10 Wrestlers Who Achieved The Impossible

10. JBL: Midcard Lifer Turned WWE Champion

JFL was probably the more suitable acronym; as a burly beast of man who took to WWE's...idiosyncratic backstage culture with a fervent zeal, the former Bradshaw seemed destined to hold a Job For Life as both onscreen midcard fixture and offscreen toady/enforcer.

A colourless brawler prior to the Attitude Era, he used his curt wit and imposing presence to carve out a colourful career as part of the Acolytes Protection Agency. While a fun act - "I'd offer you a beer, but I only got six" - he barely excelled in-ring, even in a division literally propped up by weaponry and shortcuts. Bradshaw wrestled precisely zero memorable and or good matches in an eight-year undercard career. When an act spends that long in the middle, with no fanbase willing him to reach further heights, that act stays in the middle. The midcard was Bradshaw's ceiling.

Or so it seemed.

With the thin SmackDown roster plagued by injuries and personal strife in 2004, the renamed JBL arrived from out of nowhere with the suddenness and impact of an RKO. His push was pure smoke and mirrors stuff.

He got over in the role, somehow; substituting real charisma with a deafening and loathsome belligerence, his racist blood-letter bit just worked, and for an improbable few years, JBL brought a disturbing and entertaining brand of shortcut-laden violence to the main event scene.