10 Major Career-Making Wrestling Matches
9. BRET HART Vs. Tom Magee - WWF Wrestling Challenge #7 (Dark Match)
Just before Vince McMahon swerve-turned on Bret Hart on the 4 January 2010 RAW, he spoke of the raw potential the 'Hitman' showed back in his Hart Foundation days. Vince made specific reference to his performance during WrestleMania II's Battle Royal.
He must have been implicitly referring to the ultra-rare, sadly lost-to-time carry-job of Tom Magee that same year, but couldn't bring himself to explicitly admit this on national television - for Bret Hart, in a performance of legendary apocrypha, apparently made the softest pro wrestler in history look like the next Hulk Hogan. McMahon was worked by Hart, because, even on the scant evidence of the GIF above, Magee was hysterically bad - so bad that making him look limited is considered the secret high point of Hart's early career.
When Shane McMahon misses a worked punch, he looks like he's trying, bless him, at least. Magee threw chops with the skill and intensity of Mac from It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia. You can't even use the play-fighting toddlers analogy because toddlers are unable to manage their own not inconsiderable strength, and because kids playing wrestlers have at least watched the wrestling they are inspired to imitate. Magee wrestles like the cracked mirror image doppelgänger of Ken Shamrock at Cold Day In Hell. Equally clueless, but as soft as Ken was stiff.
Hart allegedly sold these chops - credibly! - as if they were shotgun blasts, thus eventually convincing Vince of an in-ring genius he could rely on during the darkest hours.