8 Best Excuses For Wrestlers Not Doing A Job

When you really think about, a wrestler refusing to let an opponent beat him is completely ridiculous.

It'd be like Heath Ledger throwing a strop about Christian Bale getting the better of him in The Dark Knight. It's just a movie, and you're just an actor. Being instructed to take a fake punch in the face shouldn't be interpreted as a personal affront.

But ego is a powerful thing, and perhaps those of us who consider this kind of attitude worthy of derision would be singing a different tune if we too spent our evenings jumping around the squared circle in arenas packed full of adoring spectators chanting our names.

Over the years, several of wrestling's biggest and most revered stars have (reportedly) refused to do a job. Sometimes, they're offended at the very notion that they should have to lose at all, while on other occasions it's the choice of opponent, in particular, that they're not so keen on.

Either way, they generally can't let their true, incredibly petty reasons for throwing their toys out of the pram slip. Instead, they have to come up with an at least vaguely credible excuse...

It's an open secret that Hulk Hogan and Bret Hart didn't really see eye to eye. The former was said to have been suspicious of anyone threatening his spot at the top of the card, while the latter has always come across as something of a wrestling snob.

This clash of personalities apparently peaked in 1993, when The Hulkster reportedly turned his nose up at the prospect of a mega face versus face clash with The Excellence of Execution at SummerSlam, claiming that he was too small for it to be believable as a contest.

Consequently, a new booking route was devised whereby Hogan would drop the belt to Yokozuna (a larger, albeit infinitely less skilled adversary) at King of the Ring, with Hart eventually getting his hands on it at WrestleMania X in March of the following year.

It's a good thing that Vince's former franchise player isn't wrestling today. If he objected to losing to Bret Hart on the grounds that he was a lightweight, then you can only imagine how he'd feel about laying down for someone like AJ Styles or Finn Bálor.