10 Wrestlers WWE Wished They’d Debuted Differently

The September 1996 recruitment of Rick Bognar and Glenn Jacobs to replace the recently departed Scott Hall and Kevin Nash - presenting new versions of Razor Ramon and Diesel - was the product of Vince McMahon’s bruised ego. Razor and Diesel were WWF creations: as far as McMahon was concerned, he’d made stars of the men behind them, and could do it again.

The public did not take to the recasting, and that’s putting it mildly. It’s hard to imagine why McMahon ever thought they would. Journeyman wrestler Bognar’s career wasn’t impacted by the disastrous response to the rehashed gimmick, which died of natural causes a few months after it was introduced.

However, Diesel only was the latest failure for the enormous Jacobs: brought to the WWF's attention by Mark 'the Undertaker' Calaway when he went to work with him in Memphis as a favour, the company had been trying to make something of him for two years by that point, first as Unabomb in early 1995, then as mad dentist Isaac Yankem.

They finally hit the money in spring 1997, booking Jacobs into a slow, carefully protected build over six months into his eventual introduction as Kane, the Undertaker’s brother, playing the spoiler at the very first Hell In A Cell match.

Kane was a simple yet effective money gimmick, providing the WWF with a second giant supernatural fiend to play with. They’d had Jacobs on contract for two years and three failed gimmicks: imagine if they’d come up with the Kane character in early 1995 instead...