10 Wrestling Heels Who Generated The Most Heat
6. Roddy Piper
Roddy Piper was such an effective heel that CM Punk took one look at him and wanted to be him. Virtually everybody else took one look at him and wanted a super-muscled proxy to smash his face in.
Piper sprinted across the spectrum of every effective heel trope without once losing his singular identity. He was the sort of motor-mouth you hated because you had no chance of keeping up with him, let alone matching his wit. He was quietly - and loudly - intense, channelling his skid row upbringing. He did impressions of his babyface opponents, but they felt more like psychological tactics than boy-poppers. He laughed to himself that little bit too long which, in addition to the moments of hair-pulling derangement, added a sense of danger ready to combust with no forewarning.
There was a nasal, warbling quality to his voice that was just inherently detestable, too, and that was just the promos. Piper, and this is involuntarily p*ss-funny heel craic (though not to the San Francisco fans that were compelled to riot), promised to play the Mexican national anthem before baiting and switching them with La Cucaracha.
To those lured into pro wrestling's bosom by Vince McMahon, Piper was the first heel they hated, and to many, he remains the heel they hated the most.