20 Most Underrated WWE Stars Of The Past 20 Years
4. Sean O'Haire
When wrestling fans get all liquored up and talk smack to each other about the biggest wasted opportunities in WWE’s history, there are a few that come up again and again. Riding high at the top of so many lists is the late Sean O’Haire, who died tragically in 2014 at only 43 years old.
Born Sean Christopher Haire, the 6 foot 6 inch powerhouse debuted in WCW in 2000, snagging the WCW tag titles with Mark Jindrak only three months later. O’Haire was green and cocky, usually a terrible combination - but he could go. He was a serious contender: big, incredibly strong, with a fantastic look and, astonishingly, the ability to flawlessly perform moves traditionally reserved for high flyers, like the senton bomb and the standing moonsault.
The Wrestling Observer’s Rookie Of The Year in 2000, he joined the WWE when WCW petered out, but never quite found a storytelling niche in which to make his mark with the fans. However, O’Haire excelled when given a set of vignettes promoting his Devil’s Advocate gimmick in 2003, his already slightly satanic looks amplified by the charismatic, Mephistophelean character.
And then the whole thing fizzled out, in what would become WWE’s trademark stop-start booking pattern over the next decade and a half. He’d be paired with ‘Rowdy’ Roddy Piper for a while, even facing off against Hulk Hogan and racking up a decent winning streak... but Piper was ejected from WWE over controversial comments he made about drugs in wrestling. O’Haire was the enforcer, the junior partner in the Hogan angle: no Piper, no ‘O’Haire.
When creative had nothing for him again, he parted ways with the company, working in Japan for a while before leaving wrestling in 2005 to embark upon a less-than-stellar MMA career.
In interviews, O’Haire used to call himself a small man in a big man’s body. That’s an accurate description: the man could leap to the top turnbuckle in one bound like a Rob Van Dam or Shelton Benjamin, flipping backwards over his charging opponent. That’s rare for someone of his size.
Sean O’Haire was a gifted athlete with perfect timing, a larger-than-life guy with a killer look and some serious chops in the ring. Had WWE decided what to do with him in 2003, there’s no question he was main event material: he certainly had more going for him than Dave Batista or John Cena at that time. What a waste.