10 Wrestlers Who Were Punished For Breaking Kayfabe

3/2. "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan & The Iron Sheik

Once upon a time, kayfabe was a very real thing - fans really believed that wrestlers hated each other and fought with the intent of winning, and that belief, it was felt, was what made wrestling a draw. When Vince McMahon took over ownership of WWE from his father in the early 1980s, he started classifying what he did as "entertainment," but an incident in 1987 made it clear that McMahon was still very much interested in protecting the business. Following a WWE event in May of that year, The Iron Sheik and "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan were pulled over by police officers in New Jersey for driving erratically. Duggan, it was determined, was under the influence of marijuana, while Sheik had been using cocaine. The two were arrested, and when the story broke, fans were absolutely shocked to see that the patriotic Duggan had been traveling with the USA-hating Sheik, Drugs were rampant in WWE in those days, but such an unforgivable breach of etiquette led to Duggan's temporary dismissal and Sheik's firing. Filmmaker Chris Bell of Bigger, Stronger, Faster fame cites the arrest as the moment he learned wrestling was scripted.