10 Weird Periods WWE Icons Would Like You To Forget
7. Triple H (1996)
Fans with longer memories will remember the early days of Hunter Hearst Helmsley's WWE career. They will remember the Hog Pen match against Henry Godwinn, a surprisingly fun brawl that ended with the Connecticut Blueblood flailing around in what may or may not have been pig sh*t. Heck, they might even remember the name of his very first WWE victim (Buck Zumhofe, for the record).
Those same fans will remember the limbo that Helmsley found himself in for the first two-thirds of 1996. He feuded with Duke 'The Dumpster' Droese, although the use of the word 'feud' there is somewhat liberal. He was squashed by The Ultimate Warrior at WrestleMania XII, and it looked for all the world as though WWE had gained itself another largely irrelevant heel for the bottom portion of the card.
It wasn't until October that things began to turn round when Helmsley defeated long-time rival Marc Mero for the Intercontinental Championship. The previous 10 months had been an exercise in pointlessness, long months where Helmsley did little more than lose to fellow midcarders, guys like The Stalker, Freddie Joe Floyd, Savio Vega and the aforementioned Mero.