Over the years, WWE has shown an off and on again yet increasing tendency to disregard its sports entertainment product as less sport and more entertainment. To that end, for whatever reason, theyve similarly had a tendency to introduce Superstars whose apparent calling (at least where their gimmicks were concerned) seemed to lie in other sports. These two-sport Superstars would often either seem to treat the WWE as the other thing they decided to do, or believe that their original sport of choice made them more than capable of rising through the ranks and claiming championship gold, as well as the glory and fame that came with it. Some were indeed met with great success, while others almost seemed to exist purely for Vince McMahon to assert his claim to a superior athletic endeavor. Following are 11 such Superstars who played the field, so to speak. These arent the 11 best, nor the 11 worst; the range is small yet diverse enough to cover both, so were going to try to rank them from the most dreadful to the most dominant. Two things to note: Criteria for this list is that their gimmick needs to have been heavily informed by their other sport (just saying "oh, and they used to play ___ before coming to WWE" isn't enough), and were drawing the line at amateur/Greco-Roman/Olympic-style wrestling. There are enough guys who have made that leap to form their own list, so we dont need them hogging this one as well.
Former Nintendo Power writer, current Nintendo Force writer. Wrote the book on Mega Man (The Robot Master Field Guide). Was once fired by Vince McMahon. Dabbles in video games, comic books, toys, and fast food curiosities. Once had a new species of exotic bird named after him. It died.
You can find more of his writings, musings, and other such things on his websites at Nyteworks.net.
