10 Wrestlers That Seriously Took The Piss
Or how to put smiles on (some) faces...
For those reading that don't have it in their vernacular or listen to Chris Jericho's podcast to hear the phrase used on the other side of the Atlantic, the informal British slang phrase "taking the piss" is, nutshelled, the act of mocking someone or something. Like most forms of humour it can be done with admiration, affection, unconscionable cruelty and everything in between. And, like everything else in wrestling, theres's something on just about every point of the spectrum for a collection like this.
Every different kind of human gravitates towards wrestling if they get the bug, as they do to wrestling rosters. Jocks and nerds share stories and showers, prodigious athletes mingle with special attraction body guys and systems of wealth and class are temporarily parked with the locker room acting as a great leveller. Those with great patter eventually unleash it, as do those with mean streaks or money-minded motivation to undercut all the rest.
There were those that took the piss out of the process because it was high banter, those that took the piss out of everything cynically just because they could, and those that took the piss out of their opponents in an art form wholly dependent on working collaboratively.
All variants are valid for a list like this, even if some of the behaviour itself absolutely wasn't...
10. Hulk Hogan
Hulk Hogan's vanity, well-earned profile and rampant nepotism did some not-inconsiderable damage to WWE as Vince McMahon got heart-eyed for 'The Hulkster' once again in 1993, but the wealth and power rapidly amassed by the industry's biggest stat one year later managed to take the p*ss (and rip the a*se) out of WCW's biggest pay-per-view.
On his Conrad Thompson podcast 83 Weeks, Eric Bischoff has revealed that he never held Starrcade as close to his heart as the World Championship Wrestling loyalists, and there’s no evidence for that more naked than 1994’s ‘Grandaddy Of ‘Em All’.
Bringing hitherto unseen attention to WCW (as well as a couple of mammoth buyrates) that year thanks to a dream programme with Ric Flair, Hogan was looking worth the value until he used his stroke to getting Brutus b*stard Beefcake in the main event with him. It was a piss take more potent than any of his “Power Of Hulkamania” sales patter.
Preparing to win the Royal Rumble as a workhorse right around the time Hogan was politicking his best mate into a main event, Shawn Michaels probably assumed he’d never have to deal with any of that specific brand of bullsh*t.
But when he did...