10 "Buried" Wrestlers Who Weren't Actually Buried

Okay, okay, down in the back. This one might take a little more explanation than others. What was a promising new stable found itself erased in the blink of an eye, or at least however long it took John Cena to kick out of a ringside DDT before pinning both Justin Gabriel and Wade Barrett. The Nexus was never the same after that debacle.

Lambasting this booking decision is largely accepted as the proper conduct when discussing it but there are far more layers to this than originally meets the eye. For one, this wasn't simply a case of seven new stars getting derailed at a frustratingly early point in their career. The members of the Nexus had spent the previous few months being depicted as actual rookies, novices in the choppy waters of WWE. What made anyone think that they were going to be able to overcome seven legends (well, six and a post-Nexus Daniel Bryan) in a legitimate match, when their only successes to that point had come from seven-on-one ambush attacks? That is often forgotten when discussing the Nexus.

These were seven rookies looking to make their mark, and make their mark they did. It is easy to look back and say that SummerSlam 2010 was the end for the group, but that plainly isn't true. Wade Barrett, at this point arguably the only credible member of the group at the time, continued his upward momentum. Does anyone believe that Michael Tarver would have gone on to superstardom were it not for this match?

The kicking-out of the DDT will always rankle but this wasn't the burial it is often painted as. This was a group of brash young things coming up short against the number one guy in the industry at the time.