10 Stretches Of Punishments WWE Stars Had To Endure To Be Forgiven
1. The Ultimate Warrior
Crime: Several fall-outs with Vince McMahon.
Time Served: 17 years.
There's no such thing as a permanent WWE blacklisting, and the Ultimate Warrior's story proves it.
The serial bridge-burner got himself fired for the first time in 1992, having opted to no-show a bunch of house show dates after the company clamped down on his admitted steroid use, forcing the former World Champion into a period of semi-retirement that lasted four years. He'd re-emerge in 1996, hilariously squashing Hunter Hearst Helmsley at WrestleMania XII, but was out of the company again months later, with McMahon understandably taking issue with his latest self-issued sabbatical.
Warrior became WWE's biggest persona non grata. He took the company to court over ownership of his character in 1996 and 1998, costing McMahon thousands of dollars in legal fees. On top of this, he'd routinely rip into the promotion's practices at any given opportunity, and became a proto alt-right talking head, regularly spewing vile, bigoted rhetoric across a variety of platforms.
Yet WWE still took him back for a 2014 Hall of Fame induction, whitewashing his problematic past in the process. That they continue to celebrate him as a noble hero in 2018 further proves the company's own tone deafness.