10 WCW Stars Who Died Too Young
3. Emory Hale (1969 - 2006)
Arriving with manager Jimmy Hart in 2000, great things were planned for Emory Hale in WCW. Today, he doesn't even have a Wikipedia page.
Receiving something of a mini-push on WCW's B-show Thunder, a graphic would flash on the arena screens indicating a 'Hale Warning' when the impressive 6'6" rookie steamrolled through an opponent.
Jimmy Hart's association with Hulk Hogan placed Hale in a very promising position backstage, and even when Hogan left WCW for good, 'the Hulkster' kept Hale on his personal payroll so he could work with him in his own promotion.
Hogan's departure halted Hale's WCW push, and instead his defining moment was an embarrassing error in a match against DDP. Now wrestling under a mask as 'the Machine', the novice Hale botched a spot where he was supposed to fall crotch-first onto a turnbuckle after the opposite post was hit by Page. Struggling to remember the match layout, Hale instead remained perched atop the post, before realisation dawned and he completed the sequence. It obviously looked ridiculous.
Hale left WCW when the Atlanta promotion folded, but Hogan's grand plans never came to fruition, and the huge former Machine vanished from the wrestling industry entirely. After retiring from the ring, Hale began to suffer from severe health problems, first requiring a kidney transplant in 2003, and later contracting pneumonia whilst hospitalised.
Hale passed away in 2006 of suspected kidney failure, though even today details of his death remain sparse.