10 Worst Babyface Backlashes Of All Time
The wrong place, the wrong time, or just wrong wrong wrong...
In the last two years, almost all of the WWE's attention has been focused on one thing: getting Roman Reigns over, cementing his position as the company's top babyface, and finally putting the WWE World Heavyweight Championship on him.
Of course, anyone who's been paying attention knows that it's been an uphill struggle for a large proportion of that time. However, it's not the first time that a pro wrestling character has been positioned as a babyface hero only to be rejected by the audience - in point of fact, it's not even the worst.
There are many reasons why an audience might react poorly to the good guy. Sometimes it's the right guy in the right place, but at the wrong time, sometimes the right guy in the wrong place entirely and, let's face it, sometimes it's just not the right guy at all.
Then it gets more complicated.
The media (and social media) changes the way people are perceived. Gossip about backstage politics plays just as big a role as in-ring accomplishments for many in determining whether someone gets over. Crowds often react to what they've seen on television, not what's right in front of them.
To look at a few of the reasons why this kind of reaction tends to occur, I've compiled a list of some of the worst babyface backlashes that pro wrestling has ever seen.
It's not a pretty picture...
10. Goats Are Animals Too
In fairness to Big Dave, the terrible reception his huge babyface return received in early 2014 was absolutely not his fault.
He'd tried to warn the company that he was a lousy fan favourite, noting how he'd left the company four years earlier on the heels of possibly his greatest ever run, as a conceited, blinged-up villain.
However, WWE's booking whiteboard states in permanent marker at the top that a returning star will always receive a hero's welcome, and as a consequence the default alignment for pretty much every major return ever has been babyface.
Batista was no exception: more than that, however, the company were determined to capitalise on the release of Guardians Of The Galaxy in the summer by hiring one of its stars in to win the Royal Rumble and then take the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania XXX.
You can see their reasoning: imagine Batista doing press for the film with the championship belt on the table in front of him in every shot? You can't buy that kind of publicity and it must have seemed like a no-brainer at the time.
The crowd popped for Batista's return on the January 20th RAW, but not as big as expected. The WWE audience was still buzzing from Daniel Bryan's underdog run at the title in the latter part of 2013, and hadn't been deterred by his sidelining into a feud with the Wyatt Family. They knew who they wanted in the driver's seat on the road to WrestleMania.
A week later, when Bryan failed to materialise in the Royal Rumble at all, they were livid, and made sure that everyone knew it. Upon eliminating Roman Reigns to win the match, Batista was booed out of the building.
Despite Batista being programmed to convincingly beat heel Alberto Del Rio on the lead-up to WrestleMania, the boos continued: Elimination Chamber on February 23rd saw Batista get the heel reactions in their blow-off match, not Del Rio.
WWE finally capitulated and Batista turned heel on the following week's Smackdown.
Ten days later, the wheels were put in motion to add Daniel Bryan to the championship match at WrestleMania with Batista and champion Randy Orton, a match Bryan would win when he tapped out the newly heeled Batista in the main event.
WWE knew that the first WrestleMania after the launch of the WWE Network needed to be big, and needed to be a crowd pleaser. In the early part of 2014, Batista just wasn't that guy. Not when Daniel Bryan was waiting in the wings.