10 "Little Guys" Who Should Have Been WWE Champion

Coming off a short-lived and incredibly underrated run alongside "Stunning" Steve Austin as one half of the Hollywood Blondes, Flyin' Brian Pillman was poised to break out as a singles competitor as the wilder, edgier component of the reformed Four Horseman.

But his "Loose Cannon" gimmick wasn't given much time to evolve, as Eric Bischoff didn't much appreciate his ultra-realistic worked shoots and let him go (Bischoff thought he was doing so as part of the work, but Pillman had conned him into giving him his release for free so he could negotiate elsewhere).

Pillman would join the WWE in 1996, which just so happened to be the year that Pillman's former tag partner exploded thanks to a major personality overhaul. With a natural feud already in place between him and Stone Cold, Pillman seemed like a natural option to emerge as a future megastar.

Unfortunately, 1996 was also the year Pillman was involved in a terrible car accident which left him with a shattered ankle that had to be fused together.

He completely changed his wrestling style to a more grounded approach but, unlike Austin, who would undergo a similar change thanks to a botched piledriver from Owen Hart, this new style didn't seem to fit him quite as well and he was clearly struggling.

If it wasn't for the accident, and some personal demons that kept him from reaching his full potential, Brian Pillman should have spent 1997/98 feuding with Stone Cold and possibly taking The Rock's spot in the main event at WrestleMania XV.