10 Wrestlers That Bled The Hard Way
Cutting Remarks.
There was something tragically poetic about Bill Goldberg's blood spilling out all over the canvas during the catastrophic conclusion to his Super ShowDown 2019 match with The Undertaker, not least because the sweat p*ssing from his chrome dome in that three-figure temperature almost definitely made it look worse.
Life was literally draining from Goldberg's head just as it emptied from the hearts of the remaining Undertaker fans, suffering through another example of 'The Deadman's inability to find something from his past prime to be repurposed for the present. Like much about the contest's closing moments, it wasn't meant to happen - but blood never is now.
The recency bias of this particular list is unintentional, but it speaks to how powerful the sight of a spot of claret has become in an era that's attempted to do away with it. Red used to equal green in wrestling, but like many of the industry's old traditions, WWE have done away with the blade to appease their sponsors.
But views on it remain mixed elsewhere. Ahead of his match with brother Dustin Rhodes at AEW's first ever pay-per-view Double Or Nothing, Cody spoke of wanting to do away with The Attitude Era philosophies, then had his sibling p*ss the platelets as they all used to in the heat of a Monday Night Wars.
AEW didn't become a "blood and guts" promotion off the back of that blade job, and so far they haven't promoted half as much hard way, either....
10. Roman Reigns (WWE WrestleMania 34)
It feels right to get this (and the next) entry out of the way first if only to speak to WWE's bizarre thirst for this particular device in the absence of the blade that had seemed relatively safe in the past.
Barbaric as it may sound to those outside the industry, the cutting of the forehead was the closest thing to working a wound as possible without causing significant injury. Some would and could go deeper into the skull, figuratively and literally going too far for the good of the game, but it fundamentally felt safer than having somebody forcing the point of their elbow into somebody's skull.
Lesnar's been given this duty several times after successfully carving open John Cena during his stirring return match at Extreme Rules 2012, but his match-ending assault on Roman Reigns at WrestleMania 34 was legitimately depressing.
Playing out to a bored crowd that seemed certain of a 'Big Dog' big win, the humming misery of the New Orleans locals wasn't exactly the awe WWE were shooting for - particularly when they planned to have Brock go over at the end. The idea had worked marginally better two years earlier...