8 WWE Busts Who Revived Their Careers
7. Rhea Ripley
It'd be all too easy to look at Rhea Ripley, years into her run as one of Monday Night Raw's top stars and even longer into a title-heavy WWE career, and assume that she was somebody that arrived at the very top and stayed there. The reality couldn't be more different, and erases stretches on both NXT and the main roster where it looked as though the company were blasting wide in front of an open goal.
'The Nightmare' badly struggled to regain momentum in NXT after losing the brand's belt to Charlotte Flair at WrestleMania 36, succumbing to benign comedy and creative during the black-and-gold brand's pandemic slump. A speed-run to WrestleMania 37 as a babyface title challenger got her reign off on the wrong foot, and even though matches with 'The Queen' were typically very good, the angles and promos often were anything but. A 2022 tag team with Liv Morgan looks better in hindsight because of all the stories to follow between the pair in the years hence, but it started life as makeshift and thrown together as just about everything else in the final days of the company before Vince McMahon resigned in disgrace.
Even a heel turn on Morgan to join Edge's Judgment Day wasn't the answer, because the stable itself was initially a doomed prospect too. In the aftermath of Ripley, Damian Priest and Finn Bálor booting 'The Rated-R Superstar' and recruiting Dominik Mysterio, everything finally clicked, and the years since have been good to everybody orbiting the outfit. Ripley maximised her minutes to quickly become the spiritual leader, parlaying that into a babyface turn that reduced her regular workload but massively upped her profile. Like all the real stars, she's working smarter as well as harder, not least because she spent longer in the doldrums than many would care to remember.
As did...