10 Wrestlers Who Could Have Been Main Eventers With Better Gimmicks
3. Paul London
Daniel Bryan may be the most successful of Shawn Michaels's former pupils, but he's far from the only one who got a shot in WWE. Other standout graduates of his academy got a chance to wow fans years earlier, such as Brian Kendrick, Lance Cade, and Paul London.
Ultimately, none of those men became top stars, but in London's case, the most potential was wasted. London became a centerpiece of Smackdown's cruiserweight division in the early to mid-2000s, but given the lack of focus on the division itself, that didn't do much to raise him up the brand's hierarchy. He mostly competed on Velocity, even as Cruiserweight Champion.
After London lost the title, he was briefly turned heel and given a "whiner" gimmick. Eventually, though, he was back to being a babyface. Tagging with Kendrick, he held the WWE Tag Team Titles for 11 months, but it still seemed, for all his success, that he could have done much more.
Had WWE pushed London with a better persona - maybe treated him like a modern-day Michaels, making him a heroic babyface with a bit of a cocky edge - his size wouldn't have prevented him from reaching the top of the card.