10 Times WWE Tried (And Failed) To Make You Cheer For Former Heels
1. Lex Luger
SummerSlam 1993 is a show well worth firing up on the WWE Network if only for the moment Doink (and through him, Vince McMahon) banter off Bruce Hart by chucking a full bucket of water over his khaki suit. But after you've stuck around for yet another 'Excellence Of Execution' against a Clown and a King, skim to the end of Lex Luger's match with Yokozuna to watch a gloriously cheesy video package in which he fails to portray either.
A sub-Michael Bolton type wails that Luger will "be your hero" despite endless footage to the contrary. He couldn't look more ill-at-ease with a general public he was trying to galvanise in the wake of Hulk Hogan's exit, nor less interested in relentless waving (and wearing) the American flag.
Vince McMahon's investment in his grand bus tour after his July 4th slamming of WWE Champion Yokozuna was infamously one of his biggest ever overspends, especially when he foolishly thought the minimal momentum would carry all the way through to the following March's WrestleMania.
It was Bret Hart McMahon neglected that summer, and Bret Hart he turned to when WrestleMania actually came around. The Lex Express had stalled in 1993. By 1994, it was completely out of gas.