10 Excellent Reasons Why Bret "Hitman" Hart Is The Greatest Wrestler Of All-Time

As well as being incredibly loyal, a remarkable trait for which Bret was ultimately punished in egregious manners by Vince McMahon from November '96 through November '97, The Hitman was also incredibly professional.

For those that may cite the Montreal Screwjob as an argument against Bret's professionalism, all that needs to be said is that Bret gave Vince multiple options in ways he could drop the strap in the ring prior to (and after) Montreal but Vince declined all of them. The "reasonable creative control" legalese that stated Bret didn't have to do anything he didn't want in his final 30 days also negates any shots towards Bret's integrity.

Throughout his career, Bret put over numerous talents, many times when he didn't need to or could've gotten out of (like many of his peers had done).

Bret's professionalism and selflessness was never on display more than during his program with Stone Cold Steve Austin. Bret helped turn Austin into a pop culture megastar. Without Bret Hart, the Steve Austin we know today may be entirely different.

What Bret did with Steve, he had actually wanted to do with Shawn Michaels a year earlier. Bret wanted to create a multi-year long program with Michaels that would ultimately see The Hitman put over The Heartbreak Kid as the new face of the company after a series of main event championship matches. The major difference was that Austin trusted Bret whereas Shawn did not.

We all know how things turned out with Shawn, but with Steve, Bret elevated him in a way like no other wrestler could (and probably wouldn't even if they could).