10 Wrestlers Who Never Recovered From Their WWE Release
2. Virgil
Virgil’s post-WWE plight has become so meme-worthy that it now overshadows his actual wrestling career. Best known as the “Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase’s personal assistant, Virgil found his niche with WWE through the 80s and 90s, and looked set for a big babyface push in 1991. Years of built-up frustration and humiliation saw him turn on DiBiase at the Royal Rumble, but after a year-long feud with his former benefactor, Virgil’s WWE career started to slowly fade away.
He was released by WWE in 1994, and that was the beginning of the end for Virgil. Though he worked for WCW from 1996 to 2000, he was used first as the nWo’s human shield, before becoming a member of the West Texas Rednecks as “Curly Bill.” Virgil was released after four years of near-constant jobbing, but his WCW tenure wasn’t even his lowest ebb.
Virgil has become something of a hard-luck story in recent years. “Lonely Virgil” is a running joke among internet savvy wrestling fans, and the self-proclaimed “wrestling superstar” is often photographed trying to sell autographs and photos at lonely wrestling conventions (and NYC subways, bizarrely). His plight has been immortalised at LonelyVirgil.net, and while there’s a strong chance he plays the situation up as a gimmick following its surprising surge in popularity, the images of him trying to sell scribbles to an empty room are half hilarious, half depressing.