10 Wrestlers Who Sacrificed The Most To Become WWE Champion

3. Shawn Michaels

When Shawn Michaels left WWE after WrestleMania XIV in 1998, it was because of a severe back injury that required major surgery. Most people thought he would never wrestle again, even though he was only 32 years old at the time. Four years later, he felt good enough that he was able to come back and it looked like he didn't miss a beat. In his second match back at Survivor Series 2002, he won the first ever Elimination Chamber match to win the World Heavyweight Title. It was the last major World Title that he would win because over the next eight years he turned it down since he was only a part-timer. WWE would have probably put the WWE Title on him since he was a major player on the Raw brand for about eight years, but he felt it should go onto the younger guys that were doing the live events every weekend. He went from being the cocky upstart wrestler to being the noble veteran. There aren't many wrestlers that can say they took four years off from wrestling and then won a World Title in their second match back. It's not like his back surgery was something minor either. He really is some kind of medical miracle since he was able to wrestle for as long as he did, to such a high standard, after the operation.