10 Shots WWE Fired At Wrestlers (That You Didn't Notice)
And that's a shoot, brother!
Vince McMahon's pettiness knows no bounds.
In 1996, at a low ebb in his relationships with both Hulk Hogan and Macho Man Randy Savage and becoming increasingly irritated by the surprising success of WCW Monday Nitro, the Chairman sacrificed his company's limited remaining credibility by running a series of pathetic skits parodying the pair as well as Ted Turner and selected other Atlanta executives.
Preserved in an innocent infamy in the modern era, the 'Billionaire Ted' vignettes were toxic on two sides at the time. It was a flagrant example that McMahon was taking his eye off his own work to turn his weapons on that of his opponent. WCW, meanwhile, were none too happy with some of the statements made and considered legal action for some needlessly specific takes on the Turner business practices.
It proved lose/lose when the WrestleMania XII pre-show payoff saw the various ancient characters all die in the ring, as if that same thing wasn't about to happen to the bulk of the WWE's actual full time roster in front of a silent Anaheim crowd. A lack of focus on the things that mattered proved themselves detrimental to the product at large. The lesson was, don't be so f*cking petty ever again, right?
Aye, right...
10. Razor's Edge
"Bad times don't last, but Bad Guys do" was the poetic and popworthy finale from Razor Ramon's hugely gratifying 2014 Hall Of Fame induction speech as Scott Hall finally pushed away the demons that had threatened not just to wreck his legacy but take his entire life for much of the prior two decades.
A permanent fixture in dark dead pool predictions for years, Hall looked for so long like his days were limited after publicly losing so many battles with the bottle. So much so that, by December 2007, trivialising it was merely the new normal.
Such was the case when rising WWE star Mr Kennedy took a thinly-veiled shot at the fallen icon when armed with a live Monday Night Raw microphone. Going through the motions in a passable segment designed to build heat for his feud with Shawn Michaels, Kennedy was interviewing local goobers dressed as iconic 'HBK' rivals. Having done his crap bit with a Ramon impersonator, he glibly thanked the guy just for showing up before moving on.
This was loaded. Sadly, so too was Hall, 24 hours earlier.
'The Bad Guy' had no-showed a TNA pay-per-view the night before, earning an in-ring blistering from an enraged Samoa Joe on the pay-per-view. It was, for a few hours at least, the talk of the industry. Punchdrunk on his own momentum, Kennedy punched down.