7 WWE Stars Who Can Never Be Babyface Again

6. Shinsuke Nakamura

Shinsuke Nakamura Cesaro Sami Zayn
WWE.com

Wrestling fans who lived through it should shudder when thinking back to Shinsuke Nakamura's 2017 babyface run. Despite being an excellent in-ring talent who could (and still can) work with all shapes and sizes, Shinsuke's lack of promo skills let him down badly.

Like it or not, fans just couldn't relate to his broken English and laid back personality outside the ropes.

Since turning heel in 2018, Nakamura has settled into WWE life a bit better. He comes across as artistic and aloof rather than personable and relatable, and that suits his heelish persona. If WWE don't realise that things improved after he ball-shotted AJ Styles and hooked up with Sami Zayn later, then God help them. Nobody needs a rerun of that feud with Jinder Mahal.

It was awful stuff, and didn't help Naka ingratiate himself to the fans one bit. He's much better of playing heel until he inevitably leaves the company and returns to Japan for one last blast around the New Japan horn.

Advertisement
In this post: 
Randy Orton
 
First Posted On: 
Contributor

Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.