10 Terrible WWE Storylines One Tweak Away From Excellence

6. Who Ran Over Stone Cold Steve Austin? (2000)

Randy Orton
WWE.com

Year 2000 WWE was an awful lot of fun until Stone Cold Steve Austin came back and attacked everybody where they stood in a "strike first/ask questions later" approach to finding out who hit him with a car year earlier.

The plot made enough sense in kayfabe of course - 'The Rattlesnake' would Stun folk for knocking back the offer of a beer let alone knocking him over in a parking lot, but just about everybody got to look at the lights for his celebrated finisher over a period of several weeks whittling away at the potential suspects.

He trampled on a lot of good stuff, basically, but WWE was doing it for the benefit of maximising the reveal. Sadly, the reveal had only done it for The Rock.

One Tweak: It just can't be Rikishi.

It just can't be.

Ignoring the needless sacrifice of a very, very over midcard babyface for an incredibly short-term story, it was clearly never the payoff Steve Austin wanted. Whether he had The Rock or Triple H or even Billy Gunn in mind as the dangerous driver, the former Headshrinker was not a man Stone Cold seemed thrilled to give much to in their generously-labelled blowoff. The story was almost salvaged by Triple H taking retconned responsibility, but much of the damage had already been done.

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Michael is a writer, editor, podcaster and presenter for WhatCulture Wrestling, and has been with the organisation over 8 years. He primarily produces written, audio and video content on WWE and AEW, but also provides knowledge and insights on all aspects of the wrestling industry thanks to a passion for it dating back over 35 years. As one third of "The Dadley Boyz" Michael has contributed to the huge rise in popularity of the WhatCulture Wrestling Podcast and its accompanying YouTube channel, earning it top spot in the UK's wrestling podcast charts with well over 62,000,000 total downloads. Within the podcasting space, he also co-hosts Benno & Hamflett, In Your House! and Podcast Horseman: The BoJack Horseman Podcast. He has been featured as a wrestling analyst for the Tampa Bay Times, Fightful, POST Wrestling, GRAPPL, GCP, Poisonrana and Sports Guys Talking Wrestling, and has covered milestone events in New York, Dallas, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, London and Cardiff. Michael's background in media stretches beyond wrestling coverage, with a degree in Journalism from the University Of Sunderland (2:1) and a series of published articles in sports, music and culture magazines The Crack, A Love Supreme and Pilot. When not offering his voice up for daily wrestling podcasts, he can be found losing it singing far too loud watching his favourite bands play live. Follow him on X/Twitter - @MichaelHamflett