child of Houston owner Paul Bosch and the main antagonist to the Von Erich family in WCCW, Hernandez will always be one of wrestling’s big what-ifs because it’s hard to say what he would have become had he lived. With separate addictions to cocaine and gambling, Hernandez could have flamed out of wrestling just as easily as he could have gone on to be a feature player on WCW Nitro towards the tail end of his career. Or maybe Vince McMahon would have made him his Million Dollar Man. See how fun this is?

Dolph Ziggler

Like with Matt Hardy, there’s a ton of missed opportunities with Dolph Ziggler. The one I always go back to is the performance he had at Survivor Series 2014. The nature of the Team Cena vs. Team Authority match meant Ziggler had to sell for the Authority for nearly half the match, and he showed the resiliency and in-ring charisma of a front of the line superstar. His presence in pop culture and on social media makes it all the more puzzling WWE never went with him. Sure, Sting’s arrival was the big story coming out of that match, but it doesn’t change the fact that Ziggler scored the pin! But when Mr. McMahon added the stipulation that only John Cena could “bring The Authority back to power,” I should’ve smelled the rat.

Christian

For a guy initially viewed as the ancillary piece in his tag team, Christian sure had a great career, but when you look back, he could have meant so much more to WWE. It seemed like he had begun to heat up after coming back from injury at the end of 2004 and by that summer, he was challenging John Cena for the WWE Championship and factoring into the SmackDown main event. However, his contract expired that fall, and I can remember the headline clear as day on WWE.com: “CHRISTIAN QUITS.” You come to find with age that it was never really that simple, but while he did have a good run in TNA and prove he can front a company, Christian eventually returned to WWE and had all the momentum in the world coming off the Edge retirement angle. But it didn’t matter. He eventually lost out to Randy Orton on SmackDown and was subsequently turned heel despite the fans not wanting to see him as one, and that was about the end of Christian as a top guy. Could you imagine if he and Cena had been given the proper time? Remember that segment they shared at Royal Rumble 2005?

Honorable Mentions

-I deleted a long entry on Sheamus so I could write about Gino, but talk about a guy looking the part while being sufficient in all other aspects (albeit a little stiff)…Speaking of stiff, Rob Van Dam gets credit for his innovation, but had more room to grow as a star and was his own worst enemy at times…It was always crazy to me how WWE didn’t parlay the Montreal Screwjob into making Owen Hart a breakout, vengeance seeking main eventer…Billy Gunn had it all, including a Full House-esque entrance theme. As Bruce Prichard likes to say, “then the bell rang”…WWE completely bungled the Steve Austin-hosted Tough Enough season. AJ Kirsch should have won, and had he done so could have found his way to the main roster very quickly due to his promo ability…As great as Ricochet is, Jerrelle Clark popularized, if not innovated the 630 Senton…Alex Shelley never took off the way I thought he could or would…Sami Zayn is still one of the big WTF’s in the current product for myself personally, whether he or management is to blame we’ll never know…Keep an eye on Luke Harper in the coming months.