10 Most Disastrous Wrestling Debuts Ever
4. Phantasio
You can’t have a “worst debuts” list without Phantasio. Emerging at a time when WWE wrestlers couldn’t just be “wrestlers,” and had to have a goofy side occupation to supplement their character, Phantasio was a magician who just happened to wrestle.
Though Phantasio wasn’t necessarily any worse than some of the other gimmicks WWE had at the time (looking at you, Men on a Mission), Phantasio has them all trumped in terms of making a terrible first impression. Wrestling his first (and only) televised match against Tony Devito, Phantasio stunned his opponent by wedgieing his opponent’s boxer shorts off, then rolling him up with a schoolboy pin.
To compound the ridiculousness, Phantasio pulled away referee Earl Hebner’s boxer shorts after the match, and the crowd was left baffled. The finish was so ill thought-out and preposterous that Phantasio made just one more house show appearance before disappearing into the ether.
Most recently seen wrestling Simon Dean at a 2012 indy event, the wrestling magician is best left in the past.